Frankfurt  - Dell has released two new laptops from the nascent ULV class. The 13z and 15z are members of the Inspiron series and cost 550 and 580 dollars respectively. ULV stands for Ultra Low Voltage and refers to processors designed to work at lower voltages and use less power.

In the case of the new Dell laptops, that translates into respective battery lives of 11 hours (13z with a 13.3 inch monitor) and 10 hours (15z with 15.6 inch monitor).

ULV processors do not require heavy cooling, which translates into small fans and flatter devices. The 13z is no more than 26.4 millimetres thick, while its brother the 15z measures only 29.2 millimetres.

In both cases, customers can choose between the Intel Pentium Dual-Core and Intel Core-2 Duo processor. The displays provide resolutions of up to 1366 x 768 pixels, with hard drives of up to 320 gigabytes (GB) and 6 GM of RAM. Both laptops come with WLAN and a
1.3 megapixel webcam as standard features. (dpa)