Computers

Dell Mini 10 (Intel Atom N450, 250GB HDD, 1GB)

(CNET REVIEW) - We’ve previously looked at a less expensive version of Dell’s redesigned Inspiron Mini 10 Netbook, and the line continues to be a strong player in this crowded field, thanks in part to Dell’s name-brand ubiquity, as well as to the company’s ability to offer a reasonable level of configuration options.

One new configuration option is the Broadcom Crystal HD video accelerator, which replaces Nvidia’s Ion GPU in Netbooks that have Intel’s new Atom N450 CPU (which, for the moment, you can’t pair with the Nvidia Ion). For $409, you get a system similar to the $369 model we saw last month, but with the addition of both the HD video accelerator and a higher-resolution 1,366×768-pixel 10-inch display, which makes this a very smart upgrade if you’re willing to spend just a little more.

To be honest, the Crystal HD chip is a halfway solution at best, as it only does video playback, not the Ion’s basic 3D graphics. Until this week, it would only assist in playing HD video files on your machine, and not for streaming video from sites such as Hulu (which use Adobe’s Flash).

Fortunately, Adobe has finally made Flash 10.1 beta 3 available for download, which provides better HD Web video-streaming performance. Despite the definite improvements we saw, there’s still a major problem with relying on a beta version of third-party software to achieve the minimal level of functionality consumers would expect from a Netbook with something called an “HD video accelerator.”

We like the inclusion of a 1,366×768-pixel resolution display at this price, but if you’re looking to buy a Netbook for all-around HD video playback, we might hold off for future (and hopefully non-beta) software updates from Adobe, Broadcom, or both; or hang on until the next generation of Nvidia Ion Netbooks appear (and we can test them to make sure they work reasonably well). Netbooks are great for a lot of things, but streaming HD Web video still isn’t one of them.

Read full story