Dell Laptops Reviews
Dell
Studio 15
Dell
Studio 15 Review
Dell continues to try and
update their notebook designs this year, and
the new Dell Studio 15 is the latest consumer
15-inch notebook that highlights these new designs.
Is it possible to take design elements from
the 13.3" XPS M1330 and the 15.4"
Dell XPS M1530 and make a budget notebook that
keeps consumers happy? Take a look at our full
review of the Studio 15 to find out for yourself.
We purchased our review unit
of the Studio 15 from Staples where they offer
set configurations of the Studio 15. Our budget
configuration cost $799. Fully customized configurations
are available at Dell.com.
As mentioned in our first
look, we had hoped to conduct a full review
of a custom-ordered Studio 15 machine with an
orange colored lid. Unfortunately, the shipping
date for our review unit was pushed back more
than a month ... so we will complete our full
review based on the pre-configured model available
at Staples.
The specs of this particular
Studio 15, the S1535-113P, are as follows:
* Screen: glossy 15.4"
WXGA 1280 x 800 display
* Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo T5750 (2.00GHz,
667MHz FSB, 2MB Cache)
* Memory: 3.00 GB RAM
* Storage: 250GB HD (5400rpm)
* Optical Drive: Slot loading DVD+/-RW
* Wireless: 802.11b/g
* Graphics: Integrated Intel X3100
* Built-in 2.0MP web camera
* Ruby Red color lid
* Ports: 4 USB 2.0, HDMI connector, 15-pin VGA
video connector, Ethernet 10/100/1000 LAN (RJ45),
AC adapter connector, Audio jacks (1 line-in,
1-line out, 1 Mic-in), 4-pin IEEE 1394 port,
54 mm ExpressCard slot, Consumer IR
* Battery: 6-cell 56WHr Li-Ion Battery
* Dimensions: Width: 14.0" (355.6mm), Height:
1.0" (25.3mm) front / 1.3" (33mm)
back, Depth: 10.3" (261.5mm)
* Weight: Starting weight of 6.11 lbs
Build and Design
While we were reasonably impressed
with the dimensions of the Dell Studio 17 as
a 17-inch notebook, the Studio 15 is a little
heaver than other notebooks in its class. While
the design of the notebook gives it the appearance
that it's rather thick, it's actually close
to the same thickness (or even thinner) than
other 15-inch consumer notebooks.
The first time you look at
the Studio 15 it's as if Dell removed the metal
palmrests from the XPS M1530, added a little
bulk, and offered a few more ways to customize
the look. The end result is an impressive looking
desktop replacement. I use the term "desktop
replacement" because most people in the
market for a 15-inch notebook aren't planning
to haul their notebook everywhere and use it
during regular airline travel. Well ... no one
who cares about the person seated next to them
is going to use this on a plane anyway.
While the Studio 15 isn't
exactly a thin-and-light notebook designed for
mobility, it does offer solid design and construction.
As mentioned above, the Studio 15 takes several
design elements from the latest XPS notebooks:
the wedge-shaped profile, drop hinge, slot-loading
optical drive, and touch-sensitive media buttons
are all hallmarks of the XPS M1330 and M1530.
That said, there are a few extras in the design
of the Studio 15 that you won't see in the XPS
line.
The Studio 15 is available
in your choice of seven colors: Plum Purple,
Tangerine Orange, Flamingo Pink, Midnight Blue,
Ruby Red, Spring Green or standard Jet Black.
Our pre-configured unit came with the "Ruby
Red" paint job and it looks absolutely
flawless. The matte paint has an almost rubber-like
texture similar to the paint used on last year's
Inspiron notebooks and, of course, the XPS notebooks.
Dell also took the customization options one
step further by offering an optional high gloss
"Graphite Grey" color that comes in
your choice of black, blue, pink, or red edge
trim around the display back and sides.
Another nice touch is the
use of an imprinted design on the palmrest area
(also on the display lid if you select the high
gloss graphite grey color options). The design
looks like a close-up view of a topographical
map and is yet another way that the Studio notebooks
stand out from the rest of the Dell lineup.
