The Dell Inspiron 1420 is a 14.1″ screen mainstream multimedia notebook that competes with the likes of the HP dv2500t. Dell has always been known for its direct to order model and ability to configure to your hearts delight, and now they’ve taken that a step further by giving you the ability to customize the color of your notebook from a selection of eight colors. In addition to prettying up the design Dell also introduces the new Intel Santa Rosa chipset and Nvidia go 8400m graphics in the Inspiron 1420.

The Inspiron 1420 is the follow-on to the 14.1″ screen Inspiron e1405 notebook. The Inspiron 1420 offers the latest Intel platform, dubbed Santa Rosa, that offers faster processor speeds, a new and improved integrated graphics solution, Intel’s 802.11n wireless chipset and a larger amount of processor memory cache on certain processors.

System as Reviewed

The specs for the Inspiron 1420 as reviewed are the following:

• Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 (2.0GHz / 4MB L2 Cache)
• Screen: 14.1″ WXGA Glossy Display
• Hard Drive: 120 GB 5400RPM
• Color: Dark Chocolate Brown lid
• Optical Drive: 8X DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Drive
• Graphics: Nvidia 8400M GS
• Memory: 2.0GB DDR2 SDRAM
• Wireless: Intel PRO/Wireless 4965AGN, Bluetooth
• Battery: 56 Whr 6-cell
• Camera: 2.0MP
• Ports: 4 Universal Serial Bus (USB 2.0), IEEE 1394 Firewire, TV out (S-video), Integrated Consumer IR (remote control receiver), 5-in-1 digital media card reader, headphone out, microphone in, RJ-11 (modem), RJ-45 (LAN), VGA out

I paid around $1,100 after all was said and done. Using the ubiquitous Dell coupons found around the web you can drive the price down a bit. Dell is always one of the tops when it comes to price competition

Places to buy

The story is pretty simple with Dell, if you want to buy a notebook you can go to their website and configure one, call and order over the phone or go to a Dell kiosk in a mall and place an order. Either way the notebook will be delivered to you via mail!

What you get

• Inside the box you get the Dell Inspiron 1420
• CDs with preinstalled software and driver files
• Product info guide and Owner’s Manual
• Ear buds in a small black bag
• A/C Adapter
• Battery

Weigh in

One thing I like to always do with any new gadget I get is take it to the scales and see how much it weighs:

The Inspiron 1420 is heavier than your average 14.1″ notebook, and as you’ll see from the chart above, it’s actually the same weight as the Apple MacBook Pro 15.4″ screen notebook. This is somewhat of a bummer if you were buying the Inspiron 1420 to be light and portable, because it simply is not.

When you add the power brick and charge lead into the weight, commonly called the travel weight of the notebook, the total weight comes to about 6.6 lbs. At that weight this starts to get actually quite heavy and you’ll want to think twice about hauling it for miles on end across a campus.

Size-Up

Another interesting metric I like to look at is the dimensions of the notebook compared to similar notebooks.

At its thinnest point the Inspiron 1420 is 1.26 inches, so it’s slightly thicker than your average 14.1″ screen notebook. You can see by looking at the comparison chart it’s one of the thickest 14.1″ screen notebooks out there for the major brands, and is thicker than the 15.4″ screen MacBook Pro.

Looks

The Inspiron 1420 allows for customization of color for the lid. This is a nice option, although I sometimes find that too much choice leads to indecision in the configuration process and you always second guess if another color might have been better after you finally decide on one. I went with the “Premium Dark Chocolate” color, I must have been hungry at the time. I have no regrets though, the lid looks black according to my eyes, it has to catch the light for you to notice it is brown. It’s professional looking. More so than pink would be at least.

The actual design and shape of the Inspiron 1420 isn’t all that inspiring, it looks much like the old Inspiron e1405 did, except they took the white bumpers off of it. I wouldn’t call the design innovative or particularly striking. It’s pretty generic looking on the inside.

