If you can swing the price tag, definitely go for it! (Yes, it`s pricey, eek! but compared to what you'd pay to get all this on a Mac, it's pretty reasonable.) I did a TON of research and this was the best computer I found that had all the bells and whistles I was looking for. (The XPS 15 is great too, but if you can do it, go for the bigger screen and the extra toys it's worth it!)I came close to getting the HP Envy 17-2070nr instead, because the design is a lot prettier, but the screen on the Dell in my opinion is superior so crisp and clear with rich vibrant color just beautiful as compared to the HP's more washed out colors, so that's what made me finally opt for the Dell.
Touchpad I've heard people complain about the two finger scroll, but you can adjust it to one finger scroll on the right hand side where its more comfortable. Sensitivity is terrific and the pad is nice and large.
Heat issues If you keep it on a flat surface it's stays cool. I haven't had any problems by raising it up a hair, it runs even cooler than my desktop. If you want to mostly use it in your lap, go for something smaller/more portable.)
Backlit Keyboard wonderful... The HP was a bit dim and backlit just around the keys, whereas here the keys themselves are lit up and you can adjust the brightness settings.
Keyboard The 17" comes with the full keypad (includes the numeric pad which the 15" doesn`t have) and with the brushed aluminum finish where your palms rest, it's so smooth and soft to type on really a pleasure.
Battery Life not great, but I'm not doing a lot of power saving features I use full screen and no sleep mode, etc., so you may have better results with different settings.
DVD/BluRay Slide loading rather than the tray would have been nice, but I've heard people say they're more difficult to repair. Picture quality is beautiful for both haven't used the 3D yet.
Speakers I confess, I'm not as wowed as everyone else seems to be. They are better than most other laptops I've heard, but overall I think laptop speakers have a long way to go. The speaker design on the XPS 17 is nicer than the 15, where they kind of look like weird grills on either side. These are integrated better to the left and right of the palm rest.
General Adjustments I've had zero issues so far (yay!) but I did make a few adjustments based on issues other people had, like not being able to "wake up" the screen or black screen...I changed the settings so it never falls into sleep or stand-by mode, and changed the windows updates to "ask me before installing." This is important because letting updates work on auto-pilot can cause problems.
Cosmetics As mentioned above, the HP was a lot prettier, but Dell had the upper hand most everywhere else, so I opted for the ugly duckling, lol. It's not horrid looking, it's just sort of industrial and plain, but the brushed aluminum finish is really nice and it is very solid, well built. Sony Vaio was nicely loaded, but it looked cheap/flimsy in person and if I'm paying over $1,000 for a computer I want something substantial. Toshiba Satellite was nice overall, but lacked the backlit keyboard and the vibrant screen. All the models are super speedy and you get that info from looking at the specs.
So there's all my reasons why I recommend the Dell. I got kinda wordy here, but these area the types of reviews I appreciated when I was looking for a new laptop, so I hope this helps! :)
I love how it has a "bump" towards the back. Not only does it allow you to grab it easier when closed, like to pull it out of your bag, but it also elevates the machine to a comfy typing position and allows air circulation for extra cooling. It runs prety quiet too, something I worried about, and I am running some pretty graphic intense software on it with no issues, no heating (though I do use a cooling pad), no lag, and no jet engine fan noise. The keyboard has a nice comfortable size, a plus for me, and a full number pad too. And it's not loaded with crapware either--unless you count McAfee, something you can't even opt-out of at the Dell Store, but I easily got rid of it.
As for the specs, if you know specs, you know what you are getting. I did price something similar at Dell, but since at Dell they are custom building, it was way pricier! Also being custom built I wound up being distracted by shiny things I wanted to add that I really didn't need, driving the price up even higher. On top of that I would have had to wait a few more weeks before they shipped it, as opposed to getting something already put together and shipped immediately (seller was amazing too, I had my machine in just a few days). This was way convenient, had exactly what I was looking for/needed and I didn't have to wait.
all in all, great...fantasticSuper powerful system Dell sells these anywhere from $1500-$2000 so you can get a pretty good deal at Amazon. Bought mine from a third party seller and couldn't be more satisfied. This thing screams and the benchmarks are ever better than my desktop that's only about a year old. This laptop should last at minimum a few years without having to worry about upgrading. Especially like the fact it has 8GB of RAM and the 3GM graphics card. Windows screams on this!I ordered this with trepidation because I read more than a few reports of problems right out of the box. Not for me.. fortunately. I am upgrading from a Dell XPS 1730 with 2 nvidea SLI graphics cards. In MHO.. the SLI thing was not successful.. many games could not detect it.. and the machine ran very hot, all the time. This machine is a total wowser.. there are low end graphics on the motherboard that are fine for word processing, etc. but the 3G Nvidia card is fabulous! I am playing SkyRim with everything set to very high. The framerate is great.. the screen and graphics are so spectacular that I often stop and spend a long time just admiring the view in the game! The raised lip on the battery keeps everything cool..the system does blow some heat when really working but the fan is quiet. The speakers are nice, the Blue Ray drive runs quiet ( my old one sounded like it was trying to give birth!) The windows rating for this is only 5.9.. I think 7200 rpm drives are slow.. but only in comparison to everything else.. the other scores were between 6.9 and 7.6. The battery life is also awesome. I got 5 hours just playing games and watching CD's. Impressive. I wish I had got the model with the backlit keyboard and the 3d glasses ( I am sending away for the 3d stuff, can't do anything about the keyboard tho)..Other than that I could not be happier with this purchase. PS..If you purchase one of these, go on the Dell support page and run the graphics diagnostics on this rig.. it will blow you away.I loved this laptop at firstthe screen looked beautiful and the colors are rich. Then sitting in my office, simply pulling down in the top left corner of the screen to close it, I heard a "crunch." The screen cracked, so now I have a big black mark with horizontal and vertical lines in the top left of the screen.
Dell's answer is "sorry, screen damage isn't covered under warranty." I didn't abuse it, drop it, or do anything to void the warranty, but they won't fix it. To add insult to injury, after an hour on the phone with the Dell Center in India, Dell wants to charge me $528 to repair the screen (and I'd lose my laptop for a couple weeks). Needless to say, that's not the right answer. I've owned laptops for 25 years, and I've never had a screen crack sitting on a flat desk just trying to close this. (Purchase protection on my credit card didn't help because it was more than 90 days since I purchased it).
This laptop is VERY fragile, and extremely costly to repair. Let the Buyer Beware, because Dell sure doesn't care.
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