10:47AM
The Netbook Experiment
This week I had the opportunity to spend a few days driving a Dell Mini 9 OS X enabled netbook. For the uninitiated, Netbooks are those tiny computers you see people pull out of their pockets in airports and places that sale lots of expensive coffee. Like the MacBook Air, these computers give up power for portability. Unlike the MacBook Air, these computers focus on small footprint over the Air's emphasis on thin.
Anyway, although you are not supposed to be able to run OS X on one, hackers have been doing it for awhile. There are plenty of online tutorials explaining how to do this and some enterprising folks are selling them online. So I was loaned a Dell Mini 9 and gave it a try. I really did.
The netbook phenomena is all about compromises. That starts with computing power. Most of them are based on the single core Intel Atom processor. This is fine for web browsing, e-mail, and word processing, but that is about it.
Additionally the footprint is so small that the manufacturers are required to scrunch the keyboard together. In the case of the Dell Mini 9, the keyboard is quite small. Typing on it, I experienced a noticeable slow down in typing speed and accuracy hit. More importantly, after using it for 45 minutes, I felt my hands cramping. There is a reason the only person pictured typing on one of these at Dell's site looks to be about ten years old.
The screen was equally inadequate. The backlight was nothing close to the LED screen on my MacBook Air. Likewise the screen resolution of 1024 x 600 runs out of pixels very quickly.
The build quality was also unsatisfactory. The plastic case was hardly rigid and the battery actually wiggled when I carried it.
Of course there were some good points about the Dell. It was my first experience with loading an OS from an SSD drive and I liked it. The read speeds were faster than my existing hard drive while the write speeds were a bit slower. The battery life was excellent and the variety of ports and connectors was nice.
This post ignores the question of whether it is legal to run OS X on non-Apple hardware. Apple certainly doesn't think so. Either way, I wouldn't be surprised if you found upgrading these OS X netbooks to include additional steps and headaches.
Steve Jobs explained that Apple hasn't entered the netbook space because it refuses to make a computer that is "a piece of junk." Honestly, that was my impression of the Dell Mini 9. The small keyboard and screen got in the way of any productive computing. It isn't that much more money to just buy the low end MacBook or, if your budget is tight, a used MacBook. If you've already got a nice MacBook, I'd suggest that rather than buying an inadequate netbook, getting a theft and damage insurance policy on your existing Mac so you aren't so afraid to carry it around. I have one on my MacBook Air that costs me $100 a year and gets me a full replacement in the event of a catastrphe.
For the record, I get the point of netbooks. I understand they are not supposed to be the best computers. They are just supposed to be cheap and small and (for lack of a better term) disposable. I also get that it is entirely unfair to compare a Dell Mini 9 to an Apple laptop that is (at least) twice the cost. I know several Mac geeks and road warrior types who love their netbooks but in the end, I want no part of it. I think Apple will eventually get into the space but from an entirely different angle. Hopefully a tablet with a bluetooth keyboard. We'll see.
Reader Comments (49)
Hi David,
Good write up. But your closing point is somewhat understated. A netbook can be one third the price of a mac laptop.
And the point you made about them being suitable for web browsing, email, and word processing "and that's about it". You're right, but for the vast majority of non-enterprise users, this is all that they need.
For many, esp. in these economically challenging times, a netbook might well be the ONLY alternative to NO computer. So I think they're a good thing. If you need more, buy more. More options for consumers are BETTER, no?
Best Rgds
Kenny in NJ
Thanks for the review. My mother-in-law has been considering getting one because all she does is e-mail and very light surfing. However, since she's as blind as a bat, I'm not sure that the small screen size is what she needs. Sure she could get a larger screen monitor, but by then aren't you spending the same amount as a real computer? Gonna have to think on this
Hi -- After buying a Dell mini 9 for a trip to Africa, I'm selling this netbook. Why? It's a cheap piece of junk. The screen and keyboard are too small to do any real work on. I have a MacBook Air that's just as light, has a nice big and bright screen, a standard keyboard that's a joy to use, and can run OS X, Linux and Windows without a lot of hacking involved.