One thing I like about the Inspiron 1420 lid is that it stays fingerprint free and you don’t have to continuously wipe it down to remove greasy marks. The lid is actually slightly textured to the touch. The HP dv2500t has a smooth and glossy lid that is more eye catching, but it’s higher maintenance to keep it looking nice due to the fingerprints you’ll have to wipe off. If you prefer a plainer looking notebook that’s easy to keep looking good then the 1420 is a good choice.

Construction

The overall build of the Inspiron 1420 is excellent, there’s no flex in the body. The material used to build the notebook case is thick and rigid and thereby contributes to it being solid but heavy. The chassis is made of a magnesium-alloy for strength and rigidity. Now, if you’re looking for a portable 14.1″ notebook that’s thin-and-light, this is not it. The 1420 looks, feels and acts more like a typical 15.4″ screen notebook.

There’s no latch to hold the lid down, but it stays down firmly nonetheless. In fact, when you go to close the lid it snaps itself shut so hard you tend to worry the screen may get damaged! No joke, the hinges and spring mechanism for closing are so tight on this thing you’ll want to make sure you ease the lid closed instead of allowing it to snap itself shut. The good news is there’s no way the screen will open by accident when you’re carrying it in a bag.

The keyboard area of the Inspiron 1420 is sealed, so if you spill a beverage on the keyboard there’s a good chance the liquid will not go seeping into the internals of the notebook and ruin it.

The underside of the notebook has a strike zone to protect the hard drive in the event of a drop. The underside of the notebook is solid and seemingly made of some type of magnesium composite to give it more rigidity and protection.

Overall the build of the 1420 is excellent and feels very solid. It’s way more tank-like than the competing dv2500t notebook.

Ports

The port selection of the Dell Inspiron 1420 is pretty darn good for this size notebook. Again I’ll compare it to what similar notebooks have so you get an idea of where it stands relative to competition

Let�s take a look at the port offerings and locations on Inspiron 1420:

On the front side you have status lights, 8-in-1 media card slot, wi-fi catching, dual headphone out, microphone in, and consumer IR sensor

On the left side there’s the power adapter connector, air vent, FireWire, two USB ports and an ExpressCard slot

On the back is the modem and Ethernet LAN port

On the right side is the optical drive, S-Video port, two USB ports, and monitor out.

Keyboard

The keys on the Inspiron 1420 keyboard are well placed, I have no complaints there. The feel of the keys is nice too, they have a bit of a grip to them. The travel is a bit shallow and light touch typists will prefer this keyboard over those that like to pound on a keyboard and get a ton of travel with a key. There’s no sag to the keyboard anywhere, it’s very firm. The keyboard is also sealed to prevent any liquid from going into the notebook.

The touchpad works fine, it has horizontal and vertical scroll areas and the mouse buttons are quite nice. It would be nice if there were an on/off switch for the touchpad.

Buttons

The media buttons are located along the top of the keyboard of the Inspiron 1420. The keys are a bit small, but they work well. I much prefer having “regular buttons” as opposed to the touch sensitive buttons the HP dv2500t offers. While the dv2500t touch sensitive non-raised buttons might look nice, in reality they’re harder to push. When you push the Inspiron 1420 buttons you feel it go in and see an on screen feedback display so you know you’re definitely turning the volume up or down for instance.

The media buttons on the Inspiron 1520, the larger 15.4″ screen brother to the 1420, are located at the front. I think I prefer the buttons at the front for quick access, but I guess they’re less prone to getting bumped when placed toward the back of the keyboard such as they are on the 1420.

The Wi-Fi catcher on the front side of the notebook is a nice button to have. You simply push it and it lights up green if it detects wireless access points in the vicinity. It can also be used to turn wireless on/off.

On top of the keyboard is the power button and another button that you push to get to the Dell quick launch media system, this software allows you to boot to a Dell Media Direct system in 20-seconds or less to view image files, listen to music or watch a DVD. The media buttons work within this mode.

