Cheap Dell Laptops

[islandguy999]

Looking at buying a baseline Dell Laptop and can't find alot of info on Mobile Processors.

Seems I can either get a Vostro 1000 with a sempron 3500+, and 2 gigs of ram.
Or a Inspiron 1501 with an Athlon X-2 TK55 and 1 gig of ram. Both go for about the same price.

I'm under the impression neither of these processors r great, but how much better is a TK versus a Sempron? Supposably Semprons eat battery power. and I doubt the TK line up is much better. The price jumps drastically past these processors though.

Any info much appreciated.

Also, any downside to going Vostro over Inspiron? Apparently they are the same cept for colour, but dunno if Vostro comes with windows disks?

[Steve R Jones]

The Athlon is Dual Core and would be a much better CPU then the Sempron. The AMD Sempron is the low budget cpu like Intel's Celeron.

[MD1032]

You can always add RAM later (which you probably will, and might just be better off upgrading to 2 gigs, or at least one stick of 1 gig, now seeing as how you'll be running Vista), but CPU's aren't easily or cheaply replaceable in laptops.

[carl33p]

The Vostro line has deals all the time. I would go for a Core 2 Duo.
Something like this.

keep checking back here for laptop deals.

[EXreaction]

How much are you looking to spend?

[islandguy999]

Well Dell currently has laptops loaded with XP, which is what I want. Not interested in Vista at all atm. Could spend alot, but have chosen to spend very little, lol. It's really only the baseline notebooks with xp anyways, and choices are pretty hindered as to the specs it seems.

It is really only for Word Processing and probably a little surfing, but my desktop is my main comp for everything else. I'm just afraid of getting frustrated with a horribly slow Sempron. Though the TK- line of dual cores are gimped versions of the TL line anyways aren't they? Like a new age Sempron anyhow?

The prices are a bit different for Dell.ca, the only difference being they're worse, so I don't get a hell of alot of options for $600 or less. The sempron with a gig of ram being only $500.

[nemowolf]

something else you have to consider is the casing of the laptop. If you look at the info on the Vostro line of laptops, they are designed resilience and durability. This is a business line not a consumer line of laptops. You will find better materials and harder plastics. As you noted, at around the same price you get far less processor because everything else is business class.

The inspirion is designed to be a mass market, college kid style, laptop and not intended for business use. If you want more bang for your buck, keep an eye on their deals like carl said and you might be surprised.

Im only guessing but the prices in .ca would reflect the canadian dollar and not the US price. You should really be ordering from them anyways or else its international shipping from the US to CA and thats going to hurt far worse then the price jumps.



Lastly, since you said you have a budget for much more of a laptop i would really reconsider what your spending your money on. Spending 600 bucks now means your getting the lowest end of the totem pole for two to three year backdated technology. If you dont care about it to much, then do it, but expect that your going to be dissatisfied in your purchase within a year or two. Spending more means your getting more and you will be happier because it will last longer and you will be far less likey to see it take its aging effect.

If you want a solid laptop, you really should be looking at spending closer to 1k to get a decent processor and such.

[islandguy999]

Well I was wrong about the prices on dell.com being better then dell.ca, I looked into that after I mentioned it. Dell.ca is at par or better, probably because of the CDN dollar I suppose.

There are sales atm, and ya, still considering spending more. It always seems in the computer world a person spends a little more, a little more, till they spent alot more and in the end are they satisfied? For perhaps six months longer in the end. Heh. Not many peeps can keep up to that race. Need vs greed I find now, the options are endless, and so are the price possibilities.

The sempron is about 1.8ghz single core with a 512 cache, and the TK-55 is about 1.8 ghz dual core with a 512 cache. Wasn't sure if there would be a big difference here in the end? The TL- processors are the dual core 1024mb cache processors, the TK line being a halved version, and imo the new sempron line-up. The intel dual core proc's are of course the best atm, but sickly priced and not even available in the xp line-up.

If I spent more it would mean bumping up to Vista, and building a better comp just to run it properly. VS a modest machine that can handle xp alot easier. In the end I dunno if either would run any better then the other.

edit- btw- from what I have read the inspiron vs Vostro difference is mainly the colour, and also a lack of added junkware on the Vostro line. The Vostro 1000 is the inspiron 1501, exactly, but black. It's the latitude and precisions that are built more sturdy I believe.

[nemowolf]

http://www.dell.com/content/products...=04&l=en&s=bsd

Sealed keyboards and Dell's exclusive StrikeZoneTM hard drive protection?

Vostro, Latitude and Dell Precision
VostroTM , LatitudeTM and Dell PrecisionTM notebooks (except Vostro 1000 and Latitude D520) have sealed keyboards to help protect from dust and spills. Dell’s patented StrikeZoneTM technology helps protect your hard drive from drops.

XPS
XPSTM M1330 and M1710 have sealed keyboards to help protect from dust and spills. Dell’s patented StrikeZoneTM technology helps protect your hard drive from drops.
Full Magnesium-alloy construction for twice the rigidity of plastic?

Vostro, Latitude and Dell Precision
VostroTM , LatitudeTM and Dell PrecisionTM notebooks (except Vostro 1000 and Latitude D520) feature full-magnesium alloy construction for lighter-weight notebooks with twice the rigidity of plastic.




The two highlights.

[islandguy999]

Well if that holds true for the Vostro 1500 I may go for one of those then. Price starts at $750 atm on sale, with an Intel core 2 duo 5470. Faster ram, and about the best laptop they offer with xp still I think. Also has external media controls which are a bonus imo.

TY for the info, definately a selling feature with 2 crazy kids running around.