$600 Notebook Roundup - Crowning the Affordability King
by Anand Lal Shimpi on November 29, 2005 10:38 AM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
Dell's keyboard is a bit more cramped than the competition. You have about an inch less horizontal space on the Inspiron's keyboard than on the Gateway or Compaq keyboards, which can lead to more typing mistakes. For us, it wasn't too hard getting used to it, but we did feel slightly cramped typing on it and preferred the larger Compaq/Gateway keyboards.
Despite the fact that the Inspiron's Celeron M processor doesn't dynamically adjust its clock speed, the notebook itself doesn't get too far beyond warm on its underside. It will keep your lap slightly warm, but it won't burn you or make you uncomfortable after a lot of typing.
Thanks to the faster Celeron 1.5GHz processor (compared to the 1.4GHz CPU used elsewhere), the Inspiron 2200 that we tested managed to outperform all of the other notebooks. Unfortunately, the Inspiron 2200 also boasted the absolute lowest battery life, which is a real problem for anything that claims to be portable. It's the age old trade off of battery life for performance, and in the case of the Inspiron 2200, it's not one that we're willing to make.
Dell's updated B130 model switches over to a 4-cell lithium-ion battery, as opposed to the large 8-cell NiMH battery that's used in the Inspiron 2200. How this affects battery life will remain to be seen. However, it is worth pointing out that all of Dell's competitors use lithium ion batteries, although they are larger 6-cell designs.
Despite the fact that the Inspiron's Celeron M processor doesn't dynamically adjust its clock speed, the notebook itself doesn't get too far beyond warm on its underside. It will keep your lap slightly warm, but it won't burn you or make you uncomfortable after a lot of typing.
Thanks to the faster Celeron 1.5GHz processor (compared to the 1.4GHz CPU used elsewhere), the Inspiron 2200 that we tested managed to outperform all of the other notebooks. Unfortunately, the Inspiron 2200 also boasted the absolute lowest battery life, which is a real problem for anything that claims to be portable. It's the age old trade off of battery life for performance, and in the case of the Inspiron 2200, it's not one that we're willing to make.
Dell's updated B130 model switches over to a 4-cell lithium-ion battery, as opposed to the large 8-cell NiMH battery that's used in the Inspiron 2200. How this affects battery life will remain to be seen. However, it is worth pointing out that all of Dell's competitors use lithium ion batteries, although they are larger 6-cell designs.
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rqle - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
Hmm, didnt know these littler celeron M 1.4ghz can pretty much outpace the new architecture of the sempron 2800+ cpu. interesting.Questar - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
How about an Inspiron 6000? I snagged one for $584 + $19 shipping.Questar - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
BTW, that was with a P-M, not a C-M.bjacobson - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
niceQuestar - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
Yeah, and now I see you can get a 600m for less than $600.Alphafox78 - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
I have a V2000Z with a Turion64 and its great!!! It sounds like the article is biased against compaq or something, the thing is sweet. works great in World of Warcraft and even plays BF2, althouh its not too fun. the form factor is great, I highly recommend it. mine does have the brightview screen, 1GB of PC3200 ram and a 5400rpm drive tho.. ;)SS - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
The point of this was for $600 range laptops, going with the Turion64 setup over the Sempron and upgrading the RAM and hard drive all would push the price well over the price point this review was for.So you are basically asking to rate the $600 laptop based off the $1400 model's preformance.
Alphafox78 - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
I got mine for $760 after tax. then the free buestbuy ram, used the HD from my old laptop. lower than $700 after the free ram and stuff. I didnt get it for $500, missed that offer by a week! arg!Hacp - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
Tell that to the people who got the Turion 64 V2000Zs with wireless/12cell for around 500 shipped taxed. Then add the free 1GB bestbuy ram.Hacp - Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - link
Ya if you can get it for under 450 taxed shipped of course its great :).Also to further my comments, I think this article really shows the strenght of the Intel centrino platform. In other tests with dedicated graphics cards, the Turion/sempron/ and Pentium M come really close in terms of battery life, but in this test, comparing the V2000 to the V2000Z, we see that the whole platform makes the celeron have much battery life, even though the sempron "should" have more Blife.