Dell Inspiron Mini 12: the best netbook for music?

The Dell Inspiron Mini 12: pen not included.
The Dell Inspiron Mini 12: pen not included.

If you're looking for an ultra-portable laptop that you can use for music-making, you'll doubtless be interested to hear about Dell's new Inspiron Mini 12.

Sporting a 12.1 inch screen, this is the big (though not that big) brother of the Inspiron Mini 9, and is less than an inch thick. It's available with either a 1.3GHz Atom Z520 or 1.6GHz Atom Z530 processor, and with either 60 or 80GB of storage.

It ships with Windows Vista Home Basic, though Ubantu and Windows XP versions will be available before the end of the year.

Of course, you're never going to get the same level of performance out of a machine like this as you will from a high-powered laptop, but if you want something that looks classy and is genuinely portable, the Mini 12 certainly appears to be a contender.

The machine is currently shipping in Japan only, but should be available worldwide in November for less than $600.

Ben Rogerson

I’m the Deputy Editor of MusicRadar, having worked on the site since its launch in 2007. I previously spent eight years working on our sister magazine, Computer Music. I’ve been playing the piano, gigging in bands and failing to finish tracks at home for more than 30 years, 24 of which I’ve also spent writing about music and the ever-changing technology used to make it.