RE: Notebook Choices

Latitude's get the engineering dollars; Inspiron's get the the
leftovers.  Seriously, Latitudes are, in general, better designed and
have fewer problems.  While we buy Dell laptops, we long ago stopped
buying Inspirons as the failure rate was unacceptable.

Of course, Latitudes tend to cost a fair bit more, but in this case I
believe they're worth it.

Also, with Dell I recommend the highest tier of support available (Gold
or whatever).  Still US-based, little to no hold time, and they don't
have to follow a script.  I've called them before and the conversation
was like (paraphrasing) "The hard drive is making funny noises.  I ran
the diagnostics CD and it said it was failing with code __."  Dell: "OK,
we'll overnight you a replacement drive.  Let's verify your address."