Dell Mini 9 'œBattery Scandal' is explosively heated BS

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Tuesday, 23 December 2008 12:46

Opinion and Analysis

Well, over at Slashgear once more, “JayatDell” (Dell employee Jay Pinkert) has responded in the comments section to state that:

“The Inspiron Mini 9 is configured with, and has never shipped with anything but, 32WH batteries.

“A third-party test software program being used in the field doesn’t properly program every vendor’s battery to report power (versus current) capabilities, and so the utility is not properly reporting the actual battery capacity.

“We have confirmed this and all packs are 4-cell 32Whr, and will deliver more than 4 hours of battery life in typical usage.”

There are also plenty of details at the MyDellMini website, where a massive thread has popped up going through all the ins and outs of who claimed what, where, when and how.

There are some in the forum who claim to only get 2 to 3 hours from their batteries, but who knows what power saving features they are or aren’t using, etc etc?

A Dell employee called "Anne" made a similar statement in the MyDellMini to Jay Pinkert at Slashgear, which confirms Dell's position on the matter.

My own personal use of the Dell Mini 9 concurs with a 4 hour battery life span, although I’m using the Windows 7 beta and almost always put my notebooks and netbooks to the “power saving” battery settings when they aren’t plugged in, so I haven’t given it anywhere near as thorough a test as some of those you’ll read about at the MyDellMini link above.

So... there you have it. I like the Dell Mini 9, but what I really want to try next is the Dell Mini 12 – especially with the official Windows 7 beta, when it finally comes out!