Re: [MLUG] new Dell "mini" powered by Ubuntu

[Jack Smith <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Fri, 2008-09-05 at 19:59 -0400, Jonathan King wrote:
> I'm guessing this is not very fast and it may have other issues, but
> this is the beginning of something likely very interesting.
> 
> http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/laptop-inspiron-9?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs
> 
> jking

I have an HTPC with a 900 MHz Coppermine Celeron and 256 MB RAM. It has
a standard install of Debian Lenny i386 on it and works decently as a
desktop as well. The 1.6 GHz Atom is somewhere around as fast as the
Celeron 900 in my machine, so the little netbooks ought to be very
usable, particularly since they have two to four times the RAM. About
the only issues I can foresee with the Dell netbook is that it will run
very hot since it is passively-cooled and that the small keyboard might
be a touch small for fatter-fingered buyers. I have little fingers so
the keyboard would be no big deal, but the 945GM chipset in the Atom
throws off serious heat. I have the same 945GM chipset in my laptop with
a 1.06 Core 2 Duo ULV and the northbridge is easily the hottest part on
board even though it shares the heatpipe and heatsink with the CPU.
Intel really did a good job in designing an efficient little CPU with
the Atom but yet they shackle it to a 2005-era chipset that is three
process nodes older (45 nm Atom, 130 nm 945GM.) It's cheap, but not very
efficient and not very bright of Dell to leave off the fan. 

--Jack


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