It’s been a while since I ordered a new laptop, for myself or
for anyone else. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised when I went
to the Dell site on the 23rd of
last month and was able to get a
Inspiron Notebook 1300/b130 for $499 after the $150 rebate. I
didn’t add a single option or upgrade to the laptop, I just ordered
the basic system. The total came to $702.55 after adding tax, but I
got free shipping and the rebate brought the total to $552.55.
This laptop wasn’t for me, it was for the collegiate chapter of
Sigma Kappa that I advise
at Angelo State University.
They have needed their “own” laptop for some time, and since this
computer would basically be for officer reports only, a more basic
model was perfect. That’s why the following specifications sounded
great:
IB130,CM 370 (1.50GHZ)
15.4 INCH WXGA DISPLAY,B130
256MB,DDR2,533,1 DIMM,I1300
INTEL GMA 900,I1300/B130
40GB,U-ATA,HDD,I1300
WINDOWS XP HOME,SP2,ENG,INSP
INTERNAL 56K MODEM,IB1300
24X COMBO CD-RW/DVD,I1300
29WHR,4-CELL,LION,PRIM BATT,I1300
1YR LIMITED WARRANTY
When the laptop arrived on the 28th, I was so impressed with
everything about it, including the beautiful wide screen, that I
decided to order one for my daughter Sarah. The only upgrade that I
intended to do was to double the amount of internal RAM from 256MB
to 512MB…but that turned out to be unnecessary as the $499 deal
now included:
IB130,CM 370 (1.50GHZ)
15.4 INCH WXGA DISPLAY,B130
MOD,DIMM,533,DDR2,2X256,51,ULD
INTEL GMA 900,I1300/B130
40GB,U-ATA,HDD,I1300
WINDOWS XP HOME,SP2,ENG,INSP
INTERNAL 56K MODEM,IB1300
24X COMBO CD-RW/DVD,I1300
DELL WIRELESS 1370,B/G,I1300
29WHR,4-CELL,LION,PRIM BATT,I1300
1YR LIMITED WARRANTY
Did you catch that? The RAM was doubled to 512MB and this laptop
came with wireless for the same price. Shipping was still
free, and the $150 rebate was still in effect.. While I was glad to
get this deal for my daughter, I felt sort of bummed that I hadn’t
been able to get it a week before for the chapter. Anyway, I went
ahead and doubled Sarah’s hard drive to 80GB and ended up spending
$783.84 with tax. So after the rebate the laptop with wireless,
double the RAM and double the hard drive came to $633.84, or just
$81 more than the first laptop.
I guess I shouldn’t complain…I bought a Winbook laptop in 1995 that didn’t
even have such impressive specifications and it was over
$3,000. Of course, it had the swappable internal CD and floppy
drives, a gimmick I used maybe once.
No one is going to be playing games on these laptops or running
any seriously processor-taxing programs, but these laptops will be
perfect for listening to music, doing homework, watching DVDs,
preparing reports, getting online, and doing all of the other basic
things that people need laptops for. For the money, I am pretty
pleased with the purchases. Of course, after looking at the Dell
site again this morning, I found that the
deals have once again changed… :0P
