Comments Dell Inspiron 1545 - Laptop - review

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McPlopp

7:34 AM on 20 February, 2009

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An overly harsh review score in my opinion. I bought one of these about two weeks ago and it's a solid machine, doesn't feel like a budget laptop at all, looks stylish, has a good keyboard, wireless is superb, it has a great spec, runs like a dream and represents INSANE value for money. This is an excellent budget laptop. Battery life just isn't an issue for me at all as there are several power profiles that are capable of delivering extended usage. (The default profile on mine was 'high performance' and I changed it immediately.)

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Ardjuna

9:48 AM on 20 February, 2009

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@McPlopp: I'm glad you're enjoying your product. The 1545's looks are stylish, but glossy wrist-rests are never a good idea. The keyboard IS good, but wireless is by no means superb, since it only goes up to G (not the faster Draft-N) and doesn't have Bluetooth at all. I'm sure it works, but then most laptops do :)

The actual internals are quite impressive for the money, but the battery life IS very poor compared to the competition - just take a glance at our battery benchmarks (where the power profile is kept constant across all notebooks we test). Though admittedly this is not too much of an issue for all users.

As to INSANE value for money, have you seen current pricing on the Akoya? {http://www.trustedreviews.com/notebooks/review/2008/10/30/Medion-Akoya-S5610-15-4in-Notebook-PC/p1}. Aside from this you can get other notebooks offering similar specifications but with features like HDMI, Bluetooth AND better battery life from brand-names like Acer and HP for the same money.

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Ohmz

1:27 PM on 20 February, 2009

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I've recommended this notebook to a friend of mine as he is looking for a cheap 15 incher for the usual computing.

The issues you mention: lack of draft N, and bluetooth are not issues for us because we can specify them in the notebook on dell.ca. As well as a six or nine cell battery.

So I'm wondering, with those negatives not being an issue, would it still be a good buy for him Ardjuna?

I personally hate gloss, but he seems indifferent.

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Ardjuna

2:04 PM on 20 February, 2009

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@Ohmz: Going for the Dell direct approach takes away a lot of the negatives in that you can, as you mention, upgrade to nearly everything the base model lacks (except for an HDMI output). However, by the time you've upgraded to things like a webcam, bluetooth and better battery the price has gone up considerably, putting it into a class of better-specified notebooks from the competition. At least, that's the case here in the UK, I don't know what pricing is like in Canada.

Fundamentally, there's nothing much wrong with the 1545, and as long as your friend doesn't mind cleaning the palm-rest after every use, it's an adequate machine for everyday use.

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McPlopp

12:14 AM on 21 February, 2009

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@ Ardjuna - No need to be defensive mate, I'm simply offering some user feedback and it's 100% valid. I maintain that for the casual buyer (probably the target audience for this product?) this is great value for money. HDMi output and bluetooth really isn't important for me at all. (Nor would it be a deal-breaker for anyone interested in a £400 laptop.) To my mind, the wifi is good because it works better than any of the other laptops in the household. It may not be the latest profile of wifi, but again, that really doesn't matter to me. What DOES matter is that it works with my wifi at home and the office seamlessly, keeps a strong signal nearly all the time and it's very easy to manage new connections etc. Value wise, I would fully expect you to know of a trendy corner of the internet where it's possible to get a better deal. (There's ALWAYS a better deal somewhere, unfortunately.) But again, I would argue that the casual buyer (AKA me and many others!) will visit PC World, Currys and Comet. Presently, this is the best value laptop you can buy from those outlets, in my opinion. PS- Liked the review, I'm just challenging the overall score :)

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Ardjuna

11:12 AM on 23 February, 2009

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@McPlopp: Wasn't being defensive, just pointing out why I gave the 1545 the score I did . If you go for the direct approach, as I mention in my reply to Ohmz, this does take away many of the negatives, but we reviewed the configuration as it's available from PCWorld and the like.

HDMI output IS important for many people, who want to watch ripped DVDs, shows and other media on their living-room LCD TV rather than their laptop's screen. Sure, most TVs offer D-sub, but quality won't be as good as with a digital connector. As to Bluetooth, there are plenty of devices such as headphones, mice, mobile phones etc that work (sometimes exclusively) with it, and thus again I'd argue it's a handy feature for the average consumer. The lack of a webcam is also going to be a major negative for many.

