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  3. Dell Notebooks - What do you think about them?

Dell Notebooks - What do you think about them?

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  • D Daniel Turini

    We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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    Hans Dietrich
    wrote on last edited by
    #3

    Dell Latitudes are excellent - I have one myself. I have seen several reviews where they rate highest in durability.

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    • R Ravi Bhavnani

      I swear by (not at) Dell. All my home/work desktops and notebooks are Dells and work great. Have also been very happy with their support. The one time I needed it (it was my fault because I was using bad RAM), they shipped me a brand new (Inspiron 8600) notebook within 48 hours. The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. /ravi My new year's resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | Freeware | Music ravib@ravib.com

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      Andy Brummer
      wrote on last edited by
      #4

      The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. It's good to hear that people actually like and use a feature that I put so much work into. :-O


      I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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      • R Ravi Bhavnani

        I swear by (not at) Dell. All my home/work desktops and notebooks are Dells and work great. Have also been very happy with their support. The one time I needed it (it was my fault because I was using bad RAM), they shipped me a brand new (Inspiron 8600) notebook within 48 hours. The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. /ravi My new year's resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | Freeware | Music ravib@ravib.com

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        Daniel Turini
        wrote on last edited by
        #5

        Ravi Bhavnani wrote: The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. Hey, this is a great feature! Thanks for the input! Yes, even I am blogging now!

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        • A Andy Brummer

          The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. It's good to hear that people actually like and use a feature that I put so much work into. :-O


          I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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          Roger Wright
          wrote on last edited by
          #6

          You did that? Nice job!:-D I don't buy computers for my own use; I build them. But when customers ask for a recommendation, it's always Dell. Once upon a time I used Micron exclusively, but they turned flaky on me and Dell saved the day. On the rare occasions when one has to call for help, Dell Support is always responsive - that's a rare thing these days. I can't afford a laptop yet, but when I can, Dell will be the first place I shop. "My kid was Inmate of the Month at Adobe Mountain Juvenile Corrections Center" - Bumper Sticker in Bullhead City

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          • D Daniel Turini

            We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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            Shog9 0
            wrote on last edited by
            #7

            I've been using a Latitude D600 for a little over a month now, and have been quite happy with it. Performance is solid, battery life is long enough that i rarely have to think about it, and it's light enough for me to hold on one extended palm to let someone else read. I had a problem early on with the power supply (beware - Dell changed them with the newest Latitudes, so it's tough to find 3rd-party replacements), but apart from that it's been smooth sailing.
            You**'re one microscopic cog** in his catastrophic plan...

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            • R Roger Wright

              You did that? Nice job!:-D I don't buy computers for my own use; I build them. But when customers ask for a recommendation, it's always Dell. Once upon a time I used Micron exclusively, but they turned flaky on me and Dell saved the day. On the rare occasions when one has to call for help, Dell Support is always responsive - that's a rare thing these days. I can't afford a laptop yet, but when I can, Dell will be the first place I shop. "My kid was Inmate of the Month at Adobe Mountain Juvenile Corrections Center" - Bumper Sticker in Bullhead City

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              Andy Brummer
              wrote on last edited by
              #8

              Thanks!! I worked on some of the eariler versions, they've done a lot since then, but it started with a project to display online service call status directly from the mainframe system. I snuck system configuration into the project and it took off from there. :rolleyes:

              (that was back when the system was called helptech)


              I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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              • D Daniel Turini

                We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                Xybex
                wrote on last edited by
                #9

                We have 7 Dell Inspiron 8600 Notebooks, and have only had 1 incident with one of them, a broken hard drive, but that was a wierd problem all toghether. DELL Support is extreamly efficient, their online services work wonders, and the help desk is great. Hell they even called me back! :omg: The quality of the actual notebooks is very high, all high end components, slick design, and I have to hand it to them, the onboard diagnosic utility is incredibly nice. All and all, on a 1 to 10 scale, as I see it, Dell is a 9.8.

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                • D Daniel Turini

                  We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                  Alvaro Mendez
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #10

                  I've had an old Inspiron 8000 for the past 3 years and I've been mostly happy with it. After 2 months of owning it, the hard drive (IBM 30GB) went bad and I had to request a replacement. They sent it right away and I was on my way. A year later the same thing happened and they sent me another one. Since then I've had no more problems. I will say this though: I expected the performance on this thing to be much better than it was when I got it. It was the top of the line machine at the time (1 Ghz, 256MB RAM) but it didn't feel faster than my brother's 500 Mhz desktop with 128MB of RAM. I think the slow hard drive (4200 RPM) had a lot to do with it. Regards, Alvaro


                  Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we. - George W. Bush

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                  • D Daniel Turini

                    We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                    Jeff Bogan
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #11

                    If price no object, then they are a good choice with a very good integrated world wide tech support. That might be useful for salepeople on the road. I have not heard of any big plusses or minuses on the technical side. ----------------------------- All truth passes through 3 stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

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                    • J Jeff Bogan

                      If price no object, then they are a good choice with a very good integrated world wide tech support. That might be useful for salepeople on the road. I have not heard of any big plusses or minuses on the technical side. ----------------------------- All truth passes through 3 stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

