Dell Inspiron I15RV-1952BLK $177.99 Black Friday Best Buy Deal (Specs Review)

Judging from the $177.99 discounted Black Friday price tag at Best Buy, the Dell Inspiron I15RV-1952BLK 15.6-inch laptop will be one of the bestsellers, if not the most wanted model. It is all about affordability, but that doesn’t mean it’s an utterly useless one. On contrary, the Intel Celeron 1017U dual-core processor (a tad faster than the 1007U) in the I15RV-1952BLK will enable you to complete your daily web, office, and multimedia playback tasks and gives the Dell a great deal of performance advantage over the competing 178-dollar HP 2000-2d09WM with the AMD E-300 CPU. However, the 1017U won’t be able to edit movies or high-resolution images smoothly, nor handle large number of opened applications simultaneously.

 Dell Inspiron I15RV-1952BLK

Another major advantage of the Dell I15RV-1952BLK is design, since it’s much sleeker and portable and has textured matte surfaces instead of glossy. That makes it less prone to fingerprints. The machine measures 1″ in profile as opposed to 1.4″ and weighs 5.1 pounds instead of 5.4. On the other hand, the HP has a larger 500GB hard drive and it’s the weakest point of the Dell, which has a 320GB unit, the smallest one on the market. 4GB of RAM is present in both machines, which is a minimal and standard size in laptops today.

The 15.6 display delivers widely used 1366-by-768 pixel resolution and it sports TruLife technology, which basically means it’s glossy, with more glare but also more vivid colors thanks to that.

Rounding off the most important features of this system, let’s say it has a built-in DVD burner, full-size chiclet non-backlit keyboard with numeric pad, a fairly spacious trackpad with physical left- and right-click buttons, stereo speakers, web cam, Wi-Fi wireless and wired Ethernet LAN. Furthermore, there are four USB ports, whereas the majority of similar systems have three USBs, as well as HDMI output, and 8-in-1 media card reader. A VGA port is missing, so the laptop won’t be compatible with some older monitors and projectors with VGA but no HDMI. As an extra feature rarely found on the budget laptops, the I15RV-1952BLK has built-in Bluetooth 4.0, quite suitable for those who often tether their smartphones and other BT devices to the laptop.

We have no info on battery life, but given that it has a 4-cell battery combined with a power efficient ultra-low voltage processor, we assume it’ll last at least four hours.

Undoubtedly, if you’re on an extremely tight budget, this Best Buy’s Black Friday offer is worth of serious consideration. For under $200, you’ll hardly find any serious replacement for it. However, it makes sense to look further if you want some features not present on the I15RV-1952BLK, such as touch-screen. For budget-minded customers wanting it, Best Buy has prepared the 11.6 touch Asus X200CA-HCL1104G ultraportable for $250.

I15RV-1952BLK Back View

  • 15.6″ display with 1366 x 768 resolution, TruLife / glossy
  • Intel Celeron 1017U dual-core processor at 1.6GHz, 2MB cache
  • Intel HD graphics
  • 4GB DDR3 RAM, up to 8GB
  • 320GB hard disk at 5400rpm
  • DVD writer
  • 1MP 720p webcam
  • Stereo speakers
  • Wireless-N Wi-Fi, Ethernet LAN, Bluetooth 4.0
  • Full-size chiclet-style keyboard with numeric keypad, touchpad with multitouch support and physical mouse buttons
  • Ports and Slots: 2 x USB 3.0, 2 x USB 2.0, HDMI-out, 8-in-1 card reader, audio jack
  • 4-cell lithium-ion battery
  • Dimensions: 1.0″ x 14.8″ x 10.2″
  • Weight: 5.1 pounds
  • Windows 8 operating system
  • Warranty: 1-year

29 thoughts on “Dell Inspiron I15RV-1952BLK $177.99 Black Friday Best Buy Deal (Specs Review)”

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    Reply
  2. Any idea if this unit has enough CPU/GPU umph to support two additional screens? Intel’s site indicates the processor supports three monitors, but I have no idea how well/realistic that spec is. I will max out the memory to the reported 8GB max, but Windows 8 supports much more RAM, so would more RAM, like 16GB, have any impact (whether on the monitors or running multiple apps–I run Chrome with multiple tabs open and OpenOffice with multiple one-page “Word” files and maybe one or two large “Excel” file open)? The scheme I hope will work is connecting two ASUS MB168B monitors via each USB 3.0 port and, if neccessary and possible (via USB splitters), to each USB 2.0 port if the monitors need more power to operate. I came across an apparently great $100 open-box unit available at a local store, which is suppose to be in “excellent condition”. My interest in this unit is to “bridge me” about a year or so when my finances are better and hopefully 15.6″ convertibles are available that better meet my performance and price desires.

    Reply
  3. I want to buy a laptop tomorrow and i am a college student so i need it for Microsoft word and storage containing pictures and iTunes and i am also on a budget. What would you recommend for me? The Dell Inspiron I15RV-1952BLK ( which i heard was terrible ) or The HP 15.6 2000-2d09WM (Which i heard was also terrible but a bit better ). I also am going to be taking a photo course so is this good for editing pictures and is Microsoft Word is pre-installed? Lol sorry first time laptop buyer! Thanks.

    Reply
    • The 2000-2d09WM is certainly slower because it has a slower processor than the I15RV-1952BLK. The only positive side of it is a larger hard drive of 500GB versus 320GB, so you have more space for your pictures and iTunes. Overall, the Dell isn’t great, but he HP is worse because of its very sluggish CPU.

      These don’t come with Microsoft Word (maybe just with a trial version of Office). They only have pre-installed WordPad like all Windows laptops.

      Reply
    • Its graphics in on the processor, so you can’t change it and the entire i15RV series as same as the wast majority of laptops don’t enable video card upgrades, but usually just RAM and hard drive upgrades.

      Reply
  4. Which black Friday laptop for $300 or less is best for basic use i.e. facebook games (candy crush), Microsoft office and surfing the web?

    Reply
    • Yes, although the Celeron 1017U CPU in the Dell is entry-level, it still way faster than the Atom N450 inside your Samsung netbook. For comparison, the N450 has a Passmark CPU score of 287, while the 1017U has a score of 1,641.

      Reply
    • According to their Black Friday announcement, it’s a Doorbuster deal which will be available in stores only starting on Thursday November 28th 6PM. Therefore, it won’t be available online for $178.

      Reply
    • No, unfortunately. Integrated graphics inside the I15RV-1952BLK is one of the worst for gaming. If you want to play games without paying for expensive gaming laptops ($800+) with dedicated video cards, you can go for some of the mid-priced notebooks with the AMD A6/A8/A10 processors with Radeon HD 8000-series integrated graphics or Intel laptops with the Intel HD 4400 / 4600 / 5000 series. However, you’ll be able to play games mostly on lower settings and resolutions on these systems.

      Reply
      • I’m looking for an entry level gaming computer for my 11 year old son. Do you have a suggestion on what you would consider a mid-priced laptop that would check the boxes you just listed. I was going to buy him this Dell 15RV .. … But I guess I would be wasting my $ . He already has an Entry level HP that he plays on but it’s soooo slow. He’s had it for 3 years now. Any help would be appreciated.

        Thanks.. Cin

        Reply
    • Yes, there are doors on the bottom, so you can upgrade it easily. There are two SODIMM slots inside. I assume they use 4GB modules and that one slot is free.

      Reply

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