On the value score, it's really not that difficult to find better specified notebooks (importantly with better batteries to boot) for only a little more than the Dell's £430 asking price from major etailers, even the likes of Currys. Here is a random example from the home page: http://www.currys.co.uk/martprd/product/seo/419076. More RAM, double the hard drive, a webcam and probably better battery life for £34 more...

Having said all that, I do appreciate that it might suit some just fine, and appreciate your feedback; it's always good to get the opinion of someone who owns the product to get another perspective. Glad you liked the review btw :)

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RalphCook

3:24 PM on 23 February, 2009

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I've had mine since 3rd January. All this fuss over the shiny finish! Use an anti static cloth, or carefuly apply silicone furniture polish--problem solved. I'd like HDMI bluetooth and a few other features, but Dell have put the emphasis on quality electronics in the basic product and there is certainly an advance here on the 1525. Many competitors in this class still use Pentium processors. The customers appreciate this. In 80 reviews here a couple mention the limited features, nearly all are lavish in praise of the actual perfomance. Owners, of course, usually 'overrate' their purchases, but to my mind the features issue is bearing heavily on your rating of performance. Mine cost me £399 for 3Gb Ram and 250 hard drive. I could not better that for the money. You mention to McPlopp additional freatures costing 'only £34' more--but today £34 is a lot of money in the Budget computer field!

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33639856

10:38 PM on 23 February, 2009

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i feel that this review is to critical because if you were to buy the specification that is reviewd from the dell website it would be much cheaper and thus better value for money i currently have one of these on order and feel that the specification is great value for money £369 plus £29.00 for the coulor upgrade

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Ardjuna

3:22 PM on 24 February, 2009

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@Ralph Cook: "but to my mind the features issue is bearing heavily on your rating of performance” - No, in fact it doesn’t have any bearing on it at all, as we have a separate Features score. What does affect it (in this case putting the 1545’s Performance score down from a possible 8 to a 6) is the terrible battery life, since we don’t have a separate score for this.

“You mention to McPlopp additional features costing ‘only £34’ more” - DOUBLE the hard drive size, more memory, better battery AND extra features on the first notebook I looked at on Currys’ homepage. I was demonstrating that even for McPlopp’s “the casual buyer (AKA me and many others!)” it’s not difficult to find notebooks offering far better value for money than the 1545 *as reviewed*. Especially if one actually does a little digging around, it’s easy enough to find notebooks offering similar specifications for less. And surely if you’re buying a computer that should last you the next few years, the price of a night out/less than 10% of the total price is not that great an amount?

@33639856: We reviewed the 1545 as priced and configured at PCWorld (and other e-tailers) rather than direct from Dell. Though your config still comes to £410, you could probably add one point to the value score at that kind of pricing.

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RalphCook

4:11 PM on 27 February, 2009

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It's interesting to know that battery life has a two point influence on your 'performance' score, which is quite a lot. I hope Dell will do something about this-a 6 cell battery is clearly required as standard and would give at least a genuine 2.5 hours. However, although very many reviewers mention this it does not prevent them giving the 1545 an 8 or 9 rating. Fact is, very few 15.6+ widescreen laptops will ever be more than a few feet from a powerpoint. And I have booked the night out you recommend I take--it'll probably cost all of that £34!!

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Ardjuna

5:19 PM on 27 February, 2009

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@Ralph Cook: It wasn't a personal recommendation, but I hope you have a great night out :)

As to the 1545, the point is we reviewed the model sold by third parties, not direct from Dell (which is currently a better-value option), and the specific model we reviewed was quite simply not particularly good value for money on any level. Don't get me wrong, it's not bad as such (which is why it still scored a six for value), it's just that there were better value options readily available from other brands.

"Fact is, very few 15.6+ widescreen laptops will ever be more than a few feet from a power point"

Of course some users don't care about battery life, but I can't imagine too many people (who would consider the 1545 in the first place) having enough money to buy a secondary ultra-portable for on the road. I know I used my 15.4in one a lot out and about before getting a netbook.

