Dell Vostro V130: Great Looks, Lackluster Performance

The Dell Vostro V130 is the most current product in the company's Vostro lineup, joining these kinds of before entrants because the Vostra 3300 along with the Vostra V13. With its snazzy anodized aluminum circumstance, thin profile (a hair over 0.75 inch at its thickest) and widescreen 13.3-inch LED-backlit exhibit, the Vostro V130 covers fairly much every one of the type bases for the modern ultraportable. Along with a respectable audio program makes it a great option for multimedia presentations around the street.

But within that handsome exterior beats...nothing specific, performancewise. The V130 scored a humble 77 on WorldBench six, and ran to get a disappointing 3 hrs, 37 minutes in our battery life checks, putting it nicely toward the bottom from the pack, even among ultraportable laptops.

Correct, the higher performers normally price a lot more, but the Vostro V130 that I examined is not supercheap, by any indicates: Configured with Windows seven Pro (64-bit), Intel's ultra-low-voltage Core i3 U380 CPU (which possibly accounts for that mediocre WorldBench 6 score), 4GB of RAM, plus a 128GB solid-state generate, the Vostro V130 goes for $1068 (as of February two, 2011). That is over double the $429 base price tag detailed on Dell's Web site, but Dell attained that reduced number by setting Linux because the default running technique.

Nonetheless, if you're not a heavy-duty number cruncher or video editor, and when you do the majority of your function along with your laptop computer plugged in, you will discover that the Vostro V130 has some considerable virtues. The red metal case looks sharp (though it adds $40 to your cost more than the basic silver model) and presents the notebook a nice strong feel. Dell has touted new cooling engineering inside the Vostro V130, but in my checks the bottom from the case got warm soon after 15 minutes of use. The laptop computer is pretty peaceful: I heard no loud followers.

The matte-finish full-size keyboard and touchpad are a pleasure to work on, even though I'd have appreciated some backlighting (past the lights for icons above and below the keys) for low-light scenarios. The 1366 by 768 display seems to be a tad dark except if you flip the brightness all the way up, nonetheless it boasts a wide array of satisfactory viewing angles.

The Vostro V130 also brings some multimedia goodies towards the table, such as Dell's Webcam application plus a astonishingly robust audio system (with an integrated digital microphone). I really needed to flip down the quantity on some YouTube songs movies and Rhapsody tunes, all of which sounded good by means of a headset plugged into audio ports around the notebook's front edge.

The Webcam computer software allows you to modify the resolution of the 2-megapixel camera's video clip capture to settings that array from 320 by 480 to 1600 by 1200. You'll be able to utilize the Webcam for video chat, to capture videos for uploads or e-mail, or to snap nevertheless photos. The video clip quality ranges from okay to really good.

The V130's connectivity features are sufficient although not remarkable. You obtain two USB ports, a combo USB/E-SATA port, VGA and HDMI show outputs, and gigabit ethernet. Dell isn't going to supply an ExpressCard slot or optical generate, however it does provide a five-in-one SD/MMC slot that really should allow you to download material from most digital cameras. Wireless connectivity is made up with the built-in 802.11n Wi-Fi (restricted towards the two.4GHz band in my check unit) and Bluetooth; Dell offers dual-band Wi-Fi and cell broadband as extra-cost possibilities.

Apart from the aforementioned Dell Webcam computer software, the Vostro V130 doesn't carry a great deal of preloaded plans. You obtain the Starter Edition of Office 2010 (stripped-down versions of Word and Excel) along with a Bluetooth utility. At the very least you do not get any junkware, either.

Total, the Vostro V130 would seem intended for travelers who don't count on to utilize their laptop on the street a lot as at their destination. It need to deal with mainstream business tasks--particularly presentations--fine, but when overall performance or battery life make a difference a good deal to you, you may need to look beyond this quite face, er, scenario.