RIP Dell Vostro.. you will be missed

[YeuEmMaiMai]

Looks like the famous Vostro line is getting the axe from Dell. They are no longer available as laptops or deklstops on the business side...

I have 3 of the latops myself. Very reliable and long lasting imho

The orignal Vostro 1400 with Core 2 1.8GHz and Nvidia 8400GS-M 2008
The new Vostro 1440 i3 with Intel HD graphics for wife
The Vostro 3450 with what is really an i5 (branded i7 but is a dual core) with Radeon 7650.

 

[burritoincognito]

I can't say I'm sad to see them go. Never seemed to be much better than an Inspiron, and was always very limited in its options.

 

[jaffy]

They are probably updating the site since the Haswell release was today. Hopefully.

 

[burritoincognito]

That does seem a lot more likely; you'd think that Dell discontinuing an entire product line on desktops and laptops would be newsworthy, and mentioned BEFORE it happened.

Still, it doesn't make sense to get rid of the older models that would be listed.

http://www.dell.com/vostro

 

[YeuEmMaiMai]

That does seem a lot more likely; you'd think that Dell discontinuing an entire product line on desktops and laptops would be newsworthy, and mentioned BEFORE it happened.

Still, it doesn't make sense to get rid of the older models that would be listed.

http://www.dell.com/vostro

Follow that link through to it's logical conclusion and you get a product not available when you go to order one.

I can't say I'm sad to see them go. Never seemed to be much better than an Inspiron, and was always very limited in its options.

They are Inspirions and you can get them loaded the same way (dedicated graphics, large HDD, etc) the advantage was

1. No bloatware
2. recovery media
3. On site tech support for the duration of the warranty.

The machine in my sig as listed was under $980, it was $735 delivered from the outlet and uprading the display, ram, hdd and BD-Rom writer was done for less than $240.

 

[450]

I never got on-site for my 1500

 

[YeuEmMaiMai]

I never got on-site for my 1500

My original 1400 was mail in or parts sent. The studio 1558 was onsite, the 3450 is onsite and so is the 1440 that my wife has. Warranty will be up in July I believe.

 

[obug]

Looks like the famous Vostro line is getting the axe from Dell. They are no longer available as laptops or deklstops on the business side...

Dell seems to be pulling a Lenovo and rebranding the Vostro as a lower end Latitude, similar to the Thinkpad Edge.

Does this Latitude look familiar?

http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/latitude-3330-laptop/pd

I agree that the Vostros were great. Business class support and a laptop with minimal bloat. They also used parts (e.g. GPUs) that were more interesting to home users. I've got a V131. If the screen (which is awful!) was better, it would be an amazing laptop.

 

[niffcreature]

Dell seems to be pulling a Lenovo and rebranding the Vostro as a lower end Latitude, similar to the Thinkpad Edge.

Does this Latitude look familiar?

http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/latitude-3330-laptop/pd

Link is broken, but it wouldn't be the first time:

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/IFT0...2-Full-Tested-45-Days-Warranty/595866883.html

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/1425-Intel-PM965-laptop-motherboard-For-DELL-95-New/481570420.html

Both of these laptops are not sold in the US and the 1425 is especially rare, but it's definitely verifiable.

Its pretty hard to tell with new laptops unless you match up the ports, and even then...
I discovered those 2 are the same by accident. I certainly don't feel like its worth my time to investigate countless other models now.

Its actually Compal who is responsible. It's not surprising with Gateways and Emachines since they are both owned by Acer, but in the case of Dell & Lenovo... I question if Dell and Lenovo know about it, and if it was entirely legal for Compal to do that...

 

[CEpeep]

The screens on most of the Vostro lines were garbage, but the lack of bloat ware and the competitive pricing (probably due to the virtually nonexistant marketing) were worth noticing. Hopefully Dell will hang on to the best aspects when incorporating them into the main Latitude line.

 

[AMD T-type]

My last 3 laptops were all Vostros, and they have been great little machines with a good mix of capable video cards yet still very business looking.

I agree with the above sentiment about the screens but only on the last couple lines.
The screen on my 3400 was not anything like the previous two laptops i had, and lower resolution as well.

It boggles my mind why almost NO one makes 14" laptop with a resolution higher than 768 anymore.

 

[niffcreature]

The screens on most of the Vostro lines were garbage, but the lack of bloat ware and the competitive pricing (probably due to the virtually nonexistant marketing) were worth noticing. Hopefully Dell will hang on to the best aspects when incorporating them into the main Latitude line.

Almost all business laptops have horrible screens except for those made for professional graphics work. Do you think the latitude screens were better?

 

[obug]

It boggles my mind why almost NO one makes 14" laptop with a resolution higher than 768 anymore.

I never understood this either. 14" laptops seem to be popular with business users. It also always seemed to be a great size to become a hybrid to get the portability of a 13 with the power (e.g quad core with no GPU) of a 15.

Surely they would have been some interest in a halfway decent 1600x900 screen? Even the ones that did ship in Dells and Lenovos were horrible.

Almost all business laptops have horrible screens except for those made for professional graphics work. Do you think the latitude screens were better?

The 1080P 15" screens on the Latitude was decent. Unfortunately all other screens were bad to mediocre.

 

[CEpeep]

Almost all business laptops have horrible screens except for those made for professional graphics work. Do you think the latitude screens were better?

I had a 15" Latitude at work about 6 years ago with a 1080p screen on it. I remember it being awesome at the time. I'm sure the low-end screens were the same or similar to the Vostros, but the Latitude line has usually at least had the option of a decent screen.

 

[YeuEmMaiMai]

I have swapped my screen for a 900p one and I had to use the 3550 cable to do it. works great an is a LG model

 

[zod96]

The Vostro line was nice. It was Matte Screens and Matte Bezels. Unlike the glossy bezel and screens of the Inspiron line....

 

[ToddW2]

Just upgraded my wifes that was pushing ~5 years old.

Can't beat the "on site" warranty, she had her screen completely replaced at her business within 48 hours.

Just replaced it with a Inspiron 7520 15R 1080p, i5,2gb video, etc... that was $400 or something off, and got the onsite business warranty 4yrs? + accidental care max years, after tax and overnight shipping I think ended up being right around 1k$. Probably last her another 4-5 years I can't complain for that.

 

[onlnhvk]

Wife still uses the 1500.
I recently upgraded the Wireless card to a wireless N.
Also put in an old solid state I had lying around.

It still lives. And it isn't a bad machine for surfing the web, which is really all that she uses it for.