Next Computer – PDRater – Permanent Disability Calculators

Since I reviewed available netbooks about two months back several new options have opened up. ((Photo courtesy of Ciccio Pizzettaro)) There’s the new Samsung NC110 ((The Samsung NC110 is the successor to the NC10)) ((A review of the NC110 I found helpful)) and a slew of new Acer One’s.

However, none of them can touch the 4GB Dell Mini 9 on sale right now for $199 with Ubuntu.

I know I had earlier said that 8GB was too small for my purposes. I had even suggested that I was more interested in some of the other available netbooks over the Dell for this reason. However, I want to make my next computer a Dell, true to my word.

The reason I’m considering the 4GB version where I was dismissing the 8GB version before is the incredible price and the purposes to which such a laptop would be put. In order to do about 98% of what I need with a laptop, I could easily use a netbook. On any given day I use:

Firefox for web browsing
Thunderbird for e-mail
Pidgin for instant messaging
FileZilla for FTP transfers
Notepad++ for programming/text editing
OpenOffice for word processing, spreadsheets
TightVNC for remote access

All of these programs are open source software and available for Ubuntu ((An easy-to-use Liniux installation.)) and Windows. So, in shopping for a laptop, I really don’t care about which operating system I use. The 4GB Dell Mini 9 with Ubuntu could do all of these things – and for a $199 price tag. Plus, with the Mini’s SD card slot, I could pop in an extra 16GB of memory for only $26.

Dell Customer Service!!!

Dell’s customer service has been my single greatest customer service experience with any product, ever.

Let me break it down for you:

My computer, a Dell XPS m1210 was out of warranty. ((It died within 1 year after my warranty expired, but by the time I talked to Dell it was more than a year out of warranty.))
It had a bad nVidia graphics card.
I wrote one e-mail to Dell’s Chief Blogger, Lionel Menchaca, stating the nature of my technical emergency. ((It was a very simple and short e-mail, so it took me forever to write.))
He told me someone was going to contact me.
Less than 24 hours later someone from Dell’s corporate customer service called me to tell me they were going to replace my entire motherboard. ((The only way to fix a bad integrated graphics card.))
Less than 24 hours later I got a call from their local technician – James. He came to my home that very evening and swapped out my motherboard. ((“Rock on completely, with some brand new components!” – CAKE))

Here’s Lionel’s e-mail to me from just after midnight this morning:

“Jay:

That’s great news. I’m really glad to see it all worked out smoothly. I appreciate you being a loyal Dell customer. Feel free to tell any other Dell customers how to contact me directly if they need some assistance.

It’s customer’s like you that make this the best job I’ve ever had.

Sincerely,

Lionel Menchaca

Chief Blogger, Dell Inc.

www.dell.com/blogs

e-mail: lionel_menchaca@dell.com

Twitter: twitter.com/LionelatDell

phone: 512.728.8685″

If you’ve got an issue with your Dell, get a hold of Lionel directly. He’s an incredible guy working for an incredible company. Lionel and Dell took care of me. This Dell XPS m1210 is my third Dell laptop, and my next computer will absolutely be a Dell too.

Tag: Next Computer

Drooling over the Dell Mini 9

Dell Customer Service!!!