I bought a Dell laptop (Studio 17) and I'm satisfied with it overall, it's even got two hard drive bays (I was like yay when I found out) but for some reason Dell uses some kind of special, proprietary SATA adapter so I can't actually throw in an extra drive (I was like SCREW YOU when I found out), which is a real shame because I really wanted to have 2 HDDs so I could have both Windows and Linux not interfering with each other. I don't care about that so much any more but right now I want to get a small SSD for cheap but obviously I'd need a HD for storage to go with it... but I can't.
And what were they? Inspiron's and Dimension's? Latitude, Precision, and OptiPlex are the way to go with Dell.
I'm personally of the opinion that as far as cheap computers go, Dell is one of the better brands. I have a Dell Latitude D410, which is about 6 years old. I had to replace the hard drive last year, but in terms of build quality, it's still a nice laptop. I wouldn't say that Dell is one of the best brands, but I wouldn't say that they're one of the worst either.
That's one thing that I've always felt safe about with my D410. Seeing that "strikezone" thing thing under the hard drive makes me feel a little less worried about my slippery fingers.Commercial grades are. I accidentally dropped a refurb D531 off the shelf (it slipped off) and it fell a good 5ft smack onto the floor. Not a single ding on it.
my D630 has that. What does it do?
With Dell's Strike Zone hard drive protection system, your data can be safe from the bumps and bangs that come from the rigors of travel. The Strike Zone shock absorber helps prevent damage to your hard drive and your essential business data, so you can hit the road with confidence.