04-19-2006, 06:16 PM | #1 |
Jack Burton
Join Date: July 19, 2003
Location: an expat living in France
Age: 38
Posts: 5,577
|
My current laptop has started to become quite outdated (especially the only 256 MB RAM and the 32 MB Intel graphics card), and it finally looks as though I have enough money for a new one. I'm not getting a desktop PC, because with studying abroad, carrying something that large is not an option.
I've been looking a lot at Dell PCs recently, and I have found a configuration, which looks pretty interesting for the price, just wanted to ask those here who know PC hardware better than me what they think about it. I need to use the PC for university (studying Computer Sciences, so that means being able to have dual-boot Linux and Windows, and being able to run programs like Visual Studio, MatLab, Delphi, JBuilder, etc...relatively easily) and would also like if it could run at Oblivion at least acceptably. The configuration costs 1.6 k€ and the important specs are: Inspiron 6400 Processor Intel ® Core™ Duo T2500 (2 GHz, 2 MB L2 cache, 667 MHz FSB) Operating System Windows® XP Professionnel , SP2 Memory 1024 Mo (2x512) 533MHz DDR2 SDRAM Graphics Card 256MB ATI® MOBILITY™ RADEON® X1400, PCI-Express x16 Hard drive 100GB (5,400 rpm) Hard Drive Also has integrated Wifi card, DVD+/-RW 8x drive and a 15,4" 1280x800 screen. I do have a few questions though. Is it worth paying 300€ extra to double the RAM? And the other question is about the warranty. The 1.6k price includes a three year warranty. If I choose to only take one year of warranty, then the price becomes only 1.3k, which is quite a difference. Are Dell PCs reliable enough so that reducing the warranty is not too much of a risk? [ 04-19-2006, 06:17 PM: Message edited by: dplax ]
__________________
|
04-19-2006, 06:35 PM | #2 |
40th Level Warrior
|
Personally i think a one year warranty is more than enough, because it doesn't take much longer for me than a year to start thinking about all sorts of upgrades, in which case you mostly forfeit the warranty, but suit yourself.
I do believe an extra 300€ for an additional 1024 MB of RAM is a clear ripoff though. Way too much money for such a basic upgrade.
__________________
|
04-20-2006, 03:09 AM | #3 |
Jack Burton
Join Date: August 24, 2002
Location: Aussie now in the US of A!
Age: 37
Posts: 5,403
|
Don't know if I mentioned this on MSN (was at work) But when it comes to reliability, I have found Dell have one of the best records (I know some people will argue this, but im talking about laptop's not desktop's, thats another argument )
As I mentioned, I have helped heaps of people at work buy laptop's (since I have been working there, about 26) and even conviced my new superintendant (used to work at IBM and was a huge thinkpad fan) to get a Dell, and I have had 0% problems with any of them, I am in charge of all the laptop's at work and have only ever had 2 problems with any of them, one had a dead hard drive.... Because someone dropped it out of a Ute [img]tongue.gif[/img] The other had some faulty RAM. Granted, they were Laditude's and not Inspirons, b ut the differences are not huge. Now for the service....... Some people have had bad experiances, in fact many have, but I deal with them on a daily/weekly bases for repaires and what not, and have never had an issue adn have quite often given positive feedback to their team, but then again, I have never been unfortunant enough to get put onto someone in Bombay. Hope this helps [img]smile.gif[/img] (No I don't work for Dell [img]tongue.gif[/img] ) |
Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | |
Thread Tools | Search this Thread |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Got myself a new laptop! | Memnoch | General Discussion | 9 | 07-22-2005 10:25 PM |
PS2 Through Laptop.... | Lavindathar | General Discussion | 5 | 06-11-2005 11:50 AM |
Laptop help | Dave_the_quack | General Discussion | 12 | 03-16-2005 02:13 PM |
Buying a laptop | Avatar | General Conversation Archives (11/2000 - 01/2005) | 2 | 09-11-2001 12:53 PM |
Anyone want to get rid of a laptop? | Ziroc | General Conversation Archives (11/2000 - 01/2005) | 12 | 06-16-2001 05:26 AM |