Should I buy Dell XPS M1210?

Theboinkmaster

Hello

I'm looking at buying this notebook at the start of May. Currently if I go to the Dell homepage and select small business I can buy the notebook with XP but in the home section only Vista is offered. I want only Windows XP and was wondering is this is still likely to be offered in May or will Dell drop it in favour of Vista for all notebooks?

Also since I'm a personal customer can I still use the small business option and purchase this notebook with a credit card?

Anyway this is the spec I wish to purchase:

XPS M1210 €1,300 (incl shipping and VAT)

2Ghz core 2 processor with 4mb L2 cache
1Gb RAM
160Gb HD
Intel GMA950 graphics
12" screen with truelife
6 cell battery
DVD R/W

Portability is very important to me and I want to use this computer for watching DVDs, ripping music, MS office, internet exploring etc - no gaming.

Will this notebook suit my needs? Its seems a good spec other than the graphics but since I'm not gaming will I still need the nVidia for windows multimedia or is this OK?

Many thanks,
Simon

ps sorry if they way I've written this post is confusing!

Tom Dunne

Theboinkmaster wrote:

I want only Windows XP and was wondering is this is still likely to be offered in May or will Dell drop it in favour of Vista for all notebooks?

It's really hard to say. I would imagine they are trying to reduce the amount of XP machines they are selling, so I would think there is a good chance they will no longer sell that operating system in May.

Theboinkmaster wrote:

Also since I'm a personal customer can I still use the small business option and purchase this notebook with a credit card?

You can. I've done it a few times.

Theboinkmaster wrote:

Will this notebook suit my needs? Its seems a good spec other than the graphics but since I'm not gaming will I still need the nVidia for windows multimedia or is this OK?

It certainly will meet your needs. The graphics "card" will do all you want from a multimedia perspective.

Lucifer

i had the xps m1210 for a week and needed t get insurance and they said i could only get it at the time of purchase so i had 2 get the laptop colected and taken back 2 dell so i could buy it again with the insurance....thats not the important bit...

anyway i decided i thought it was very bulky and quite heavy....although my last laptop was the sony vaio tx series (very small) but after all that...i decided not to get the dell again so i got the sony vaio sz4....it's lovely
so fast and very light but still nice size screen...

hope this helps

BostonB

From reading comments, the M1210 is one of the bulkier 12" laptops, and not all that light. Its similar in weight to the 14" 640m and the 640m gets longer battery life on a extended 9 cell battery. The 640m is a lot cheaper too.

If you're set on a 12" or 13" laptop smaller than a 640m, then I'd look at the Sony, IBM or Apple.

juliuspret

Im using a m1210 right now and as said above its pretty bulky!

The main gripe I ave with it is that they used a 12.1" screen when a 13.3" would most certainly have fit due to all the spare room they have left around the perimeter of the screen!!

The battery life is another problem I have with it.
I bought the 9 cell battery but due to the problem Dell and a lot of other manufacturers have with the intel 945 chipset I have had to use a program called RM Clock to stop the high frequency buzz emitted when the CPU goes in/out of power saving modes.
It has shortened the battery life to barely 4 hours when I have expected about 6 hours from the batter.

In terms of portability its pretty good in all honestly but its certainly not as light as the FAR MORE EXPENSIVE Sony Vaio sz4....which makes sense dont you think???

Get it if you are going all out on the graphics and 3G telco hardware as its pretty good all specc'd up.

If you want a more Business type of 12" notebook then look no further than this IBM/Lenovo
http://www5.pc.ibm.com/ie/products.nsf/$wwwPartNumLookup/_UK15UUK?OpenDocument

If I were buying and had more money to spend I would have probable got one of those!!

BostonB

Just as a FYI when I had a 640m with the extended battery, I got between 5~7 hours battery life out of it doing light office stuff.