It is fairly interesting to actively participate in the beta process as well, using the software as I normally would and submitting detailed bug reports when/if something goes awry.

After adding the beta PPA, I opened Software Settings > Add and Remove Software (KPackageKit), refreshed the update list, selected all updates, and clicked apply. A few minutes later it was installed and I rebooted, but… there was a problem. After logging in, plasma-workspace immediately crashed. I could still bring up the run-command interface and launch a terminal, but this frustratingly blank screen was not what I was hoping for. After trying several reboots and trying to log into KDE recovery mode (to no avail), I launched a terminal and did ’sudo apt-get install dist-upgrade’. It downloaded some more kde-base and kde-workspace packages. I rebooted and… WOO HOO! KDE 4.4 RC desktop!

I still don’t know if some of the packages broke or didn’t install correctly the first time or what, but it is working now, and I am enamored.

Here are some screenshots:

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Update 1: I have so far been unable to get the smooth-tasks plasmoid to not crash the plasma workspace. I am hoping that a fix is on the way soon. I miss my smooth-tasks

Update 2: I installed the KDE development packages through apt-get, including kdebase-workspace-dev and used Mercurial to checkout the latest source code from bitbucket. After building and installing, smooth-tasks works great!

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The custom version of Ubuntu that ships with the Mini 9 is pretty cool. The application launcher bar that Dell provides seems quite handy. I think the general Idea is to provide similar functionality to the Asus Xandros offering. The Dell Ubuntu is quite a bit nicer than Asus’ Xandros though, with really fluid animations and a full gnome desktop just a mouse click away.

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But I digress… My true intentions were to install Mac OS X on this tiny beast and save some right shoulder ache from lugging around that 17″ MacBook Pro.

The first thing I did was purchase a retail copy of the Mac OS X Leopard install DVD from my local Apple Store. The one I got installed 10.5.6. I put the DVD in my MBP and opened Disk Utility.

Next I plugged in my 8GB USB flash drive. I selected this flash drive in disc utility and formated it into two partitions as Mac OS X Extended (Journaled). The first was about 50MB for the DellEFI Bootloader. For the rest, I selected the “Restore” tab and chose the Mac OS X install DVD as the source, and the bigger partition on the flash drive as the destination.

After the restore finished, I used  DellEFIBootMaker to make the first partition bootable with the DellEFI bootloader. I also put a copy of DellEFI 1.2 alpha in the extras folder that was created on the first partition.

With this USB flash drive plugged into the mini, I powered it on and pressed “0″ at the BIOS splash to select the boot device and chose the USB flash drive. The DellEFIBootMaker has a semi-polished GUI. I chose the Mac OS X Install partition on the flash drive and it started an OS X install session just like it were a real Mac.

The install took about 30 or 40 Minutes. At the end, It said that the installation failed, but everything I read said that this was normal and expected. The installation actually succeeded in spite of what the message said.

The last step was to reboot, choose the USB drive again, select the SSD from the DellEFIBootMaker menu, and when OS X loads, run the DellEFI 1.2 application from the extras folder on the flash drive. after this, the Mini will boot straight into OS X like any other Mac.

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Since this is not a Hackintosh modified install disc, I can use software update without any issues.

Here are some action shots of OS X on the Mini 9:

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BTW, I am posting this from the NetBook Pro (my new name for the Mini 9).