Meet Matt, a senior technician here at Laptop Broker. Like all our technicians, Matt knows his way around a laptop and has upgraded and rebuilt thousands of computers over the years. We asked Matt to review a few laptops he is familiar with and have posted them for our customers to review. We hope you find this information helpful and welcome your feedback.

Dell Latitude D820 Review

Dell Latitude D820 is a powerful and complete portable laptop. This laptop is half-pound less heavy than its predecessor D810 is. It weighs six pounds. It has a sleeker look and therefore is more portable. Dell Latitude D820 best suits corporate buyers on the lookout for a high-end machine.

Dell Latitude D820 offers a fast Core 2 Duo T7400 processor with 2.0 GHz processor speed, all essential security features, and embedded wireless broadband connectivity. It offers 2GB RAM memory and can support 4 GB RAM maximum memory. Hard drive size is 60 GB and speed is 7200 rpm.

Features

Dell Latitude D820 offers a crisp, 15.4-inch wide-screen with integrated wireless WAN and biometric security. It has a fingerprint reader in between two mouse buttons. This hooks on to the TPM chip onboard and handles all security functions like encryption. This feature proves very useful if you work with sensitive information. The Core Duo machine is among the fastest and works thirty percent faster than its predecessor D810.

The silver gray or metallic graphite chassis with black accents could present a conservative look and may not seem to be in sync with the current trends of laptops. However, D820 is the perfect choice for boardroom meetings and conferences.

Dell Latitude D820 comes with a full-sized keyboard, pointing stick, and touchpad. It offers choices of resolutions. The Dell Company offers a three-year warranty. The design of D820 is tastefully done. If not awe-inspiring, this laptop is definitely a pleasant sight. The laptop comes with the AC power adapter, battery, user manual, CDs, and software. The latch on the front is a metallic latch and not a plastic button as available in most other laptops.

Rating: 5/5

The Looks on the Exterior

Dell Latitude D820 has a durable design. It is within a magnesium alloy casing that offers a cushion for all possible wear and tear through corporate travel. It has a solid look and feel. The steel hinges offer necessary support. These are little stiff and you have to hold down the keyboard part a little to open the laptop fully. The whole underside, wrist rests, and lid is of plastic. The laptop presents a rigid look.

D820 is thin, although not exactly a lightweight. It theoretically weighs less than its predecessor does. However, it is an overall heavy luggage. Yet, it does not prove very uncomfortable lugging it around. A retractable metallic latch with clasps locks the laptop. These latches, locks, and hinges could wear out through regular use. Magnetic closing mechanism is the best option, as available in many other laptops.

Rating: 4/5

Screen

Dell Latitude D820 has a 15.4" diagonal and matte screen. The screen is not glossy, unlike most other laptops. However, matte screen best suits office work while the glossy screen is the best for photoviewing, movie-watching, gaming, and other multimedia tasks.

D820 screen lacks essential brightness. If you set it to higher brightness, it drains battery power. The automatic light sensor feature adjusts screen brightness to available light conditions. You cannot however use this feature often. Overall, the screen is dim.

If you set the screen to black, there is little light leakage. If screen setting is white, you can find little uneven backlighting. The bottom of the screen is bright while there is slight shadowing at the corners. You can choose from WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screen, WXGA+ (1280x800) screen, and the ultrahigh resolution WUXGA (1900x1200).

Rating: 2/5

Sound, Heat, and Noise

Dell Latitude D820 features the usual laptop speakers. There are two speakers with stereo sound on either side. The speakers deliver poor volume with nonexistent bass and distorted highs. Sound quality improves significantly if you use headphones. Sigmatel audio chipset controls sound subsystem on D820. D820 has mute and volume control buttons above the keyboard. This laptop does not have the usual media control buttons like pause, play, and similar others.

Dell D820 has two exhaust vents for heat dissipation. One of the vents is on the rear while the other is on the side. Only the left wrist-rest heats up after long hours of use. The right wrist-rest remains cool. The underside of the laptop becomes little warm after few hours of use. Nonetheless, it does not hamper your working. D820 has many high performance components that emit lot of heat. Yet, the laptop remains cool.

Fan is perennially on at slow speed. Yet, there is almost no noise emanating from the fan. If you run many applications at the same time, fan speed gears up but still does not make any offensive noise. The DVD-RW drive does cause substantial noise while reading a CD or DVD.

Rating: 3/5

Internal Features

Dell Latitude D820 comes with Strike Zone protection for the hard disk. This protection acts a shock absorber and minimizes any possible damage to your hard disk in case of an accidental fall. The inner aesthetics are inoffensive. The charcoal and black motif is a sober combination. It does not cause any distractions in an office or academic environment.

Rating: 5/5

Keyboard and Touchpad

Dell Latitude D820 has a full-sized keyboard. The keyboard offers easy navigation. Pressing one key does not affect working of other keys. This is a very appreciable feature. Key sizes are appropriate. Function, Num Lock, Pause, Print Screen, and other less used keys are in half-size. The touch pad is small and provides necessary grip. Mouse buttons are below the touch pad. Touch pad has dual left and right select buttons.

Rating: 5/5

I/O ports

Dell Latitude D820 comes with two USB 2.0 ports on the right side. The left side has an IrDA port, a PC Card and Express Card slot, jacks for headphone and microphone, and a 4-pin IEEE1394 Fire wire port. There are three more USB ports at the backside, a modem connection, a VGA out port, a COM port, an Ethernet connection, and power port for AC adapter. Smart Card reader is on the underside. There is no DVI port. Although there might not be many ports in D820, they are more than sufficient to handle all necessary office tasks.

Rating: 4/5

Wireless

Wireless connectivity of Dell Latitude D820 is excellent. Bluetooth connectivity is perfect. Right side screen hinges house indicators for WiFi and Bluetooth. The same place also houses indicators for battery warnings, power, battery warnings, and hard disk activity. The Dell wireless broadband connection allows you to connect at almost DSL speeds if there is any Verizon Wireless EV-DO signal.

Rating: 5/5

Battery Life

Dell Latitude D820 comes with eight-cell battery. You can get a nine-cell battery, if need be. Battery takes two full hours to charge completely. Dell offers Express Charge facility. This optimizes battery charge time. In crises, you can charge the battery to 80% in an hour.

If you use normal applications like web browsing and word processing, battery life is around four hours. If you use many applications simultaneously, battery life would be only two hours. Five LEDs on the exterior indicate existing battery backup.

Rating: 4/5

Software and Operating System

Dell Latitude D820 comes with Windows XP operating system and all other essential CDs. Software includes Dell's QuickSet management suite, DVD burning software, and DVD viewing software. QuickSet management software offers various configurations of WiFi, wireless profiles, and display settings. It additionally provides security software.

Rating: 5/5

Support

Dell offers comprehensive web site support. This support system offers a customer forum, relevant downloads, troubleshooting info, and real-time chatting with a tech-support representative. Dell executes all onsite repairs by the next business day without any extra costs.

Rating: 5/5

Overall Conclusions

Dell Latitude D820 is a good choice for professionals and students. Although you cannot take it out for travels across the globe, a D820 best suits short travels. It offers the perfect balance between portability and build quality. Flexibility is very good.

Pros

• Excellent build quality
• Good heat management
• Dual mouse options
• Competitive price
• Comprehensive communications and security features

Cons

• Screen quality lacking
• Optical drive noise
• Small mouse buttons
• Heavier