Laptop, Whaddayah think

[samcross]

ello',
I want to get a laptop for general home use, surfing the net, word processing etc.
I'm looking at the Dell Inspiron 15.4", just wondered what everyone though off the spec etc.

BASE Intel® Pentium Dual Core Processor T2370 (1.73Ghz, 533 MHz FSB, 1 MB L2 cache)
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium SP1 - English
HARDWARE SUPPORT 1 Year Base Warranty
COLOUR CHOICE Midnight Blue Colour with Microsatin Finish
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA+ (1440 x 900) Display with TrueLife™
MEMORY 2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x1024]
HARD DRIVE 160GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive edit
GRAPHICS CARD Integrated Intel® Graphic Media Accelerator X3100
MOUSE Logitech V220 Cordless Notebook Mouse - Ergonomic design, soft rubber grips & snap-on mini-receiver
OPTICAL DRIVE 8x DVD+/-RW Optical drive, including SW
PRIMARY BATTERY 6-cell battery
WIRELESS CONNECTIVITY Dell™ Wireless 1490 802.11a/b/g Mini-Card - Europe - Pentium Dual Core Only

Thanks in advance

[AdvWar]

Its generally good, although the processor is a little on the weak side. Wouldn't really want to spend any more than £300 on it.

[staffsMike]

I'm assuming that is about £370.. maybe £400.

You get better deals with vostro's found here (just use the tabs to get to 1510)
http://www.dmxdimension.com/dell-uk/...al-comparison/

But I would be inclined to get the studio 15 and probably buy the £600 one on offer right now.

Hear me out though it's not as crazy as it sounds.

For £350 - £400 you get something like you have specced.

For £450 you would get the basic pentium dual core, HD3450 graphics Studio 15.

For £600 you get the the slightly better C2D 1.8 chip, 3GB of RAM and better HDD etc..

But you also get the HD3450 again and a blu ray player. Now since the studio 15 will run nice and quietly sat under your TV and has a HDMI out (audio and video).. you get a nice little HD setup thrown in

That is what I would do anyway since blu ray players are still very expensive, even if you get a PS3 or build a cheapy HTPC.

[Mithrandir]

Dell Inspiron 1720 Laptop for the Home and Office
Product code: 136908


£399 (theres a 5% off voucher going around)

- Intel Pentium Dual Core Processor T2390 (1.86 GHz, 533MHz FSB, 1 MB Cache)
- Genuine Windows Vista (R) Home Premium
- 2 GB Memory
- 120 GB Hard Drive
- 17" TrueLife Widescreen display
- NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS graphics card
- 256MB dedicated graphics memory
- Wireless Enabled
- Webcam
- Silver, Black lid colour

[staffsMike]

Not a bad deal that. If you can live with the bulk which, I guess you can if it's in the house

[mercyground]

GRAPHICS CARD Integrated Intel® Graphic Media Accelerator X3100 - Bit weak if u ever want to play games/Blueray on it.
BASE Intel® Pentium Dual Core Processor T2370 (1.73Ghz, 533 MHz FSB, 1 MB L2 cache) - Thats not a Core 2 Duo... is that the P4 duallie? <me scratches head> I get lost with all Intel chip revisions.

I'd personally use XP on it rather than Vista. See if you can upset them into giving u XP rather than Vista. Dont let them force you into buying an XP upgrade. They should provide you with an XP key under downgrade licence agreement. Snarf a XP SP3 image of a torrent if they wont send you a CD. Yes i know torrents bad but i have been told by MS that they just want you to have a valid licence. They dont care where you get the media from. (I'm still peeved with them that I had to grab my new builds from torrents because MSDN couldnt get their act together and release them properly.)

[samcross]

Cheers for all the help guys,
@ staffs mike:
I'm tempted by the blu ray idea, I've got a HDTV so it would be nice, but the DVD upscaler on my 360 makes DVD's look so good I'm not sure its really worth it. If I ever do want a blu ray player, I'll just get a dedicated one.

@ Mithrandir:
I won't get a 17" because the battery life is never as good and I will still want to use the lappy for stuff like DVD's on train/plane journeys etc. I do have a desktop PC with a pretty big monitor anyways so the extra screen size isn't really worth it.

Revised spec:
Studio with:

BASE Intel&#174; Core™ 2 Duo Processor T5550 (1.83 GHz, 667 MHz FSB, 2 MB L2 Cache)
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista&#174; Home Premium SP1- English
HARDWARE SUPPORT 1 Year Base Warranty
COLOUR CHOICE Jet Black Colour with Matte Finish
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display with TrueLife™
WEBCAM 2.0 Mega pixel Integrated Web Camera - CCFL
MEMORY 2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x1024]
HARD DRIVE 160GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive
GRAPHICS CARD 256MB ATI Mobility RADEON HD 3450
OPTICAL DRIVE Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Slot Load Drive including Software
PRIMARY BATTERY Primary 6-cell 56 WHr Lithium Ion battery
WIRELESS CONNECTIVITY Dell Wireless 1397 Mini Card (802.11 b/g)

Come to 458.69 with a wireless mouse

I'm very tempted to upgrade the screen to the 1440x900 one though.

[staffsMike]

The 1440 x 900 being LED is lovely, my dell LED is gorgeous compared to the CCFL. This is an XPS M1330 though. It's an expensive upgrade though that is for sure.

Deffinatly give dell a call though, it's not the best time of year to be haggling with them to be honest but it's always worth a shot.

Well the best thing about that laptop is, it can effectively still become a blu ray player. You will just need to upgrade it yourself later if the idea tempts you

[samcross]

The 1440 x 900 being LED is lovely, my dell LED is gorgeous compared to the CCFL. This is an XPS M1330 though. It's an expensive upgrade though that is for sure.

Deffinatly give dell a call though, it's not the best time of year to be haggling with them to be honest but it's always worth a shot.

Well the best thing about that laptop is, it can effectively still become a blu ray player. You will just need to upgrade it yourself later if the idea tempts you

If its worth upgrading to the 1440x900 screen I will. I had a look at the 1280x800 in PC world yesterday and I didn't like having such a low resolution. How much money do you reckon you can get off by haggling??

[staffsMike]

This time of year or a laptop that price.. 5 - 10&#37; depending how good you are at it.

Don't expect much though. If you use or sign up to quidco you would save a bit too.

1280 x 800 is a little low on a 15" screen, 1440 x 900 is pretty much the perfect res, also being LED you save a little on battery. It's a shame they don't offer a CCFL 1440 x 900 really since it is a big jump in price to the LED.

[samcross]

£90 for the XLED screen
Thats nudging me back to the inspiron as you can have a regular 1440x900 screen for £30
So many choices