As with its competitors, Dell’s Inspiron Mini 9 is fitted with Intel’s Atom N270 chip. This pint-sized processor has a surprising amount of muscle. Partnered with 1GB of RAM, it gallops through everyday tasks such as email and the web and uses programs such as Microsoft Office. If you’re in the market for a netbook, the Inspiron Mini should be near the top of your list.

Based on Mandriva Linux 2008, which was released last October, Mandriva Mini is designed to work on small format, low-cost netbooks, which typically have screens ranging from 7 to 10 inches. It is said to support key netbook platforms, such as products based on the Intel Atom processor.

In some tests the stock Eee Linux distribution was running quite slow and placing far behind Mandriva, Fedora, and Ubuntu, but when it came to the solid-state disk performance Xandros had the lead. Overall though, it appears that Ubuntu 8.10 Alpha 4 had delivered the best performance on the Intel Atom architecture.

With a sharp 9 inch screen, 16GB solid state drive and optional 3G mobile internet functionality waiting in the wings, Dell’s new $599 mini notebook, the Inspiron Mini 9, has maximum appeal – unless you want Linux…

A few weeks ago, I reviewed the Acer Aspire One notebook, the variant which came with an Acer-modified version of Linpus Linux. A few days ago, however, I realised Linux wouldn’t be ideal for me on my netbook. Due to pragmatic reasons, I’m now running Windows XP.

For new users though the Xandros Linux configuration is very easy to use with its IceWM-based manager and simple tabs for navigating between the different areas. However, we would have liked to see ASUS use Ubuntu’s Netbook Remix for the Eee PC. Perhaps we will see them make the switch for a future model.

A few weeks ago we ran some rumored specs of Dell’s answer to the Eee, the Dell Inspiron 910 (aka Mini Inspiron and Inspiron Mini). Now we’ve gotten our hands on the full (internal) 910 web documentation. The system will go on sale in the US in just a few days—August 22nd our source says—but we still don’t know whether or not that $299 starting price is just a myth.

Hewlett-Packard’s new $500 incarnation of the Mini-Note boasts a “92 percent full-size” keyboard, the vendor says, along with unusually large stereo speakers flanking the mid-sized (for a netbook) 8.9-inch LCD display. The Linux Mini-Note variant runs Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop.

To sum up the Acer Aspire One: this is what notebooks should have always been like. Small, portable, light, fast, and cheap. For just EUR 299, you are getting a proper netbook, with all the functionality of its big brothers and sisters. Maybe not as full-featured as the MSI Wind, and not as hyped as the eeePC, but still the better choice.

Overall this version of Ubuntu Mobile Edition represents a good start toward making the Linux operating system a viable alternative to Windows for ultra portable devices.