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Sager vs Dell

It seems like every time I am about to purchase my laptop, something comes up and I am delayed once again...

This time, I was literally within hours of purchasing my laptop, a Sager NP2090, when I descovered that Dell had released the Inspirons with Santa Rosa and the 8600M GT.
Configured identically, the two laptops are within spitting distance (~50 Dollars apart).

The issue is this: I feel that Dell often has build quality issues. My experiences with them have agreed with this. As with most consumer notebooks, there is a substantial amount of screen twisting and the plastic seems weak in their last generation Inspirons. I also hear Dell customer support is a nightmare to deal with.

Sager, on the other hand, I have heard has superior build quality. The problem is that they seem to have a huge issue with warranty and service. I have read countless horror stories on various forums, as well as at resellerratings.com, regarding Sager's inability to service faulty parts. It seems like build quality is a hit-or-miss with Sager.

The other issue with Sager is that the price is a little higher, mostly because of options I could do without and chose to opt out of on the Dell, but was unable to do so on the Sager. These include a webcam, fingerprint scanner, and a Wireless-N capable wireless card.

On paper, these laptops are functionally identical. I believe I would be happy with either. However, I am reluctant to spend a great deal of money on something that won't last (the Dell) or that I could potentially have nightmares getting repaired or replaced (the Sager). Can anybody share their personal experiences with these companies?
Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance.
 
I recommend the Sager NP2090. If you are worried about the warranty, check out the Compal IFL90 at Powernotebooks or Xoticpc. These companies have excellent 3 year warranties that are better than the one Sager provides. Also, Compal makes the Sager NP2090 so it is the same exact laptop as the IFL90

I plan on buying one of these this week myself 😎
 
If you want to buy a Sager buy it from a third party distributor thats got good ratings for customer service. Its been a while since I kept up with notebooks but PCTorque.com used to get rave reviews for their customer service. They sell Sager units. For more info I would suggest going over to notebookforums.com and read the boards there. There's a whole section devoted to Sager there.
 
Yeah, I was planning to purchase from powernotebooks.com because they have a very high costumer satisfaction rating. I have heard stories in which they were able to pull alot of strings in order to force a reluctant Sager to service parts that were faulty. Thanks for the advice, guys.
 
Purchased a dozen or more laptops from Sager over the years. Several units did go back for service just prior to the 3 year warranty expiring, but easy resolution of issues - customers still happy.
 
Well, I went ahead and pulled a trigger on a Sager NP2090 configured as follows:

Core 2 T7100
15.4" Widescreen 12x8 (Decided to go with smaller resolution because after ~5 years at 10x7 and another year at 1152x864, lower resolutions don't really bother me... plus it should allow me to run games at native resolution just a bit longer with higher settings)
8600M GT 512MB
2GB DDR2 667
120GB 5400RPM HDD

Hope I don't get a lemon... thanks to all you guys for the advice!

 
Congrats. I'm going to order the same laptop (with higher resolution) within the next week myself
 
Yes, good decision, Shadow. I think you should feel extremely confident with powernotebooks.com vs. Dell .
I just ordered a PowerPro IFL90 yesterday.
PowerPro J 10:15 SUPRA -

15.4" WXGA (1280 x 800) "Glossy" LCD w/PCI-e nVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT w/256MB --
Intel® Core?2 Duo T7300 2.0GHz Processor w/4MB L2 On-die cache - 800MHz FSB
2GB (1 SODIMM) DDR2/667 Memory
120GB SATA 3Gb/s Seagate Momentus 7200.2 Hard Drive at 7,200 RPM
Combo Dual Layer SuperMulti DVDRW/CDRW Drive w/Softwares
4-in-1 Memory Card Reader (MS/MSPRO/SD/MMC)
Built-in Intel® PRO/Wireless 4965 802.11a/g/n
Built-in Bluetooth Wireless 2.0+EDR
Smart Li-ion Battery (6-Cell) - (WXGA & WXGA+ Screen Only)
Windows Vista Premium


 
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