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PyroTim

9:07 PM on 23 March, 2009

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The one I bought from Tesco has a webcam, but the sacrifice is for Vista Basic instead of Premium. A small price to pay. I would like HDMI and bluetooth, but not a deal breaker. £400 means that this little gadget is good value for money. I agree with your glossy points, but the spec led me down this path.

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NervousBreakdance

4:21 PM on 30 March, 2009

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Hi there.. Thanks for a helpful and well-written review of the Inspiron 1545, but I can't help feeling that time have changed with regards to what Dell offers.. the latest machines on offer give you the options of adding much higher-spec pieces of kit. I know that reviewing Dells is nigh-on impossible since they're so customisable (as if that were a BAD thing!!) but I was wondering if you'd reappraise in a paragraph or so the latest incarnation of the Inspiron 1545. Specifically:

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?oc=n0454508&c=uk&l=en&s=dhs&cs=ukdhs1

Because in my opinion an P8600 Processor, Free 2 Yr Warranty, 1.3m Webcam, cheap screen upgrade, 4MB Ram, Late-ish discrete ATI Mobility GPU, and Blu-ray for 670 make this a serious contender for Low-Mid-Price buyers, as well as adding a couple points to each rating...

What do you think? How does it compare to non-"entry-level" notebook such as a Studio 15?

Thanks (in advance) for your time...

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Geordie

7:21 PM on 4 May, 2009

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I bought a dell inspiron 1545@ xmas since then it freezes & has to be turned off with the on/off button,it doesnt recognise all dvd's, the battery life sucks, cant even watch a dvd on battery power, my dock freezes & the dropdown menu doesnt appear, the screen goes black & wont recover. am sick of calling dell @ my expense & going back to original factory settings........help plse ps i wont buy another one

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notanexpert

1:36 PM on 27 May, 2009

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I'm a current Dell Inspiron owner but after about 4/5 years mine no longer seems want to connect to the internet has become extremely slow and has lost the 'w' key since my little boy picked it off! I was just going to purchase the latest version but having read your somewhat mixed reviews I was wondering if anyone can give me a list of good alternatives in a similar price range (I have until today to purchase at the discounted £379 price). Please note I only use my laptop for internet shopping and photos/music pretty much so lack of webcams and extras isn't a must.

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Mnica

12:15 PM on 30 May, 2009

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Thanks for your very helpful review. I thought the short battery life of my Inspiron 1545 was a defect, and it turns out it really isn't, unfortunately.

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alpap

3:40 AM on 11 June, 2009

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I got the 1545 from PCWorld in Mid May and found the following - paid £389.99.

Bad News : It is a Intel T4800 processor, the glossy black is a pain but worse of all there is no HDD use light !

Good News : Comes with a 320Gb HDD, Comes with bluetooth.

The OK news : battery life is poor - I get just over 2 hours watching a movie and slightly more browsing with a 70% dimmed screen.

Bought a 9 cell Dell battery for £69.99 and managed to get nearly 7 hours of life with light use, 70% dimemd screen and in Power saver mode. This battery makes the Laptop much heavier but because of the design provides a back "leg" so it sits really well with the battery in.

Very pleased with it and handles Office 2007, MS Project and MS Visio easily.

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DannyB

6:07 AM on 13 June, 2009

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I am currently looking for a new laptop, my current one a Compaq Presario C500 i brought for £349 from PC World 1 1/2 yeas ago, both hinges have snapped which has annoyed me.

My Dad who gets a business laptop has a dell and allways had, i think its an Precision M20 or somthing, and has been used in industrial enviroments and has lasted and worked better then mine.

The Inspiron 1545 is the laptop i am going to buy, from the dell website which they have a deal on for £349 and is sooo much better then my current one now. Battery doesnt bother me as it is allways plugged in and if its not it is only unplugged for 30-40 mins max, bluetooth isnt a problem either ok its nice to have built in but i allready have a bluetooth dongle, as for the webcam as well it would be nice built in but i have a external one ready to go. Wireless is never a problem as long as it connects to the router and stays connected. Thank you for this review.

