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6 out of 6 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"Terrific notebook, so long as you don't work with dark images"
Pros: Performance, Weight, Size, Features, Build quality
Cons: Display backlight leakage, lack of legacy ports
Summary: I have owned this laptop for a couple of months now, and I have never been happier. I purchased it with a 1.86GHz CPU, 80GB Hard drive, GeForce Go 6800 Graphics, and the WXGA+ display (1440x900 resolution).
I hear often of the light leakage issues with the display, and I can confirm that it does definitely exist. However, I can live with it easily, and so long as you aren't working with dark images constantly, it is not noticeable. The leakage does not really take from any DVD movies in my opinion anyway. The display does make up for this in the way that it has a good viewing angle, even from the sides.
The performance of this system I have found to be excellent. In most uses, this laptop puts my 3GHz Pentium 4 system to shame (except with multi-tasking and loading performance, due to a 5400RPM hard drive, and a CPU not supporting hyper-threading). I can run any current game (including Half-Life 2 and Doom 3) in maximum detail, with amazing performance.
The workmanship and effort put into the appearance and construction is rather remarkable. This seems to be one of the few laptops where the notebook is rugged enough to be roughed around a bit. It has a die-cast base, and the display has metal side supports to stop the LCD panel from becoming distorted while opening and closing it. This also means that the display does not wobble around much either. I did not find any scratches or surface damage to any part of the laptop on arrival.
As one of the features rarely listed, the Inspiron 9300 also has a subwoofer inbuilt. I would not actually call it that, as it cannot reproduce subsonic sounds, however, when it is turned off through the windows volume control, the lack of bass is clearly noticeable. It seriously makes games and movies sound that much better!
As rare features in a notebook, this one has 6 USB ports (4 USB 1.1 on the back, 2 USB 2.0 on the left side). It also has a mini firewire port on the right side, with a SD Media slot, and a headphone and microphone port. In this configuration, a dual-layer DVD writer was included, which supports 24x write/read CD-R, 20x CD-RW, and can write 8x DVD, and at 4x Dual Layer. Also included is a DVI and Analog connector for external displays. However, only 2 monitors can be used at any one time, so the internal monitor and 2 external monitors cannot be used in tandem.
I guess one of the important features for the enthusiast, is that this notebook can be upgraded fairly easily. The manual includes a step-by-step section on upgrading main parts to the system, including the hard drive, memory, and wireless devices. It also covers more detailed steps, such as disassembling parts to the system casing. As the graphics card is PCI-express, it can also be upgraded if needs to be (I would assume). The CPU is relatively accessible too, and could probably be upgraded too.
However, there are some bad points to this system, besides the light leakage on the display. Probably the main issue I have found is that the touchpad seems rather small for my use. It does get quite annoying at times, especially trying to do graphics work. The battery life I don't know whether to class as a good, or a bad point, as it does manage to get about 3:20 under heavy use (not 3d graphics), and about 1 1/2 to 2 hours running 3d games. This is however better than most notbooks with this configuration. The weight is also a debate, as for this type of notebook, it seems rather light (about 3.5kg I think), but is still rather heavy for a notebook. Finally, the lack of legacy ports is a shame. There is no parallel, serial, or PS2 port on this system. There is also no option of including the legacy floppy drive, but it can however be purchased seperately as an external USB device.
As a side note of my experience with Dell, I do not see any problems. I had a couple of bright pixels on my display, which came a few weeks after the system arrived. I contacted Dell about them, and a technician arrived promptly and replaced the display and the video card on site. It did not help with the light leakage much, but the bright pixels are gone. I used e-mail when asking for support, and I would get a reply back the next day each time. I would however recommend, as with any notebook, that one of the three-year plans be chosen for the warranty. It just helps give peace of mind. Dell constantly runs deals on their website, so just waiting for a bunch of good deals to occur at once is a real advantage. With this system, I got free double memory, 10% off all warranty plans, and a $200 discount from the total price. All in all, it probably saved me about $1000!
In summary, I would recommend this laptop to anyone considering a high performance notebook, without the price tag usually associated with DTR (desktop replacement) notebooks. I believe the very few bad points make up for the light leakage of the display, and shouldn't be the deciding factor in an otherwise excellent notebook.