Screen

Dell offers up to WXGA+ (1440 x 900) resolution on the 1420, it’s nice to have extra viewing real estate but not have resolution so high that you can’t read text. Your options for the screen include a WXGA glossy, WXGA non-glossy or WXGA+ glossy screens. This is better than the HP dv2500t that only offers WXGA glossy.

The screen is fairly bright, but not blazingly so. Unfortunately, just like with the Inspiron 1520, there’s a bit of graininess on this screen if you stare hard enough — it’s more noticeable on a white background screen. I used Astra32 to detect who the maker of the screen was and it appears it’s made by AU Optronics.

With the glossy screen colors are bright and bold, but you will get reflection from strong lighting. Viewing angles are so-so, about average among other notebooks.

Sound

The speakers for the Inspiron 1420 are located above the keyboard. I was quite amazed by the loudness and quality of these speakers, I watched a movie using the Inspiron 1420 and was stunned by how loud it got, it was completely audible from across my apartment and the quality was good — not at all tinny. A big plus in this area for the Inspiron 1420!

Performance

The Inspiron 1420 has been a joy to use, it’s extremely snappy with the Intel T7300 2.0GHz processor and Nvidia 8400m graphics. Bootup is fast, and programs load instantly in Vista. You can get up to a 2.2GHz processor at the moment, I think that would be overkill given the amazing performance the 2.0GHz T7300 already gives.

I ran the popular 3DMark06 on the Inspiron 1420 and got a score of 1,391 3DMarks, which is respectable for a notebook of this size. You can do some light gaming.

I ran PCMark05 on the 1420 to get an overall system performance score, you can see that the system performs very well with a 4,670 score. This result was gained using out of the box configuration settings and before any of the bloatware was removed from the system.

I also ran Cinebench, a benchmark that tests the graphic and dual processor capabilities of a notebook, the Inspiron 1420 scored a very good 590 with the configuration I have.

Remember that the configuration of the Inspiron 1420 as reviewed is pretty high-end, the performance will vary a lot depending on how you configure the 1420. Bottom line is that you can really configure this notebook to be a great all around performer if you want to though.

Noise

The Inspiron 1420 is very quiet, at no time did it get really loud with fans. Basically you won’t hear this notebook at all in an environment with ambient noise, and if you’re in a library it won’t get loud enough to annoy anyone. The optical drive is the noisiest component, and that’s only when it’s spinning up a DVD.

Heat

The Inspiron 1420 stays mostly cool, the left touchpad does get slightly warm when the notebook is being pushed hard, but the right palmrest stays cool. The bottom of the notebook also warms up a bit, but nothing drastic by any means. Under normal usage processor temperatures seemed to remain around 50C and never went past 65C during any benchmarking tests. Heat will not be an issue with this notebook for the average user.

Battery

The 6-cell battery gave me about 2.5 hours of battery life while it was mostly idling but with wireless on and the screen at about medium brightness. My guess is you could maybe stretch the 6-cell battery to 3 hours. More realistically you’ll get about 2 hours of battery life under normal usage. Not bad overall, but definitely not the best.

Conclusion

The Inspiron 1420 is certainly an improvement on the Inspiron e1405 and I like the new option of configuring the lid color to give the notebook a more personal touch. The performance can be really amazing if you get a high-end processor and Nvidia 8400m graphics card. Options for built-in Verizon EVDO is certainly nice to have for those that want to be connected while on the road too. The only problem with being on the road with this laptop is that it’s heavy and chunky, so it’s not the easiest thing in the world to lug around.

Pros

• Nice personalization option with lid color selection
• Excellent performance with Intel Santa Rosa processor and Nvidia card
• Good screen options
• Very cool running and quiet notebook
• Excellent build quality, very solid
• Very good wireless connectivity options
• Good price

Cons

• They added color to the outside, but the design is still kind of bland on the inside
• Not a thin-and-light, it’s a bit bigger than average 14.1″ notebook
• Screen has some graininess to it