In a fairly subtle move, punters have noted that Dell has rather silently ran out-of-stock of its Dell Inspiron Mini 1012 netbook devices amongst a few others.
After ending production of the Dell Streak 7 and Streak 5 tablets earlier this year, Dell has now confirmed that it has ended the consumer Mini line of netbooks and will no longer be making devices of 10 inches or below, though the firm's netbook/tablet hybrid, the Inspiron Duo, whilst frequently out of stock continues to sell well and availability of the product would continue.
Dell's marketing director, Alison Gardner affirmed that Dell's plan was to focus on thin but powerful devices, such as the Dell XPS 14z, essentially removing Dell from the affordable portable computing market and for now, at least, the ultra-compact market, with a focus on the ultra-slim ultrabooks as opposed to netbooks and tablets, "Thin and powerful is where it is at for us." she said.
Ultrabooks have been a big up-and-coming trend of late, with ASUS amongst others making a serious play for this market with devices such as the ZENBOOK, where focus has been on the thickness as opposed to the flat area of devices, making them better suited for sliding into a bag or between a few documents, they attempt to achieve the best of each world, generally powered with Intel Core series processors as opposed to low-performance Atoms, standard screen sizes with good resolutions and with several companies focusing on replicating the instant-on feel of a tablet device through superior standby modes.
The Dell XPS 14z isn't what we'd call a typical ultrabook however and still looks and feels like a laptop. It's expected that Dell will release its first true ultrabooks during 2012's mid-January CES show.
