Dell Computer on Monday released a new consumer notebook with middle-of-the-road features and a low-end price.

Dell comes near the magical "$999" mark with its new Inspiron 2500, which starts at $1,049. Meanwhile, Hewlett-Packard on Monday unveiled new Pavilion n5300 notebooks that offer better features than the Inspiron 2500, such as a slightly faster processor and a DVD drive. However, its price tag starts at $1,299. In what might shape up to become the battle of the cheap notebooks--among Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Toshiba--Dell is using price to attract consumers who might not have purchased a notebook before. At $1,049, Dell's Inspiron 2500 offers a 700MHz Intel mobile Celeron chip, a 12.1-inch active-matrix display, 64MB RAM memory, a 5GB hard drive and a CD-ROM drive. The notebook, in addition, includes six free months of America Online or one free year of MSN Internet access, ostensibly saving the consumer another $130 to $260. Despite its smaller screen size, the Dell notebook offers a number of features that have not typically been available on rock-bottom priced notebooks. The screen, for example, is active matrix as opposed to many previous $1,000 notebooks, which shipped only with dual-scan displays. An active-matrix display is considered better than a dual-scan one because it is brighter, is easier to view at side angles and minimizes the so-called ghosting effect when the cursor moves across the screen. Similarly, the Inspiron 2500 includes 64MB of RAM and a lithium-ion battery, whereas low-cost models in the past provided only 32MB and nickel metal hydride batteries. Lithium-ion batteries can store more energy than their nickel metal hydride counterparts and thus last longer.