What do you think of these specs?

Vim Fuego · 01-04-2008 1:39pm #1

Hey everyone,

I'm thinking about ordering a dell laptop with the following specs and just wanted to get your opinion on if you're think it'd be ok. It's mostly for internet browsing, wirelessly streaming video to my xbox 360, downloading and iTunes usage. Will probably be using a bit for MS Office and I may download Steam to play the odd game at low specs (not much of a big deal for me though). I'm not after top performance but looking for a laptop that will do me for a few years at least and can handle a couple of apps running at once.

Specs (edited to remove the inconsequential):

InspironTM XPS M1530(N04X5305)
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.40 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 3 MB L2 cache), Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium - English

Memory -4096MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x2048]

Video Card - NVIDIA® GeForce™ Go 8600M GT with 256MB dedicated graphic memory

Hard Drive - 250GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive

Optical Devices - Fixed 8x DVD+/-RW Slim Slot Load drive, including SW

Wireless Networking - Intel® Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-Card - Europe - Core 2 Duo Processors

LCD - 15.4" Widescreen WXGA+ (1440x900) TFT Display with TrueLife™

Cheers for your help, I think the above fits in with my requirements but just want to double check.

kaimera · 01-04-2008 2:06pm

How much?

Solid laptop and the 8600GT will handle Steam games at high with no problems.

The 4gigs of RAM wont be seen fully by Vista unless you have the x64 version; otherwise you'll have 3.5xxgigs available.

Vim Fuego · 01-04-2008 2:21pm

The price quoted is around 1500 but that includes 4 years cover (I've had laptops die early deaths before), MS Office and 36 months of McAfee. Would be around the 1200 or less mark without those extras.

That's good news about Steam, would love to play some team fortress 2 or Company of Heroes on this.

Cheers kaimera

kaimera · 01-04-2008 2:26pm

1500 is grand. 4 years coverage must cost a bit. I'd drop McAfee and either get something free like AVG or pay for Nod32 v3.

Soz, I should have said the 8600GT will play Valve games fine, the Orange box is great on it. Not so sure about CoH myself.

One thing, it might be worth looking at latopvideo2go.com for modified nvidia drivers for the card. The windows update ones you'll get are fairly old and I had problems with TF2 on the default drivers.

Vim Fuego · 01-04-2008 3:56pm

Ah, that's great, thanks a million for the advice.

Voodu Child · 01-04-2008 4:58pm

Don't forget to check the Bargain Alerts forum - there's a Dell laptops thread on it, there are very frequent 10% discounts available. One right now if I recall, and even when it expires another will follow shortly.

But anyway, they're a great laptop, those specs are good, and it'll do what you want quite nicely. The 8600M GT in the M1530 is the DDR3 version so it has a little higher performance than the more common DDR2 8600M GT. Either way, its a good mid-range card for a laptop and will play most games quite nicely, except for very recent or very demanding ones. Orange Box, no problem, full settings and FPS higher than screen refresh most of the time.

AlmightyCushion · 01-04-2008 7:48pm

Agree with ditching mcafee, avg/avast are much better free alternatives. You could ditch office and get open office to save yourself a few bob.

majiktripp · 02-04-2008 6:42am

As an aside to the Open Office suggestion , if buying regular MS Office ,its cheaper to get the Student Teacher Edition from PC World (€150,Word,Excel,PowerPoint,OneNote) than from Dell,plus with Student/Teacher its 1 license but you can install it on 3 different machines as per the license agreement.

Vim Fuego · 02-04-2008 8:28am

Sound, cheers folks. Especially liking the free alternatives!

TerrorFirmer · 02-04-2008 8:31am

Company of Heroes runs at 1280x800 max settings with 2x AA.

Team Fortress 2 will run at 1680x1050 high settings.

This is my 8600GT Mobility in action, and it's the slower DDR2 version at that.

Black_Knight · 02-04-2008 9:05am

1500! WHAT?
See my sig! Thats my new laptop, delivering tomorrow hopefully. Cost me ~1000. As far as i can see its the same or similar spec to the one you mention, only its a vostro, not a XPS.

Vim Fuego · 02-04-2008 12:17pm

Great shots TerrorFirmer. That's deadly, I wouldn't have even expected the likes of Bioshock to run on it really. Black Knight, cheers, I'll have a look at the Vostros though a good chunk of the price is from extending the warranty out to 4 years, would obviously be cheaper with the standard 1 year warranty.

Nice one anyway, looking forward to getting my hands on this now. I listen to the GFW podcast and it's a bit annoying hearing of cracking PC games that I'm missing out on. When I get my next laptop in 4 or so years, I'll pick up Crysis for it :-)

Black_Knight · 02-04-2008 12:32pm

Vim Fuego wrote: »

a good chunk of the price is from extending the warranty out to 4 years

I knew I was forgetting something. I even noticed that you had the extended warrenty. The gambler inside me wouldnt let me choose it tho.