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mimi09

12:33 AM on 24 June, 2009

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I just got the dell inspiron 1545 as a graduation present and i love it. It works very well and it is great for school. i love that it has vista which i think is very easy to use. also it connects to my wireless internet a lot quicker than our other laptop. overall i think this is a great laptop and it was a great price!

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TJB

12:37 PM on 27 June, 2009

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I purchased my laptop in April. From the outset there were problems. For no reason the computer shutdown even with the sleep mode settings correctly adjusted. The shutdown always occurred while typing emails etc. Dell downloaded new drivers, but this didn't rectify it. They sent an engineer out who replaced the motherboard. This didn't work. The computer was sent away and they just put another motherboard in. You can imagine by now I was getting angry and they agreed to replace it with a new one. This they did on June 16th

The second computer does exactly the same. It just shuts down while typing. Dell have offered me a refund. There is something clearly wrong with this model for two computers to shut down repeatedly. The Dell support is poor and frankly a disgrace. Why can they not offer a solution? I would never buy a computer from Dell again, a total waste of my time and hours spent waiting for delivery and return and on the phone. I am one very unhappy customer.

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stratus5ss

5:44 PM on 5 July, 2009

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If you are thinking of ordering something from Dell there are a few things to keep in mind. Search the internet for coupon codes. Call Dell and ask about discounts. I order by phone and get better deals than I could have on the internet. Ask about deals on comparable models with similar or better components. I think you get better deals when you order over the phone because I negotiate with them. Shop around, be an informed consumer.

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doug

2:49 AM on 7 July, 2009

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well, the review was spot on but pretty negative. there's a lot of good in this unit. i like the feel and look of the piano wrist rest. sure, i wipe it off everytime i use it, so what? the keys have a great feel, better than most laptops. the colors on the screen are outstanding. no, this is not a gamer's unit and doesn't hide the fact. i think vista is aesthetically cool and have enjoyed using it so far. i bought it to replace an old desktop and could care less about the battery life, which does suck, but it rarely leaves my desk, and when it does, i plug it in. the review did not accentuate the innerds of this thing. this unit is outstanding for the average schmo who looks at facebook, writes papers, checks email, surfs the internet. i have used SPSS on this for statistical analyses and it doesn't break a sweat. movies run great, and who cares about the speakers, i have 2.1 bose speakers hooked up anyway. all in all, quit nit picking and give it a look. it's a mid level book for a great price. should have a webcam, but i don't care about that either.

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Ardjuna

1:07 PM on 9 July, 2009

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@Danny.B:

"both hinges have snapped which has annoyed me" - wow, I think most people (myself included) would be more than 'annoyed' :) if that happened, and after less than two years!

Hope you have better luck with your new purchase, and you're welcome.

@Doug:

The point was that as configured and priced from PCWorld *at the time of the review*, there were plenty of other laptops that offered more for less - and how can anyone argue against that? By now the 1545 could well be an excellent deal direct from Dell.

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micegorawr

5:00 AM on 13 July, 2009

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i just ordered a dell inspiron 1545 i upgraded almost everything even the battery like it is 9 cell now do you know how long it would last

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KischaGair

12:50 PM on 7 September, 2009

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My Dell Inspiron 1545 was bought for me for my Birthday on the 4th of September. I think it is a very handsome Laptop, the shiny finish is very attractive and ease of use is excellent. I was dissapointed and a bit worried after reading these reviews, i havnt had any problems as of late, except for poor battery life which doesnt really matter to me. I was pleasently surpirsed by Windows Vista as i had been told it isnt as good a XP but i found it really organised and easy to use, the toolbars are very handy. I havnt had any problems with connecting to the internet yet. So far i think it was worth every penny and im very very pleased with it, but then that could just be because Ive never had a laptop before and havnt been on a higher spec laptop who knows. so all in all i think Dell have done a great job, does anyone know if the customer service is good standard incase anything does happen to go wrong with it, as i have a 3 year warrenty. Kischa

