With so many netbooks available in the market today, impressing an average computer-obsess geek proves to be a difficult and challenging task. The obiquity of netbooks have turned these light-weighted and smaller versions of the traditional laptop computers into an ordinary thing of the past. They all look freakin the same. No wonder companies are pulling their own gimmick, albeit unsuccessful for some, to set them apart from the rest. The Dell Inspiron Duo is no exemption.
Displayed under the statement “Sometimes you want to touch. Sometimes you need to type. With the new touch-sensitive, Flash-capable Inspiron™ duo convertible tablet, you can do both in style. You can tell it’s Dell”, the Dell Inspiron Duo is a hybrid laptop/ tablet. With its 180 degrees swivel screen the netbook can instantly morph into a tablet. It is probably the first netbook to boast such functionality.
Launched last September 14, 2010, the Dell Inspiron Duo immediately caught the media attention. According to a blog review, the Inspiron Duo’s product demo– vertically rotating screen– was so impressive that the writer almost hit the ceiling when she first saw it. “It was like nothing we’d ever seen before,” as she puts it.
But of course the back-flipping swiveling 10.1 inch screen is not what it is all about. Inspiron Duo’s 1366×768-resolution display is partnered with an accelerometer, though interestingly not in the display itself. The accelerometer controls the screen orientation which means that when the screen is rotated, the viewing orientation doesn’t actually change until it is locked over the keyboard.
For sound performance, the Inspiron Duo has two built-in speaker, two USB ports for external plug-ins, Ethernet jack, media card reader, and an additional audio line-in socket. This baby has no issue with video quality either. Inspiron Duo can view 1080p video clips in Windows Media Player and 720p YouTube HD videos, thanks to its Broadcom Crystal HD accelerator.
Operating under Windows 7 Premium platform, the Inspiron Duo is loaded apps. To enhance functionality, Dell has added its very own DuoStage software layer. Below is a quick run down of each:
MusicStage: A built in album art / tracks direct from your locally stored music, but also has tabs for Napster and Radiotime.
PhotoStage: Similar to the music app, PhotoStage pulls in pictures that are stored on the hard drive, but also lets you access images from your Facebook and Flickr accounts right from the interface.
VideoStage: Using a skinned version of Windows Media Player, this app pulls in thumbnails of your locally stored video, but also recent rentals from CinemaNow.
Books: Similar to Blio for PC, Inspiron Duo has a parallel reading program, which currently has only about 10,000 paid titles from Baker & Taylor.
Another highlight is Inspiron Duo’s 1.5GHz dual-core Atom N550 processor, 2GB of RAM, and 320GB 7,200rpm drive that keep things running fairly well.
Few things to point out though, While Inspiron duo has a 1.3 megapixel camera on the top of the bezel, it is useless when in tablet mode as it is located on the opposite side of the bezel. Another letdown is the absence of VGA, Ethernet, and SD card slot on the chassis iteself.
December 1st, 2010 at 11:50 pm
[...] Complete Article Tags: acer, asus, chrome, chrome os, cloud computing, computer, dell, ipad, laptop, lenovo, netbook, netbook ratings, samsung, sony, technology, toshibaPosted in Netbook News, Netbooks on Dec 1st, 2010, 3:49 pm by admin [...]
December 2nd, 2010 at 6:24 pm
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