Frankly, I think netbooks are just a fad. As mobile devices like the iPhone and T-Mobile G1 get more and more powerful, does the world really need a crippled device like a 9" netbook? I get more functionality out of the iPhone and G1 than I ever did with the netbook. Many people want one because they're "so cute", but I hear the same griping from everyone who has one once they've used it for a while.
Just my 2¢ worth!
Steve
Thanks for your review.
If one can't afford a Mac, then get a second job or better job. It's as simple as that.
Netbooks are pieces of junk. Some people want them but they are highly compromised experiences. They are not things that Apple would produce.
Apple makes high quality products that people, even in a recession, would buy. Apple doesn't make "disposable" products. Macs generally are useful for 7 years, much longer than the 2-3 years of the average PC.
I prefer the capabilities of a MacBook to a netbook. The average Mac user runs several applictions at once - something a netbook can hardly do.
Again, If you want a Mac and are poor, get a second job or a better job. Get an education so you can get a better job. Get some work ethic going.
Reply to Ken Lee
"More options for consumers are BETTER, no?"
Actually, No! Take a look at the book "The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less" by Barry Schwartz. It turns out that having more choice is actually a bad thing. Humans like to have a small handful of distinct choices, anything over that and we start to second guess ourselves and have to do too much research before we make a purchase. Having said that competition usually forces manufacturers to innovate and make better products (there are lots of exceptions to this - just look at how little cars have evolved or cell phones before the iPhone)
James... Sheesh, that's a bit harsh. All the education in the world won't help when companies aren't hiring.
Good article.
If you can't afford a NEW Mac, you can always buy a USED Mac. OR buy a refurb unit from Apple, that still carries a warranty.
A MacBook or MacBook Pro that's a couple of generations old will cost about half the price of a new machine and still give you a few years of service. Try to find one that still has AppleCare in effect. Try craigslist.org so it's a LOCAL seller and you can meet them in person.
For bit of a speed bump, max out the RAM and swap out the hard drive for a faster one when you can.
I feel like I'm living on another planet because my experience with my Dell Mini 9 "Hackintosh" is so different. I think it's an incredible little computer. Outside of the too-small keyboard (I find hunt and peck works well), this little marvel does everything I ask of it. It boots like a speed-demon, runs iChat (with video chat from the built in webcam), Skype, Slingbox, DVD images via Video LAN perfectly, stream songs and video via iTunes sharing. I surf with Firfox and effortlessly stream videos from Hulu and YouTube and watch Apple movie trailers with Quick Time Pro. It goes to sleep and wakes up when I ask it. Seems pretty sturdy to me and get about 3 hours on the battery. For the record, I have 2GB RAM and a 32GB SSD. Oh yeah, I even run software updates (cautiously) without a worry because I got the little bugger backed up via SuperDuper and Time Machine. For under $400 I built a little OS X road warrior. I love it!
It's a frustrating piece of junk. In fact, a full-sized PC is a piece of junk. E-mail and web-surfing are beyond text, and if you do either you don't want to be painfully aware of your limitations to the point where you're cursing continuously. My feeling is, if you can't afford a Macbook, new, or refurbished, then you're not managing your money very well. And if you think a "notebook" is too big or heavy, you're a lazy-butted wimp.
Funny how years ago PC fanboys called the original multi-colored iMacs "toys," but now many of them are throwing away a few hundred on disposable junk.
Response to Jim S.
With all due respect to you, and to the guy you quote, I don't care what he thinks about humans liking to have a handful of choices. I do like having choices, LOTS OF 'EM, and I possess the intelligence to make them --- as do most people.
You see, its really quite simple. You assess your needs, study all possible solutions to your problems and needs, and build/buy/otherwise acquire the solutions.
More choices give you more flexibility, and more choices from more sources equals greater competition. You alluded to this in your post, while questioning its inherent truth. its thinking like that the monopolists/duopolists love.