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tokidoki

8:31 AM on 8 September, 2009

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So, I ordered this online wanted to get a colorful one besides the black. No, didn't happened didn't want to pay $40 dollars just to get it purple or put a design on it. I chose the back to school deal. Yes, a student like me is on a budget and was hoping to pay less than $555. The back to school advertisement is so misleading to me in so many ways... I thought I would get all the MS programs on here for the price I paid, but got a 60 day trial to use them. I mean I was expecting the whole package that would be useful for me to use for educational purposes besides browsing online. This is my second week with the laptop and I am already noticng the flaws as I type... the keyboard is so retarded I like type lightly like I do with a Mac laptop. But with this one, I have to pound on it, hit the keys hard enough to get the letters to appear on the screen, which I have to hit them 2-3 times to get it to work. The space bar sucks too. Also through the ordering process where you can add on things I clicked on most of them but someone managed to have lo jack and a data safe crap dude like I know what that is to even add it. So of course that price added on to my bill. I called customer service to take it out, but since the call center is in India then I should just hang up cause the person on the other end didn't understand my problem, a problem I feel could have been easily fixed by pulling my info and deleting some things. The dell people told me to cancel my order to redo it again, yeah like I wanted to be charged twice for a laptop and you know how that goes it takes weeks before they even refund the money into your account. F'it I says I'll sacrifice $100 I could easily spend on shoes for some stupid program and its not even MS! Oh yeah laptop can easily get scratched, the cheap cover needs a plastic casing. Good thing it is black you can hardly tell unless u look close. The glossy border gets dirty with dust and finger prints easily too.

The webcam options are fun and connection to wireless is good.

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JEK

7:05 PM on 28 September, 2009

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@Ardjuna: I was planning on buying this laptop until I read your review. Can you recommend an alternative that has a spec as good as this, is reasonably priced, but has the extras that you believe it needs - bluetooth, webcam, etc. I am totally clueless about laptops and really don't know what I am doing so I would be very grateful for your help! However, the one I found does appear to have a built in webcam - has the model been updated since your review?

Many thanks.

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GJones

4:45 PM on 29 September, 2009

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I purchased one of these for my daughter about 6 months ago, since than it has had it's hard drive replaced, had many Vista problems, and now the power supply won't charge, Dell says it's the motherboard... I just wanted to let people know how my experience is going. Maybe i just got a bad seed, but it has been a major headache!!

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Nick14

2:07 AM on 2 October, 2009

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I won my Inspiron 1545 in a contest at school. Overall its a nice looking computer, but not exactly my favorite computer in the world. It came with Vista Basic, and that in itself was a downer. I personally don't like vista, because it's slower and comes with too many things preinstalled. Personally I dont like the gloss finish, yeah it looks nice, but it attracts fingerprints like none other. haha. I like the keyboard setup and the size, but i have had a problem with it clicking buttons i don't touch, whether it be the ctrl key, or the mouse buttons, and sometimes while typing, it opens new web browsers, clears text, or closes out of programs which is frusterating. After having the laptop for 3 months the AC adapter quit out on me, my laptop doesn't reconigze its own battery adapter, and had to change to an older dell power adapter. I love the size of the screen, and really enjoy the widescreen look. It seems like a smaller laptop, but really has a beastly weight. I was hoping to upgrade some stuff on it from RAM to processor to video card, and was really disheartening to find that the video card cannot be upgraded. I'm a gamer who can't afford a nicer computer haha. All in all, this computer is great for internet, and sometimes typing, on a good day =} Its much faster now that i run Windows 7 RC, and can't wait until the full version comes out. This computer is very nice for older games. Warcraft, World Of Warcraft(Not old, but still, it runs quite nicely)Battlefield 2(Quite suprisingly, i can run that on high graphics), Oblivion(On lower then low graphics). It runs most games, but sometimes it needs a little help, from editing game data =} haha. Hope my review was somewhat helpful =}

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Luke2

2:17 PM on 11 October, 2009

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I bought this laptop essentially because of the customizable properties it has when its purchased direct from the Dell website. I wanted a blue one but I wasn't prepared to pay an extra 30 dollars just for a different colour... this makes little sense to me because it costs them no extra to make it blue (or so i'd imagine). I'm on a student's budget and this laptop represented best value for money throughout the various laptops I researched before purchasing.

