I’ve had my Dell Mini 9 netbook for about a year now, and I’m happy to say I’m still using it off and on, though less so due to a certain magical phone.  As of late it’s been a sort of test machine for trying out different operating systems and tinkering.  Jolicloud was my primarly OS on my Mini 9 for a long time, as it was free and well supported. Recently, however, I wanted to try something different, something I don’t have much experience with:  OSX.  Until this weekend the most experience I had with Apple’s operating system was either with the iPhone 3GS or my battered old iPod Video.  Being the curious sort, I wanted to fiddle with it, and as Gizmodo discovered, the Dell Mini 9 is a near-perfect match for OSX, creating a small, lightweight ‘hackintosh’ netbook.

After checking out a few guides and how-tos, I enlisted the help of Phil.  Here’s what I needed to get the job done:

• A computer already running OSX: easier than handling any weirdness or needing an external DVD drive, enterprising techs cobbled together a very helpful program to copy the install DVD to a flash drive
• A Dell Mini 9 (or 10v) you can score the Mini 9 on Dell’s Outlet site refurbished for >$300, look around for one that suits your needs.  The Mini 10v is a slightly larger model with a few more bells and whistles and a crisper screen.

  

• flash drive (~8GB): needs to have a decent capacity to handle all the data being moved over to it

  

• A retail copy of OSX: It’s only $30 and you might as well support Apple, it will at least ease some of the guilt for breaking/bending the EULA

  

• Optional (but recommended): 2GB of RAM for the Mini 9, a 8-cell battery, as well as at least a 16GB HD, though bigger is better.  I’ve got a 64GB SSD installed in mine and it set me back ~$200. They’re even cheaper these days.

The install was fairly painless.  The Netbook BootMaker app made the process as easy as clicking and dragging the disk image to the app, pointing it to the flash drive, and waiting. Twenty minutes later the flash drive had OSX on it, ready to pop into my Mini 9.  After a reformat and partition-creation process the install took about an hour or so; thankfully I remembered to bring my power cord, as the stock battery on the Mini 9 isn’t working so hot these days. Boot time is about the same as Jolicloud or Windows XP, around a minute, which isn’t terrible, and I can run multiple apps simultaneously without any slowdown.
After a few more steps I had OSX installed on my Mini 9.  It’s been an interesting experience so far.  I really, really like the unified aesthetic of both the system apps as well as the third-party programs I’ve installed.  If I had one gripe it would be about the keyboard of the Mini 9.

The keyboard, to put it bluntly, is only for dainty-fingered folk such as myself, with a lilliputian layout and some odd descions as to where to put the quotation key, as well as a tiny Alt key, and miniature Shift keys.  As such using some keyboard shortcuts like CMD+C and CMD+V take some getting used to.

Alt-Tabbing doesn’t work the same as Windows, which takes some getting used to.  If an app is taking up the full screen and you Alt-Tab to another, it won’t necessarily bring it’s windows into focus.  I suppose it makes sense from one perspective, perhaps if you needed to pull information or content from the first app into the second, but it’s still a bit odd.  The Exposé corners helps to alleviate this, though.  Each corner of the screen acts as a hotspot for different Exposé actions, like displaying all open windows, hiding all and displaying the desktop as well as a few other features.
So, for under the same price as an iPad you get a fully functional version of OSX Snow Leopard in a solid, portable device.  Who says netbooks aren’t good at anything?

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Ubuntu 9.04 was offcially released last week.  I’d been running the beta for a week or so prior, and so far it hasn’t disappointed.  The new features aren’t anything to write home about, but one thing I’ve noticed is the boot-time has dropped from 45 seconds to about 20.  I was able to upgrade the BIOS as well, adding a few features missing from the Mini, namely F11 and F12 key functionality and improved power management.  The new notification system is. . .an interesting choice.  Notifications pop up in the right corner to notify you of various things, such as Volume, Brightness, new Pidgin messages, etc.  When you mouse over one of those, it turns transparent, so you can see what’s below them.  Clicking the notification doesn’t do anything; many people believe it should bring the subject of the notification into focus, myself inlcuded.  I’m really looking forward to Octobers [Ubuntu has a 6-month development cycle] release of Karmic Koala, which claims to be very netbook-friendly, with even faster boot times.  In addition, my Runcore 64GB SSD shipped and should arrive on Wednesday; looking forward to the increased space.  May even hackintosh it, as I have very little experience with Macs and it would be fun to learn another operating system.

In other computer-related news, I recently purchased the Fallout Collection from Good Old Games, an online distributor of old or out of publication games.  DRM-Free and packed with bonus extras, GOG.com manages to keep the price low and permits me to do whatever I want with the game; no tracking down patches, no dubious hacks to get it running.  A simple install and it’s up and running.  Fallout is a game I’ve been meaning to play with earnest for years now, but never sat down long enough to get into it.  The groundbreaking post-apocalyptic tale that set the standard for many post-apocalypses to come has an antiquated charm about it.  The controls are clunky and a bit obtuse, the inventory system is atrocious; and yet, I find myself enamored with the dilemma of choosing between carring that extra few clips of ammo or that spare shotgun.  Combat is slow going and enemy and ally AI aren’t the sharpest shivs on the cellblock, as likely to hit friendly targets as they are foes.  Altogether, though, the game is fun in spite of it’s dated controls and graphics.  Nothing is more satisfying that targeting an enemy’s eyes and blowing them to gooey, bloody chunks with a burst of semiautomatic pistol fire.