Digital Home Thoughts: Inspiron Mini 12 Targets the Macbook Air

"The Inspiron Mini 12 isn’t set to please everyone. Some will slam its price tag as being too high for a netbook, and ask why you wouldn’t buy a ‘real’ notebook for that price. Others will decry the presence of Windows Vista and the 1GB memory limit, either on their own or as a pair. And we expect the battery life to raise some eyebrows and lower some credit cards. Yet I can think of plenty of mainstream users – typically the family, friends and workmates of many APC readers – for whom this $999 netbook will really hit the sweet spot by blurring the conventional boundary of form factor and blowing apart the long-standing sub-note barrier of price."

I'd really consider this as a competitor to the Macbook Air. I'm sure it is a matter of semantics, but I would not really consider this (or the Air) to be a netbook. I must commend Dell for responding nicely to the competition with both of the Mini's, now they need to bring something new to the party rather than just following along.