Official Mini 11z Owners Lounge

Well, ran the pcmark 05, 06 and the wprime and the numbers were in the general area of the review score...

really disapointing...but f it...i have it..cant complain

 

looking for the W7 x64 drivers for the trackpad...
does anyone knows where to fins them?

 

1. Can this laptop play .mkv movies with no problem?

2. Has anyone play the movie to the HDTV yet? Got audio thru it?

3. Will Dell add bluetooth module?

4. Is it easy to put in a 500 gb 2.5" hd?

I have a Pentium D computer and when I install W7 RTM on it, it is faster than using it on a Vista. So W7 RTM is perfect for netbook.

 

every time I see your avatar chong67 I laugh and then get hungry. That looks like such a good burger.

I didnt even know dell had this laptop. I must be living in a hole. It looks like a nice machine. Its finally good to see a 11 inch machine with better then an atom z520 1.33 ghz.

 

Hey AppleUsr,

I am always hungry for any big beef cake. I can eat that and ramen noodles everyday.

So you are an Appler User and a Window User?

 

ya I use both lately though I am actually using windows 7 more now then my mac.

I am jealous I cant eat like that. Im already gaining to much weight.

 

agreed about the picture as well, makes me laugh and want a burger at the same time

 

no news on w7 64 drivers?

 

Any one know where I can get a 3 Cell battery for this thing. The mini 10's battery is apparently the same but I can't find that in the UK anywhere either.

I really would like to be able to dramatically shrink this thing on occasion.

 

Well, ordered the 11z and absolutely loved it! Perfect for note taking and handles mkv's much better then my mini 10.

Unfortunately, after a week it failed to boot. All hardware tests failed, Dell claims it's a bad motherboard. Ok, fair enough, there's always a few lemons in the bunch.

I received the replacement today. It boots up just fine except it won't boot from the cd / dvd drive. I am using my hd dvd xbox 360 drive which worked fine with the other one. It won't boot my Win 7 ISO or the OEM Dell restore disk provided with the computer. I tried formatting a USB and going that rout. NOTHING!

Any ideas? Would a bios update make a difference? Should I take the HD from the computer I haven't returned yet and switch them or just send both back and be done with the 11z?

Thanks!!!

 

I just got mine today. I'm also a mini 9 owner. I haven't played with it much yet but first impressions are that it is snappier than the 9 and the extra resolution is very nice to have. I've got win7 loaded on both now. Will post more once I've had more time with it. It is 1 3/4" deeper and 2 1/4" wider than the mini 9 which is quite a bit in the compact world. It's an equal jump visually from the mini 9 to the 11z to a D820 15.4". I guess what I'm trying to say is that it is bigger than I thought it would be!

Windows Experience Index is 2.0 on the 9 and 2.7 on the 11z.

 

to answer my own question on 3 cell batteries I ordered one today from these guys.

Will let you know how that goes

 

Has anybody found an alternate source for the six cell? Dell wants $150 for it which seems ridiculous

 

Has anyone tried to upgrade or install WWAN/3G module in this 11z? The Service Manual seems to confirm it can be done.

Given the facts that before this 11z appears, the Inspiron Mini series were crippled out from the possibility to upgrade WWAN. Appreciated if somebody who has already pop-up the trunk could give confirmation on the mini PCIe slot and the two antenna cables (white w/ stripe and black w/ stripe) required for WWAN module installation. Also on the SIM card slot in the battery bay.

 

After a week with this thing I will say I love the added resolution and it is way snappier than my mini 9 - but, I can't stand the touchpad. I played with the settings a ton and the only thing I like about it is the 2 finger tap scrolling. I can't stop my habit with the left click button and half the time the cursor jumps to the start button. It's going back and I've got my eye on the 1410tz next month. If I had done my research I would have bought the 1410t instead of this. Better specs for the same price. Holding out for dual core now though.

 

I'd try before I bought. We have one of the 1410's in house as an eval unit along with the 11z.

I agree that the trackpad is not good.

However a few observations about the 1410 (not the z)

screen gets washed out in very bright light. Our presidents office is all windows and the screen is almost unusable in there. Additionally the off angle viewing is much worse than the dell. The screen is one of the best things about the dell.

Real world usage- (not synthetic benchmarks) running office, adobe apps, access database, web apps the dell and the acer feel roughly equal. The acer does boot faster.

The acer can get a bit warm under load. More so than the dell.

The keyboard feels better on the dell as well. The acer is a bit mushy feeling

On the plus side for the acer. Much better trackpad and a bit better battery life. Two Ram slots versus one in the dell. I like the looks of the acer a bit better as well. The sound quality is also a bit better

Long story short, we have found either as the right fit for our company and will keep looking including at the new HP 311 and envys when they come out next month. Sony tells us they have new models as well (besides the X)

 

Anyone got a picture of the six cell battery?

 

question ...the 11z have 1 or 2 ddr slot ?

dual channel is enable ?

 

There is only one memory slot available (under the keyboard).
So to reach the maximum of 4GB you would need a costly 4GB chip.

