Dell Criticizes Netbooks, Praises Windows 7
Dell founder and CEO Michael Dell must, even if only by outward appearances, love all of the products that his company makes, right?
Perhaps not, as Dell made comments that were quite disparaging towards the netbook.
"Take a user who's used to a 15-inch notebook and then give him a 10-inch netbook. He'll say 'Oh, this is so cool, it's so lightweight.' Then 36 hours later he'll say the screen's not big enough, give me my 15-inch back," said Dell, according to IDG.
Dell was relatively late to the netbook party by the time it introduced the Inspiron Mini 9, which has since been discontinued. The Mini 10 has since taken its place and has been a popular netbook.
Michael Dell later added that "a fair amount of customers" have been unsatisfied with the smaller screens and lower-performance parts.
The CEO later made more positive comments regarding the new version of Windows, promising that new software such as Windows 7 and Office 2010 will make users love their PCs again.
"If you get the latest processor technology and you get Windows 7 and Office 2010, you will love your PC again," Dell said. "And we actually have not been able to say that for a long time. It's a dramatic improvement."
He has a point and I think he is right on this one for at least most people.
He has a point and I think he is right on this one for at least most people.
Windows 7 is excellent, even without the "latest processor technology", though I don't find myself giddy in anticipation for Office 10.
Aside from that, I think netbooks are good as long as you have realistic expectations.
I dont think its windows 7 that is the problem. I am running windows 7 on a laptop 1.4 ghz gen 1 centrino platform and it runs like a champ. Much faster that xp loaded on the same machine (i dual boot).
Know what you want, get what you need.
That's awkward! My XP runs much faster on a Core2Duo 1,66GHz than Win7!
Not for me!
I love the size of the 9" netbooks, but only dislike the small resolution.
They could have increased the resolution on 10" netbooks to 1280x720 or similar, without causing too much eyestrain to the user.
In essence, what most people want is see all their information on one screen, preferably without scrolling.
A bump in screensize is not the solution if it does not go together with a bump in resolution as well.
Besides many of the netbooks' hardware is made for 720p video's; it would also make sense to match the screens as well!
So to me, the only disappointment is the resolution.
And like some users have mentioned, a netbook is not a notebook, and does not replace a notebook!
It's a lightweight, small, very affordable device to read documents, do some light browsing and document editing, and at best watch a 720pmovie with it.
It is not created to watch blueray video's, or play the latest games.
But even still, it performs better than a Wii. Why then are there so little comments about Nintendo's Wii (which is slower than a netbook)?
Yeah you have a different problem, I have windows 7 rc on both a aspire one netbook and two old centrino laptops, and it runs like a champ. Just as fast as xp. No areo though.
Atom / ARM based portable computer + Windows XP = Crappy Notebook.
Netbook has its purpose and as some people already said. Know what do you need and want. If you need netbook get netbook and use it as netbook.
If you need a notebook, please get a notebook. You can get Core2 Duo for all most the same price as netbook.
Mr. Dell, go and fire your marketing director for marketing netbooks as notebooks.
My dad personally has a Dell Mini 10v with Ubuntu, and it runs amazingly for only having an Atom processor and 1GB of memory. I would venture a guess it would not be as great with XP, let alone Vista. He loves it, not because it's everything a laptop is, but because it suits his needs, and he knew it would before he bought it. He uses it for emails on the go, and for keeping track of small things, and a little word processing, and simply having internet access wherever theres Wifi without the huge bulky case that comes with a 15" laptop.
Notebook = actually getting things (office work,etc)done.
Any one who's used a netbook to type a school/research report knows the pain of having a small KB and screen.