To upgrade or replace

Soldato
Joined
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Exeter
Currently got a Dell Inspiron 1520 thats about 2 years old now. Its a C2D 2.0Ghz T7250, 2gb RAM, 160gb 7200rpm HDD an 8600M GT HDD.

It performs fine for my needs, but there's a few things that I dont like. First, the HDD although pretty quick for a laptop is bursting at the seams a little bit, only got about 10gb free, so that wants upgrading so 500gb 7200rpm for £85

Could also do with a memory upgrade to 4Gb, that'll be £50

I want to upgrade to Win7 when that comes out, so thats £65

Its also a bit heavy/thick for my liking, I'm carrying it around more these days so it's becoming annoying.

So I'm potentially going to spend 200 quid on it. I could probably sell this one for £250~300 so it got me thinking about replacing it.

Would I get a worthwhile upgrade for £700~£800? I was looking at the Dell XPS 16 or the Sony FW series. Both are much nicer looking machines than my current Dell, thinner and lighter. Both would be along the lines of C2D 2.1Ghz, 4gb, 500gb HDD and some sort of discrete graphics.

Is a new 2.1Ghz C2D much faster than a 2 year old 2.0Ghz? Any comments on the above machines? Any other options I havent thought of? Ta!
 
Soldato
Joined
8 Jun 2006
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12,638
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Hertfordshire
Had the XPS16 but sent it back as I noticed I can get a 4670 1GB, 4GB DDR3, 2.4 C2D for the same price (approx £630) from the Dell outlet

Just waiting for a refund then will purchase... great laptops though nice backlit keyboard too
 
Soldato
OP
Joined
26 Feb 2009
Posts
14,814
Location
Exeter
Thats not a bad price - I never found much of interest in the outlet, they always look cheap but then you realise the prices are ex vat...
 
Associate
Joined
20 Sep 2009
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9
ive got a dell stuido xps 16 and i love mine performs well other than hd probelm but i think i might have a dodge hard drive. one probelm is it gets very hot and doesnt seem to get rid of the heat very well. when i push it hard it normal hits 60 with a cool pad i, dont think you could use it on ur lap as it would be to hot.
 
Soldato
Joined
9 Oct 2008
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London, England
It looks like the new Core i7 based processors are available in the Studio 15 range, for £700 you can get the i7-720QM, 4GB RAM and a 320GB 7200RPM drive which you can upgrade to a 500gb for £30. It may be worth considering as it would a decent upgrade over your existing laptop, especially considering the turbo mode taking it up to 2.8GHz. It's the one I would go for, personally.
 
Soldato
Joined
8 Jun 2006
Posts
12,638
Location
Hertfordshire
It looks like the new Core i7 based processors are available in the Studio 15 range, for £700 you can get the i7-720QM, 4GB RAM and a 320GB 7200RPM drive which you can upgrade to a 500gb for £30. It may be worth considering as it would a decent upgrade over your existing laptop, especially considering the turbo mode taking it up to 2.8GHz. It's the one I would go for, personally.

Are they on the website at the moment?


EDIT: Got it ;)
 
Last edited:
Soldato
OP
Joined
26 Feb 2009
Posts
14,814
Location
Exeter
Looking at the product page of the XPS 16 says its now available with the i7 mobile but its not showing as an option? Any ideas - I really like the XPS.

Also, whats the difference between the XPS16 and the 1640 that the purple place are offering?
 
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