 

Dell France now offering the dual core Pentium SU4100 as an option.

 

SU4100 coming to 11z in US

 

Dell Malaysia 11z SU4100 on sell now ... haha ....

 

Question: how do you "middle click" on the 11z touchpad? I'm used to hitting the left and right button together to - for example - open a link in a new browser tab. The corners are quite far apart. \m/ click?

 

where is lounge for mini 10v?

 

I'm wondering if it's a noticeable bump over the celeron and if battery life (which is not that great with the stock 3 cell) is affected

 

Well I just ordered one of these things today so that I can take it overseas with me instead of my Macbook Pro.

Got the Dual Core version, 320G HDD - fortunately trackpads don't worry me as I will be using my VX Nano with it.

Basically it will be used as a backup device for my camera whilst I trot up and down the east coast of the US so I think it will be perfect.

Considering I was contemplating another Asus EeePC model and this thing appeared with dual cores for around the same price, and Windows 7 preinstalled..I think I did all right

Now to have it delivered...and remove Windows 7 and put something decent on there

 

Received my 11z dual-core on Monday - really liking it. Keyboard feels a bit cheap but it's large and good enough to type on. Multitouch trackpad feels good and the double, tripple tapping and swipe scrolling works perfectly. As noted in the review the multitouch thing does basically render the click buttons unuseable. Selecting text is really fscking difficult. Windows feels very snappy and it drives a Dell 2408wfp at full res over HDMI perfectly so really no complaints. I have a Logitech wireless mouse for graphics work.

One question: has anyone managed to request a Windows 7 upgrade via http://win7.dell.com/? It keeps saying my service tag isn't in the database though it has been over two weeks since I ordered. I emailed them about it and received a template reply that completely ignored my pointed question and just linked me to the eligibility info and various FAQs. Not helpful

 

If you call Dell customer service they will activate your service tag and then you can request the upgrade. I had the same problem - they resolved this for me via phone and I completed the order for Windows 7 while talking to them.

 

According to Dell (who stuffed up my order submission date ) mine will be delivered by the middle of next week...fingers crossed....

 

It arrived yesterday yay! Runs Ubuntu flawlessly (barring restricted drivers for the Broadcom wifi card) so its time to try another disto lol.

One thing that I did notice though was the amount of keyboard flex on the lefthand side

 

I am considering purchasing a fully loaded 11z and then throwing a ssd in. Can any owners comment on the apparent touchpad difficulties, any heat issues or battery life that they have experienced????

I also want to confirm...no bluetooth???

 

the touch pad is crappy but I have learnt to deal with it (this is annoying but it is now uncommon for me to jump to the corner)

No idea about throwing in an SSD, I personally would save the SSD for a better machine like some of the other CULV netbooks out now or soon.

had no heat issues and battery life is excellent (IMO)

I also bought (from HK I thinkn) a small 3 cell battery so I could make it more portable and that has been excellent, less battery life of course but still 3 hours or so and it makes it _really_ slim compared to previously.

 

I have the Mini 1010, which has the same touchpad. At first, the thing was a crap shoot - reproducibly, positioning the cursor over a button while using your other hand to click the embedded left mousepad button always made the cursor jump to the bottom left corner of the screen. I am not sure about right-clicking (and whether that causes the cursor to jump as well).

It seems that the issue here is the speed - specifically, how fast you position the mouse and then click. When using both hands (in my case, my right hand manipulates the cursor while my left thumb clicks), there is obviously almost zero lag between the two events. The cursor will jump to the corner, without fail. However, this never happens with me when I right-click things, because I don't use my other hand to do the clicking - i.e. I manipulate the cursor and then click with the same hand. With the added lag, the cursor does not jump.

In fact, I cannot get the cursor to jump while only using one hand. Furthermore, the problem of the jumping cursor can also be circumvented by not using the embedded right trackpad button altogether, and relying on tap-clicking instead (which I've now come to do).

 

Thanks all....made my mind up to hold backon this machine as much as there are some decent pluses with it...

 

Just got my Inspiron 11z a few days ago. Liking the size and the Pentium SU4100 (dual-core 1.3GHz, 2MB cache) is a pretty decent CPU. The unit certainly feels much snappier than the Intel Atom N270 netbooks I had.

Anyways, anyone ever have this issue with their webcam? I got mine with Windows Vista Home Basic 32bit on a 160GB HDD(cheaper), and when I got it I fired up Dell Webcam Central software and it doesn't detect the webcam (I get a "Please plug in a supported webcam" message). I figured meh probably driver related. I swap in a Seagate 500GB HDD (5400RPM) and make a fresh install of Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit (legit Dell OEM disk) and install all the Windows 7 64bit drivers I can find from the Dell Inspiron 11z driver page on support.dell.com. Everything shows up fine in Device Manager except for an "Unknown Device" in the "Universal Serial Bus controllers" section.

