Latitude D410

WexCan

Ok, shameful part about this is I'm asking about a lappy that I support every day. But, hear me out

Does anyone have the D410? Any opinions? Anyone with the X1 who wants to defend their corner of the Dell "ultraportables"? Thinking of getting the D410 and I know what it's like from a reliability and "solidness" point of view - mainly looking for what ye all think of the looks/size/mobility/etc etc.

Cal

Yup. The D410 is a great unit.

Nothing much I can say against it except the screen has a little more of a 'matt' effect than I care for. It has a good battery life and a very good wifi signal but I would recommend going for the 2195 wireless card. It seems to be a tad less troublesome than the 2200. If an internal CD/DVD is of importance then go for the X1 but a copy of Alcohol 120% and bunch of iso's does the job for me. I prefer the processing power over the internal CD.

I was between the Dell and the Viao but the 3 year next day warranty did it for me.

Also don't buy online, ring them and look for a better price. I saved €200:D

Cal.

WexCan

I work for them Got a quote for €1100 which I'm happy enough with.

DVD is no problem for me, you get the D-Bay attachment with DVD as standard so I'll have that at home. It's really for net and lazing around the house, old lappy is losing its appeal and will probably end up as a linux box to tempt me to actually get to grips with linux.

sceptre

Cal wrote:

If an internal CD/DVD is of importance then go for the X1

You're thinking of the XPS. The X1 is the tiny 1.1kilo carry-it-with-three-fingers machine with no internal optical drive.

As for the D410, it can run a bit hot. Unless that's been sorted out with the newer mainboard revisions, which I haven't seen, though I suspect it hasn't made any difference. From a heat point of view at least the battery is at the front of the unit which helps a bit - there will be quite a bit of heat everywhere else on the underside of the machine so you won't be doing anything too taxing while resting it on your bare knees.

No firewire - it was on the D400, it's on the X1, not on the D410, no SD slot, again available on pretty much all the inspirons and the X1 but not on the D410 or any of the other latitudes. The D410 does have infra red though which the X1 lacks.

Speedwise it whips the X1 - the X1's designed to be as portable as possible and the 1.1GHz ULV processor just isn't up to par with the higher processor speeds of the regular P-Ms in the D410. Having said that, for MS Office use it doesn't matter a damn anyway.

Obviously supporting the things (so I'll mention the list for anyone else), you'll be aware that the X1 screen is widescreen while that of the D410 has a regular 4:3 display (which I'd tend to prefer on an ultraportable anyway), the D410 can take up to 2GB of memory while the X1 is limited to 1.25.

Personally I reckon I still like the X1 though but that's me.

Cal

sceptre wrote:

You're thinking of the XPS. The X1 is the tiny 1.1kilo carry-it-with-three-fingers machine with no internal optical drive.

No I'm actually confusing myself with the Viao's.

sceptre wrote:

so you won't be doing anything too taxing while resting it on your bare knees.

As for the heat. Yes it does warm up at the back when under load but as for using it on bare legs...............It has been said that I spend too much time with computers but I still cannot think of a situation where I would have it on bare legs.:eek:

Cal.

sceptre

Cal wrote:

I still cannot think of a situation where I would have it on bare legs.:eek:

You know, I honestly didn't think of that. For the record, neither can I:)

Seriously though, the one thing you'll not want to do with a D410 is use it on a non-flat surface like, say a cushion (or a better example that might actually happen that someone else could think of). It'll be fine on any surface that's desklike or table-like or whatever. That won't be good for it. It's just something to keep in mind and quite a few notebooks these days have vents on the underside that fall into the same category. The x1 uses passive cooling so it doesn't really arise there.

Cal

I wouldn't go so far as to say it is a laptop for using only on a flat surface. It runs very happily on the arm of my sofa for hours on end. Never once has it overheated to the point of warnings/reboots. That said when it is used on the sofa it is just for surfing and other light use.

Cal.

WexCan

What about noise? How loud is it?

Cal

I would consider it to be super quiet. It only has one small fan and it only runs when needed.

Cal.

WexCan

Lovely, might go ahead and get it then. They seem pretty stable from a support/"solidness" point of view.

sceptre

Cal wrote:

I wouldn't go so far as to say it is a laptop for using only on a flat surface. It runs very happily on the arm of my sofa for hours on end. Never once has it overheated to the point of warnings/reboots. That said when it is used on the sofa it is just for surfing and other light use.

Yeah, I'm thinking more of mp3 encoding and the like where it'll definitely get a wee bit hot on the underside but you're the guy using it day in day out so I'll happily defer to your more experienced view. Even file encoding I suspect it wouldn't get hot to the point of warnings/reboots anyway. I'm guessing the board revision is up to about a07 or thereabouts so they should indeed be solid as hell, which is obviously important.