Vostro 1500-
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.40 GHz, 3 MB L2 cache, 800 MHz FSB)
3Yr Basic Warranty - Next Business Day
15.4" UltraSharp™ Widescreen WSXGA+ (1680x1050) TFT Display with TrueLife™
Matte Jet Black with 2.0 mega pixel camera
4096MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x2048]
250GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive
256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT
Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive

€ 1,207.58 delivered.

Theres a better resolution screen in there then the XPS one you choose. Other then that their pretty much the same machine, same componants.

kaimera · 02-04-2008 12:51pm

The 8600 in the XPS has the better RAM as stated above.

Black_Knight · 02-04-2008 12:55pm

kaimera wrote: »

The 8600 in the XPS has the better RAM as stated above.

So the Vostros 8600 is DDR2. Where does it say ones DDR2 and then others DDR3?

Voodu Child · 02-04-2008 1:00pm

kaimera wrote: »

The 8600 in the XPS has the better RAM as stated above.

Yep, it's a slightly higher performing graphics card. And also, you're going to pay a bit more for an XPS vs a Vostro, that's just the way it goes. The slimmer/lighter design and brushed-aluminium bits are always going to make it a bit pricier. Kind of pointing out the obvious tbh.

I wouldn't knock either the M1530 or the Vostro, they're both great machines, depends on how tight your budget is and what kind of laptop you're after.

So the Vostros 8600 is DDR2. Where does it say ones DDR2 and then others DDR3?

Post #6

Voodu Child · 02-04-2008 1:31pm

Vim Fuego,
I've gone into the EPP and put together the M1530 from the first post (T8300, 4gb ram, 250Gb HDD, 1440x900 etc) for:
€ 1,237.68 including 4 years warranty

That's using the current 10% discount (GMDW091?GNR$FT expires today), and the EPP which gives another 10%. I havent included any of the software packages, but I leave that up to yourself, its not something i'd bother with personally.

It'd be € 1,027.88 WITHOUT the 4-year warranty. So like I was saying above, just keep an eye out for deals, there's always a good saving to be made on Dells.

Vim Fuego · 02-04-2008 3:53pm

Wow, super deal, thanks very much Voodoo!

Black_Knight · 03-04-2008 6:52am

I know its mentioned in post #6 but im asking where this is stated by dell or otherwise. Their both the same card as far as I can see; what, other then the laptop their installed into and post #6, tells me that ones DDR3 and the others DDR2?

TerrorFirmer · 03-04-2008 8:07am

The XPS does use DDR3, think Dell just list it universally as 'Nvidia 8600GT 256mb' though.

kaimera · 03-04-2008 9:35am

voodoo_child wrote: »

Vim Fuego,
I've gone into the EPP and put together the M1530 from the first post (T8300, 4gb ram, 250Gb HDD, 1440x900 etc) for:
€ 1,237.68 including 4 years warranty

That's using the current 10% discount (GMDW091?GNR$FT expires today), and the EPP which gives another 10%. I havent included any of the software packages, but I leave that up to yourself, its not something i'd bother with personally.

It'd be € 1,027.88 WITHOUT the 4-year warranty. So like I was saying above, just keep an eye out for deals, there's always a good saving to be made on Dells.

Given that price is after a 20% discount, is the OP's machine not better given he said in post #3 that without the extras it would be around the 1200 mark without a discount.

To buy your spec now would be 20% more? I get what you mean about shopping around for discount deals tho.

Office is quite pricey if it's not the student package.

Voodu Child · 03-04-2008 1:12pm

kaimera wrote: »

Given that price is after a 20% discount, is the OP's machine not better given he said in post #3 that without the extras it would be around the 1200 mark without a discount.

I couldn't say tbh, without knowing exactly where it came from I don't know if the vouchers would have worked on it. The deal i listed there should have been about as good as you'll do for that spec at the time of posting - obviously the 10% voucher has expired but if any more pop up they'll be mentioned in the bargain alerts forum so it's just a case of keeping the eyes open.

kaimera · 03-04-2008 1:15pm

voodoo_child wrote: »

I couldn't say tbh, without knowing exactly where it came from I don't know if the vouchers would have worked on it. The deal i listed there should have been about as good as you'll do for that spec at the time of posting - obviously the 10% voucher has expired but if any more pop up they'll be mentioned in the bargain alerts forum so it's just a case of keeping the eyes open.

Oh don't get me wrong, like I said it is about shopping around and looking for bargins and the ones you linked to was ideal

What do you think of these specs?

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