Dell Laptops
 

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Although I don't have any experience with either model you are looking at I will say that you should somewhere else than Dell. At least make sure you get an extended warranty.

I've had two Dell laptops and I'll never purchase another from them. I've had functional problems with the screens on both (as in the screen going black when I open and close the top) and I've had serious hardware issues with both as well.

I would also strongly urge you to look into something other than a Dell. I've owned one and it was a disaster...I would never consider buying another one.

I concur. Dell laptops are good for about a year. Then the warranty runs out and they start to fall apart. I have an Inspiron 5160 that I got last October. It tends to overheat like crazy to the point that my fingers get hot just typing. Another word of advice, if you are planning on getting an Inspiron: they have a lot of storage space and memory because they're meant to be entertainment computers. However, they are really heavy. If you're looking for a laptop that you will be carrying around a lot, then an Inspiron is not your best bet.

I have had nothing but wonderful experiences with Dell. I am the only one in my family with something other than a Dell laptop and the network we run at work is 100% Dell.

It is my understanding that the dual core processors are really for gaming and that for your uses they are more computer than you need. That being said, the techies I hang out with LOVE the dual core processor and it isn't a huge step up in price.

Have fun and happy shopping!

I work in IT and everyone tells me that what really matters these days is the service. Dell doesn't make whats inside their computers any more than HP does. They're really just middlemen. But Dell's service is supposed to be the best overall.

/trusting my co-workers, and my experience, and buying a Dell

My first laptop was a Dell Inspiron 8200 and was an absolute excelent Computer, my only reason for upgrading is i handed it over to my younger sister as she needed a new PC..

I now have a HP compaq NX7010 Centrino procesor and i can honestly say this machine out does the Dell in quality. Im also a Network Administrator so I have heaps of experiance in alot of new machines.. All the Dell machines i have delt with have been good on the hardware side so my choice would be either a Dell or HP..

As for what specs it will need to be from what you say you intend on using it for then a celeron would be more than suitable for your needs.. Although like said the price differance isnt all that much, well here in Aus anyway..

Good luck with it all..

Yiannis

[QUOTE=damasa] I've had functional problems with the screens on both (as in the screen going black when I open and close the top) .[/QUOTE


Is this not a reg. feature of most laptops? I just bought a brand new GQ laptop, and mine does this whenever i close it- actually, not only does mine do it, but both of the laptops my family uses do it as well (diff brands), so i always assumed it was supposed to do that!

[QUOTE=pinkiebell1001]Ha Ha, so much funny.

That's not what I meant to say. What I was trying to say was that when I would adjust the top of laptop up or down, the screen would go blank and I would have to restart the computer in order for the screen to power up again. It had nothing to do with my power settings. And on one of them the screen would black out when I closed the laptop and it wouldn't power back on when I reopened it, thus having to restart it as well.

The second one got so bad that at some points when the screen blacked out the hard drive would also crash.

I didn't have any problems with my Dell until it just DIED. And it was less than 2 years old.

I love love love my Toshiba. It feels better made than the Dell and (knock on wood) no issues with it so far.

I believe it was the Celeron that my dad (who builds computers) told me to avoid. He always tells his clients to avoid Dell. Do either of those computers come with an AMD Athalon processor? Mine's been great.

My first laptop was an HP and it ran for about 5 years before I ended up needing a new harddrive. I passed that one along to my husband and got a Compaq. I know it's the same company as HP, but my HP had better options and was more functional. The next one I get will definitely be another HP. Their customer service is excellent and it ran like a charm.

I'd avoid Toshiba, too. I had a few from them that would end up just dying in the middle of writing a paper (while plugged in). I made Circuit City take them back. After that happened a few times, I got the HP, and I was much happier.

The differance between the celeron and the centrino(pentium M) is the cache, and the other is the bus speed..

A centrino will always outperform a celeron in all aspects but the main part were it will dominate will be when doing things like Graphic rendering, or applying a codec to a video file(data compresion).. Basicly when the CPU has to use its mathcoprocessor and do mathamatical calculations the Pentium M is more powerfull.

When using a PC as a web browser, email and basic wordproccesing a celeron is more then capable.. Celerons can even do the harder jobs but just not as quick..

When the celerons were first released they didnt have a Level 2 cache at all, this made them very cheap and very useless. Nower days celerons have both levels of cache but not as much nor as fast as a pentium M..So IMHO celerons dont need to be avoided anymore..

Yiannis

I had a Dell laptop that belonged to a previous company, and had a fair amount of trouble with it. Most seemed to be heat related.

For whatever it's worth.