Its an absolutely gorgeous computer despite the fingerprinty nature of the sexy glossy surfaces.

Mine ships with Vista home premium, which is a crappy operating system anyway in my opinion, but it was eligible for a free windows 7 upgrade, which I think is great because there's nothing worse than buying something new and then having it be outdated within months. Its also an attempt from Microsoft to maintain sales deals with computer manufacturers.

Its gonna cost a hefty 100 dollars extra for a dedicated graphics option, and even then its no gaming laptop. My version obviously shipped with the X4500HD Intel Integrated Graphics Accelerator, which is reviewed to be a more powerful integrated graphics accelerator.

3 gig of DDR2 ram comes standard, but in my opinion the upgrade from the standard Celeron 900 2ghz single core processor is probably the only truly "necessary" upgrade from the baseline options.

I like the fact it gives you the options for enhanced customer support or none at all, saving you money, or costing it. I chose to have no customer support because I know my way around well enough not to rely on customer support, even though Dell's support is supposed to have a reputation as one of the best.

Its a beautiful laptop and I think the reveiw is a little bit harsh... its not the best choice, sure. but its what you make of it and no matter what you're getting a great little computer.

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leopardppk

7:32 PM on 9 November, 2009

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hi, i was just gifted this laptop for my birthday. its barely a day old and the scrollers already giving me problems. i did not know untill discovering it the hard way that it doesnt have an integrated bluetooth and no webcam was a huge dissapointment. i have never owned a laptop before so i want to know if apart from these problems i am to expect any more in the future? (i am used to laptops at work from hp and acer which have about the same battery life.)

also, if i need to use an external webcam can u suggest any tht will be compatible with no problems? plus has anyone tried to use linux on this?

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Victor

5:56 PM on 24 November, 2009

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I purchased the Dell 1545 as a better alternative to a cheesy Netbook for my 10yo son's birthday present. The bigger screen, built-in DVD burner, and the webcam were "musts"! We found a Pacific Blue model with Vista Home Premium, (with the free Win 7 upgrade) at Besy Buy for $449, August 2009.

It's held up great to the regular use a 10 year old can put to a laptop. It's been upgraded to Win7. Lots of of web surfing, webcam play, and using the USB ports for a plugging in a keyboard, and an iPod.

The only problem to report now that the Best Buy's 30 day warranty has expired is a "STUCK PIXEL" in the lower left side of the screen. I had previously owned Dell, IBM, and Toshiba laptops and abused them for years and never had problems with anything other than the hard drives, (which I could easily replace), so I did not purchase an extended warranty. Now this three month old laptop develops a stuck pixel, (it's a blue pixel, when seen against a black background).

I noticed it. My son has not yet noticed it, and probably won't think anything of it when he does. I'm not sure if I should immediately get Dell tech support involved for this one stuck pixel, or wait to see if more things break and fall apart before the end of the 1 year factory warranty? Hmmm?

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Reny

1:12 PM on 29 November, 2009

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If you are looking for best deal laptop with good configuration then Dell is the one that is in the market.

I had bought dell inspiron. Dell is for people who are looking for laptop that can last for an year.After the warranty period expires your laptop also expires.I am telling this after i had seen 6 of my friends dell laptop inspiron. I can assure you dell will never manage to sell their laptop to someone who had dell before. They know the pain of having it

1.Your monitor screen oscillates freely for 15 degrees in 14 months, 45 degrees in 16 months and 90 degrees in 17 months.

2.Previous version had heating problem but they had reduced it.. but still the heat that is raised inside is good enough to make your laptop go crazy after 14 months.

My best advice is if you have plans to buy new laptop for every year, then dell is the best laptop you can opt for.

Its the worst S*** i ever had.... f***

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JohnBillot

6:11 PM on 20 December, 2009

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Spec.- Dual Core T4200 2GbRAM 160GbHDD Vista Prem. - Bought this for £255 from the Dell Outlet site in June 2009. I'm not a "power" user, don't play games but do run two websites, using Adobe Photoshop Elements, MS Office etc. Other than that, email and web browsing are the main uses. Given all that, I've found the 1545 more than adequate for these tasks, in fact I am delighted with it.

