Dell XPS M1530

I've had this laptop for 3 years. I bought it refurbished from Dell with a 3 year complete care warranty. It has been a good laptop. I had a hard drive crash once and replaced the hard drive (covered under warranty). Otherwise it has been super. It still runs the games I like to play, like Civilization 5 and MMORPG's, though I have to play Rift with super low graphics settings. Considering that I only paid $800 for it three years ago and it is still functional and useful, I can't complain.

Cons--1. The battery life is low. I have a 9 cell and (as another reviewer states) it doesn't last long at all. However, I always play plugged in, so it isn't a real problem with me. 2. Heat. It does get really hot. The graphics card is a bit much for this computer, and it could use a better fan. It works best on a cooling pad with a fan. That's about it! If you want to buy an older computer (it is 2012 now) that can still play medium level games, this is worth a shot. :)

Not a pc fan as a vetern mac user. But after buying this laptop slighty customized better opposed to this one I am very impressed. The speed, performance, reliability, and gaming on this machine has been terrific, not up to my mac or OSX standard but very well made. Vista sucks hard, but we all know that. Thankfully I only use this machine for gaming or multiplayer when friends come over or online. From a OSX/Mac user this laptop is a very good purchase save the bloated windows OS.

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I have had to replace the hard drive and it has now failed again.

Need to look for another laptop, as i am not about to invest anymore time and money in this one.

other problems I have had with this laptop

1. very hot

2. can hardly hear speakers at full volume

3. will not update windows

4. no battery life at all

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I've owned my XPS M1530 for just over four years. During that time I have replaced the key board twice along with the battery, the hard drive, and the fan. In addition, I found it necessary to re-install Vista twice (or was it three times?). As was mentioned in other reviews, the laptop can run very hot so hot that on a couple of occasions it suddenly shut itself down. Apparently, the Dell M-series laptops have faulty nvidia 8400gs chips which is the source of the heat problem. To prevent damage I purchased a cooling pad, which is not convenient if you travel with your laptop.

Performance and graphics have been acceptable; however, I do not use my laptop for gaming or watching videos. In addition to MS Word and Excel, I mainly use the laptop to run computer algebra systems such as Mathematica and Matlab, or type documents in latex. Maybe I was spoiled by my Inspiron 6000, which I continue to use as a backup. It is about 8 years old and is still going strong (it's just a little too slow for everyday use).

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DO NOT EVER buy this computer. My husband has had it for a little while now and when we got it the mother load was malfunctioning. We bought the warranty with it, but the problem existed when we first got the computer. They will not fix the problem, even though we bought the warranty. We have spent countless hours on the phone with dell and they still will not fix the problem. We are ready to throw the computer out the window. DO NOT EVER BUY. Also DO NOT buy dell computers at all because they will not help you with any problem even if you have the extended warranty. They also tell you one thing and then never document it on your account so what they just told you doesn't exist. Horrible Customer Service. (May 20, 2011)