Dell Inspiron™ E1505 PC Notebook

I had been in the market for a media oriented notebook for some time. I have customized many Dells, Sonys, HP's and Toshibas on their sites and tried to come up with the laptop that did everything I wanted it to do for the price I could afford to pay.

I don't do much gaming but I wanted to be able to download and play movies as well as live TV. I wanted to burn DVD's and have the portability of a notebook. I wanted Media Center. By the time I had customized a notebook on most sites I was very close to and in some cases over 2 grand.

Finally, one day I was customizing my ideal laptop on the Dell site and saw that they had up to a $750 discount on Inpirons. This allowed to to get some of the high end features I had been craving and still be able to afford them.

I settled on the E1505. It is the new version of the 6000. Initially, I thought I wanted the E1705 (or new version of the 9300) but decided that I did not need the size of it, it would be heavy to carry and probably use alot of battery. Now that I am sitting here typing on my E1505 I am certain that I made the right choice.

I got the T2300, Dual core processor, the medium screen (WXGA with true life),1 gig of ram, Media accelerater 950, 80 gig hard drive, the 8X DVD +/- RW drive, the base wireless card, the 9 cell battery and the Dell Angel USB TV tuner and remote. This ran, with discount, shipping and tax, about $1300.

First off, the exterier of the laptop. The laptop is Silver with white edging - it feels very solid to me. The cover closes nicely and there is no warping anywhere that I can see. The speakers are to the front, the DVD drive on the left side facing. There are DVD, Media center buttons on the front to adjust volume, tracks etc. There is also a button to go directly to Media center without starting up Windows. I have tried all of these and they all work the way they are supposed to and are very convenient.

The order process was very smooth (Dell does a good job with this, the order interface, either on line or by phone, in my experience has always been good) It took exactly 7 days from the time I ordered the laptop to the time that it arrived at my door.

I got the medium screen, not the ultra. In my opinion this was a good compromise. The screen is very good - there is some distortion when you are looking at the screen from an angle but looking head on at the screen it is perfect. It took some trial and error but I also found that adjusting the screen to the right angle was important.

The DVD drive works well and quiet. I found that my DVD's played better when I went into Power DVD and Enabled Eagle vision rather then hardware accelerater so once I figured out how to make that adjustment all was well.


The speakers are on the front and I am really impressed with them. They are quite loud and the volume can be adjusted right from the front of the laptop. They are stereo and really play nicely.

The wireless card connected to my network painlessly and maintains a signal of 4 bars or excellent so I feel that upgrading the wireless card was not necessary and I am glad I did not do that.

The TV tuner is easy to set up and works very well. It requires a cable connection and also internet to work its best. The things I like the best about it are the ability to watch TV and work on something else and I love the guide. It gives more information on the upcoming shows then any others that I have seen. Also with the TV tuner you can record any shows you wish to and then burn them to DVD's - a very handy feature. If you had a student living in a dorm having a tv tuner would save them having to have a tv and a computer. A very nifty invention.

As everyone knows, Dell support is challenging. I do like their forum community though. I have found that many of my questions can be answered by others who post on that site, many of whom seem to really know their stuff. I would highly recommend using this resource to anyone purchasing from Dell and needing advice on anything.

How well does the laptop download movies, you ask? Very Well. I use Starz on Real Player and the movies download and play with excellent video and picture quality.

All told, I got a laptop that is exactly what I want for a very good price.

***Update 4-7-06

A couple of things I have learned.

If you have a Westfall Modem you want to stay away from the base wireless card as they have compatability issues.

If you are going to upgrade your 950 integrated card do it at the time of ordering your laptop - since it is integrated you cannot upgrade after your system as been built.

Consider going with the Dell on Call help for $49 for the first 30 days. After the fact it is $99 per occurence and even if you are good with computers you will probably have a few questions about your new system and it is the best and least stressful way to contact Dell. I am told this service is really excellent and I wish I had gotten it.


***Update 5-11-07

Well I have had the laptop for a year now and I thought I would give an update.

I am dissapointed with the battery. I get message on startup that even tho my battery is able to charge normally it is ending its life. I upgraded to the 9 volt battery and it did not even make it a trouble free year. It still works but discharges very quickly. It was not included in the recall.

I did have to call tech support a week ago because I was having problems with the operating system, it became unstable (dont know why - I dont think it was a virus as I have alot of antivirus stuff) Wound up having to reset the computer (always back up your Itunes stuff) Since this is my fun computer I did not loose anything but Itunes. It was quick and fixed the problem. So that is one problem in 1 year of use - not bad. Tech support spent quite a while with me and was very helpful - even if they were from India.

I have had no keys popping off or dead pixels or breakage in any way. Media center does occasionally skip or freeze but it is usually temperary. Normally shutting it down and restarting it will fix it. I watch this pc like a tv at times with a tv tuner and use it to record all my tv shows. I also download alot of movies and watch them. It works very well for this purpose. I have never played a game on it besides freecell.

All in all, after a year, I am still glad I bought this computer.