Build - Ardjun spot on. Quality is very good, solid feel even when carrying with one hand via the edge, no bending or creaking and the I actually like the plain matte black frontage (then again I have no artistic bent at all!). Yes, the glossy black interior is a bit of a pain but I clean it with spectacle cleaner now and then and its fine. If I'm honest my daughter's 1525 with its LEDs and silver keys etc is better looking but, hey, this is minimalism!

Screen - is superb, I take lots of photos and the resolution is very good (my previous Dell 8600 had a 1920 resolution so am comparing with a high res screen).

Keyboard is excellent, it IS a laptop but I'm very comfortable typing on it. Interestingly I don't agree with Ardjuna re the speakers, they are not as good as my Dell 8600 but my daughter has the 1525 and they are comparable (perhaps I was fortunate with the 8600). Having said that I don't listen to much music and only tend to watch/listen BBC iPlayer for TV or Radio programs I've missed - the 1545 runs them more than adequately.

The inbuilt 7 x card-reader is a boon (for a photographer) and whilst a built-in webcam would have been useful (for Skype) I had one already which works just fine.

WiFi - yes the "G" version but this is plenty fast enough for me (I live in a rural environment some 20 miles from the nearest big town) and am fortunate to get 4Mb BB speed which allows me to stream HD TV etc quite comfortably.

Battery - agree with Ardjun, the battery lasts about 90 minutes at best which doesn't present a problem for me but can be a deal-breaker for some (spare battery costs!).

HDD - at 160Gb is perhaps small for some like my daughter who has 000's of iTunes but the later specs of this laptop seem to have 250Gb as standard. I run two OS's, Vista and Linux, and therefore have three partitons but have used only half the space so far - and that includes 6000+ photos!

Running, hardly hear the fan cut in at all and when it does it is extremely quiet.

Conclusion - this is an excellent machine for the basic use that I put it to. I have bought 6 Dell laptops over the past 10 years (I have three grown-up children) and have never had a problem with any of them (the laptops not the children). Four of them I've got from the Dell Outlet site (UK) all of which have been excellent value. You cannot go far wrong with this machine.

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dianabeckemeyer

2:26 PM on 19 January, 2010

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Hi...I purchased a Dell 1545 6/2009 and have had 2 techs replace keyboards, 2 online driver downloads, a replacement computer and still have keyboard and touch pad problems. Very frustrating. Actually only had touch pad issues with original machine, now with the replacement...the keyboard is my bigger problem.

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Mark36

4:22 PM on 26 January, 2010

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Has anyone tried to connect a Dell Inspiron 1545 to an external monitor ?

I have found that if a VGA to VGA cable is used it will work.

If a VGA to S-Vidio cable is used there is NO signal.

When I use the Intel(R)TV Wizard automatic connection,I get "TV NOT Detected"

If you specify TV connection type and hi-light S-Vidio and click next nothing happens.

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Mark36

4:29 PM on 31 January, 2010

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I finaly have my Dell Inspiron connected to a Philips T.V..

I had to purchase a VGA to HDMI converter. Works great!

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sedoco

7:04 PM on 4 March, 2010

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Bought this machine about a year ago and have never had any problems with it. Rubbish Graphics Card, but what do you expect for a budget machine. Stuck Win7 on it and it runs really quickly. Good keyboard but rubbish battery life.

I had a Toshiba for two years and to scrap it. It's motherboard was replaced 4 times, along with the keyboard and HD. You get donkey machines in all makes. So far I have had no problems - touch wood. A good, all-round machine for the cash.

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KirkM

5:27 PM on 8 April, 2010

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I bought my daughter who lives out of state a Dell Inspiron 1545. She likes everything but the fact that it drops wireless connection to a router. I don't know if this is Vista or computer related. Anyone have experience in this area.

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DonnaSimons

4:31 AM on 22 June, 2010

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I just got a brand new Inspiron 1545 & it won't connect to my network. I have spent 2 hours online with Dell & an hour with AT&T trying to get to the root of the problem. The IPv4 and IPv6 are showing no connectivity. My laptop is picking up the signal, but reads "Limited Access". If you had this issue & resolved it, please advise! Thanks.