On the other hand, if you see this design on
the palmrests from a few feet away it looks
like someone spilt a milk-based fluid on your
notebook and let it dry under the sun.
In terms of overall chassis
construction the Studio 15 is quite solid and
suffers from virtually no flex or creaks when
squeezed and twisted between your hands. The
Studio 15 might not tolerate being thrown across
the room, but it should survive a drop from
your desk without significant damage.
The one design element I have
mixed feelings about is the bottom access panel.
Rather than having the typical RAM cover, hard
drive cover, and main panel on the bottom of
the notebook, the Studio 15 (like the Studio
17) uses a single, massive panel that provides
access to all of the notebook at once. This
is extremely helpful for those people who want
to make multiple modifications or service their
notebook. However, removing seven screws and
exposing the entire bottom of the notebook is
a little intimidating for people who just want
to upgrade their RAM.
Screen
The Studio 15 widescreen display
is not the LED variety available as an option
on the XPS line, it's just your regular CCFL
style of display that uses a couple of traditional
backlights to illuminate the screen. The screen
is nice though, it's very bright at around 200-nits.
The glossy finish helps to make colors really
pop and is especially nice for watching movies.
The Studio 15 we have is just a regular 1280
x 800 XGA resolution, you can get higher resolution
displays (1440 x 900 or 1920 x 1200) that will
allow you to fit more content on the screen
and enjoy movies in a higher-defintion format
such as the optional Blu-ray drive.
The screen on our review unit
looks beautiful from straight on. The horizontal
viewing angles are likewise great. You won't
have any trouble watching movies on this screen
with a couple of your friends. Upper vertical
viewing angles are good, but colors did begin
to invert at lower viewing angles when the screen
is tilted back.
Keyboard, Touchpad and Media
Controls
The keyboard on the Studio
15 is quite good with nice key travel and proper
key size and spacing. The keyboard is reasonably
firm with only a minor bit of flex near the
center of the keyboard and directly above the
optical drive. I personally felt that the key
presses were a little louder than I like (I
prefer quiet keys rather than keys that "clack"
when typing).
That said, the Studio 15 is
still quite nice to type on and won't cause
many issues for students who need to type long
papers for high school or college. There is
also an option for a backlit keyboard in case
you find yourself working in a dark classroom
or lecture hall, but our budget configuration
from Staples doesn't include the backlit keyboard
option.
The touchpad works well and the mouse buttons
have excellent travel and cushion with extremely
quiet clicks. The good news with the touchpad
is that it's responsive, has dedicated scroll
areas and the glossy textured feel is extremely
good.
A series of touch-sensitive
media buttons with white LED backlights are
located above the keyboard similar to the buttons
on the M1330 and M1530. One nice feature about
the media buttons is that the LEDs only stay
lit for a fraction of a second after being pressed,
so they won't distract you by staying lit all
the time.
Dell also includes a Media
Center remote control that fits neatly into
the ExpressCard slot on the side of the notebook.
This is a great accessory for presentations
or if you want to control a DVD from across
the room.
Ports and Features
The port selection of the
Studio 15 is reasonably good for a notebook
of this size. Here's a quick rundown of what
you get:
Front: IR port for remote
control. (view large image)
Rear: No ports. (view large image)
Left: WiFi on/off, security lock slot, WiFi
catcher/locator, HDMI, VGA, two USB, Ethernet,
microphone jack, two headphone jacks, ExpressCard
slot, 8-in-1 memory card reader. (view large
image)
Right: Firewire, two USB ports, slot-loading
optical drive, power jack, power button. (view
large image)
The built-in HDMI is a very
nice thing to have for those that want digital
video output. Unfortunately, the combination
of HDMI and integrated Intel X3100 graphics
leaves much to be desired. In fact, the HDMI
output from our Studio 15 lacks audio out (not
uncommon on budget notebooks with HDMI, but
sad to see when the new budget notebooks from
HP and Lenovo carry audio and video over HDMI)
and did not work at all with my HDMI-equipped
42" HDTV. The notebook also kept giving
me error messages when I tried to connect my
HDMI-equipped 22-inch desktop display.
