I know, it was just two weeks ago that I picked on Dell over its uncontrollable lust for sub-branding. No fair going after them again. But hey, I’m just reporting the news here — and yesterday’s press release from Dell got the blood flowing once more.

Besides, this time it’s about naming, so at least I’m not beating the same Dell horse.

Yesterday’s announcement was to unveil a new member of Dell’s E-Family of laptops. They call it the Precision M6500.

I’m sorry, that just hit my funny bone. After re-reading the name M6500 several times, I still couldn’t find an E in there. Why, I wondered, wouldn’t they just call it the E6500 and be done with it? That way, we’d all get our minimum daily requirement of E, and that charming “6500″ moniker would remain intact.

So I went to Dell’s E-Family page for further investigation. Wouldn’t you know it, they already have an E6500 model. Damn. What are the odds of that happening? Rather than create one more E name, I guess they decided this one would be an E in spirit only.

It turns out that several members of Dell’s E-Family have actually blazed this trail before. I see E-models galore — but the E-Family also features the completely E-less XFR, Netbook, X2 Table and XT Tablet. No mention of the new M6500 just yet, but it will fit right in with those other renegade models.

Hats off to the Dell naming wizards for keeping tradition alive, and actively resisting even the appearance of logic. They’ve built a naming structure only a contortionist could love.