Laptop Thoughts: Dell Inspiron 14z Hands-on

"Yes, you can get a sexy full-powered notebook for a double dip recession-friendly price tag. Dell has announced the Inspiron 13z and 14z, two stylish laptops featuring second-gen Intel Core processors, a chassis less than an inch thick, and a starting price of $599."

Knowing Ultrabooks are coming from most manufacturers in the 2011 holiday season makes everything else seem enormous by comparison. Yet Dell has done an admittedly good job keeping the size down on the Inspiron Z series, without compromising on features. With a 14-inch 1366x768 screen and second generation Intel Core i3, starting at $599 base price, the Inspiron 14z makes a solid back-to-school laptop or effective workaday laptop for those of us who simply need to browse the web and check some email. At the top end, the Inspiron 14z maxes out with a 2.3GHz Core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM, and a 750GB hard drive, for only $200 more.