14 DAY TRIAL // It seems that things are really shaking up at Dell since the return of Michael Dell as the company's CEO, as the giant computer maker has started to roll out all sorts of interesting new line-ups in an attempt to broaden its customer base and answer some of the demands of the targeted market segments. And that's exactly the case with the new Vostro line of computing solutions, which, according to Dell's representatives, is aimed especially at small business users and has been designed and created based on an international survey carried out by Dell and the International Council for Small Business among the IT executives in SMBs.
The conclusions of this survey were "translated" into technical features and pricing, the result being Vostro, a series of products that bridges the gap between the company's Latitude/OptiPlex family and the home-user oriented Inspiron series and which is from now on also available for the Romanian customers.
As mentioned in the title, the Vostro family includes four notebooks and three desktop models. We'll start with the notebooks, since they're generally the most impressive and, according to Mr. Dragos Mateescu, Country Manager, Dell Distribution (EMEA), this is the specific area where the most impressive sales growth has been recorded.
Thus, the Vostro series includes the 1000, 1400, 1500 and 1700 models, each of them sharing certain common features, as for example the magnesium alloy casing and the black and chrome finishing that grants them a very professional and business look. However, upon closer inspection, their finishing is not exactly top-notch, nor is the overall design, the portable computing solutions being clearly designed in order to meet the demands of budget-conscious business owners who want to purchase an efficient tool, rather than a computing companion.
Moreover, most of the models are built around Intel Core 2 Duo processors, although the entry-level 1000 model incorporates an AMD Turion Dual Core, and they also provide enhanced connectivity options, including here built-in Wi-Fi networking capabilities, Ethernet and USB (unfortunately, Bluetooth connectivity is available only on the customer's demand).
The Vostro notebooks feature 15.4, 14.1, 15.4 and 17-inch displays respectively, and, as most of the other products from Dell, can be very seriously customized, the users being able to choose pretty much every internal component, from storage capacity to RAM memory to the graphics card.
Another important selling point of the new Vostros (both notebooks and desktops) is the lack of pre-installed trial programs, or trial-ware, as they're better known, which could prove to be rather difficult to handle after the trial period expires, especially by those users who don't have a very solid IT background. Thus, the new Vostro users will be able to install exactly what they want onto their new machines, without having to worry about uninstalling third-party apps or software.
We've talked quite enough about notebooks, so it's about time to take a look at the desktop part of the Vostro series. The family offers 3 desktop models, namely the 200ST, the 200MT and the 400MT, the most interesting of these being the ST, which can be used in both vertical and horizontal positions. Moreover, they also support a superior level of customization and provide Wi-Fi connectivity out of the box, as well as an optional built-in Bluetooth module.
However, Dell's representatives for Romania announced more than the Vostro line. Thus, according to Mr.Mateescu, Dell Romania has recorded a spectacular growth in sales over the first 2 quarters of 2007, especially in the notebook department, where it provides one of the best performance / price ratios on the Romanian market. Moreover, the desktop segment is also on an ascending trend, and the same can be said about the company's overall turnover, which is estimated to record an increase of up to 60% in 2007, a very rare figure among the many companies on the Romanian IT market.
