Inspiron to be discontinued in favor of Studio!!!

Hello all,

I was discussing Dell today with a representative and she accidentally let slip that the Inspiron series is going to be discontinued in favor of the Studio line!!! Is this old news? The inspiron line had class and it is sad to see it go if it is going to be discontinued. It's been a good journey with the Inspiron line and I will miss it.

 

To be honest, I think that's a good thing...Dell has waaay too many lines to worry about.

 

you should see the mess acer has... remember they have all pre-configured units!

but good on Dell, we need a change.

 

Inspiron will just be used as the budget line going forward. So the Inspiron 13 will stay at least.

 

I think it's a good thing.

 

I doubt this. It has been said by executives at Dell that the future lines will be Inspiron, Studio, and Alienware. XPS will become a sub brand of Studio for the higher end notebooks, while Alienware takes over gaming notebooks for Dell.

 

That sounds like a reasonable plan.

 

I did notice that the base price of the Inspiron 1525 and the Studio 15 here in the Netherlands were getting really close, much closer than at the launch of the Studio line (€ 449 vs € 499).

So I could see them making Inspiron the 'budget and small' line perhaps? With the Inspiron mini, perhaps the 12 inch Dell E and the 13 inch Inspiron or so.

 

The Inspiron is definitely the budget line. Basically ever since they removed a lot of its configurability such as dedicated video. The Mini 9 and either 10 or 12 inch model are a different line altogether even though they share the Inspiron name. These are netbooks with the Atom processor and really can't compare in performance to even the more basic Inspiron. They are meant to be lightweight and able to be thrown in your bag and go type of notebooks.

 

Talked to the Dell business reps (who frankly seem to have a better idea of what is actually going on than the normal reps). The Inspiron line is now netbooks and ultra portables.

Studio is general consumer and is mirrored on the business side by vostro and latitude. XPS is no more and is being fire sale'd as end of line (look out for dell to be doing some amazing deals on the last stocks of these, even to business customers apparently).

Alienware is designing some XPS replacements (currently un-announced) and finally, there is to be a high end studio line for artists, designers and photographers (I guess this is what people are referring to as the studio XPS line).

He seemed pretty sure of his facts though he was unaware that they were planning to call the high end line studio XPS. So maybe it's actually going to appear under a different name?

 

That all does sound reasonable, PeterDw, and in line with the Studio line becoming lower and lower priced.

At the moment in Europe, Dell is also doing a '7 days of XPS deals' promotion, so perhaps the end of (at least the Santa Rosa) XPS models is near now?

Although, 'deals'... we all know what Dell calls a deal (price is lower, but specs are lowered as well in most cases... Today's deal is not even one euro cheaper than it was yesterday if you up the specs again for example...).

 

I'm still glad I got my XPS M1530 before they discontinued them just because I think they are such gorgeous laptops. I hope when they re-design the high end studio to replace the XPS then they slim it down so its no thicker than the current M1530 and M1330's because they are lovely computers and the Studio XPS will need to be as good or better looking which means just as slim

 

yeah were seeing a pretty good deal in Australia.
8% off $1000 and above
12% off $1500 and above
15% off $2000 and above
or something like that anyway. I dont think I will get one tho.

 

Not bad, though I'm not sure how the pricing is in Australia, compared to the US!


Cin!

 

For UK users just watch out for price hikes some time as HP and Acer have already raised their prices, Dell are others are sure to follow in the UK soon due to lower value of the pound unless it changes, although the inrease probably would be 5-10% max

 

Heh, I'm glad that I bought the 1720 when I did. Just for HaHa's, I configured a Studio 17 with the same specs with what I bought and I came out about $600 USD cheaper than the Studio 17. It was a no-Brainer that Dell was going to nix the upper end of the Inspiron line......................

 

When I bought my XPS M1530 at the end of July I remember they were selling the Insipron on the DELL UK site with the 8600m gt, but it was the DDR2 version (it said DDR2 specifically), which is obviously inferior to the GDDR3 version found in the M1530, but its just an example of how they stripped it down in terms of high end customisation.

To customise an Inspiron now with a good processor etc really costs too much to be worth it since the Studio offers better value and dedicated graphics.

Its good to see a £400 laptop (Studio) that comes with dedicated graphics as before the Studio you would rarely find anything under £700 with dedicated graphics and whilst the studio is no gaming PC, the dedicated ATI card is perfect for a media laptop w/ HDMI

 

Inspiron, phased out?!!! Nooooo!!!! Please, nooooo!!!! God, wwhhhyyyyy??? Oh, well.

 

If you like it because it's gorgeous the Sony laptops have a lot up on dell when it comes to design.

 

I still think the M1530 is better looking than even the sony laptops.

 

This sounds all good and all but it won't amount to a hilla beans unless the products themselves look good and are customizable with a range of technology so that average people and tech geeks can find something they like.

 

dang... xps on sale... too bad the 17" looks like blinged out toys imo...