You don't like netbooks? Its simple, DON'T BUY ONE. You like Macbooks and think they're worth the money, then BUY ONE. For what its worth, I don't own a netbook, and I do own (several) Macbooks. But only because after sifting through dozens of choices, I reached the conclusion about what was right for me.
Take care,
Kenny in NJ
I feel like I am in a different universe too, Prompter Bob. I have a Dell Mini 9 and not only is the build quality top notch (and this is coming from an Apple devotee!!), but it runs OS X like a dream. The boot time is crazy fast, sleep and wake from sleep are perfect, I get almost 4 hours of battery life, and all my favorite applications run great, no slow downs and no hangups. I can touch type almost flawlessly (maybe because I was used to the Eee PC keyboard, heh). I have a fully functional, sub-$400 OS X netbook, and it is awesome. Will it keep me from buying more Mac hardware in the future? Definitely not. But I will say that it not only has met but exceeded my expectations for a Hackintosh netbook.
The dell mini 9 loaded w/ mac OS X is to put it simply - amazing. For approximately $350 you get a machine with not one but two cores and plenty of screen space for ordinary tasks. The shell is of decent and granted not apple build quality however still a nifty piece of engineering.
Aside from editing a feature film there aren't many tasks that it can not handle. The mac line of notebooks are quickly approaching what was 10 years ago supercomputer status especially w/ the gpu's included. These machines far outstrip the needs of 99% of their purchasers.
As an Apple user since the first 128K I have not had this much fun for a while. I do not have the Dell but an MSI u100 Wind. It runs a retail install of OS 10.5.6 flawlessly. I do not need a laptop for much since the iPhone does 98% of what I need. The day Apple comes out with a netbook I will order it but for now this is great. I am actually looking forward to the release of the Asus T101H so I can try to do the same on a touch screen/tablet. While I agree that the quality is not what Apple is my little MacBook nano does just fine, thank you very much,
seeya
eidolon
24" iMac 3.06GHz/4GB/300GB Velociraptor/4TB WD ShareSpace
MSI u100/432us 1.6GHz/2GB/200GB 7200RPM
Very good article Kenny. I do agree with your point, despite the fact that I bought an Acer Aspire One in a late summer trip to D.C. last year.
I think that when you are on the go, netbooks are very hard to beat. The experience I had: staying at the hotel, being at airports. All of this really explains why a netbook is the way to go. However when you come back to your desk and need to do some real productive work, or want to watch a movie in a comfortable setup, the netbook fails miserably.
That's why I'm planning on buying a Unibody MB which, hopefully, will meet my needs in terms of portability and productivity.
I don't know what unit you've been reviewing, but the Dell Mini is build very solidly. The screen is excellent (also LED backlit).
The keys are small, what do you expect from a small form factor? I do think the key layout could be better (see Vostro A90).
Of course using one for other than light e-mail, browsing, etc is going to suck. The whole point is to have a computer in places you normally wouldn't take your notebook (considering most are 4lb+). If you already have a Macbook Air, well a netbook probably isn't for you.
For a variety of reasons, I own 2 white plastic MacBooks, 1 last gen MacBook Pro, and an aluminum iMac 20". I also own a Lenovo S10 netbook that I just installed Mac OS 10.5.6 on. Of all those machines, which do I spend the most time using? The netbook. It's a great machine for consuming information. The build quality is great, it runs 10.5.6 faster in some situations (i.e. wake from sleep, establishing a Wifi connection) than my MacBooks, and it's so light I can take it practically anywhere. I should also say it runs a heck of a lot cooler than my MacBooks (especially the MBP) for equivalent lightweight tasks such as reading my RSS articles & social networking stuff. Because of how cool, light, and small it is, I find myself having the opportunity to use it in many more situations than before. I wouldn't write code or do heavy photo or video editing on it. But frankly, I wouldn't do that on a 13" or 15" display in a MacBook or MBP, either, without a good external monitor and extended keyboard setup, anyway. I use Dropbox to keep my files in synch, and synch my MobileMe data, as well.
