So, how unreliable ARE these Dell laptops?

Personally, I've seen the whole gamut of Laptops fail. Not just Dells. The only reason you hear about more Dells dying is because DEE DEE DEE, Dell sells more PCs than anybody just about. Of course looking at the numbers more Dells will crap out than any other system, but proportionally they aren't any worse or better than anybody else (including Thinkpads).

You probably should get the extended warranty (you still can) simply for the fact that computers are probably the MOST unreliable consumer product in the universe. They're worse than automobiles and major appliances. Not only that, if your Laptop fails out of warranty you will be facing repair costs that are as much, and possibly more than if you were to just buy a new Laptop. If you plan on buying a new laptop in a year, don't worry. If you want to make sure that you won't be forced to buy a new Laptop after a year, get the extended warranty. That being said though, a friend of mine has an Inspiron 9300 that's a year and a half old and hasn't had a thing go wrong with it (and he didn't get an extended warranty)

My sister is in her 3rd year of college, majoring in Animal Science, and even though my parents got the 4 year warranty, nothing has ever went wrong with her computer. She has a Dell 600m, and the thing has been used ALL the time. However, I just got a XPS M140 and have already had the screen replaced. Its nothing really about how you take care of them because Ive babied mine and it has messed up more than my sisters one that has been used hard.

Inspiron 9300 here--had to replace the screen after 14 months of moderate (5-8 hours a day) use. Otherwise, no problems.

Besides battery, and the power supply going out, my 9300 is still kicking well, and i must say at times it is on 24 hours or more. It sits around on the table turned on for other peeps, so it sees lot's of use. I'm starting to think that i have killed off my ps and batt. with the good old 7800gtx.

I had a 9300 for over a year with no problems. It is now with my brother going strong. I got the extended warranty of both of my current notebooks. I especially need it for my 710m, because I carry it in my vehicle. Really though, if you have it for a year with no problems, it should get you through with no problems.

this is just a thought, but to me it almost seems like if you DO buy a warranty, theres a lesser chance your product will die than if you dont get the warranty..where you are almost guaranteed to run into problems =P

i've had my 700m for more than a year now (relatively cheap too, had one of those $750 off $1500 coupons back in the day), and i havent had any problems with it. didn't buy any warranty or anything, and i've transported it to and from college (so, it's gone through the airport about 4 or 5 times) and i take it all over the place at school (so it gets bumped arounda lot), and i leave it on for extended periods of time (5+ days) without anything like standby/hibernate.

i also think that some systems are more likely to have failures than others too. some systems that generate too much heat (though strangely mine idles at 50C+ all the timeat full power, and higher when i put it into lower power modes) might have more problems.

also, what someone said earlier is definitely true. dell is one of the biggest laptop vendors, if not the biggest, at least in terms of quantity. and because there seems to be a larger percentage of people who get dells that fail are loudmouths who complain a lot, you hear a lot more about dells than other companies. but, despite all the bad reputation they get for having cheap unreliable systems that burst into flames all the time, they still sell just as much. why? because they are just as good as any other company's laptops.

I have a Latitude D610 w/ CompleteCare (got it free a year ago) and I have had absolutley NO problems with this machine. Well, aside from the fact that I killed a harddrive. But that was my fault, I was demoing the machine and smashing it on the table from like 2 feet. I did this about 20 times before anything happened. The drive worked fine, but I had a few bad sectors, so Dell sent me a new hard drive(was covered under standard warranty cuz I told them it just stopped working. I "forgot" to tell them I dropped it a few times). I just reformatted the "bad" drive and now use it as a secondary harddrive.

The Latitudes are built for a business enviornment so they will take more abuse than an Inspiron. It might be worth getting CompleteCare since you have an Inspiron. I would be most worried about the screen (Latitudes have a sturdier display backing and can withstand more abuse before the screen gets damaged as opposed to an Inspiron which is easier to break), since they are expensive to replace, whereas harddrives are much cheaper and easier to replace if u do break them. But those are really the only 2 things I would be worried about.

BTW, expect to buy a new battery every year if you use it as much as I do. Batteries are considered "wear items" and are not covered under warranty. But you can find em for cheap on ebay.

Dells in general have good build quality and fit and finish and therefore are pretty reliable. I've had my share of problems with Dell, but overall i am happy.

Don't worry, that thing should last you way longer than a year.

Yups, you shouldnt worry too much about Dell laptops. Theres lots of horror stories about laptops simply because people will always will complain more their problems than say how well something works. I had an old I4150 that lasted a good 3 years until the optical drive wore out. Still works fine to date too. Currently using an E1505 with no major problems... had some issues with media direct and the HPA stuff, but that was fixed easily enough. I've personally found Dell computers to be really reliable as I've had several and theyre all still working with all the original parts except for that replaced optical drive. As long as youre not pushing it down staircases, it should last you quite a while and if something goes wrong Dell is pretty good about replacing stuff too.

Hey, could you tell me how you configured it and what discounts/coupons you used? Thanks ^^

I bought a refurb'ed 2650 in Feb 2002. Had ZERO problems with it. I broke it 1 month ago by letting it fall off my bed while I was sleeping. It still works, only the PCMCIA card slot is busted and I have to fix the CPU cooling fan because its power cable was severed by the PCMCIA slot. The thing was a tank and I loved it. If I get the cooling fan cable fixed, the thing will be running like a champ again. 4+ solid years of service out of a refurb'ed laptop - that's hot.

I'm a network admin for 700 PCs and about 40 laptops.

We've cycled thru Texas Instruments, Microns, Compaqs and most currently Dell laptops.

Of all the Dells seem to have been the best of the batch. All other brands have been aded out or fouled out.

Dells D600s and D610s have been our choice for the last few years and are rock solid. We've not had a failure yet, execpt for one ladt who dropped it cracked the hinge and lost some keycaps. It worked after that, too, just a little ugly.

My opinions differ regarding desktops and servers by Dells, as well as for the Dell helpdesk*. But the Laptops impressed me enought to just get myself personally an E1505.

My problem with the help desk is they treat everyone like a moron.
Q: "My server needs a replacement power supply. The old one is dead and smoking."
A: "Will you please reboot it, sir?