Ok where to start with this beauty? Well i'll kick off with a little bit about the ordering process as I believe this to be all part of the laptop as if you are already aware or not when you buy a dell computer, you pretty much choose the whole thing to be built to your choice, which if you aks me means that the order process is all part of this pc!!
Now I've had my dell inspiron 1520 for nearly a year ( i'm even writing this review using it!) and even though you can order it to your specification, this model wasn't changed much from the basic spec so it gives a good insight into standard etc.
First off, upon ringing through to order my dell laptop, I already knew exactly what I wanted after doing reserach on the net and knew straight off that I didn't want any of the other 'extras' they offer to bump up their sales. With this in mind I thought that the order procees would be a simple affair of getting my finance and then getting it ordered. I was wrong! Now I have no problem with people who have an accent being employed by companies who have a lot of clients over the phone but, I do think that they should be aware whether a persons acccent is so hard to understand that it will leave a customer feeling confused and irritated! The sales rep who I spoke to had such a strong accent that I couldn't understand a lot of what he kept saying so we spent what I think was a lot longer on the phone than normal as I was needing to repeat things and he was asking me questions that I was having to get him to repeat! After what seemed like an eternity we finally manged to get the finance part sorted and he then wanted to run over the details of the order.
Now during the process of me giving me the details for him to do my finance he had asked certain things along the way to obviously determine how much finance I was looking to take out but, I STILL had to give him all the products codes again (maybe this is just me as I work in sales too and I write things like this down so as not to have to get the customer to give it me all again which I believe creates better customer service!) After doing this he confirmed what the pc was and I replied that it was correct and the only thing I wanted to change was that it was upgraded to the bubblegum pink colour with the integrated webcam. no more, no less. Pretty simple. At this point I advised I didn't want anything else as I was entirely happy with it after doing extensive research into it and they were the only two extras I wanted. Still though during what ended up being a further 40 minutes conversation I had to advise the sales agent that it was in pink, not black as he recapped over the order twice saying ''thats the dell inspiron in black with...'' I found this to be the most annoying thing as if it wasn't for the fact that it was this exact pc I wanted I would have at that point taken my business elsewhere. Its' not like I was asking for a lot of difficult unusual specs or extras - it was basic with a couple of simple things. My pc did take quite a while to arrive, due to them waiting on parts which I can understand so just a bit unfortunate but actual delivery by dell was smooth and online tracking allowed me to see when it went into production and when it left for delivery u until it left the depot the morning it arrived so full marks for this here dell!
Now the laptop itself! Obviously the first thing is the actual model is a dell inspiron 1520 In a bubblegum pink. The whole thing isn't pink, just the top cover which is a lovley shade of metallic so not a cheap pink look! For those wondering this model can be ordered in a variety of colours, which are standard black and white, red, pink,green, yellow, blue and brown. good choice and all are metallic so a good way to personalise it without it looking cheap and tacky!
The standard specifications of the model as it comes is as follows: standard black finish windows vista basic Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5250 Processor (1.5GHz,667MHz,2MB L2 cache) 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA monitor nVidia® GeForce™ Go 8400M GS with 128MB DDR2 dedicated graphic memory 1024MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x512] 120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive including Software Intel® Pro Wireless 3945 802.11a/b/g Mini-Card - Europe 1 Year Base Warranty - Collect & Return Free shipping
Now to some, most of the above is complete jargon but, things to note is that the basic package does come with a good sized hard drive for storing files etc at 1024mb and that it also has a dvd rewriter already installed. The laptop is also wireless ready as it has a a wireless adapter card already fitted. ( which most laptops are anyway now). Now the standard model is advertised as £599 at the moment on the dell website - www.dell.co.uk - but i believe it does vary from time to time if they have special offers on so worth checking it out a few times before purchasing as the standard was only £539 (mine is basic vista though, not premium) when i bought it so really by the time i'd added the extras it was roughly the same price! Also when I received my laptop it came with 15 months free mcafee security but this wasn't mentioned the last time I checked so make sure you ask to see if it is, as this was one of the things the reps try to get you to purchase at approx £70 but it is pointless if you get the first 15months free - you may aswell just purchase it later on when the free subscription ends!
As i said previously I upgraded my laptop to inlcude the webcam and to have it in pink instead of standard black - it depends what colour you have but black and white are both included in cost so either of them two will not cost you anymore. To have any different colour, and with the webcam it costs £78 more - if you ask me this is really good as the webcam is then intergrated, so no bulky attachment to put on the laptop everytime you want to use it and you don't have to worry about storing it anywhere either. The camera that is integrated is 2mp so more than adequate for the job in hand and the price includes the different colour selection too. You are paying for convenience too but overall I would say worth it in the long run! The dvd rewriter is excellent - not used that much yet but, what Ihave used it has been speedy and easy to use. Obviously agian, this is already installed so no installing to do to start using it. Graphiccs are of high quality and as soon as i had started using the laptop I was trying out dvds on it. Great sound and brilliant graphics! The laptop has microsoft works inlcuded and it is a useful tool for those who need basic stuff for creating projects etc. All the usual microsfot stuff is included such as games, and things like calculator, diary etc. I noticed that once i'd started up to the laptop automatically had the google toolbar which you can display at the right hand side of your screen and you can choose which aplications you want to display such as the local weather, date news feed etc. handy little tool. To add aswell, i don't think this laptop is particulary heavyy for it's size as it does have a good sized screen so quite a wide laptop but, it's not the lightest laptop on the market either! Nothing too heavy though! You can purchase a laptop bag from dell at the time of order and to fit my laptop it was £38. I know you can get cheaper ones from elsewhere so i would say this is probably worth leaving. As said previously, all dell pc's are made to order so even if you like this model for it's size style etc but want higher specs then it is possible to do this. You can upgrade the hard drive etc to as high as you want and add as many extras as you need and upgrade the vista to the level you require.
Overall an excellent pc that is fast, has great graphics, lots of useful little tools and is attractive - what more could you need?
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