While we're on the topic of
external displays, I'm a little sad to see no
lugs/screw posts for the VGA cable. While the
lack of posts makes the VGA connection look
"cleaner" it isn't convenient for
people who regularly leave their notebook connected
to an external monitor. I wouldn't be bothered
by this if the Studio 15 featured a dedicated
docking station port such as those used on the
Latitude notebooks, but since there is no dedicated
docking station connection there needs to be
a way to secure a VGA cable.
With FireWire, four USB ports,
a media card reader, two headphone jacks, microphone
jack, ExpressCard slot and Ethernet port you're
well equipped ports wise.
Some of our editorial staff
are huge fans of slot-loading drives and while
I think these drives look amazing, I'm not entirely
sold on the technology. Slot loading drives
don't like small DVDs or CDs like those you
sometimes receive with hardware drivers or in
the mail. Another issue is that slot-loading
drives tend to be a bit more noisy than traditional
tray-type drives. While the drive in the Studio
15 is extremely quiet for a slot-loading drive
it still makes more noise than a quiet tray-loading
drive.
Speakers
The speaker quality was extremely
good compared to most notebooks, but only "acceptable"
compared to some 15-inch media notebooks with
built-in subwoofers. If you aren't an audiophile
then you'll probably find the built-in speakers
to be more than adequate. Still, if you want
deep, satisfying bass you'll need dedicated
speakers or a great pair of headphones.
The speakers for the Studio
15 are located at the top of the keyboard area
above the media buttons. There's not much to
write home about the speakers, they get loud
enough with minimal distortion, but the sound
doesn't have the impressive lows you get from
dedicated subwoofers.
Performance and Benchmarks
At the end of the day the
most important parts of a laptop are the internal
components that do all the work. Our review
unit came equipped with the Intel Core 2 Duo
T5750 processor (2.0GHz) which offers reasonable
performance in terms of number crunching and
video encoding. The 3GB of system RAM is enough
for satisfy Vista and still provide enough RAM
for most needs. The 250GB Western Digital Scorpio
Blue hard disk drive (HDD) in our review unit
is a 5400rpm drive with good performance.
As mentioned above, the integrated
Intel X3100 graphics left much to be desired.
While integrated graphics generally help with
battery life by drawing less power than dedicated
graphics cards, the optional ATI Radeon HD 3450
dedicated graphics card would have been a much
better choice. On that note, it would have been
nice if Dell offered additional dedicated graphics
options even beyond the ATI Radeon HD 3450,
but I recognize that would position the Studio
15 to compete directly with the XPS M1530. The
synthetic benchmarks listed below will give
you some idea of how this system performs compared
to other systems on the market.
All of the 3DMark06 scores for all of the systems
listed above were run at 1280 x 800 or 1280
x 768 resolution. Clearly, this configuration
of the Studio 15 suffers from the use of under-powered
Intel X3100 integrated graphics.
Heat and Noise
The Studio 15 does a reasonable
job keeping heat under control. The system fan
and heatsinks in the Studio 15 do a great job
managing heat when the system is under load
... as we discovered when we ran multiple benchmarks
back to back. The fan moves a significant amount
of hot air but the noise is reasonably low and
isn't noticeable over background noise most
of the time. While the Studio 15 will heat up
when stressed, it never gets too hot to use
as a "laptop."
As mentioned previously, noise
wasn't much of an issue with the Studio 15.
The slot-loading optical drive made some noise
when inserting or ejecting a disk but it was
among the quietest slot-loading drives we've
had in our office.
The hard drive was likewise
quiet and it seems as if Dell has done a good
job finding ways to minimize the noise coming
from the hard drive.
