nad_masters's Full Review: Dell Latitude E4300 (blcwbfp_2) PC Notebook
The Dell Latitude line of laptops has always been more expensive compared to the consumer line (Vostro and Inspiron). The platform they based on stick around much longer, and have parts that are interchangable for the most part (batteries, optical drives, AC Adapters, etc.). This makes them perfect for corporate use, since it is easy for IT departments to use a single hard drive image for varying models, and inventory can be simplified if they all share the same parts and accessories.
The new Latitudes are redesigned now, and they do look pretty sexy - something you'd usually say to an Apple product, not a Latitude. In fact, traditionally, Dell Latitudes are pretty boring.
Dell Latitude E4300 The Latitude E4300 has a lid that looks as if it's brush aluminum. After looking at it closely, I think it may be plastic, but have a brushed aluminum texture. Either way, it looks better than the glossy or plain matted surface they usually use. It looks purposeful, but looks good without trying too hard. Despite not being glossy, they attract a lot of grease from fingers (though no distinctive finger prints - must be good news for someone out there...).
The speakers are the front, which projects the sound downward. It sounds okay for notebook speakers, but the downward orientation isn't great when you have it on your lap. A single SD Card reader is located in the center, between the speakers. The keyboard is large enough to be comfortable, and retains most of the key groupings found on desktop keyboards (such as the Insert, Del, Home, End, PgUP, PgDN keys). It also features dual pointing devices, much like how the business oriented Thinkpads are. The touchpad is marked where you can use to scroll, and the surface has a slight matted feel for your fingers to easily slide across. The other pointing device is a Thinkpad-like joystick in between the G and H keys. The mouse click buttons for the pointer is under the spacebar, while the touchpad has it's own dedicated for itself as well.
The rear is were the black laptop gets a bit of contrast, with an almost silver (almost gray) color where the battery and Ethernet jack is located. The AC adapter jack is here as well. All in all, the rear is nearly clean of jacks and ports.
The left side has a slot for a security smart card, VGA, and E-SATA. The vent for heat is also located on this side.
On the right, we have a single USB 2.0 port, headphone and mic jacks, switch for Bluetooth and WiFi, a mini Firewire 400 port, an Express Card slot, and the optical drive (we ordered it with a DVD-ROM drive). That's right folks... ONLY ONE USB PORT!
The optical drive can be removed and replaced with any Latitude-compatible drive. This mean while we have a DVD-ROM drive now, we can always upgrade to a DVD recorder or even a Blu-Ray drive if one becomes available in the future. Also, if a user ever destroy their drive, we can replace it easily.
The 13.3" widescreen display is crisp, bright, and clear. The 1200x800 resolution, while low, suits the size of the screen without making text too small. It's the exact same size and resolution as the 13.3" MacBook and MacBook Pros. The lid is not physically latched at all, giving it a rickety feel when carrying it around. This is a good screen size for those who need to travel. Any smaller and most users feel that it's too small and uncomfortable to use. Think netbooks!
The Intel Core 2 Duo P9300 is running at 2.26 GHz, while the 2 GB of RAM is just fine for 32-bit OSes. As with most corporate environment, we choose Windows XP Pro SP3 as our OS. Of course, a Vista Business DVD install disc was included with the package (WinXP is actually an extra cost item). The COA (Certificate of Authentication) sticker of the laptop does indicate that Vista is installed, but this is not the case.
Overall, the Latitude E4300 is a pretty handsome device. It is also relatively thing, which makes it feel good in the hands when carrying it around. It's about less than 3/4 inch thick. The battery does stick out though (we ordered the extended battery), but doesn't get in the way. The laptop is very anti-modern. What I mean is, it has a very hard-edge squared-off design!
Actually, come to think of it, it looks very much like the Dell Latitude E6400 I reviewed earlier.
Applications The pre-installed OS, Windows XP Pro SP3, was relatively clean, but still have a bit of applets we did not care for. It includes the Roxio CD creation software, as well as a Dell customized version of PowerDVD for DVD playback. While that's fine, the usual Dell support applications were also installed. We didn't need them for our users, since we do all the support and software updates. Users will not have the administrative rights to do updates through Dell's software anyways.
Also, the Dell ControlPoint applet gave us troubles with setting up wireless profiles for WiFi, as well as causing issues with the ethernet port to turn off when operating with a battery (unplugged from the outlet). Users were not familiar with this application, and we were not able to give control back to the Windows built-in wireless application. Even when we were able to add a few profiles in ControlPoint, the connections were unreliable. After uninstalling ControlPoint, and using the standard Windows wireless app, we were able to get trouble-free operation with both wired and wireless networking.
Dell Latitude On Reader Dell included an interesting and weird feature. It may or may not be useful. I don't think any of our users would use it, since it adds another layer of complexity to their daily lives. This is ironic, considering that it was suppose to make it easier and quicker to access your email, contacts, and calendar.
