A little over 4 months ago I decided to experiment with Mac OS X on my Dell Mini 9 netbook. At the time I was very excited, but would the feeling last? The short answer is: mostly. For the slightly (very slightly) longer answer, keep reading.I should preface this by saying that 4 months ago, this was definitely the way to go as far as a super cheap, portable Mac. The Dell Mini 9 still seems to be ahead of the pack as far as OS X compatibility. It does have some problems though, so I'll run through those in a minute. But first, what I like:
This thing is super easy to carry around. It does everything I need for everyday stuff, as well as a lot of work stuff (I just ssh into remote servers). I love to hook the netbook up to an external monitor (supports 1440x900 at work and up to 2048x1536 theoretically). Of course, it is only a VGA output, so it is a bit blurry, but certainly usable.
To sum it up, I am pleased with my netbook and use it often. I do not regret installing OS X. Now for the downsides:
1.) The Audio
This has been a persistent problem for me. I've installed every third party audio driver I can find, and still nothing works quite right. The most annoying part I've found is that the netbook tends to un-mute itself when you wake it from sleeping. This tends to be embarrassing in class.
2.) The Trackpad
This problem has only started coming up recently. For the last couple weeks, the trackpad has stopped working when coming out of sleep. This is annoying because you have to plug in an external mouse (which I usually don't have), or restart.
3.) The Keyboard
This is a well known problem with the Mini 9. The keyboard is pretty bad. You could always order the slightly improved US-Intl version from Dell for around $20, or you could just get a small, portable USB keyboard with a better feel and layout. The Apple keyboard is great for this.
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