Dell's M101z: Is it a pushy Netbook or a modest notebook?

by Steven Mostyn - Jul 29 2010, 12:06

It’s getting increasingly more difficult to peg new portable computer hardware these days, and Dell’s latest offering is no exception. Specifically, it would appear the Dell Inspiron M101z is caught in limbo somewhere betwixt the Netbook and notebook categories.

Although situated closely to the humble Netbook thanks, in the main, to its uber portable 11.6-inch sizing, the M101z foregoes Intel’s energy efficient but underpowered Atom processor in favour of something a tad more capable.

Granted, it is only a tad, but the inclusion of a 1.7GHz AMD Athlon II Neo K125 single-core processor certainly helps nudge Dell’s little M101z away from the Netbook tag – as does a solid 2GBs of DDR3 SDRAM and 250GBs of hard drive storage.

Factor in Windows 7 Premium (no XP or Windows 7 Starter on show here) alongside integrated graphics provided by the ATI Radeon RS880M, and suddenly the M101z starts to feel far more like a bone fide notebook.

Other contributing factors walk the line. For example, the 11.6-inch screen has a Netbook-beating resolution of 1366 x 768 and Wi-Fi is spread across 802.11b/g/n, but the humble 1.3 Webcam holds no great appeal, while Bluetooth, a wired Ethernet port, VGA, an HDMI out are unlikely to raise any skirts.

If you’re interested in straddling two hardware categories, the Dell M101z starts at 379 GBP. A dual-core processor configuration (Neo K325) will set you back 429 GBP, while the upper tier model costs 499 GBP but offers 4GBs of DDR3 SDRAM and a 320GB hard drive.

So is it a Netbook, or is it a notebook? More to the point, do you really care?

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