Dell's new Latitude has no attitude
Written: May 27 '01
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Pros: Sufficient for office applications and DVD movies
Cons: Poor fan design and location; 24X-speed CD-ROM
The Bottom Line: Positives are the 750MHz Pentium III processor and 128Mb of memory, but fan location and design are poor. Corporate buyers should check this out before considering bulk purchases.
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| ozgamer's Full Review: Dell Latitude C600 (220-6670) PC Notebook |
The demands of e-commerce today require corporate fleet notebooks to offer more than just budget-priced computing for the corporate employee. Dell's new Latitude C600 combines the features required in a corporate notebook at a price that should make it easier to afford. The C600's styling is fairly conservative, as you would expect for a corporate workhorse.
The 14.1 inch active matrix, screen offers a standard 1024 x 768-pixel resolution and, though it isn't as much as other screens of the same size, it's more than adequate for office applications. It's powered by ATI's ever-present Rage Mobility graphics controller, the main staple of current-generation notebook computers. Its performance is fine for office applications, adequate for DVD movies but not really enough for serious 3-D after-hours entertainment.
Intel's 750MHz mobile Pentium III processor, with 128Mb of memory, keeps Windows 2000 chugging along at good speed - in fact, the performance of this system is about 30 per cent better on standard office applications such as Microsoft Office than the same system running Windows ME or 98SE. The reason is that Windows 2000 is a fully-optimized 32-bit operating system that perfectly matches the capabilities of the Pentium III processor.
The 10Gb UltraATA hard disk drive is also fairly standard given the price tag, but it is a surprisingly fast drive with an average 4470Kb/sec data transfer speed. Hard disk drives are the slowest part of any computer system, so a fast drive goes a long way to building a fast computer - and this is no exception. Dell's inclusion of a 24X-speed CD-ROM drive might seem a bit spartan, but you can upgrade this to a DVD-ROM drive if you choose when you order.
One thing that came as a surprise and concern in this unit was the location and design of the built-in cooling fan. Despite improvements in processor design, the 750MHz mobile Pentium III still chews up a considerable amount of power and produces a considerable amount of heat. The fan's job is to remove that heat, but it's location and design are cause for concern. It is located under the notebook at one of the rear corners, which means you need to be careful if you're going to use this one on your lap - make sure you keep that fan uncovered. The other thing was a lack of a grille to protect the fan blades - my test unit's fan was quite exposed, far more so than I have ever seen on any other notebook in recent times. Other than that, the C600 has a wide range of peripherals, including a v.90 modem and Fast Ethernet connection built into the notebook. These two features on their own don't make a corporate notebook, but they certainly go a long way in the right direction.
The multibay at the front allows you to connect either a second hard disk drive or a CD-RW drive, which could be a useful option for data storage and archiving. It also sports legacy serial, parallel and external VGA ports as well as an S-video output to connect the display to a VCR or large-screen TV. You can also add to that two Type II PC card slots and a USB (universal serial bus) port as well. The 14.8V 3.6Ah Lithium ion battery is good for around two-and-a half hours, which again is fairly standard for a notebook of this type but depends on your usage patterns.
Overall, though the C600 is quite a creditable fleet notebook, the fan design and location are not ideal. My suggestion to corporate buyers would be to obtain one on loan and check it for yourself with your typical corporate usage patterns in mind before placing a big order. Small business users might be better off looking at Dell's Inspiron range for an improved mix of features and price.
Recommended:
No
Amount Paid (US$): 3379
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Epinions.com ID:
ozgamer
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Member: Setzer
Reviews written: 60
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