Dell Inspiron 531s Desktop Review
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The good: Sleek new case design;
overachieving application performance; finally has a Wi-Fi
adapter option; integrated Bluetooth (shortly after launch);
new, mostly useful support software.
The bad: Some higher-end configuration
options are limited to Dell's XPS line.
The bottom line: The last of
the major desktop vendors to update this year's desktops,
Dell used that time to good advantage. On some tests, the
Inspiron 531 is even faster than systems that cost $500 more.
Keep your gaming and digital media ambitions modest, and this
PC should deliver nearly everything you'd want in a mainstream
system.
The Dell Inspiron 531 (along
with a handful of other new desktops) marks the introduction
of a more streamlined Dell product family. For both laptops
and desktops, the Inspiron line will represent its mainstream
consumer PCs, with the XPS looping together the high-end products.
In other words, so long Dimension, hello Inspiron, which makes
a strong first impression with this new midtower system. Our
$979 Inspiron 531 config is as fast or faster than others
in its class and it also has a compelling set of features.
Throw in its clean new looks, and this suddenly becomes the
mainstream desktop we'd recommend first.
Consider the Inspiron 531 the
spiritual successor to the Dimension E521. Both represent
Dell's mainstream consumer desktop offering, with configuration
options that let you build a system in a price range roughly
between $350 and $1,500, not including peripherals and optional
software. The new Inspiron also continues the Dimension 531's
aesthetic update from the old Dimension 4000 series. While
not quite as clean-lined as an Apple product, Dell's new desktop
design is attractive enough so that you shouldn't feel embarrassed
to keep it in public view.
Like the Dimension E521 we
reviewed, our sample Inspiron 531 came with a 2.6GHz AMD Athlon
64 X2 5000+ dual core processor. This new model has 2GB of
faster 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM, though, as well as a more recent
256MB Nvidia GeForce 8600GT 3D card. The hard drive actually
got a little smaller, down to roomy-enough 250GB from 320GB
on the older Dell, but then the price of this system is actually
about $50 less than the older system. We expect you'd be able
to upgrade to a larger hard drive for about that price, giving
the Inspiron a stronger config on balance.
Compare the Inspiron 531 to
PCs from other vendors, though, and you'll find that this
system stands out in both features and performance. Two key
updates bring the Inspiron 531 in line with and even beyond
its competition. Finally, Dell offers 802.11 a/b/g Wi-Fi via
a PCI card. And it won't be available until "shortly
after launch," according to Dell, but our review unit
also came with Bluetooth functionality built into the 13-in-1
media card reader. You can get Bluetooth in a few other systems
if you purchase an expensive Bluetooth-connected mouse-and-keyboard
set, but no other mainstream midtower PC that we're aware
of has an option for effectively integrated Bluetooth, as
Dell has here.
We were also surprised by the
Inspiron 531 on our performance tests. Most of the systems
we've seen in the $1,000 to $1,500 category aim for speed
on either basic applications or games. The Inspiron 531 is
just as fast as it should be games-wise, giving you solid-enough
Quake 4 performance as long as you keep the resolution reasonable.
More exciting are its Cinebench and iTunes scores, which tied
or outperformed the pricier Gateway DX430X. You can perform
most any mainstream task with the Inspiron 531, and in some
cases, much faster than we expected.
In addition to the speed and
the various means of wireless connectivity, Dell rounds this
system out with the standard optical drive combination of
a DVD drive and a dual-layer DVD burner. We're a bit surprised
that Dell doesn't even offer a Blu-ray drive as an option
with this PC, but we suspect it's keeping that feature exclusive
to the higher-end
(Read more at http://www.notebookreview.com)
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