One of the advantages of choosind a Dell laptop as a desktop replacement is the fact that Inspiron1720 offers a wide range of hardware configurations (RAM from 1GB to 4GB, HD from 120GB to 500GB), as well as 8 different color options to be customized exactly as you want it (jet black, alpine white, espresso brown, ruby red, midnight blue, spring green, flamingo pink, and sunshine yellow). The rest of the body has a solid shimmering silver paint on it. The entire bottom shell is a metal alloy which gives the laptop a strong feel on your desk, and is gives enough strength to resist at presure.

The glossy WUXGA (1920×1200) screen is vizible in both bark rooms and bright sun outside, the colors are vibrant and there are no dead pixels. The speakers on the 1720 are better than average of most laptops, volume levels were quite loud, the sound is clear and distortion at peak levels do not exist. The keyboard and palm rest structure are the strength of the bottom panel of this laptop, being very firm, responsive, comfortable, silent and with such a pleasent design, plus, the keyboard has the numeric keys in their place like on a desktop PC. The size of the touchpad surface was large enough for comfortable control, and the surface texture had a smooth matte feel, also the touchpad buttons use the full length of the touchpad, both responsive.

The Intel T7500 and nVidia 8600M GT, combined with enough RAM’s of memory, really make this laptop an excellent performer, for both multimedia uses and gamers. The fan noise is rarely noticed in a quiet room unless the notebook was under extreme use. It heats up to normal levels. I/O Ports include 4x USB, Kensington lock slot, expresscard slot, Headphone/Mic, Firewire, VGA, LAN, S-video and 56k modem. Media access and volume controls are located in front. Under normal web browsing with bright screen, the 9-cell battery performes around 3 hours and 12 minutes, but by descreasing the screen brightness you can get more than that.

Dell Inspiron 1720