Carla Thornton

Dell Inspiron 5100

The Inspiron 5100's silver case and striking blue lid and mouse buttons herald a new look for Dell portables. Part of the company's high-performing desktop-replacement line, the Inspiron 5100 comes with a FireWire port, a 16MB or 32MB ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 AGP graphics card (our review system had 32MB), and a Wi-Fi antenna. To complete the notebook's wireless setup, you'll have to pay $49 for an 802.11b/g Mini-PCI adapter.
A bit on the hefty side, the Inspiron 5100 weighs 8.1 pounds (not including its power adapter) and measures 1.9 inches thick. The Inspiron 5100's battery life, at 1 hour, 48 minutes in our tests, is far from impressive.
Equipped with Intel's 2.66-GHz Pentium 4 desktop processor, the Inspiron 5100 performed well for its price class, earning a PC WorldBench 4 score of 117. (We've tested relatively few notebooks with desktop processors, but the closest competitor for the Inspiron is a Toshiba Satellite 2455-S305 equipped with a 2.4-GHz chip; it, too, earned a score of 117.) Currently, the 5100 can also be had with a 2.4-GHz or a 2.8-GHz Pentium 4.Our review unit had a 15-inch screen with a 1400 by 1050 resolution; the notebook can be configured with a 14-inch screen, as well. The large keyboard has quiet, steady action, but boasts few extras--just a power button and one programmable quick-launch button at the top. You can't miss the Inspiron 5100's mouse buttons; they're bright blue and twice normal size. Like mouse buttons on too many notebooks, though, the 5100's are rather stiff. Audio was somewhat disappointing: The stereo speakers are loud but slightly buzzy at their highest volume, and the 5100 has no physical volume control--you must use the Windows volume slider. All of the 5100's removable components--the battery pack, memory slots, and hard drive--are easy to access. To remove the hard drive, you simply remove two small screws on the bottom of the notebook and pull it out by its cover plate. We received a preproduction copy of the notebook's user manual; it thoroughly covered parts, troubleshooting, and upgrades, with nice drawings. The help screens provide mostly generic information about the notebook's hardware, and are not specific to the 5100.
The Inspiron 5100 doesn't have the most inspired design we've seen, but it's a fine, relatively basic desktop replacement with good performance as its main attraction.