Any sub-£500 laptop better than Samsung NP300E5A-S01UK?

[VectraMan]

fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify

Confirmed that mine is using TRIM. No registry hacks required.

[Gentile]

These are the chaps you want

NewmodeUS, Hard Drive Caddys for Notebooks

They ship from the US but are pretty quick

I have posted this twice before

http://forums.contractoruk.com/techn...ml#post1231970

http://forums.contractoruk.com/techn...ml#post1477717

Nice one, Spacecadet. I'll consider doing that next time around, if I need the space on the existing drive and the small file writing efficiency of a platter device to run a huge SQL Server database or ten. It's nice having the quietness and build speed efficiency of a SSD for a development environment, but it's not the best solution for every single task, such as modifying an existing large database made up of millions of small data files. In the past, I've used an encrypted external high capacity drive when I've had to work with SQL Server, which has been an OK solution. And you do get hybrid drives now that are part traditional platter, and part SSD. However, your suggestion of actually having two separate drives that can be dedicated to their own specialised tasks hosted within the one laptop sounds even better. Next time around, I think I'll still rebuild the machine and install the operating system on a DVD bay -hosted SSD, but I'll make sure all the SQL Server stuff gets installed on the existing platter drive and leave it dedicated to that task. Like most people, I hardly use the DVD/CDRW bay anyway, and mostly work with ISOs and MagicDisc whenever I need to access a DVD or CD.

[Sysman]

I hardly use the DVD/CDRW bay anyway, and mostly work with ISOs and MagicDisc whenever I need to access a DVD or CD.

I hardly use physical CD or DVD nowadays, and in fact just managed 6 months without any spare writeable discs and only cracked and bought some because I had some installations coming up.

For my Macs I have an external Firewire DVD writer. For PCs I could probably get away with some mix of an external USB DVD drive and USB sticks.

[VectraMan]

I hardly use physical CD or DVD nowadays, and in fact just managed 6 months without any spare writeable discs and only cracked and bought some because I had some installations coming up.

For my Macs I have an external Firewire DVD writer. For PCs I could probably get away with some mix of an external USB DVD drive and USB sticks.

Agreed. I'd much rather have an external DVD/CD drive and thinner/lighter laptop. But I think if you're looking around the £500 bracket, then manufacturers tend to assume it's for entertainment (certainly the XPS15 is) and so you want to play DVDs on it, and of course they tend to get carried away giving you as many features as possible.

In fact, half the reason I chose the Dell XPS15 was because it's one of the few 15" laptops without a stupid extra pointless numberpad keyboard.