Vostro 1500 mini review

Ordered on 7/25. Arrived via overnight fed ex on 8-2.

Impressions:
Holy crabs this thing is heavy. I'm coming from a 12" 3lb Toshiba tablet, so it's a bit of an adjustment.

Wide Screen SXGA+ w/Truelife:
Wow, I need to shave, and I could, using this mirror that dell shipped. There's not even much light in here. However, once you turn it on and start using it, you don't even notice it. You can definitely notice a difference in image quality. There's no graininess or weird sounds to be seen or heard. XP came preconfigured with 120 DPI vs the standard 96 DPI, which can cause some things to look wierd. It's easy enough to change though.

Headphone jack:
Yuck. Talk about shoddy. It doesn't matter what the volume is at, you can hear the processor activity, and it's annoying. When music is playing, it's pretty much drowned out, but you can still hear it in the background if you listen for it.

Touch pad:
Not as soft as most, but it gets the job done.

Media buttons:
Maybe it's just an XP thing, but the responsiveness is very slow when you first use em. I've also had instances of it just not doing anything, and having to mute it manually.

Built in web cam:
Surprisingly clear and crisp for a 2MP. Does a good job with lighting and face tracking. Has some fun features, and the software lets you do timelapse, motion detection, etc.

Boot time:
After turning on AHCI in the Bios, jawdroppingly fast.

Heat and noise:
Fine for browsing, but gets a little uncomfortable on your lap if you are stressing the system. Quiet as hell.

Battery:
I got a 9 cell, and it's loose. Lasts around 3 hours of non-gaming use.

Keyboard:
The keyboard is nice. I removed it to install memory, and they were lying about it being spill-resistant. Well, the keyboard itself may be spill resistant, but there's nothing to stop the liquid from going into the innards of the laptop.

Speakers: They are average, but a bit muffled from being on the underside.

Closing thoughts: If you're willing to make some sacrifices for raw power, this is a good laptop. It runs fast and looks pretty, but needs to drop a few pounds and not be so noisy in the headphone jack. 7.5/10

 

great review,

I am just curious about your battery life, whats the brightness level and is wireless on? Because there are other people reporting 4-5 hrs with 9 cell

 

I have the brightness all the way up, and constant wireless traffic.

 

ok, that makes sense. Seems like good battery life.

 

Thanks for the report on battery life. Also what graphics card do you have ? I'm getting the 8600GT and wonder if that will take any more power while doing internet and whatnot.

3 hours seems pretty decent considering you are having network activity and full brightness I'm happy.

 

Looks like he has the 8600M GT, according to his signature.

 

I have my brightness at 75%, little wireless activity, I have the 8400 graphics instead of 8600 and I get anywhere from 3-6 hours depending on what im doing with my 9 cell

 

Whoops. Good to know though.