A LOW-TECH LOOK AT MY LOVELY LAPTOP (Dell Inspiron 6000 Essential)

Member Name: katestuartuk

Product:	Dell Inspiron 6000 Essential
Date:	01/10/06 (234 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: DOES EXACTLY WHAT I NEED IT TO DO

Disadvantages: NONE THAT I CAN THINK OF

Dell Inspiron 6000

For as long as I have been writing reviews on Dooyoo, I have had a real urge to write a good solid review about my laptop computer. I am not, however the most technical of people, and so planning and writing a fully fledged technologically sound review has been pretty much impossible. I have toiled and tried and given up countless times, thinking there was no way I could build a review with the limited amount of technical jargon and knowledge that I have.

A hopeless case?

Well, I thought so. And then I remembered what Dooyoo was all about. The whole idea of a “consumer review” popped back into my head. I remembered how I felt, buying my first laptop (this one) and how there was so much I didn’t understand that confused the heck out of me and stopped me taking in the bits that were really important to me. What I could have done with then was a review written by someone like me. Who knows what they’ve got, who knows what it does and is capable of, and who knows how much it cost them.

So I began to write. And here it is. A review for all the people out there like me who don’t know jack about computers, but need a clue on which one to buy.

The Dell Inspiron 6000

The Inspiron 6000 is a laptop, which can be used in the home, or out and about. It is quite lightweight, and though I don’t mind having it sat on my lap for a while, at 3kg, I’m not sure I’d be happy about carrying it around all day. It is very stylish in looks, with silver coloured surfaces, and two white bands on either side of the keyboard. When you close it up, the lid is silver too, with the Dell symbol in the centre.

The screen is the next thing you will notice – in that it is quite large. The screen is 13 inches by just over 8 inches.
This is good if you want to watch a movie on your laptop: something you can do if you wish, as the Inspiron 6000 has a DVD drive on the left hand side. This can be used for watching DVDs and for listening to CDs. It is a CD and DVD writer too, so you can copy information from your computer onto a CD or DVD: wedding videos, a child’s music recital, or songs and videos if they have been taken from legal download sites (the ones where you pay a fee.)

The laptop has speakers on the keyboard, to the left and right of the keys, on the sides, and at the front. There are also controls for the sound, and for when you’re playing music on your laptop (stop, play, pause etc.)

The laptop can be used for the internet, and comes with Intel Centrino, which means you can use you computer wirelessly for the internet. All this means is that there is no wire or cable connecting the laptop to the phone line. In the manner of cordless phones, there would be a unit (a router) plugged into the phone socket that sends out a signal to the laptop, and the little Intel Centrino chip in the laptop receives the signal. So you’re connected to the internet without a physical connection, hence wireless. This is a really good feature, and I can highly recommend this function whichever computer you decide to buy. Having a wireless connection means I can sit in my garden with the laptop in the summer and work with the internet there, or if I go away, I can take my laptop and use it wirelessly in train stations and airports. Even if you don’t think that you would do any of those things, it’s important to think about where you want to have the computer, Is it near a phone socket? If not, it can cost over £100 to get a new socket fitted. If you have a wireless laptop, you don’t need a new phone point. Plus, if you decide you want to work in a different room, you can, without having to rewire the whole house. Very clever stuff! The battery life on this laptop is also one of the longest I know about – a fully charged battery lasts just over 5 hours for me, and though I don’t know how that compares to newer models, I know it’s more than enough to impress me!

The laptop has a 56K modem, which means if all you wanted to do was go online with a pay-as-you-go dial-up internet service (not as fast and reliable as Broadband is, and often more expensive), you already have the ability to connect with this modem, and you wouldn’t have to buy anything else. Most people do, however use Broadband, which is much faster to connect, load pages, and navigate.

The Inspiron 6000 has a series of connections ports, which are very useful to know about. It has 4 USB ports, which you connect things like printers, digital cameras, mobile phones, ipods, mps players etc up to when you want to move information. So say you took a picture on your mobile phone, you would plug in the USB cable to connect the phone (having installed the software first, also very easy) and then you can take pictures from you phone and put them on your computer.

It also has a port to plug headphones into – I use this all the time to listen to music while I’m working on the laptop. Very handy!

There is an Ethernet port, which is where you connect up to your broadband router, and a port to use if you just use dial-up for your internet connection.

The keyboard is the next thing to look at. It is very simple and easy to use. It doesn’t have a mouse, but instead has a touchpad, which I find very easy to use. You just kind of stroke it and tap it, and as you stroke, the mouse moves. I think it’s a lot easier than a mouse, though you can plug a mouse in if this is what you are used to.

My Inspiron 6000 came with Windows XP Home, and lots of stuff like Word (for writing documents), Paint Shop Pro (for making pictures!), plus loads more. Different shops will no-doubt have different things available, but all you have to do is think about what you want to use it for. I just wanted to be able to write, and to go online, so a lot of the features I don’t even use, and I’ve had it over a year!

The processor (the brain of the computer) is 1.4Ghz – this is how fast the brain of the computer works. There are much faster, better laptops out there, but again, it just depends what you need it for. I don’t need to use mine for work, just for leisure purposes, so it doesn’t need to be a top of the range laptop.

What this laptop is, however, is reliable. I have had it a year, and so far, touch wood, it has done me proud. Lightweight, easy to carry, very flexible in the sense of internet connection, and with a good size memory (60GB on the hard drive is reasonable), it does what I need it to do.

As far as costs are concerned, this is something that will probably change on a daily basis, and certainly during the run up to Christmas, when shop prices fluctuate like a reservoir, you’ll possibly find big differences in price depending on where you look. My laptop is a work deal, so I’m still paying for it every month, however, you’re probably looking at something in the region of £500.00. If you’re buying new, get a printer too – you think you don’t need one, and then you do. It’s often cheaper to buy as a package. Also, look around. Don’t buy the first one you like the look of, shop around and see what you can get for your hard earned cash. Finally, going into a PC shop and saying you know nothing about computers is guaranteed to have you walking out with half the shop, boxes of stuff you really don’t need, and a lifetime of debt trying to pay off your credit card once you realise you don’t need much of what you’ve bought. Go in, know what you want to be able to do, and don’t let yourself be badgered into buying more than you need!

The Dell Inspiron 6000 has been for me, quite literally, an inspiration. It has given me an important tool to be able to do what I’ve wanted to do for a long time, which is to write. It is a place where I can store inspirational images that one day I’ll turn into paintings. It’s a place where I can file and organise photographs, reprinting them for friends and relatives. It is, in short, absolutely perfect for me. Now it might not be what you want, or need, but it’s well worth doing a bit of research before taking the plunge. I speak from experience!

Well, I hope this low-tech review of my lovely laptop helps in and purchasing decision you might be making in the near future, and I’m really glad to be able to share my small, unconventionally non-technical pearls of wisdom with you. Thank you for reading! Kate x

Summary: A GREAT LAPTOP IDEA FOR NEW USERS AND PERFECT FOR MOBILITY IN THE HOME.

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