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Dell Latitude CPx J650GT

Toronto Star Fast Forward column for April 20, 2000

Copyright ©, Myles White, 2000

If you're shopping around for a new notebook computer this month, you'll have noticed particularly if you've been in the hunt for a while that the prices have bounced around a bit since January.

At the beginning of the of the year, they ranged from just over $2,000 for a trailing edge name brand product with older processor and meagre features, to over $7,500 for a leading edge system with all the bells and whistles.

As of the week of April 10, however, both the bottom and the top have fallen slightly. The least expensive name brand I could find was IBM's ThinkPad 1400 series, beginning at $1,639 with a 450 MHz Celeron processor, 32 MB of memory, 4.8 GB hard drive and 13-inch "High Performance Addressing (i.e., passive matrix LCD) screen. 

Next in line was Toshiba's Satellite 2100CDS beginning at about $1,800, but with an AMD K6 processor at 400 MHz (and unlike AMD's desktop marvel, the Athlon, this particular model is not known for providing great performance) with 32 MB of memory, 4.3 GB hard drive and 12.1-inch STN (passive matrix) screen.

At the top rung of the price structure and virtually always the perennial leader is Toshiba's Tecra 8100 at $7,499 with 650 MHz Pentium III processor (with speed-step), 128 MB of memory, 18.1 GB hard drive, DVD-ROM drive, and 14.1-inch TFT (active matrix) screen.

Most notebook models with robust processors, hard drives, TFT screens, and at least enough memory to make it worthwhile (64 MB, plus) hover around the $3,899 - $5,300 range.

Reviewer's notes

And that brings us to the Dell Latitude CPx J650GT the company loaned me for a couple of weeks to use at last weekend's Computer Fest and a visit I'm making to the Durham Personal Computer Users' Club next month (Thursday, May 11, 2000 at 7:00 p.m, in the downstairs room of the Robert McLaughlin Public Library, 65 Bagot St., Oshawa and yes, this is a plug for the club).

Dell has two notebook computer lines. It positions its Inspiron models for small to medium sized businesses and the line utilizes both Pentium and Celeron processors. The Latitude line is aimed at larger corporate markets, but this is the line you want to look at if you're a mobile power user. It comes strictly with Pentium III processors, lots of memory and other options. Both have expansion options such as a port replicator, but only the Latitude also includes a docking station.

The Latitude CPx J650GT is about the top of the line. The review unit came with 650 MHz Pentium III mobile processor running on the 440BX mobile chipset with 128 MB of memory, 6 GB hard drive (models up to 18 GB are available), and a 14.1-inch TFT screen with a resolution of 1024 by 768 pixels. The screen is driven by an ATI "Mobility M1" graphics chipset with 64-bit graphics accelerator, 8 MB of video SDRAM (synchronous DRAM), and runs on a 2X AGP (accelerated graphics port) bus.

Along with the basics, the unit also comes with 24X CD-ROM drive in a hot-swappable bay (options include 6X DVD drive, 4X write CD-RW (ReWriteable) drive, a 2nd (up to 18 GB) hard drive, floppy disk drive, LS-120 drive, and/or second battery). While you can swap out one of the drives (or battery) from the bay in order to use the included floppy drive, you can also connect it externally through an included cable.

The Latitude also has sound, provided by an ESS Maestro 3l wavetable audio controller with line in, line out, and external mic-in ports. There are also built-in microphone and speakers.

Other notable features include an S-Video out port in case you want to run a presentation to VCR or TV monitor, a pair of PC-card slots (CardBus and Zoom Video support). It has one USB (universal serial bus) port, an SVGA out port, and a docking port for either a port replicator or $979 docking station that weighs almost as much as the computer.

The battery is Lithium-Ion, which means it lasts a long time and just loves short charges.

Some models of newer notebook have tried to incorporate the type of one-touch controls for invoking programs that newer desktop keyboards now sport, but Dell has left the Latitude's keyboard layout pretty much alone with one mighty exception. You now have three choices of pointing device support.

You can attach a standard mouse or tablet to the unit's rear serial or PS/2 ports, or you can use one of the two devices embedded in the keyboard and shelf. That's right two. 

The Latitude CPx J650GT has both an "eraser head" pointing stick embedded in the keyboard with a pair of thumb-button toggles just below the space bar. And it also has a touch-pad in the wide shelf in front of the keyboard. You can use either one or both interactively they're both live and it answers the question posed for those who simply can't get used to one or the other.

The unit is relatively light in weight (6.74 lbs 3.06 Kg with battery and CD-ROM drive installed), and well within the upper range in notebook computer size 1.77 inches (45 mm) thick, 12.55 inches (319 mm) wide, and 9.94 inches (252.5 mm) deep.

Dell also says the hard drive is specially shock-mounted to reduce the possibility that dropping will damage the hard drive. I want the company to let me have more products for review, so I didn't drop it to find out how well that worked.

More info:

Dell Latitude CPx J650 GT as reviewed (with additional memory) $4, 768. Dell Canada: www.dell.ca or 1-800-WWW DELL (999-3355)

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