Dell Inspiron 9300

March 26, 2005 · Comments

That’s what I decided to get. I just placed my order this morning, and it should be here the first week in April. I looked at so many different laptop/notebook review sites and forums that my head is spinning. The Dell Inspiron 9300 was well reviewed and strikes a nice balance between power and portability.

I called Dell this morning and my new best friend Matthew and I talked for about 30 minutes. In addition to the current $350 off promotion with free shipping, he took another 5% off thanks to my NAPP membership.

For $2600 $2260* after taxes and rebates I’m getting:

  • Pentium M 740 (1.73 GHz)
  • 17“ UXGA screen
  • 1 GB RAM
  • 80 GB hard drive
  • PCMCIA slot, SD slot, 4-pin Firewire (1394), six USB 2 ports (why is Apple so stingy on ports?!?)
  • 128 MB ATI Radeon X300 video
  • Windows XP Pro
  • 8X DVD +/-RW optical drive
  • 802.11b/g internal WiFi
  • MS Office Small Business (my mom is getting my old desktop so I’m going to give her Office, Quicken & Norton that’s already on it)
  • Norton Internet Security 2005 (see above)
  • 3 year complete warranty, including accidental coverage and tech support. No more ”I really don’t know how that water got on the keyboard or how that screen shattered. Honest!“ Plus, Matthew pointed out to me that if in 2 years I need a replacement and this model is discontinued, I’ll get the comparable current model. Nice.

Excluding the inevitable ”but it’s Mac OS vs. Windows XP!“ argument (aka ”viruses! spyware! evil empires! oh my!“) a similarly configured PowerBook is $3,098 without any of the software and accident coverage. Don’t get me wrong, Apple makes fantastic laptops but right now it doesn’t make sense for me.

I’ve heard from semi-reliable sources that the next version of Studio MX will be out in September. So I’ve decided to just get an extra license of Dreamweaver MX 2004 for the PC ($399) and then get the next full version as an upgrade on the PC if the features warrant. Macromedia doesn’t sell separate software for Mac/PC, and they allow you to install the software on both a desktop and a laptop but both computers must be on the same platform. Ridiculous! It would be so much easier if I could just deactivate the software from my iBook and install on the Dell and be done with it. More and more web developers are cross-platform these days so I hope this is a policy that Macromedia will reconsider. JD, you listening? ;-)

Looking at eBay I should be able to get around $600 for my iBook so I think I’m going to put it up. Specs are identical to this listing including an inCase bag. Mine still has 6 months left on AppleCare to boot. Anyone interested before I offer it to the masses? Comment or email me.

Update: Shortly after posting this entry, I was surfing sites that had Dell coupons and I found one that offered $800 off select Inspiron computers. I went back in through Dell Home & Home Office (instead of Small Business) and configured the exact same system and with the coupon applied saved almost $400 off the original order. I emailed Matthew who agreed that I was getting a better deal through the Home division so he graciously cancelled the order and I reordered to get the better savings.

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