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Alex1

5:47 PM on 30 September, 2010

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I'm a professional web developer and I've used one of these pretty much every day for 8+ hours for the past 22 months. Touch wood its been spot on, and I can't say that for a lot of far more expensive kit (including my colleague's 6 month old £2K Alienware brick!)

Yes the battery life is absolutely awful (and the lack of rollback drivers for XP wound me up no end until I grudgingly got used to Vista in Classic mode,) but I bought it in a pinch when I had no money, and its lasted far far longer than I'd expected, so I'm pretty happy with it all in all!

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Cinemike

5:26 PM on 12 December, 2010

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@ Ardjuna...

I will wagad abouter that the review wasn't written on the Dell... I have h fifty computers moves the cursor to some random point when you brush the mousepad.

Then there is the layout of the keyboard.... consider... one is accessing information from the internet and pasting it into a spreadsheet, or typing it in some different format...

So, you use the F2 key to edit the data in the cell and... HEY, where did the internet go? Oh, the F***ING Keyboard didn't register the function keyre near tha complete mess and I have disconnected f. accents. My French correspondents, therefore, can just assume that I am illiteraterpad, therefore there are no. Where is the E accute accent? Alt 130, of course, except that there is no numeric keyom the WiFi link!!!

Also, I write a lot of emails in French that this one makes of the keyboard. By this time you are thinking that I am crazy or an inadequate typist, but I am a script-writer and journalist and I type quickly and accurately... it is the f***ing keyboard thatin my time and NONE was anywhe

immaculate typing as reformatted by the Inspiron 1545 keyboardguage suitable for this machine - ABOMINATION... There is a single word in the English lan

So, have fun deciphering my

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max1zzz

1:02 AM on 30 January, 2011

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"Thankfully, build quality doesn't show any signs of such severe cost-cutting" I beg to differ, my sisters 1.5year old dell inspiron 1545 has been a constant source of problems which so far stand at: Hdd failed, dvd drive is on the way out, track pad is also failing, solder on dc in socket has cracked, power-brick failed and the battery is truly rubbish, it has also at times not wanted to power on of even see the wifi card, another little nag is the lack of hdd activity led (very annoying when trying to debug software problems), in short very very poor build quality (i am typing this on my 10 year old ibook g3 500mhz which is working perfectly)

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Lasswenex

12:52 AM on 17 October, 2011

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My advice: Do.Not.Get.This.Laptop.
I'm serious, don't.
Unless you have the money to continuously replace laptops I would not recommend the inspiron.
I have a Dell Inspiron 1545, from the 3rd day I had it I experienced problems, I tried to run the PC game 'sims' on it, and it would overheat and crash, and then do a system restore deleting anything I had installed. I, being the idiot I am, didn't think to get it replaced or get a refund while I still could and decided to keep it. The problems from then on flooded in, It developed the problem 'Plugged in, not charging', this was an absolute nightmare to deal with and I had to spend over £50 for a new battery and £10 for a new charger, this solved the problem for about a week. Now I have had the laptop for well over a year maybe two years, the fan has started to make a grinding noise and overheats, and my laptop's not allowing me to open certain programs, which is annoying as hell.
Please, PLEASE don't get this laptop. Or a dell for that matter, I am saving to get a new laptop and I can assure you it will NOT be a dell.

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More Photos

Though it is remarkably cheap, a few too many corners have been cut in this configuration of Dell's 15.6in 1545 laptop to make it worthwhile for any but the most budgetary-constrained.

Overall

6/10

User Rating

3/10

Reviewed by Ardjuna Seghers

20 February 2009

Price as reviewed

£429.99

Awards

Scores in detail

Performance: 6/10
Value: 6/10
Features: 5/10
Design: 7/10
Overall: 6/10

Pros & Cons

Pros

Cheap
Decent build quality
Customizable

Cons

Glossy all over
No digital video out
Poor battery life
Inferior display

Manufacturer

Dell

Comments on Dell Inspiron 1545

Overall

User Rating

Price as reviewed

Comments

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Scores in detail

Pros & Cons

Pros

Cons

Price as reviewed

Manufacturer

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