Dell Touts Studio Hybrid

July 30, 2008

Dell’s smallest, most personalized and most environmentally responsible consumer PC, the Studio Hybrid has been launched. The PC’s new unique shape and size, personalized with six optional, external jewel-toned color or bamboo sleeves, unleashes stylistic expression, inspiration and fun and looks great in any room.

Studio Hybrid is available in 6 external jewel-toned colors or a bamboo finish.

Dell also unveiled two new Inspiron PCs, including the Inspiron 13, a sleek and stylish sub $800 13-inch laptop perfect for students heading back to school, available starting next week at Wal-Mart. The Inspiron 518 desktop is designed for everyday family multi-media activities, be it catching up on favorite TV shows via the Internet, playing online games, and storing and accessing music playlists and digital images.

“The design and craftsmanship of the Studio Hybrid alone are enough to cause you to do a double take,” Michael Tatelman, vice president, Dell global consumer sales and marketing. “Combine that with the performance of this little beauty and its environmentally smart DNA, and you’ve got something truly unique – something that you can make your own.”

As with Dell’s recently announced Studio laptops, the Studio Hybrid was designed to enhance personal expression and creative living. Dell’s smallest desktop PC, about the size of a collegiate dictionary, can fit just about anywhere. Depending on the location or decor, the Studio Hybrid can be set up in a vertical or horizontal orientation, and be personalized with a choice of seven optional, interchangeable external finishes or color sleeves: Bamboo, Emerald, Quartz, Ruby, Sapphire, Slate, and Topaz.

With a starting price of $499, the petite Hybrid PC has the performance to take on the digitally enlightened user’s everyday activities like creating mash-ups, content for personal web pages, editing and uploading videos and digital photo albums. The Studio Hybrid is at home in the living room, fitting easily into entertainment centers, and connecting to HD TVs via a standard HDMI port. When paired with an optional wireless keyboard, people can easily flip back and forth from watching a favorite broadcast TV show or sporting event to checking online stats, sending email, looking at digital pictures, etc. on the TV. Customers can configure a Studio Hybrid with variety of optional technologies and peripherals to make it truly unique, like:

• Wi-Fi networking – allows people to place the PC anywhere that’s convenient for them.
• Wireless keyboard and mouse help ensure a clean desktop, counter top or coffee table.
• Blu-ray Disc  drive for watching high-definition DVDs.
• TV tuner that enables users to watch, pause and record live TV.
• Multiple flat panel display options, like the Dell’s first 16:9 Full HD LCD monitor, the 24-inch S2409W

“Our goal was to design a desktop that fits in the office or in the living room, or anywhere space is at a premium,” said Michael Scheschuk, Dell desktop product marketing. “We’ve created a desktop PC category that combines style, performance and a high degree of energy efficiency.”

The Dell Studio Hybrid is about 80 percent smaller than the typical desktop minitower, and uses up to 70 percent less energy. In addition to being extremely energy efficient and Energy Star 4.0 compliant, the Studio Hybrid’s unique packaging was designed to be environmentally responsible:

• Reduced packing materials about 30 percent by weight as compared to typical tower desktops.
• Packing materials are also 95 percent recyclable.
• Reduced printed documentation 75 percent by weight on average as compared to typical tower desktops.
• System recycling kit is included.