As a portable 2nd or 3rd computer, it's hard to go wrong for $350.
@Everybody
Thanks for the informative, spirited debate.
@Happy Netbook owners
I get it and am not trying to take away from your experience. I do a lot of writing when I'm at a computer so it just isn't a viable option. I'd much rather buy a used MacBook with a full size keyboard and screen than a netbook and the small squat form factor just isn't that important to me. That doesn't mean it isn't spectacular for you and that is okay with me. Heck, Andy Ihnatko seems to enjoy his and generally I like EVERYTHING Ihnatko does.
I love my Hackbook Hydrogen! I've got OS X, NeoOffice and iLife '08 on mine (16GB SSD)! It does everything a NetBook should. Build quality is great - when compared to others and community support is awesome!
Seems at last one of the people here is a shill for Apple. Sad to see Apple stooping.
Dale
I have a macbook pro that I've been using for the past couple of years. Prior to that was a last gen Tibook, I've had mac laptops since the first powerbook 100 and I'm what you might term an Apple fanboy 9or Macnazi as one of my friends calls me) but I love my hackbook mini9. I cycle or motorbike to work each day and wanted to cut down on the stuff I carry. I needed a machine at work for webbrowsing, skype, email, simple spreadsheets, word processing etc. I have a monitor and full size keyboard on my desk and the dell is a perfect adjunct to the macbook pro.
I've found the build quality excellent, it runs everything smoothly including software updates and I installed from my (paid for) leopard retail disc. Yes, the keyboard on the mini is small but then the entire machine is less than half the zize of my macbook pro, and is more disposable in case of accidents.
I'm not trying to replace my bigger laptop, I just needed something low powered and smaller. Given that a new macbook (aluminium) starts at £929 in the uk and my mini9 cost me a total of £240 (16Gb ssd, 2Gb ram, hires webcam) it's a quarter of the cost of a new macbook. It's certainly more than a quarter as capable.
I think you were expecting too much of the basic hardware but if you go with the limitations it imposes it's a great machine. I love mine.
I don't understand why people say the CPU is only good for web browsing, word processing, and email. 1.6GHz is plenty for all but the most intensive games and applications available today. I've been writing game code (physics simulation + OpenGL) on my hackintosh Mini 9 (1GB RAM, 32 GB SSD) over the last couple weeks since I got it. I run the XCode IDE, my game code, a web browser and other apps in the background with no problems at all. It's not my main computer, but it's perfect when I'm sitting on the couch or on a trip somewhere.
David, from one point of view you have summarized perfectly what a netbook is good at:
"This is fine for web browsing, e-mail, and word processing, but that is about it."
From another point of view you missed the point: the netbook is about connectivity on the move, again web browsing, e-mail, and word processing.
A computer savvy user will buy a proper computer (think about a 500$ 14 inches celeron machine as entry point). The occasional user will buy a netbook or even something cheaper.
From my point of view, I really like the MacBook, but I really would like to have something around 11 inches to write email while traveling. Something like an old 12 inches PowerBook would provide also additional capabilities, but if a netbook does allow me to write emails on the move I do not see why I should buy something different/more expensive (after all I have a Mac on the desktop that has all the power I need).
I love to write python code on an Acer netbook. The small keyboard took some time to get use to. For years I refused to buy a "NoteBook" because of their size and price.
"I’d suggest... getting a theft and damage insurance policy on your existing Mac ... that costs me $100 a year and gets me a full replacement in the event of a catastrphe."
Sir... could you please provide me with the Insurance Company INFO
that I may inquire and purchase a policy for my computer and
electronic equipment. Thank you in advance.
Mic
Netbooks are for people who think pdas are too small and laptops too expensive. Netbooks are just here to provide choice
I am an Apple devotee to the max. I am also reading and writing on a Dell Mini 9 running OSX. I love this computer almost like none other that I've had. It runs OS X perfectly; it is as stable as any Mac that I've ever used. Also, it doesn't seem so cheap to me. Just about perfect. Sorry, but I needed a netbook, and this absolutely fills the bill.