Dell has numerous product lines in terms of portable computers. You have the Studio line, Studio XPS, Mini, Alienware, and the consumer pocket-friendly Inspiron. The Dell Inspiron 15 is not a new runner on the block, but the newly improved and better spec’d Inspiron 15 with a Core i5 Intel processor is something new. And it’s fast. For the price of $969, this is a pretty good deal for a Windows 7 Core i5-powered laptop. Check out the review by clicking through and see if Dell is still thinking about its consumer line (as well as its competitors). You will join us, won’t you?
Price as Reviewed: $969
Full Disclosure: This unit laptop was sent in by Dell for review.
The Looks and Feel
When you first take this shiny new unit out of the box, you feel – well — amazed? To begin with, there’s the 2.4 Ghz Core i5 processor, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, 320GB hard drive at 5,400 rpm, 1.3 megapixel webcam, 15.6-inch screen with a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels, an ATI Radeon 4550 HD mobile graphics chip, Windows 7 Home Premium, built-in slide-out DVD burner, and a 9-cell battery (unfortunately not included in this review unit). Oh, and this powerhouse weighs 5.4 lbs, just that you should know.
An interesting surprise I found in the Inspiron 15 is the keyboard, which has an added numpad. As most of you might know, a numbers pad on a laptop calls for immediate typing malfunction, but I can tell you here that it’s great to type on after getting a little used to it, has no flex, and the numpad can actually come in handy (for those who use and need it; not me). This unit comes with an “Ice Blue”cover and doesn’t look too shabby. The build quality is another jump for Dell, and the trackpad is one of the most comfortable I’ve ever used (and I’ve tried out a lot of touchpads, trust me).
However, while the buttons on the touchpad are superb, the driver software is not. The touchpad constantly locks up, bounces around, and sometimes doesn’t respond at all. The only quick fix I’ve found is the disable touchpad hotkey, which you can usually enable and have everything running smoothly again – until it goes out of whack in 30 minutes time. Otherwise I also found it mandatory to play around with the settings to make the touchpad more refined.
One more thing to talk about in the feels of this laptop is the media controls. One thing I expected in the Inspiron 15 was the exclusion of touchstrip media controls. And my guess was right; the media controls are actually on the keyboard but with a twist. Usually on most entertainment laptops that have this drawback you’d have to use the Fn key with other keys for media-related control, but not on the Inspiron. By default, the F7 to F12 keys are used for brightness, volume, next and previous chapters, and mute. Besides that, the F1 to F5 keys are used for Wi-Fi, projector, battery status, and brightness. You have the option to turn all of these keys back into their original setup as regular Windows function keys
Zippy Performance
Above: Geekbench Testing
As further proof of the specs I mentioned earlier, above is the Geekbench score (in 32-bit mode). With a score of 4440, it places the Inspiron 15 between the ranks of the Alienware M15x (6,468 points) that I reviewed and the MSi X600 (1,321 points), which was completely crushed by the Dell’s Core i5 and the M15x’s Core-i7.
But even when you compile charts, tests, and analytical data, it’s all numbers compared to old-fashioned regular real-world use. Which is what matters in the real world. Analytical data is used to make calculations, real-world data is used for read-world situations.
Or maybe I just mixed all of this up? I think I just did. Back to study. Anyways.
Multitasking was smooth and heavily backed up by four gigs of DDR3-class RAM. To start things off, I resized some 3,000+ pixel images in a matter of seconds, while have multiple windows running in Chrome without any lag , and without any outside power sources. So the Inspiron 15 could be your heavy-data processing friend, even on the road with the 9-cell or 6-cell battery. That is of course, if you can carry a 5.4 pound 15-inch laptop wherever you go. That’s another matter entirely that I won’t cover here, because its personal preference.
Gaming on this laptop is so-so. The equation for a perfect gaming laptop is the following:
Extreme price (exclude the Alienware M11x) + powerful CPU (here) + insane graphics card (not here) + large HDD (here) + lots of RAM (here) = Modern Warfare 2 n00b killer.
The ATi 4550 HD Mobility graphics card will play all of your movies and YouTube HD videos at crystal clear quality as I found out, but even with a Core i5 chip there’s not enough here to play Modern Warfare 2 for instance (on full settings), or anything else like Dirt 2. With this sort of graphics card you’d only be able to play games that the MSi X600 can, but with only slightly better settings.
Perfect Keyboard & Speakers
As I said before, the keyboard is very firm and has lots of support. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it, and in fact is one of the most comfortable I’ve tested and probably one of the most comfortable out there. Moving on to audio reception and quality, the Inspiron 15 has superb speakers for audio playback, games, and movies. There’s a nearly perfect amount of bass, and great coverage of softer tones as well.
That All-Important Wi-Fi Signal & Camera
Wi-Fi reception is very acceptable and strong. Moving from a room to outside (normally 30+ feet in LaptopMemo headquarters) only reduced Wi-Fi strength from 5 bars down to 4. As for the built-in 1,3-megapixel webcam, I could wave hands in different light settings and find that it captured each frame flawlessly in a good light setting. Impressive.
15.6-inch LED Screen
The Inspiron 15 obviously uses a 15.6-inch LED panel with a resolution of 1366×768. While not of superior quality the panel has just the amount of brightness and great viewing angles to watch a movie with other people, and do some news posting. Though, one thing that is amazingly flawed in the Inspiron 15 is glare. Yes, I know, I know. Glossy screens always cause glare. At least you can adjust brightness levels to such a high point that you could out-do the sun, but that’s not very practical with battery life, either. Something that we’ll get to in a minute.
Ports, Ports, and more Ports
Sorry, but this little lappy only has 9 ports, not a infinite amount by far. But you have everything you’d ever need (except an E-SATA port). To start with, there’s 3 USB 2.0 ports, an HDMI-out port, VGA-out, microphone and headset jacks, SD card slot, lock slot, and power port. A nice little bonus would have been a combo E-SATA port with USB, but in this case, Dell’s design lab probably just said “No” and left it at that, which is totally OK with us.
Battery Life = Not Brilliant
I took it very seriously that I tested the battery life of a Core i5 powered laptop that has 4GB of DDR3 RAM and a 6-cell battery very well in different circumstances. So while playing casual games with the ATi 4550 HD graphics card, which is the same in the MSi X600, as well as browsing Digg on Google Chrome and watching YouTube videos at HQ, I can 99.99% say that the Inspiron 15′s battery lasts no more than:
3+ hours with “High Performance” mode, Wi-Fi turned on, and screen brightness close to max.
It’s not extremely impressive by any means. But since this was done mainly on a brutal performance setting, you can be sure that you could squeeze out more juice by using it on different settings, and going easy on the brightness meter.
The Conclusion
The Inspiron 15 isn’t a major player in the notebook market, but it has the guts to do the job, and does it well. With amazing sound quality, reasonable graphics, award-worthy performance, and a superb keyboard, I could see myself buying an Inspiron 15. Except that if I would, it would probably be an Alienware M11x instead, also made by Dell, which packs in much more graphics power in an 11.6-inch screen, while keeping pricing in check. Also note that I’m not a super gamer, but feel comfortable knowing that I have enough graphics energy to get any task done.
Pros:
- Zippy performance.
- Great specs.
- Decent pricing.
- Bright and vibrant LED screen.
- Heavenly-feeling keyboard
Cons:
- Buggy touchpad; buggy touchpad software
- Lower than expected battery life
- Small directional buttons
[Thanks! Sarah @ Dell]
