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The Dell Vostro 1520 is targeted towards small to medium-sized businesses. Bearing a weight of only 5.42 lbs and having measurements of 357mm x 258mm x 38mm, the Dell Vostro 1520 is a very portable machine that offers an extensive range of configurations. This laptop has screen size of 15.4”, a tad smaller than its 15.6” HP Compaq 610 competition. Nonetheless, the 15.4” of screen is nothing to complain about. The screen is of adequate size for small business entrepreneurs to be able to work on various office applications with ease.

 

The user can choose from the available configurations for the Dell Vostro 1520 depending on his or her specific needs. A buyer may choose a budget configuration of Intel Celeron 900 for the processor and a standard 160GB SATA for the disk storage. One may choose to boost the configuration to a racy Intel Core 2 Duo T9550 2.66 GHz and fast 128 GB Solid State Drive, while having an optional Nvidia 9300 graphics. The downside is that extra weight will be carried on this laptop once the upgrades are made.

 

Specifications
Central Processing Unit	Intel Celeron 900, Intel Core 2 Duo T6600, P7550, P8600, P8700, or T9550
Display	15.4 inches WXGA Anti-Glare LED, WXGA+ Anti-Glare, WXGA+ w/TrueLife
Random Access Memory	2 GB Single Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800 MHz
	2 to 8 GB of Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800 MHz
Optical Drive	8X DVD+/-RW drive, Blu-ray Disc Combo drive
Video Card	Integrated Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD,
	NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS
Hard Drive	160 GB SATA at 5400 RPM, 250 or 320 GB at 7200 RPM w/Freefall Sensor
	or 250GB Encrypted Hard Drive at 7200RPM w/Free Fall Sensor & Wave software
	128 GB Solid State Drive
Wireless Connection	Dell Wireless 1397 or 1510 mini card, Intel WiFi Link 5100 or 5300 mini card
Bluetooth	Dell Wireless 355 Bluetooth 2.0
Web cam	Integrated 1.3 MP web cam w/digital mic
Battery	four-cell, six-cell, or nine-cell Lithium Ion battery

 

Pros

Unlike its competition, the Dell Vostro 1520 has flexible configurations that allow its owners to customize their computing needs. For users who don’t normally use a lot of heavy applications, they can configure their machines to exclude speedy hardware and other add-ons. For those who like to mix work with pleasure, they can rope in higher-end processors, data storage, graphics card and longer-life Lithium Ion batteries.

 

The Dell Vostro 1520 succeeds in terms of durability and build quality since its components are not made of cheap plastics that are prone to breaking. Its case is rigid allowing those who prefer backpacks to bring their laptop where they go.

 

The keyboard’s buttons are touch-sensitive, making it a good computing machine for touchtypers.

With the Nvidia 9300 option, the user may play with older 3D-based games.

 

Cons

Those who want to stand out may not find the Dell Vostro 1520 appealing. The laptop has a simple design that is not stylish in the least. It looks like any standard-issue notebook out there.

 

Unlike its HP Compaq 610 competition that carries a two-megapixel camera, the Dell Vostro 1520 only holds a 1.3 MP Web cam. The user however, may opt to upgrade the camera for video-conferencing purposes.

 

The Dell Vostro 1520 has some issues with heat – its palm rest gets warm quickly and its fan bogs down after a short while.

 

Conclusion

The Dell Vostro 1520’s design may not be impressive to look at, but if one wants a dependable computing machine that is portable, this would be a good buy. Although it would be small businesses that are expected to find the Dell Vostro 1520 quite appealing, students who want to balance computing performance, price, portability and durability would be getting a great bargain.

Related posts:

1. Dell Vostro 1720 – Review
2. DELL Vostro 1710 – Review
3. Dell Vostro A860 – review
4. Dell Vostro 1320 – Review
5. Dell Vostro 1220 – Review

Tags: business laptop, Dell, Dell Vostro

This entry was posted on Monday, October 26th, 2009 at 4:09 pm and is filed under Dell, and is tagged with business laptop, Dell, Dell Vostro. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.