Dell Inspiron Mini 9 running Ubuntu has arrived.

The Mini 9 shipped yesterday morning at 12:00am and arrived today around 10:00am, much faster than the delayed order status page. =

First impressions often count, and the Mini 9 delivers. As stated by many reviewers, the system feels like it costs much more than it actually does. The build quality appears and feels top notch, just like the 4 other Dell portables that I use. The package and its contents arrived neat and tight.

The default interface is a custom one provided by Dell. I think that the toolbar / access bar would be beneficial for people that are new to Ubuntu, or to those that look at it more as a communication tool with a stripped down OS. Personally, it was the first thing that I turned off. To turn it off just go to the Ubuntu menu and click on Switch Desktop Mode.

One thing that was a bit of a surprise was Firefox. If you are the type that uses shortcuts and menus, you won’t find Firefox, by name that is. Go to Applications -> Internet -> Web Browser. So maybe that isn’t such a big deal, but what about bloat and excess? Let me make this clear, I am picky when it comes to preloaded software and apps that lack sane defaults. Firefox comes with Yahoo! set as the homepage, upon opening Firefox for the first time, you get prompted to set your homepage to Yahoo! or leave as is. After getting rid of that, the next thing that you notice is that Firefox has its default search provider set to Yahoo!, a Yahoo! toolbar, and a Yahoo! menu across the top along with the usual File menus. Luckily they did include a remove option at the bottom of the Yahoo! menu.

Initial thoughts complete, more to come.

–Himuraken