What I'm talking about, of course, is a way to check all the above without booting into Windows. However, the "Latitude On Reader" is actually a custom Linux operating system, which has a boot up process of its own. In my testing, it takes just about the same time it takes for Windows XP SP3 to boot!
Setting it up is easy. Dell includes the set up program in Windows. You have to run it and configure it. You must have Outlook 2003 or 2007 installed for this to work.
Once you're done, shutdown Windows XP, and the next time you want to check your email, calendar or contacts, you can hit a button next to your power button to start up Latitude On. It will boot up (took about a minute for me), and you will be greeted with your calendar in the monthly view.
To switch between the three functions, there are buttons on the left which corresponds to each function. You can always add a contact, appointment, or even email, but if you are not connected to the Exchange server, it will be sent out the next time you log into Windows when Outlook is started.
Of course, our company have a standard build we push out on all computers, which also blows away the partition that Dell Latitude On is installed on. Unfortunately the button to start it cannot be reconfigured to do anything else, nor could it be set to ignore pushes in the BIOS. This mean if you push this button, your laptop will turn on and attempt to boot up, only to show up with an error message.
Performance The Core 2 Duo CPU running at 2.26 GHz is plenty fast for multitasking the standard Office applications. Having large documents opened in Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and Adobe Reader did not pose an issue. Also, users would also have Outlook, several telnet sessions, and several IE windows with tabs. Windows XP was still as fast at switching between applications without slowing down. We rarely use up the 2 GB of memory.
The 80 GB hard drive is small, and spins at 5400 RPMs, so it's not the fastest in the market, but overall, using the Latitude E6400 was not noticeably slower than on our office desktops. Even when installing software (such as the Office suite) was quick. The entire Office 2007 Enterprise edition (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access, Outlook, Communications, Infopath, etc) took only 15 minutes including entering the serial number and installing SP1. I am, however, very disappointed at the small 80 GB HDD. However, this is something our purchasing department chose, so you don't really have to order one with such a small drive.
The built-in gigabit Ethernet makes quick work of file transfers to our server (about 25 MB/sec), but wireless is the standard 54G fare, using the Dell-branded wireless 802.11g WLAN internal card. I was able to muster about 2 MB/sec over the air with WPA security on.
While there is a Bluetooth option, we did not opt to include it in our build, so I could not test Bluetooth performance.
All in all, in our informal tests, the Latitude E4300 is a very quick machine. There's virtually no performance hit when compared to our desktops, while some actually informed us they feel the E4300 is faster!
Battery Life Despite the speedy nature of the beast, battery life did not suffer. With on-and-off use, WiFi on, and screen brightness turned down, I was able to muster 6 hours. Constant use (no chance to sleep) seem to ring in at a still excellent 5:15 hours. At full screen brightness, watching a DVD movie, and making sure the screen does not go to sleep, I was able to polish off the 2 Matrix movies, and still had time for another hour or two of light work and browse a few pages before needing a charge. All told, it was a little over 4:45 hours.
If you are a road warrior, the 13.3" screen size is perfect for movies, but not as big as the usual 15.1" screens found in other notebooks, and a very cooperative battery life.
The Upshot Despite the snafu with the Dell ControlPoint software, everything else was smooth sailing. The updated design of the Latitude line no longer mean that business laptops should look stuffy and boring. While the design is still understated (not a wild design that draws maximum attention), it also doesn't look so ordinary that it will blend in with the older Dell designs. It even look better than the Vostro 1310, which is in the consumer line.
Performance also didn't disappoint, sporting a Core 2 Duo running at 2.26 GHz and 2 GB of DDR2 memory helps a lot.
While the Latitude E4300 disk image will not work with the older Latitude models we have, going forward, we have no doubt they will work with future Latitudes, easing the support efforts for IT departments everywhere. We were able to use the E6400's disk image for the E4300 without changing a single driver!
Not everything is roses, though. I mean, why just one USB port? USB devices are everywhere! This is one thing I cannot forgive Dell for. I already ran into many frustrations of wanting to use a USB mouse and trying to grab a few files off a USB flash drive! Carrying around a USB hub is just another device to lug around and potentially loose or break. I didn't want to discuss my multitude of frustrations over this in my review because it would seem out of place, but THE UPSHOT is that it really makes an otherwise great laptop into a crummy one.
The only other ding is the Dell Latitude On Reader, which to me is another feature list checkpoint that is useless. Maybe someone out there will think otherwise.
Amount Paid (US$): 700 Operating System: Windows Processor: Other Processor speed: over 1000 Screen Size: 13 inches RAM: More than 256 Internal Storage: DVD Hard Drive (GB): Over 50
Dell Latitude E4300 Laptop Computer Intel Core 2 Duo SP9400 with VT (2.40GHz) w/Latitude ON ready 2.0GB, DDR3-1066 SDRAM, 2 DIMMS 160GB Hard Drive, ...More at Dell SMB
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