Now, I didn't see a driver entry for the webcam on support.dell.com and read that it just uses the built-in Microsoft Driver, so was wondering why the webcam did not use this driver. After several reboots the webcam now shows up as "Integrated Webcam" under "Imaging Devices" category! Dell Webcam Central sees it and lets me play around with it. I am able to video-chat on AIM. I reboot again to see if the "fix" is permanent, and low-and-behold it shows up as "Unknown device" again. I reinstall Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit and try my Windows 7 Professional 32bit disk as well (legit license from school) but no dice. Every few reboots the webcam does show up.

Has anyone come across this issue and if so fixed it? Or perhaps this sounds like a hardware issue? Thanks.

 

Well this is great. Bought my GF an 11z. Arrived. Working great. thing is she doesn't like the lid colour. (pink, thought it would suit) Don;t want the hassle of sending it back. Does anyone know where i could get a diff colour lid? Or a skin that covers the whole lot of the pink?

 

The 11Z has peaked my interest but I'm not sure if I need it in addition to my 15" laptop. Like to hear what you folks use the 11Z for ? Is it mostly for traveling?

 

That was my plan originally but am taking my Macbook Pro travelling instead - I am now looking at getting rid of my 11z (iPad..lol)

It would be a nice machine if I wasn't so hooked on my MBP - for the size and the price it is really good, however it spends more time just sitting on my desk doing nothing now apart from the occasional Windows 7 outing for something that does not work on the Mac.

If you are after something a little beefier and a better screen than a basic netbook (which some of the Asus netbook models running Atoms I have seen are priced about the same over here - I do not get that logic?) then sure go for it. It would be a great accompaniment to a desktop.

 

Just got my replacement 11z, turns out my original one had a defective webcam. Anyways, I'm really digging this little guy. I commute everyday on the train so bring my laptop with me daily. I hook it up to an external monitor at work (external keyboard + mouse too) so basically just need a portable desktop lol. Thought a netbook would do the trick since all I do is web browse, listen to music, and watch videos. Turns out the Atom can't handle 50-60 tabs being open in Firefox (yea I know, I have weird browsing habits) so got rid of it. Haven't bogged this 11z down with quite that many tabs just yet but so far its very responsive performance-wise. The trackpad seems terrible at first but for me after I tweaked the settings some its actually quite usable (I gave up using the clicky buttons in the bottom corners altogether, just use the tap-to-click feature). It even has 2finger scrolling and 3finger page back/forward for web browsing like the new Macbook trackpads, very slick.

 

Would someone with the SU4100 processor please let me know if the 11z can handle HD video? Thanks

 

Since the GMA 4500 supports acceleration of h.264 video, a trained ape can handle/render HD video. An SU4100 would be overkill.

 

Waiting for my new 11z to be delivered, planning to make it dual boot (with Grub probably) Ubuntu and Windoze

Anyone have any observations about lack of drivers for *nux?

I know Dell appear to have stopped supporting Ubuntu, bl**dy shame!

Cheers

Chris

 

Got one on the way, and an Intel X-25M. Anythings special I need to know on drive swap on these puppies? I have an external DVD and an external drive caddy, so I can go either way in drive copy.

I got the su4100 off the outlet site for $399.

 

OK,
My mini-review if it can help any. I received an outlet 11z 2 days ago. SU4100, 2 GB, it has the revised trackpad (2 buttons). I pulled the hard drive (5 min) and slid in an X-25M and did a clean install of Win 7 Home Premium x64 from the disk that shipped with the machine. Hardware manager identifies one unknown device - I need to loot at it more. I loaded NO crapware. I did load Office 2007, Foxfire, and Acrobat Pro.
The machine is fast enough, it did max out both cores when loading software, but in light use has not been sluggish. With an SSD boot time is good. I have not tried a movie. The trackpad is absolute JUNK. I have a travel mouse on order. This machine could really benefit from a thinkpad style trackpoint, but so far that is my only complaint. Aside from the trackpad, all around an ideal netbook (based on my opinion that Atom based ones are only useful as children's toys and the su4100 should be about the base processor offered today).

 

I'm looking for one of these on the Dell Outlet and can't find any. Any tips?

 

Outlet stock changes a LOT. Check daily. Click the DELL part of the following link - the forum has done somethign funy with it.
Dell Inspiron 11z Laptop Product Details | Dell

 

So far I love my 11z. I previously had the celly 743 version with older trackpad. I now have the newer Win 7 version with SU4100 and love outputting HD movies to my TV through HDMI. I also threw in an Intel X25-V SSD which helps with battery life and app loading immensely. I think Dell got this model right, but some still don't like the trackpad.

 

Default Inspiron 11z bettry sticks-out !!!
I got 11-z with 6-cell battery , it sticks out somewhat. I didn't like that.

Is this (stick out behavior) is with just 6/9 cell battery or its same if I replace it with 3-cell battery?

 

Can anyone with the new trackpad (the one with actual buttons) report back as to how they like it (or don't) and why?

I have the older style with integrated buttons (which we all know is torture to use), and now the last couple of 11z buyers with the new trackpad say it's bad, but not why.

Please, if you can, give a mini-review of the new trackpad and any problems it solves over the old one, or new problems that makes it worse.

Thanks!