Our family of five currently has 6 running computers. This one, unfortunately, is the stinker. It is not even the oldest, but has had BY FAR the most problems. First I should point out that it ran great for almost 2 years I think. It was somewhere around that 2 year (maybe year and a half?) mark when the first problem occurred. I plugged a headphone jack into the speaker out. In my defense, the pictures saying which was which was long rubbed away. Why should it matter anyway? Well, apparently it does. I smelled something burning immediately and of course, my computer was dead. I found out later that Dell had poorly designed a short circuit in their board if you do this... So I had to replace the motherboard. Not cheap or easy... but I did it. Next, it seems like only a couple of months later, the speakers started to go out. I found out that Dell also had poor wiring in this model for the speakers and they commonly go out with repeated opening and closing. THEN, the mousepad went out. Now, we keep it for emergencies only.... Got no working speakers and the mousepad is busted. Ah well. Sorry Dell, I usually love you guys.

JeffPlant

Plano, TX

This computer promised to be a good unit coming out of the box.  But now, nearly two years later (Christmas '07), this computer has had the LCD screen replaced twice, the Motherboard replaced four times, the touch pad replaced twice, the modem replaced three times, the keyboard replaced twice, the bottom plastics replaced once and the DVD burner replaced once.  The service has always been nice, and the techs courteous, but I woudn't recommend this unit to anyone, unless they like sending their computer out to get it fixed.

chris8884

Jefferson, MD

I travel a lot and this laptop is perfect for that. Small, lightweight, fast. I had one problem with a program, not the computer itself and I had to call Dell, the customer service there is wonderful, they went way beyond what they had to do. They even sent me new discs in case I were to have a similar problem later. No charge to me.

soberlady

Elizabethtown, KY

I purchased my Dell Inspiron 700m back in December 2005 and I absolutely love it!  It does everything I need it to.  It is fast and very portable.  My only complaint is that I wish it came with more memory.  I use it for everything; work, photos, internet and I run my non-profit organization on it.  I am a huge fan of all Dell products because they are both affordable and high-quality.

ahammar

Long Valley, NJ

Before the huge netbook craze, I was looking for a small sized laptop that could still handle the daily grind (which still many netbooks can't do).  I knew plenty about computers, but never researched laptops, everything I knew was desktops.  So when I came across the Dell 700m, I thought it was perfect.  A nice comptact 12" screen, a CD-rom drive, and an extended battery which could last up to 5 hours.  It seemed perfect for me.  Unfortunately, while the concept was great, Dell just designed one of the worst laptops I have ever used.  The first major flaw, was the mic jack was shipped broken for all 700m's and they would not fix it for anyone.  Second, the speaker wires are as thick as about 3 strands of hair, and is run through the hinge of the screen, so after opening and closing the monitor through regular use, it fatigues the wires and they eventually break resulting is broken speakers, and because they're so thin, it's almost impossible to solder them back together.  The memory options were terrible and after they sold this laptop, they realized the miniature keyboard they used annoyed a lot of people and fixed it in their 12" XPS series laptop.  While I've gotten used to the keyboard, many people can not type on my keyboard.  Many more problems occurred almost 1 week after the 1 year warranty ended.  Great design Dell, perfect so you don't need to fix anything under warranty.  Overall, this is just an overpriced laptop with an optical drive, with how badly Dell designed it

darkarrow

Anaheim, CA

One of the greatest qualities of the Dell Inspiron 700m laptop is its small size and light weight.  It is convenient to carry, even with the larger battery pack and AC power cord.  The processor can handle most any task quite well.  Naturally, it has no problem with the typically installed applications such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Access, Microsoft Internet Explorer, etc., but it is also sufficiently beefy to handle statistical and computationally intensive applications such as Stata, Matlab, Mathematica, and R.  The hard disk storage is sufficient, but nothing to brag about.  The wireless hardware works remarkably well and connects with even the weakest of signals.  One of the only complaints I have about the Dell Inspiron 700m laptop is that the DVD/CD drive installed by the manufacturer failed very soon after the warranty expired.  This was quite disappointing, but certainly not a deal-breaker. 

mishamisha

Castro Valley, CA

Considering that i've been using this laptop for almost 6 years alone is enough for me to give 5 stars. The only thing that is missing now is the battery, but that is expected since battery can't have the same power over the years. But i'm still using this laptop for my HTPC and it is enough for me to watch Hulu online, connected to my TV.  I had a problem about 2 years ago, where the DVD drive won't detect a CD/DVD properly. I had to call Dell Customer Service and it was a pain to get a new drive from them. I would give a 5 to this product and perhaps a 2 on their Technical Support people. They only followed scripts and took me several hours just to make them sent me a new DVD drive, even though I explained the various method that I try to fix the situation. They seemed to ignore me like a robot and keep talking through their script. Very annoying! Another thing to note is over the years, the LCD screen become yellowish, and perhaps I need to buy a new screen from ebay. I think that is expected after almost 6 years of use. Also I recommend to use a laptop cooling pad because this laptop is hot on the left back-end side.

martabakeju

Atlanta, GA

I have had this dell inspiron for quite a while. For my use, it has everything I need. It has been a fun experience . When I need to do other things that require more "bells and whistles",I use the desk top pc.  

samwham

Delray Beach, FL

Poor battery life, poor battery life. This laptop could have been better but for its very poor battery life. Other problem is with keys on keyboard. they are not very strong, may fall off. The design of laptop is poor. The screen is connected to the base by hinges which makes it weak. The good points are light weight, processor speed is good, and if you have 1 GB RAM, it really works fast. Small Hard drive capacity which is not good enough.

koolam

Urbana, IL