Dell Wants to Compete with Apple's MacBook Air

It’s been almost one month since the Round Rock-based systems maker, Dell, announced its latest lineup of Latitude laptops, designed for business users. Even back then, the company prided itself on releasing the lightest commercial notebook in the company's history, the E4200. This is a 12.1-inch notebook that has a starting weight of only 2.2 pounds, making it ideal for business users who require a high-end, ultra-portable system.

 

The E4200 has been designed to support Intel's Core 2 Duo Ultra Low Voltage processors, and is based on the GS45 Express chipset. Built with a Magnesium Alloy LCD back and base, it has several extra connectivity features, compared with Apple's MacBook Air.

 

Because of them, it becomes pretty clear that Dell's ultra-portable E4200 has some unexploited marketing potential. Apparently, the company felt left out when many major portable systems manufacturers had their own products go against Apple's “light-as-air” MacBook Air. This is where the new E4200 fits in just perfectly, namely as a new competitor for the highly mediated MacBook Air, which was released in early 2008.

 

This goes to explain why the Round Rock system maker has decided to launch its own “envelope video” featuring the Latitude E4200. In the very words used by the company to promote it, “The Latitude E4200 fits in an envelope too... with room to spare.”

 

The video, uploaded on the company's direct2dell blog page, shows a Latitude E4200 notebook that can easily fit into an envelope, pretty much the same way as Apple's MacBook Air. In addition, in the video, the E4200 is placed on a MacBook Air, to demonstrate that Dell’s notebook comes in a smaller form factor. The video message is simple, “More Substance, Less Air.”

 

Ever since Dell first announced the new Latitude E4200, it was somewhat to be expected that the Round Rock systems vendor would try to compete with Apple in some way. However, perhaps some of us were waiting for a more original approach, especially since Lenovo used the same envelope video to show off the design features of its X300 notebook.

Here is the video: