Gentlemen (and ladies),

First let me say that I have learned more from these forums here than from any other source...ever.

Anyway, for Christmas, I was hoping to purchase a new laptop. Apparently, building your own laptop by yourself is much more difficult than building a PC, even a high-end one with RAID and special cooling. So, I suppose that I'll be buying one.

Purpose: playing DVD movies, internet surfing, word processing, spreadsheets, Powerpoint presentations, e-mail, and other office duties. I might do some AutoCAD 2D design work, perhaps. Some light gaming would be nice. There will be no Call of Duty 2 at max. settings or anything like that.

Requirement: 17" monitor (for viewing DVD movies)

Future upgrades: Don't care about upgrading

Here is a build from Dell's website:

$1,699 (I have a 15% discount for being a home customer or something to that effect.)

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5200 (1.60GHz, 2MB L2 Cache, 533 MHz FSB)
Windows® XP Professional
LCD PANEL 17 inch UltraSharp™ Wide Screen UXGA Display with TrueLife™
2GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz
120GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive
24X CD Burner/DVD Combo Drive
256MB ATI MOBILITY™ RADEON® X1400 HyperMemory
Integrated Audio
9-cell Primary Battery and 9-cell additional Lithium Ion Battery
Dell Nylon Deluxe Carrying Case
Dell Wireless 1390b/g (54Mbps)
No other software (I'll add it myself later)

1) Hammer me with the critiques and make it hurt.

2) Also, if you think that I could build a laptop with relative ease and save $$$ using Newegg or Zipzoomfly, then please let me know.

3) Should I worry about add-on cooling for the CPU (which would require me to open the case and mess around with the guts of the laptop)?

Thanks,
Jim

This would do more than you are wanting for significantly less. It is not a core duo. It has dual core amd and will provide what you are requiring out of it for a decent price. Goes down to about 800-900 for the 15.4" screen.

$1,099.99

http://www.officedepot.com/ddSKU.d [...] &An=browse

# The Pavilion dv9005us offers: 17"-diagonal widescreen WXGA+ (1440 x 900) BrightView LCD screen
# AMD Turion 64 X2 Dual-Core Mobile Technology TL-50 operating at 1.6GHz, with Enhanced Virus Protection†
# 512KB (256KB+256KB) L2 cache
# Up to 1600MHz frontside bus
# 1.0GB of PC2700 DDR SDRAM (2 x 512MB), upgradable to 2.0GB
# 100GB 5400-rpm Serial ATA (SATA) hard drive
# LightScribe SuperMulti DVD drive with Double Layer support (reads/writes DVD±R/RW, DVD-RAM, DVD+R Double Layer, CD-R/RW)
# ExpressCard slot: supports ExpressCard/34, ExpressCard/54
# 802.11b/g wireless LAN (WLAN)
# 10/100Base-T Ethernet port
# 56K V.90 modem
# 4 USB 2.0 ports
# 1 FireWire (IEEE 1394) port
# 1 S-video out port
# 1 notebook expansion port 3
# 5-in-1 memory card reader: reads SD, MMC, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro and xD-Picture Card
# nVidia GeForce Go 6150 (UMA) graphics with up to 128MB of shared memory
# Altec Lansing audio with stereo speakers, and headphone output and microphone input jacks
# HP mobile remote control (stores in ExpressCard slot)
# Stereo earbud headphones (1 pair)
# Dimensions: 1 9/16"H x 15 3/16"W x 11 5/8"D
# Weight: 7.8 lbs

I can kindof tell by your post you want something that you just buy and is done. For what you want to do that DELL is fine. The thing about DELL is, that no matter how much people want to make out that they are "one negative thing or another", they are the king of low end systems for a reason. They have a system and process in place to support and handle problems that arise more frequently with lower end systems then higher end ones.

The last poster also mentioned an HP, that is a decent machine also, and can definately do everything you are requiring. You are not going to need any additional cooling on those machines.

With the max strain on the system being Some light gaming would be nice. There will be no Call of Duty 2 at max. settings or anything like that.
, either card will handle your requirements. The nice thing about the DELL is that you can always upgrade he video card in the future if need be.

You said you had 15% off coupons, here is a 20% off, if you wait, I'm sure you can do much better than that right before or after Christmas when Dell's quarter is ending.

INSPIRON NOTEBOOK Coupon: This offer is not available on any other desktop system, and can not be combinable with other dollars off, percentage off or mail-in rebate offers. Online coupons not valid on the XPS series notebooks. Only one coupon may be applied per cart at checkout.
Dell Home Coupon: 8JVC1R9N6V8VC9 - Expires: 12/7/2006

Thank you for this information. Such a laptop would indeed save me some $$$ without sacrificing too much performance.

Wonderful! Thank you for the coupon reference.

And, I certainly can wait until right before or right after Christmas to save even more $$$. I'm not trying to be cheap; just a good steward of the money with which God has blessed me.

That's what it's all about.

That HP compared to the DELL is really like comparing apples to oranges.
= DELL
= HP

(2) 9 cell batteries
(1) 8 cell battery

(2) Gigs of RAM
(1) Gig (2x512 MB) RAM

120 GB 5,400 rpm HD
100 GB 5,400 rpm HD

17" WUXGA 1920 x 1200 UltraSharp
17" WXGA+ 1440 x 900

:tongue: x1400 256 MB shared memory
:arrow: 6150 128 MB shared memory (that's going to hurt on a 1 GB system)

:tongue: CD Burner / DVD Reader
:arrow: DL DVD Burner w/ Lightscribe (which seldom works well in slim notebook drives)

Factor in that the DELL 1705/1710 is an Inspiron 9400 which is a stripped down DELL XPS that you can upgrade the video to 7900 class cards, and you have a pretty decent system with some potential should someone want to put the effort and extra money into it.

Yes, I had noticed all those differences. Honestly, I was still leaning toward the more expensive Dell laptop because of those differences.

Then, I kicked in that 20% coupon and BAMMM!!! The $1,699 Dell laptop dropped to $1,520. Yeah, buddy!

Hmmm...I do have more $$$ left over and I am underbudget a little...maybe an upgrade here and there.

Now, all I need to do is create a fictitious business name which will allow me to get the Dell business support package (so that I can speak to support people who are not in India) and I'm set.

Thanks, pal.

You know what I would recommend? Getting the smallest HD you canfrom DELL, buy a 100 gig 7,200 from newegg and just replacing it yourself.

If you don't want to do that then a 7,200 HD from DELL is going to give you the most performance bang for your buck in that system. Next thing I would look at would be the CPU. Other than that it has everything you need.

Good ideas. Thank you.

Yea, the problem with DELL is they think you should pay $250 for upgrading to a 7,200 rpm drive when a new Hitachi OEm drive is $135 at NewEgg?!

I agree with KN's comment on the CPU. I chose a better processor and am aware of hard drive bottlenecks for laptop computers. The dell upgrades during the production of Yonah made me select a core duo @ 1.66 Ghz with 667 FSB, and a 7,200 rpm drive. I am happy with the computer, and when I performed a similar configuration as you have shown for dell I would warn you of lower Front side bus (533 Ghz) Core 2 (merom) cpu's that are being offered by dell of which an upgrade price is very steep--which is different from the ~ $50 upgrade from a core solo and ~ $80 upgrade to a core duo T2400 @ 1.83 Ghz when I configured my E1405.

I don't know what affect the FSB would have on the meroms, but if I had 64 bit capability I would like optimum data transfer. Also intel does not even list the core 2 T5200 @ 1.6 Ghz and 533 FSB on this site: link.

Hmmm...I checked my build on Dell's website. It seems that moving the motherboard and memory from 533 MHz to 677 MHz would cost me an additional $214 (including the tax increase).

With 533 MHz...$1,638

With 677 MHz...$1,851

Hmmm...is $214 worth this increase in speed? Ahhh...screw it. It's Christmas. OK. 677 MHz it is.

I wouldn't have been able to do this without that 20% coupon (thanks KN) and this extra knowledge. I owe you. Merry Christmas!

It will make the difference, and it is the one thing that will be a Pita to upgrade later, to the point of not being worth it AFTER you get the system. I think it is a good choice.