Hands-on with Superslim Dell Adamo, What the Voodoo Envy Should Have Been

Today Dell gave the world a sneak peek of one of the sweetest looking ultraportables we've ever seen. We won't bother calling it a MacBook Air killer, but the Adamo (pronounced Ah-dom-o) is certainly a sexier and sturdier notebook than the flawed Voodoo Envy. Dell was kind enough to let us take some photos and shoot a quick video. Our first impressions? The Adamo is drop-dead gorgeous and yet it feels quite durable. It's made of aircraft grade aluminum and weighs about 3.9 pounds. We didn't get the exact dimensions but it certainly looks under an inch thin.

Dell will offer two versions of this fashionable ultraportable, one black and one white and silver. We really dig the latter, and not because it more closely resembles the MacBook Air. It's because it better shows off the chemically etched design pattern you can see on back of the system. Other cool touches include a smooth trackpad with a spun metal look and a backlit keyboard. with a futuristic font (shades of the Voodoo Envy). Even the fan holes in the back, punched out squares, look modern. Interestingly, this is one of the first Dell notebooks that won't have a battery you can easily swap or replace. The lithium polymer battery is beneath the flat back panel. Dell is targeting around five hours of battery life. The Adamo will feature mobile broadband connectivity, unlike the MacBook Air and Voodoo Envy. All of the ports on the Adamo are crammed in the back to keep the notebook thin, including two USB, eSATA, and DisplayPort. Dell will

sell adapters for other types of video-out connections. That's it, though we wouldn't expect an optical drive with this kind of form factor. Dell couldn't tell us anything about the specs of the Adamo, so we can't share any info about processor, memory, storage, graphics, etc. We'll have to wait until later this year when the Adamo is released. Overall, we think the Adamo is a strong design statement for Dell. It looks and feels like a Halo product. Check out the gallery and video and let us know what you think in the coments. [flq:909851de72c99b871ed16b8955b366ab]

Mark Spoonauer
Editor-in-Chief
Responsible for the editorial vision for Laptopmag.com, Mark Spoonauer has been Editor in Chief of LAPTOP since 2003 and has covered technology for nearly 15 years. Mark speaks at key tech industry events and makes regular media appearances on CNBC, Fox and CNN. Mark was previously reviews editor at Mobile Computing, and his work has appeared in Wired, Popular Science and Inc.