Dell ring the netbook death knell

The age of the netbook is well and truly over, and nothing rings the death knell more loud and clear than when a massive PC manufacturer like Dell announces it’s stepping out of the market sector.

After Dell’s Inspirion Mini line silently fell off the radar, the company have since confirmed that they will no longer be producing the little low-powered laptops.

“Thin and powerful is where it is at for us,” Dell’s marketing director Alison Gardner told The Verge.

Thin and powerful? Like ultrabook thin and powerful?

It looks that way, though Gardner cleverly avoided using the term and all the weight of expectation the new product category brings with it.

Dell’s XPS 14z is the closest thing they’ve built recently to what could be compared to a premium-feeling ultrabook, but would need to slim down even further without compromising on power to really get consumers pulses racing and offer a genuine challenge to Apple’s Air range and the wave of ultrabooks on the way from Samsung and Acer.

We’ll be keeping a close eye on Dell in the coming months to see how they approach this exciting new sector of the PC market. We’d expect to hear a little bit more come CES in Las Vegas this coming January, so check back then for all the news from the show floor.