• OK. A 13 inch display screen isn’t really that small and having a 1280×800 resolution (like many of the 15″ laptops) means you get a decent amount of space. Most IDEs like Eclipse fit just fine on the screen but I wouldn’t recommend doing any graphic editing since that does require a little more than this resolution has to offer.
• BAD. Capacitive media buttons are cool for about 5 minutes.
• AWESOME. The remote control that fits into the express card slot is awesome. Apart from shielding the slot from dust (which would be otherwise covered by a useless piece of plastic) it proves quite useful at presentations or watching a movie.
  
• USELESS. Fingerprint reader is also cool for a few hours. I haven’t even installed the drivers anymore. So it’s useless at this point for me.
  
• USELESS. Who uses a DVD unit anymore? Even Windows can be booted and installed with an USB stick. If I could I would remove it completely and probably buy an external USB unit for emergencies. Now it only uses space, power and adds to the laptop’s weight.
• BAD. The power button should be positioned on one side, not beneath the screen. You may want to connect the laptop to an external display + mouse + keyboard and disable the laptop’s monitor. But now you still have to open the lid to power it up.
  
• BAD. Not having an edge to edge monitor screen means you get dust and dirt stuck right on the margin above the actual pixels.
• OK. The integrated webcam and microphone are rarely used but prove useful when the need arises. The bluetooth and card reader are great as well.

So what would I look for in a laptop If I was searching for one right now:

• A maximum 13″ display if you want a mobile unit. Otherwise let’s just call it a desktop replacement :).
• Power button access without opening the lid.
• Multimedia remote control (play, pause, mute, next, etc).
• Volume controlled by a physical wheel situated on one side. Yes, it’s not so cool but is extremely fast and easier to use than buttons for +/-.
• HDMI output. This is a must have.
• A minimum of 2 USB ports.

I would also not worry about the HDD’s capacity too much. Out of a 250GB HDD I’m only using 50GB (Windows 7 32 bit and all software needed is installed). All the important and heavyweight data (photos, movies) are stored at home on my NAS.

Let’s keep it short and structured:

Configuration

• Intel Core 2 Duo T9300
• HDD 250 GB
• 3 GB RAM
• nVIDIA 8400 GS
• 13″ LED display
• fingerprint reader
• 0.3 Mp web cam
• Windows Vista Business OEM
• wireless G (nope, my model does not have N)
• DVD-RW slot-load
• Bluetooth

The GOOD

• great design
• light
• small
• LED display means a brighter screen and a lower power consumption (at least they brag about it)
• about 3 hrs battery time (normal usage)
• remote control which fits in the express card slot. Very useful for presentations or movie playback.
• HDMI output

The BAD

• capacitive media buttons. I guess they were introduced just to be cool. Other than that they have no practical use. If you are using the laptop in a dark place you cannot feel them and end up pressing a couple before reaching the one you want. For some reason, when pressing the eject button the entire OS freezes for 2-3 seconds while the disk is ejected. And yes, the volume controls are capacitive too and do not have direct control on the speaker output. This is quite dumb because there are cases in which you cannot make the laptop shut up: try running Winamp, then lock the system; you won’t be able to turn down the volume or mute the speakers unless you log into Windows again.

The really BAD

• it’s broken. The graphics board decided that about 10 months of use it served enough. Now I get to watch beautiful colorful vertical lines instead of… anything else. Leaving the sarcasm aside, for a laptop that has a 3 year warranty, was used primarily for web surfing and rarely left my desk this doesn’t sound too good. I really had the impression that DELL laptops are reliable. Not any more.

Hopefully I’ll get my graphics board replaced in about a week. If not I may blog about the quality of DELL’s service.