Dude, you're gettin' a Dell! It's nothing to be excited about
Written: Aug 08 '04
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Pros: bright LCD, good performance for work related computing, sharp display, comfortable keyboard
Cons: resolution problems, lack of connectivity, touchpad goes funky once in a while
The Bottom Line: If you need to make a presentation or work anywhere where there's wireless, this is a solid notebook. If you're looking for a desktop replacement, forget it.
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| conformr's Full Review: Dell Inspiron 1100 (1100SAP) PC Notebook |
One faithful day I awoke to the ring of my door bell. At the time I was groggy and I wasn't too aware of what was going on until I signed for a box. I realized that it was my laptop I ordered from Dell. I rip open the box like a pack of mad children on christmas morning to find my laptop and accesories neatly packed. So I bring it out and the laptop itself was bigger than I thought it would be. I purchased this for the sole purpose of having a mobile PC in the house so I can work anywhere on any floor of my house. It did just that, with the addition of a network PCMCIA. So it's size isn't overly huge but don't plan to lug this thing around in school along with text books and what might you have. This thing weighs about 7.7 lbs.
I customized my note book with the following specifications
1x Intel celeron 2.2ghz
2x 128 MB pc2100 Ram
1x 14.1" LCD display
1x 30 GB 4200rpm fujitsu HDD
0x dell wireless card
1x 24x CD-rom drive
So how fast can this baby run? Well it's decent for most applications. Productivity programs likes visual studio.net and office run quite smoothly without a hiccup. Videos play great and runs whatever a desktop can in terms of work related computing. Internet runs as it should on a desktop. There's a program from intel called Intel Application Accelerator. It does help and I recommend looking it up.
Now, the display/graphics. The LCD can be bright. Very bright infact. Working in combination with the Intel Extreme graphics processor, the display can get TOO bright leaving the display looking like the brightness is too high. Easily fixed however by adjusting the gamma under the display settings. The 14.1" LCD is sharp and clear. The very disappointing thing about the display is the flexibility of the graphics chip. It won't scale the resolution up to the maximum size of the LCD. What do I mean? say if you choose to have the display size at 800x600 on the desktop. You are left with a nice black boarder around the screen. This isn't anything too overly serious. The native display for this notebook is 1024x768. So only with a resolution that high will the graphics chip utilize the entire LCD. This may not be important to most users who use this notebook as an entry-level notebook for work. It's just kind of irritating for people who play a few games that don't allow resolution change. This problem can't be fixed from what I've read on the dell support forums. It's not recommended to play games for an extended period of time. The notebook gets hot and you'll know when the fan gets louder.
The notebook is lacking a few of the connectors that I'd like to see on all notebooks. First, you will not be able to use a legacy parallel port printer because this notebook doesn't connect. Second, since there is no wireless card I'd like to have more than one PCMCIA slot. Lastly there is no PS/2 mouse connector so if you choose to use an external mouse, one of the USB slots will be taken up. The touchpad is goes a little funky more often than not. Sometimes it's unresponsive and sometimes the mouse moves on it's own. So a mouse is definitely recommended. So with one of the USB ports taken up by a mouse let's see what ports ARE available.
1x PCMCIA slot
1x telephone jack for 56k modem
1x monitor out
1x s-video out
2x USB ports
1x ethernet connector
1x earphone jack
1x mic input
Doesn't leave too much room for expansion. But there are alternatives like a USB hub. I don't suggest using the earphone jack. It tends to have a lot of hissing for earphones of anykind.
While I'm on the topic of sound, the speakers in the notebook are actually quite clear on the high levels. There's no bass though. It's quite understandable though since the speakers are about the size of a chestnut. Where it is placed though is a bit awkward. it's at the immediate edge just under the power, HDD and battery light indicators. When in use while on your lap, the sound can get muffled. Other sounds from the notebook are pretty noticeable too. Markedly the fan. It's very noticeable and it can get annoying but it gets tuned out as time goes on. The CD rom is really loud when it loads up. I haven't fully tested the CD rom but it works with most, if not all cds including burned and original cds. Some notebook cd roms have problems reading burned cds.
The keyboard is comfortable and there's a nice large space for the wrists as well. I can type on this thing for as long as the battery lasts. Battery life can last up to 4hours per charge given the applications run aren't too intensive.
Overall this is a good notebook for work, portable internet around the house and the occasional lug to school/work routine. It's just not a notebook for intensive gaming.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 799
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Celeron
Processor speed: over 1000
Screen Size: 14 inches
RAM: 256
Internal Storage: CD-ROM
Hard Drive (GB): 21-30
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conformr
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Reviews written: 17
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