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Gerrie Lim

In a bold move to cut a swath through the onslaught of new notebook PCs, Dell Computer today will launch the newest model in its Latitude notebook line for corporate users.

 The new 233 MHz notebook is called, appropriately, the Latitude CP.

 'The CP stands for Corporate Product - sometimes, you do the obvious,' said Bruce Cooper, Dell's senior group manager of product marketing.

 Dell, which ranks number three in the world (behind Compaq and IBM) as a provider of PCs, already has been selling its corporate-positioned Latitude LM and XPi models, the latter launched in June.

 The company aims its direct order business at the 'individual experienced user, not the individual retail customer'.

 Asia (excluding Japan) accounts for 15 per cent of the overall PC market, but for only 5 per cent of Dell's notebooks, which have been manufactured in Penang, Malaysia, since 1994.

 The Dell Latitude CP is a 233 MHz machine that uses Intel's new Tillamook Pentium processor with MMX technology, which reportedly enhances performance by 26 per cent over current 166 MHz Pentium notebooks.

 IBM and AST have both recently released 233 MHz notebook PCs in the SAR.

 The Latitude CP comes in two screen models: a 13.3-inch (XGA, 1,024 x 768 resolution) weighing six pounds; and a 12.1-inch (SVGA, 800 x 600 resolution) weighing 5.5 pounds.

 Both are 1.5 inches thick, and use NeoMagic 128-bit graphics accelerators and NM2160 video controllers, integrated with 2 MB of EDO memory.

 'This is a major overhaul of our product line,' said Mr Cooper.

 'We've chosen to move on to the newest Intel architecture of the MMX module, to move forward with the latest generation of displays and video controllers, and to move into PCI docking stores, with high-performance PCI out to vast networks.'  With the rapid phasing-out of notebooks these days, Mr Cooper conceded that the decreasing shelf-life of new notebooks had been 'at the heart of the strategic choice we've made. There has been rapid change, and we know that customers have begun to expect change'.

 Dell also said it would try to serve customers better by having two distinctly different types of products.

 'On one end, we move towards customers who value the classic time-to-market/ price/value equation which has built the notebook industry, but it is not the one which we see a good deal of corporate customers moving towards.'  Corporate customers, Mr Cooper contended, wanted a notebook PC that looked, felt, and operated the same even as it became more powerful with each generation.

 'They need a product that can be a corporate standard in the six, nine, 12-month range,' he said. 'That's why we are taking our product line in the direction of a split, with the new Latitude CP and the Inspiron 3000.'  Dell launched its Inspiron 3000 notebook line two weeks ago. Mr Cooper believed the Inspiron 'is for the consumer who's out to find the best value in the marketplace, who's interested in high performance and who is probably an Internet user'.

 The Inspiron comes in two models, the Inspiron 3000 M233XT, which lists for $32,505, and the Inspiron 3000 M200ST, which lists for $27,859.

 It was aimed at the 'small and medium businesses and experienced individual users', said Phil Kelly, Dell's Asian president.



Dell adopts a Latitude attitude with its newest notebook model