Dell Inspiron E1405 HP Pavilion dv5t Laptops

3 1/2 years ago I bought my first laptop. A Dell Inspiron E1405. Nice, little portable machine. Intel Core Duo T2350 1.83GHz, 2gb RAM, 62gb hard drive, which pales in comparison to the disk space available these days. I mainly use it for blogging, updating websites, email, Facebook, Twitter etc. Once in a while I test some code on it. Only downfall is it came with Windows Vista, which was standard at the time. It still runs great, but hardware wise, it is falling apart. I'm missing 4 keys from the keyboard, the left click button for the touchpad lost it's spring a long time ago. The killer: now the display won't stay up. The hinge went. Really sucks trying to sit on the couch and type. At the moment I have it set on the counter with a pack of BBs propping it up.
Well, the hinge was the last straw. I sucked it up and bought an HP during HP's after Christmas red tag sale.
I went with the HP Pavilion dv5t because it has a 14.5" display. My Dell has a 14". I wanted something a little bigger, but not really as big as a 15.6" display. I got it for $806.45 with tax. There was a $100 instant rebate, free shipping and $25.00 off with HP Coupon code SVMB39487. I also saved an extra 5% by clicking through to HP using Ebates. That saved me another $40.32, bringing total cost down to $766.13.
It has Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-460M Dual Core Processor (2.53 GHz, 3MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.8GHz, 6GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm), 500GB 7200RPM Hard Drive and webcam, bluetooth. Just Intel integrated graphics which is what my Dell has. Good enough for what I do since I'm not a gamer.
I'm a little uncertain as to how the HP's touchpad is going to work out though. Apparently it's a multitouch and lots of the reviews complained about it. The whole thing is touch, including the left and right click buttons. I guess it's more difficult to use than a touchpad with actual left and right click buttons.
After I ordered the HP, I had second thoughts. I didn't want another Dell since my old work one was a Dell that died and my home, falling apart laptop is a Dell. I went over to their site though and checked out what they had. Apparently, they no longer let you customize a system. They have a bunch of different machines, but you are stuck with how they are configured as far as processor, memory, hard drive size etc. One that came close to the HP I ordered was an XPS 14, but it costs more than what I paid for the HP, so I guess I'm satisfied with the HP I ordered. Hopefully it works out ok.
One thing I discovered though is laptops don't come with an internal modem anymore. Since most people are going wireless, the modems are no longer needed, except for us poor saps who live in a rural area and can only get dial up or satellite. I am going to look into Mobile Broadband. I should be able to get reception and it should be pretty fast. Verizon's 4G package is $50 per month with a cap of 5gb. It's more than the $10 a month I pay for my Toast.net dial up, but I think it will be worth it in the end to look into getting a faster connection. Until then, I can use my good old WiFlyer, which turns a dial up internet connection into a wireless dial up internet connection, or my Zoom bluetooth modem. I may look into getting an external modem too. You can pick one up fairly cheap on Amazon.com.


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