My Dell Mini Forum

Runcore, the supplier of many a Dell Mini 9/Vostro SSD upgrade, has released their new and final line of SSDs for the Dell Mini 9, the "Runcore Pro IV Light" PATA SSD.

The new "light" SSD is obviously much faster than it's older brother, but also has lots of redeeming new features over previous models and other SSD upgrades out there too. It has been described as the "be-all and end-all" of Dell Mini 9 SSDs.

One notable feature is that the performance increase from using the newly designed drive is more equal throughout the different range of sizes - which are from 16GB - 64GB btw - unlike in previous versions where the speed would actually decrease as the size of the drive did. This makes for a much more economical choice for speeding up you Mini 9 but without having to blow loads on a 64GB drive you may not need.

Key Features:

• 90MB/s Read and 55MB/s Write speeds
• 4K random: 18MB/s read and 5 MB/s write speeds
• 32MB (16GB, 32GB) and 64MB (64GB) cache size
• Speed increases in startup, application launch, multitasking between programs, opening/rendering/saving large files, and shutdown
• No difference in speed between models
• Silent operation
• Heat Reduction
• Longer Battery Life
• Increased reliability and durability
• Includes Upgrade Kit (see next paragraph)

The Pro IV Light drive is standard 50mm PCI-E card that'll take up just one slot - so it will replace your existing SSD easily. What's really cool is that Runcore also provide an "upgrade kit" with each drive which has everything you need to easily upgrade from your current SSD without having to re-install anything. The upgrade package actually includes a USB HDD case and cables to turn your old 50mm drive into an external USB drive - saving your old driver from the knackers yard! Of course, you get all the screw drivers/stickers you need too.

Runcore Pro IV Light SSDs have just started shipping, check out the Runcore where to buy site for locations internationally. Be sure to look out for "Pro IV Light".

If you're purchasing from the US get them here from MDD where the 16GB is just $120, 32GB for $140 and 64GB for $230.

If purchasing from our sponsor MyDigitalDiscount, or you if have any specialist Runcore questions, direct them to this forum where a MDD representative will be able to answer any queries you may have.

The Alienware M11x has been thoroughly reviewed and thoroughly enjoyed by
technology websites HardwareHeaven.

The M11x was very well received and quotes:The M11x did well in every category they could review it in, including performance, battery, design and HD capabilities. The Alieware entry into the UMPC market seems to be the be-all-and-end-all of sub-notebook powerhouses.

There are also some detailed pictures, including some disassembly images and upgrade potentials, notably the hard drive, RAM and Wifi had easy access. The guys show off playing L4D2 and MW2 with some benchmarks too, well worth the read!

Read the full review here.
The Alienware m11x is now available for pre-order in the UK.

The Alienware M11x, Dells gaming netbook under the Alienware brand is now available to pre-order on the Dell US site. I say netbook but maybe GamingBook would be more appropriate.

The unit comes with an array of options, there are many different combinations, I managed to max it out at over $2k, but by the time I had got to that, it probably could have run Crysis. Twice. No just kidding, but who knows? You can upgrade to a dual-core CPU, up to 8GB of RAM, an uber-256GB SSD and WWAN + GPS on Verizon or AT&T.

Shipping date for this baby is as early as March 1st.

The big link want is here: The Dell Online Store: Build Your System

Whoa, Nelly! We learned back at CES that Alienware's pretty-much-a-netbook would launch in the Spring for less than a grand, but now we know precisely what the base price will be: $799. The starting MSRP of the M11x was delivered courtesy of the company's own website, but not in the most straightforward way. If you surf on over to the M11x microsite and view the source, you'll notice the following blurb tucked within the code:

The Alienware M11x, with over 6.5 hours of battery life and weighing under 4.5 lbs. will start at an amazing $799! Leave it to the folks at Alienware to enable truly mobile performance gaming at an affordable price.

So, a polarizing (albeit vivacious) design, an 11.6-inch display, NVIDIA GT335M switchable graphics and a 6.5 hour battery, all for $799. Shall we sign you up, or what?

[via Darren Murph -- Engadget]

*the contents of this news article are an exact replica of the Engadget posting*

Engadget have gotten hold of a new Dell Mini 10 with Broadcom Crystal HD decoder and posted a review of the unit.

There overall rating is not good, although they rate the look of the new Dell Mini, the HD capabilities of the Broadcom HD decoder are not yet fully available. Accelerated flash playback isn't available until version 10.1 beta 3 is released and the only supported media player at the moment is Windows Media Player, which means any HD iTunes downloads and blu-ray playback just aren't going to happen at this stage. However, time will tell!

They also mention that the HD Decode option will be coming as early as February!

Check out the full review at Engadget. Thanks to those who pointed this out.

After just 4 days we got around 300 retweets (entries) to our competition!

The winner is @harveyofclapham. The winner has been notified and the prize shipped out very soon! Thanks to all who entered, if you'd still like a T-Style SSD, they are available in sizes 32GB - 128GB from MDD.

Due to the success of this competition, I can assure you there will be similar competitions in the future!

On a side note, apologies for the minor spout of downtime last night. I've been told it was a one-off.

It looks like the New Dell Mini 10 has got itself into the hands of some of our members, and our budding amateur photographers have a taken host of lovely photographs for all to see.
Including some disassembly shots and evidence of how to do the elusive RAM upgrade.

From the pictures we can see the RAM upgrade simply requires removing the keyboard and then a cover with just a few screws, looks to be easier than the RAM upgrade in the 10v.

Another notable thing, is that Dell have opted for the same un-flush memory card reader, we can see from some pictures that SDHC cards and memory sticks do not sit flush with the Mini 10s design, this seems to be the norm now, only the original Mini 9 contained the handy spring-loaded flush card reader.

View the pictures in this thread. If you have a new Dell Mini 10, please do contribute! Any questions you may have about the overall design are bound to be answered.

Early adopters, you can get your own Mini 1012 from Dell!