Battery Life
The 6-cell lithium-ion battery
provides reasonable battery life for the Studio
15. With Vista's power management running in
"balanced" mode, screen brightness
set to 50 percent and wireless on, the 6-cell
battery delivered roughly 3 hours and 41 minutes
of battery life.
If these numbers aren't impressive
enough for your needs then Dell also offers
a 9-cell 85WHr Li-Ion battery for extended battery
life. The only potential negative to the 9-cell
battery is that the additional cells stick out
from the bottom of the notebook which adds to
the overall thickness of the Studio 15 and raises
the notebook off the surface of your desk.
Conclusion
At the end of the day the
Studio 15 is a solid offering in the 15-inch
consumer notebook category. The build quality,
range of customizable options, expandability,
style, and price make this an excellent choice
if you're in the market for a 15-inch notebook.
Still, we would have liked to see more graphics
card options than just the integrated Intel
X3100 and dedicated ATI Radeon HD 3450.
Issues like lack of VGA cable
screw posts, dedicated docking station connector,
or lack of a simple RAM expansion cover are
minor, and many experienced users may find the
all-in-one access panel on the bottom of the
notebook to be extremely helpful. The pre-configured
model we tested suffered from weak integrated
graphics that ruined an otherwise enjoyable
experience, but configurations with dedicated
graphics are available from Dell.com.
That said, we are a little
upset over the delayed shipping of our original
order from Dell.com and if other customers can
expect a delay of a month or more then some
back-to-school shoppers will be disappointed
this year. Hopefully Dell can resolve these
shipping delays.
Bottom line, if you're in
the market for a 15-inch desktop replacement
notebook with nice multi-media options then
the Dell Studio 15 deserves serious consideration.
Although the budget configuration we reviewed
is far from being a multi-media powerhouse,
it still makes an excellent laptop for average
use.
Pros
* Beautiful design
* Solid selection of available configurations
* Reasonable battery life
* Nice keyboard, touchpad and media buttons
* Great component layout makes for easy upgrades/repair
* Good value for the price
Cons
* No lugs/screw posts for
VGA cable and no docking station connector
* All-in-one access cover on the bottom of the
notebook is either great or frustrating
* HDMI with integrated Intel graphics ... bad
move
* No option for better graphics than ATI Radeon
HD 3450 at this time
www.notebookreview.com
Visit Dell computers range.
Lenovo X61
Review
Though the optical drive is
not integrated, everything else about this business
portable is top-notch, especially battery life.
In the ThinkPad X61, Lenovo
has introduced its successor to the ThinkPad
X60. The X61 uses Intel's Santa Rosa mobile
processor. Otherwise, it's the same light, sophisticated
ultraportable as the earlier model; like the
X60, it lacks an integrated optical drive but
offers dazzling battery life.
This 3.6-pound X-series member goes to the top
of our list of ultraportables for mobile professionals.
Our X61 test unit, with a 2-GHz Core 2 Duo T7300
processor and 2GB of DDR2-667 SDRAM, earned
a WorldBench 6 Beta 2 score of 75, which is
tops among currently tested ultraportables.
The extended-life four-cell battery lasted an
amazing 6 hours and 14 minutes.
The bright, 12.1-inch screen
and the keyboard might feel a bit close at first,
but the cramped feeling quickly goes away. The
keyboard has no touchpad, but the eraserhead
pointing device is first-rate and easy to acclimate
to. The usual nice touches found on Lenovo keyboards,
such as volume buttons and a one-press launch
of the recovery system, are also present.
The UltraBase docking station
adds four more USB ports (for a total of seven)
as well as legacy parallel and serial ports.
In addition, the modular optical drive has a
side release, so you can swap with one hand
between an optical drive, a second battery,
or a second hard drive (those are optional accessories).
Including the base, which is easy to snap on
and off, the unit's total weight is a little
over 6 pounds.
Our review unit, which included
an UltraBase docking station with a dual-layer
DVD burner, costs $1724 (as of July 27, 2007).
The great performance and features, and its
reasonable price, make the X61 our current top
choice of ultraportable.
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