Dell's answer to Apple's Mac mini - The Inspiron Zino HD

It seems to be no secret that Dell is slowly taking on Apple. First we saw the Adamo XPS, Dell's take on the MacBook Air, and now we see a Mac mini clone - The Inspiron Zino HD.

Check out the Zino HD gallery

The Zino HD is an interesting machine because Dell has managed to cram a lot of power into the Mac mini-esque 7.8 inch by 7.8 inch footprint of the system. Buyers can choose from a selection of single and dual core AMD energy-efficient CPUs, as opposed to the Intel dual-core parts used in the Mac mini by Apple.

Buyers can also choose between 2GB and 8GB of DDR2 RAM, hard drives ranging in size from 160GB to 1TB and graphics powered by either an ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3200 or 4330 GPUs. Also available is a Blu-ray drive. On the back of the Zino HD are two eSATA ports and an HDMI port.

For the energy-conscious shopper, the Zino HD meets Energy Star 5.0 Standards.

Another feature that differentiates the Zino HD from the Mac mini is the design. While the Mac mini only comes in white, the Zino comes in a range of ten designs, none of which are white.

Prices start at $299. The fully-loaded price (dual-core Athlon Neo X2 6850e 1.8GHz, 8GB RAM, 1TB hard disk, Blu-ray drive, Radeon HD 4330 GPU and 802.11 b/g/n WiFi) pushes the price up to $959.