Dell Studio 17 laptop - quick review

With the Studio 17 notebook, Dell has clearly made its place in the market of laptops. It is not only unique and stylish, as per the needs of the mobile generation, it is also amazingly attractive popular and highly customizable too!

The Dell Studio 17 which is part of the new Studio Line is part of the realization by Dell that package matters as much as the contents which are held inside the box. However, upon first look of the Studio 17, you will realize that Dell has added on a few inches when compared to other Dell counter parts and actually gotten rid of the brushed aluminum parts and added on a few means of customization. Although this may not be the most mobile laptop, it certainly compensates in terms of solid design and construction. The chassis is extremely solid and suffers from just about “no flex.” There are also no creaks when squeezed or twisted between the hands.

 

The Studio 17 has a variety of customizable options with a WXGA+ (1440 x 900) glossy display or a WUXGA (1920 x 1200) glossy display or a WXGA+ LED (1440 x 900) glossy display. When coupled with the optional Blu-ray drive, it would be fantastic when watching 1080p HD movies. The Dell Dock is a specialty providing a unique visual interface. The benefit is that it helps to keep the desktop free of clutter and makes usage of Vista a little more user friendly.

The keyboard is actually quite good with its excellent firmness. The keys have excellent travel and the cushioning is great. Truly speaking typing can be a great pleasure with the Studio 17 and the dedicated number pad is a huge plus too. However, long fingernails might be prone to getting caught under the keys. There is also a nice backlight function which can be extremely useful when typing in the dark. The touch pad is quite effective although it is quite small when compared to the rest of the notebook. Although the mouse buttons are as well structured as those of the keyboard, they can be a little noisy. On the other hand the touchpad is quite responsive and the dedicated scroll areas are excellent.

 

The top of the keyboard as a series of touch-sensitive media buttons. These have white LED backlights which stay lit for a fraction of a second after being pressed. Hence, they don’t pose a distraction by staying lit continuously.

The internal components include an Intel Core 2 Duo T9300 process (2.5GHz) which provides room for excellent performance when it comes to video encoding and number crunching. The 3GB of system RAM is adequate to drive Vista and have extra RAM for other needs. If needs be you can always push in a second HDD for added storage and performance in this notebook. These notebooks also come with dedicated graphics card ATI Radeon HD 3650 which provides enough fuel for average gaming or 3D graphics work; additional dedicated graphics options would have certainly been a plus.

For those of you who find digital video output important, the built-in HDMI will be a boon. However, the lack of lugs or screw posts for the VGA cable seemed a little disappointing but it did give a cleaner look. On the other hand, for those who leave their notebook connected to an external monitor, this will certainly is an inconvenience. As far as ports are concerned, you will be fully geared with five USB ports, FireWire, two headphone jacks, ExpressCard slot, Ethernet port, microphone jack and a media card reader. The slot-loading drive seems to be a little noisy when compared to the tray-loading type; however, it is much quieter than other slot-loading drives.

The speaker quality was extremely good in the individual sense but is only “acceptable” when compared to other competitors who have built-in subwoofers. If you are not the “audio loving” freak, you will probably find that the built-in speakers are enough for you. The speakers are location just above the media buttons. Although the sound is not superb, the speakers can get loud enough without much distortion.