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Dell

Recently, Dell started offering pre-installed movies on their computers during online checkout. They are now pushing the media distribution further by offering pre-installed “music packs” on their PCs.

Dell’s agreement with Universal enables the computer maker to offer attractively priced music when a customer buys a new computer. A 50-song pack will cost $25, and a 100-song pack will cost $50. That’s half of what it would cost if the same amount of songs were bough on iTunes!

All songs will be DRM-free. Users will be able to use and listen to the purchased songs anywhere, anytime. As of now, the XPS One and Dell Mini 9 netbook are excluded from the offering.

The Boston Globe

Dell Inspiron Mini12

Dell has just announced that the new Inspiron Mini 12 laptop will be available globally sometime in the month of November for around $600.

Dell refers to this product as being a laptop (not a netbook). This sounds rather unusual, as this product runs on an Intel Atom-type CPU which, so far, has been used only by UMPCs and netbooks. Morover, this specific model will run on a “Z” series Atom CPU which was developed for handheld internet tablets, not notebooks.

Here are some specifications:

• 12-inch display (1280×800)
• Atom CPU (1.3GHz Z520 or 1.6GHz Z530)
• 1GB RAM
• 40, 60, or 80GB hard drive
• Bluetooth and 802.11b/g
• Built-in webcam
• 3G wireless option available in 2009
• 3 or 6-cell battery (respectively 3h and 6h operating time)
• 3 USB ports and a 3-in-1 card reader
• Windows Vista Home Edition (Linux Ubuntu available later)
• Starting weight of 2.72 and 0.92in at its thinnest point

ZDNet

Dell

After Nokia’s “Comes with music” phones, Dell is introducing something similar with their computers.

Shoppers will now be able to add movies to their computer purchases right on the Dell website during checkout. The movies will be pre-loaded on the hard drive with all the extras that would normally come with the DVD version of the same movie.

For now, only “Iron Man” is available but more titles are to come. Count $20 per movie.

TechCrunch