Inspiron 8600 vs. HP/Compaq z5000/r3000

  • Thread starter Thread starter fastfwd
  • Start date Start date
F

fastfwd

I'm shopping for my first laptop and I've got a few questions. If any of
you can answer any of these I would appreciate it. I'm not looking for a
gaming machine, but a desktop replacement machine that might do a little
video editing and various multimedia tasks. Ok, I see that Dell Small
Business has a low end 8600 for $949 and I've been looking at HP/Compaq
zv5000z/r3000z configured right around that price. The HP/Compaq looks
stellar on paper (I'm opting for the 64 bit processor and lots of bells and
whistles) in comparison to the low end 8600, but I'm not really impressed
with the feel of the HP/Compaqs that I've looked at in stores. I take it
that the 8600 is a higher level of laptop - build wise, as far as durability
and such. Is this true?

If I get the Dell with entry level wireless (.b) is there going to be a mini
PCI slot to upgrade in the future? Does the Dell DVD-ROM read DVD+RW? Are
there aftermarket 7,200 rpm drives that fit the Dell? What all can go into
the modular bay (extra battery, floppy, anything else)? I hear that the XGA
screen
on the Dell isn't all that great?

Am I going to be sorry that I didn't go with 64bit? I'm a bit disappointed
that I hear the video card for the HP/Compaq's doesn't support Direct X9 and
that will be a requirement for full Longhorn Aero Glass (but that's not
really a deal breaker if true).

Specs - (the HP has already dropped the free hard drive upgrade offer, so
I've gotta make this decision pretty quick) :
Compaq Presario R3000Z series customize notebook
- Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP Home Edition
- AMD Athlon(TM) 64 3000+ 1.80 GHz
- 15.4" WXGA Widescreen (1280x800)
- 64MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(TM) 4 440 Go +1394 & 5-in-1
- 256MB DDR SDRAM (1x256MB)
- FREE Upgrade from 40GB to 60GB 4200 RPM Hard Drive
- DVD/CDRW Combo Drive
- FREE Upgrade to 54g(TM) Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN !!
- Microsoft(R) Works/Money
- 12 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
- hpshopping in-box envelope

+ $1 Backpack



HP Pavilion zv5000z series customize notebook
- Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP Home Edition
- AMD Athlon(TM) 64 3000+ 1.80 GHz
- 15.4" WXGA Widescreen (1280x800)
- 64MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(TM) 4 440 Go +1394 & 5-in-1
- 256MB DDR SDRAM (1x256MB)
- 30 GB 4200 RPM Hard Drive
- FREE Upgrade from 8X DVD to DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive
- 54g(TM) 802.11b/g WLAN w/ 125HSM/SpeedBooster(TM)
- Microsoft(R) Works/Money
- 12 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
- hpshopping in-box envelope



Inspiron 8600

Intel® Pentium® M Processor 715(1.50A GHz/400MHz FSB) 15.4 WXGA

Operating System

Microsoft® Windows® XP Home

Memory

256MB DDR SDRAM 1 Dimm

Video Card

32MB DDR NVIDIA®GeForceT FX Go5200 AGP 4X Graphics

Hard Drive

30GB Hard Drive

Power Adapter

AC adapter - 65w, 19.5v

Floppy Drive and Additional Storage Devices

No Floppy

Network Card

Integrated 10/100 Network Card and Modem

CD ROM/DVD ROM

8X Max DVD ROM

Wireless Networking Cards

Intel® PRO/Wireless 2100 Internal Wireless (802.11b, 11Mbps)

Bundled Software

Productivity Pack including WordPerfect®

Security Software

McAfee Security Center w/ VirusScan, Firewall and Privacy, 90-day trial

Digital Music

Dell Jukebox - easy-to-use music player and CD burning software

Primary Battery

72 WHr Primary Battery

Limited Warranty, Services and Support Options

1 Year Basic Mail-In Plan (No Rebate offered with this Plan)

Installation Services

No Installation

Dial-Up Internet Access

6 Months of America Online Membership Included

Digital Imaging or Digital Photography

Paint ShopT Pro® Trial plus Photo AlbumT Starter Edition

Mail- In Rebate

None

Dell Media Experience

Dell Media ExperienceT

Purchase Intent

Purchase is not intended for resale.

Free printer or Palm Zire


--
A sickened mind and spirit
The mirror tells me lies
Could I mistake myself for someone
Who lives behind my eyes
Will he escape my soul
Or will he live in me
Is he tryin' to get out or tryin' to enter me

THX 1138
 
JK said:
Why are you even considering notebooks with a 32 bit processor?
Click to expand...


Excuse me if I'm confused, but it seems like I've read somewhere that the
video card in these HP/Compaq machines (NVIDIA GeForce 4 440 Go) isn't
compatible with DirectX 9? Is this true? If so isn't that going to more
than likely cause incompatibility with any future 64bit video editing
programs?

Other than that - I'm trying to weight out if the Dell machine is possibly
more robust as far as it's construction. Possibly the money is going into
that more than all the bonus stuff that I'd be getting with the HP/Compaq
models?

No question that the HP/Compaq's look much better feature wise (haven't seen
a head to head performance comparison). Most of the deficiencies in the
Dell (besides the 64 bit processor) can be upgraded later.

--
A sickened mind and spirit
The mirror tells me lies
Could I mistake myself for someone
Who lives behind my eyes
Will he escape my soul
Or will he live in me
Is he tryin' to get out or tryin' to enter me

THX 1138
 
I'm catching in another group that the DirectX 9 incompadibility is limited
to a few 'gaming' features of DirectX 9. Is anyone using DirectX 9
sucessfully with these AMD machines? My biggest concern is a possible 64bit
Adobe Premiere in the future.

--
A sickened mind and spirit
The mirror tells me lies
Could I mistake myself for someone
Who lives behind my eyes
Will he escape my soul
Or will he live in me
Is he tryin' to get out or tryin' to enter me

THX 1138
 
fastfwd said:
I'm catching in another group that the DirectX 9 incompadibility is limited
to a few 'gaming' features of DirectX 9. Is anyone using DirectX 9
sucessfully with these AMD machines? My biggest concern is a possible 64bit
Adobe Premiere in the future.
Click to expand...
I have a MSI K8T Neo-FSR (skt 754) and a nVidia GeForce4 MX4000. I have
no problems with DX9 in XP64.
 
I have the Compaq R3000z with a 3400+ processor and 1G of memory. The
video card is nothing to write home about but it's adequate for my
purposes, but I use Linux and don't care about DirectX. The disk is
also slow, 4400 RPM. The processor is extremely fast, in my benchmarking
it's up to twice as fast as my 2.66GHz Xeon. However I'm using it for FPGA
design work so the types of things that are important to me are Verilog
simulators and place and route tools. Those types of applications don't
use the SSE3 instructions, video editing does. The P4 architecture is
generally awful for general purpose computing but it does very well on
video type applications because the SSE3 instructions are helped by the
high clock rate. The Pentium M processor is much more efficient than P4
for general purpose computing but it's lower clock rate means that the
SSE3 instructions aren't going to be as fast. The issue of 32 bit vs 64
bit is irrelevant in a laptop. There are only two DIMM sockets so there is
no way that this box is ever going to have more than 4G of RAM in it. If I
were looking for a video editing machine I'd get a 3.2GHz P4 with a fast
graphics processor, 1G of RAM and at least a 5400RPM disk. P4 laptops are
generally a lot cheaper than Pentium M laptops so you can get more RAM and
a faster disk for the same money.
 
Back
Top