Dell upgrades the Vostro 3000 series with Nehalem

The four upgraded models now come with Core i-series Dual and Quad-core processors

Dell has upgraded its Vostro 3000 series with Intel Nehalem chip architecture, giving the series the power of Core i3, i5 and i7 processors. The models upgraded are the Vostro 3300, 3400, 3500 and 3700 ranging from 13- to 17-inches.

Vostro 3300

The youngest member of this upgrade sports a 13.3-inch High Definition Wide LED Anti-Glare Display panel, and is powered by the Intel Core i3 or i5 Dual Core processor based on the Nehalem architecture, accompanied by the Mobile Intel HM57 Express Chipset. It offers up to 6GB of DDR3 RAM, and you can upgrade that to 8GB. You have a SATA hard drive of up to 500GB or and a 250GB encrypted HDD. Also there is an option of the NVidia GeForce 310M, 512MB Graphics card. It comes with a DVD writer. Connectivity is taken care of by the Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1, HSPA 2.0 or EVDO-HSPA mini-card which is optional and is available only in selected countries.

For security you have the fingerprint reader with digitalPersona software, and also the encrypted hard drive comes with Wave Software for better safety of your sensitive data. Dell also has an online back-up option in place.

There is an option of getting a 4-cell or an 8-cell Lithium Ion battery, and the 3300 comes pre-loaded with the Windows 7 Home Premium or Professional (both 32- and 64-bit). The 1.94kg machine (including the 4-cell battery and optical drive) has a dimension of 325mm x 229mm x 20.1-28.6mm.

You get to take home the Vostro 3300 in any one of these three shades - Aberdeen Silver, Lucerne Red, and Brisbane Bronze. It is now available on the Dell US site starting at $669.

Vostro 3400

It sports a 14-inch display panel, and apart from that pretty similar to the Vostro 3300 in major specifications. It has the same options of processors, OS, memory, chipset, graphics card, storage, colors and other features. So I guess the only difference is the size – and the price because the 3400 starts cheaper at $649.

Vostro 3500

Again same specs except the screen size, which is 15.6-inch and you get the option of choosing a multi-touch screen this time. The 3500 doesnot give the option of an EVDO-HSPA mini-card. The Vostro 3500 also starts at $649.

Vostro 3700

Dell likes to call the Vostro 3700 a desktop replacement, and at a massive 17.3-inch, it is not far from that. The Vostro 3700 comes with an option of the Core i3 Dual-core, i5 Dual core or…hold your breath - a Core i7 Quad-core processor! It sports the 17.3-inch High Definition+ Wide LED Anti-Glare Display, but the rest of the specs are pretty much same as the best of specs in the above models.

So you pay a starting price of just $679 for the big size, but I guess if you want the Godly Quad-core CPU, better be prepared to shell out more mullah.

About Nehalem

Processors based on Intel Nehalem microarchitecture initially featured a 45nm Quad Core version codenamed Clarksfield and a 32nm version codenamed Arrandale. The first processor released was the desktop Core i7, in November 2008. The mobile Nehalem-based processors were introduced in September 2009.