It seems everyone is thinning out their product offerings -
following in ASUS footsteps to keep the 7 and 10+ inch models only.

It'd be a shame if Dell is abandoning the 9 rather than, say, just clearing out Diamondville stock for Silverthorne; I just got my 9 this week and think it's nearly perfect (perfectly readable for software development, although the keyboard isn't optimal) and surprisingly fast (Visual Studio 2008 launches under Windows 7 in under 1 second, and the entire thing boots in about 15 seconds.

As soon as you put in a larger drive, web cam, etc... quickly builds up close to $400 and that's not including the $25 needed for 2GB of ram.
But I guess that's in the techies nature to try to upgrade. Base price is $199 but in order to get something nice it's still gonna cost a bit. If only I could just work with base :(

They are likely blowing out the disastrous mini 9 to try and start over with the mini 10(also doomed if it's 1gb cap isn't changed). I doubt the worst of them all (the mini 12, 1gb cap, atom processor, 700+$ with decent battery running vista??! ) will last that long either!

This is why Dell is slowly going out of business! The only people picking up Dell netbooks are the die-hard Dell fanbase. They've misfired badly on all of these.

They're promising 2GB RAM for the Mini 10, "Coming Soon," but you might overlook it, since it's listed under "More Storage" :)

Also they'e hyping 2GB of free extra internet storage, beyond the 160GB hard drive. At first I was baffled as to why anyone would want this, then I decided maybe to store stuff you would want if your netbook was stolen or crashed.

Yes, I did see that, which is fine....WHEN it's out! "Coming soon", has proven to be a very loose term with Dell, though how the heck hard can it be to put 2gb in a laptop??? C'mon now! It's only available in almost every other netbook...

So yes, when they provide a 2gb model, or make models that are user expandable, that criticism will be addressed. Right now, nobody should buy a fixed 1gb netbook! Not with all the other manufacturers out there!

The free internet storage has been offered with the mini 9 since the beginning. I am pretty sure this is just the result of a deal they made with the net storage supplier. 2gb is not really something I think about or consider worthwhile at all, I heard you can sign up for 1gb free from the same source! Originally, it may have been to help supplement the small ssd drives, but it just doesn't seem very useful to me.
1.you can get some free storage
2.you need net access to get it
3.it's only 2gb
4.it's slow to access by net...much better off with simple usb drive, memory card
5.could only be useful for emergency small file backup that you are willing to put on net....but then again, use a free service or just email yourself!

Well anyways, too many little drawbacks to the Dell netbooks when the market is this competitive! Took forever to get mini 9 out, missed back to school crowd, false/teaser release dates and then they drop function keys on the claim it makes other keys bigger??? WHY?! To save VERTICAL space???? Ridiculous! Then on the horizontal, they didn't even use the whole space! Ugh.

"the disastrous mini 9"

I have owned a "disastrous" Mini 9 since October, and--with the exception of the inconvenient keyboard issue--it is a wonderful machine. It is fast, reliable, beautifully designed, and has great graphics. I suppose if I pay enough attention, I'll come across the "disastrous" part.