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                      Daniel Turini
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #12

                      Jeff Bogan wrote: If price no object, Believe me, in Brazil Dell makes the cheapest notebooks (ok, there are the el-cheapo ECS and PCChips). Just as a note, they are half the price of a similar Toshiba or a HP/Compaq and 1/3 the price of an IBM. That's why I'm concerned about quality. Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                      • D Daniel Turini

                        Jeff Bogan wrote: If price no object, Believe me, in Brazil Dell makes the cheapest notebooks (ok, there are the el-cheapo ECS and PCChips). Just as a note, they are half the price of a similar Toshiba or a HP/Compaq and 1/3 the price of an IBM. That's why I'm concerned about quality. Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                        Andy Brummer
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #13

                        I'm biased, but any Dell equipment is going to be better or equal quality to it's competition. The whole company is built around extremely efficient factories, which is why they can sell for such a low price. And the lack of inventory really keeps costs down. The downside is that when there is a shortage, usually things like LCD panels and memory, you might end up waiting for your system, so check the lead times before ordering. Also, having worked with Dell tech support, they have a real focus on making every call a first time fix with 0-1 parts replaced. It means that they normally force you to troubleshoot more when there is a problem, but most problems are usually fixed with only one call.


                        I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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                        • D Daniel Turini

                          We're about to buy 3 Dell Latitude 100L (with 512MB RAM) for our sales people, so I wanted to know about horror histories, praises, etc with Dell Notebooks. (ok, lauren, we won't buy a Sony :-D ) Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                          Henry miller
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #14

                          If someone does has a history of destroying laptops, the panasonic toughbook is the only way to go. For most people Dells (IBM, hp, whoever) is good enough. Watch the off brands. True their laptops are made in the same factory in many cases, but there are ways to cut quality on what is otherwise the same model. OTOH, if quality wasn't cut sometimes you can find an off brand that is cheaper if you don't need the support the big names give.

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                          • A Andy Brummer

                            The ability to maintain your system configs online also makes it a breeze to get the right drivers any time down the line. It's good to hear that people actually like and use a feature that I put so much work into. :-O


                            I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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                            R Offline
                            Ravi Bhavnani
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #15

                            Awesome! Makes it easier to direct my bug report: :) The system list often forgets my system descriptions. It's as if this data is stored in a cookie vs. in Dell's database? /ravi My new year's resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | Freeware | Music ravib@ravib.com

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                            • A Alvaro Mendez

                              I've had an old Inspiron 8000 for the past 3 years and I've been mostly happy with it. After 2 months of owning it, the hard drive (IBM 30GB) went bad and I had to request a replacement. They sent it right away and I was on my way. A year later the same thing happened and they sent me another one. Since then I've had no more problems. I will say this though: I expected the performance on this thing to be much better than it was when I got it. It was the top of the line machine at the time (1 Ghz, 256MB RAM) but it didn't feel faster than my brother's 500 Mhz desktop with 128MB of RAM. I think the slow hard drive (4200 RPM) had a lot to do with it. Regards, Alvaro


                              Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we. - George W. Bush

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                              Ravi Bhavnani
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #16

                              Alvaro Mendez wrote: I think the slow hard drive (4200 RPM) had a lot to do with it. I would agree. I forked out a bit more to get a 7200 rpm 60G disk (vs. an 80G disk for less) and am quite happy with the machine's performance. My one regret is the 8600 didn't (doesn't) come in a 1600x1200 config. I really wanted the 1200 pixel height, so I upgraded to the 1920x1200 screen which (while amazingly sharp) can be a little hard to see (old eyes:)). All in all, a great little machine! 5 hours of battery life (developing code, so lot of hard disk access) when connected to an external monitor. /ravi My new year's resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | Freeware | Music ravib@ravib.com

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                              • D Daniel Turini

                                Jeff Bogan wrote: If price no object, Believe me, in Brazil Dell makes the cheapest notebooks (ok, there are the el-cheapo ECS and PCChips). Just as a note, they are half the price of a similar Toshiba or a HP/Compaq and 1/3 the price of an IBM. That's why I'm concerned about quality. Yes, even I am blogging now!

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                                Jeff Bogan
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #17

                                I am going on figures from a couple of years ago, maybe they have changed their marketing strategy. One thing that hasn't changed is that IBM's are always the most expensive.

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                                • R Ravi Bhavnani

                                  Awesome! Makes it easier to direct my bug report: :) The system list often forgets my system descriptions. It's as if this data is stored in a cookie vs. in Dell's database? /ravi My new year's resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | Freeware | Music ravib@ravib.com

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                                  Andy Brummer
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #18

                                  Well, I worked there up until about a 9 months ago. But, at the time if you registered and logged in with your email adderess they would store that information for you, otherwise it was just in a cookie. On top of that, there was seperate registration information for business vs. home users, so you could potentially have 3 different registration settings and switch between them based on the different pages you went to. Anyway, I don't work on any of that stuff anymore, and they've probably made a lot of improvements.


                                  I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon

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