Am I too quick to give up on Dell?

First off, a little background.

I go to a university that provides laptops to students (included in tuiton). Through this, I have had an IBM Thinkpad R31 and a Dell Latitude D600. So not only do I know what condition MY laptop is in, I also see hundreds of others on a daily basis (there are a total of about 4000 laptops at the school, same model, given out to people within about a one month period).

Now, my honest opinion of the D600 is that the build quality is absolute ****. Within a few days to a couple weeks of having the things, really obvious scuff marks started showing on the cases (like it's a darker grey finish but a silvery colour shows up from underneath). The cases have a ton of flex to them (and I can make the LCD ripple easily by pressing on the back). At about the 1 year mark, I started noticing cracks on mine, and took a look at some of my classmates - a fairly reasonable percentage (like at least 30%, maybe more like 60%) were getting cracks in more or less the same place - the front corners near the palm rests. There are parts along the seams of the case where the two halves aren't fitting together well. The hinges on some of the laptops totally gave out, so that it would just flop closed or completely flat on the desk; I seem to recall hearing of a few cases where the screen pretty much completely detached from the laptop. Mine are kinda loose but will hold it within a certain range (like I can flick it with my pinky lightly and it will easily move about half an inch). And there's definitely a lot of 'light leak' around the edges of the display.

In terms of the components, my system board died at about 16 months, two of my good friends also had their boards die +/- about 4 months of that time. So many hard drives died in such a way that data was completely unrecoverable within the first couple months that Dell replaced all of them pre-emptively starting at about the 6 month mark. This model has overheating issues as well, although given that I saw a review for the next version of it (D610? Or maybe I'm mixing up the numbers) that commented that it was much better that seems like something to blame on this model rather than Dell as a whole.

So basically what I am wondering is, was this model a particularly bad model? Maybe the case was designed to be light and they sacrificed a lot on durability? Or is this pretty much typical of Dell?

 

That seems atypical regarding the durability of the case. If you want more durability get a laptop with Magnesium case, usually by Lenovo/IBM, Compaq Business, Panasonic Toughbook, Hummer and the new Dell Latitude/Precisions.

I don't have issues, personally, regarding 'overheating' compromising the data. Were those Pentium Ms or 4s?

 

The latest Dell Latitude 600 model is the D620, it is far far superior to the old D600 and the D610 was well ahead of the D600. Basically, the D600 was before Dell really started improving the build of their notebooks. Things have changed.

 

I wouldn't judge a notebook based on hard drive failures either; that can happen to any notebook.

Speaking of the D600 - they were very problematic. The D610's were vastly improved in terms of reliability and stability.

 

Don't give up on Dell - they offer good prices for their notebooks, and tend to offer good features.

Instead, if you plan on using a laptop long term (without warranty) get a decent surge protector. I have personally had system boards fry while plugged in. If you have ever travelled abroad, you know what I mean (current flow isnt constant in some countries)