Dell launches Macbook Air rival

Dell has unveiled what it claims is the world's thinnest laptop, its much previewed rival to Apple's MacBook Air.

The company's announcement refrained from saying how thin the Adamo notebook is. though reports on the web say that it is 0.65in at the thinnest point, and slightly thicker at the hinge.

The MacBook Air is 016in thick at its thinnest point, thickening out to 0.76in at the centre. It has a 13.3in screen compared with the Adamo's 13.4in widescreen, but weighs less at 1.36kg compared with 1.77kg.

Both machines are thus significantly heavier than most mini-laptops, but in terms of how much weight users have to carry around there is little to choose between them.

This is because of the Air's minimalist approach to i/o. It has just one USB port, and non-standard video extension and audio ports, which means working mobile users will almost certainly have to carry a powered USB hub, with adapter, plus a USB network adapter for those many hotel rooms that offer only wired web access.

The Dell has two USB ports, one combined USB and eSATA combo port, a Display Port, and an RJ-45 networking jack. Dell is claiming a battery life of five hours.
Both the Air and the Adamo are milled out of a single piece of aluminium though the Dell offers a choice of Onyx and Pearl colours.

The Adamo has a 1.2GHz Core 2 Duo processor, Wifi 11n, Bluetooth 2.1 and a 3g option. But with prices starting at £1649 (a large slice of which is due to the 128GB solid-state disk) and marketing stressing its looks, many sales are likely to be to the kind of people who buy for style rather than technology.

One unwelcome feature it shares with the Air, probably due to the size, is that it has non standard batteries that need to be replaced.

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