Dell has started shipping its top-end laptop, the XPS M1710 with the option of a built-in Blu-ray disc drive according to Tom's Hardware Guide. However, while the Blu-ray option of about US$350 may seem cheaper than buying an IDE Blu-ray drive, the price of the basic laptop with this option included is US$3,700! This drive is capable of reading & writing to CD, DVD and Blu-ray media.
Dell is a leading company in the BD Founders Association and thus is aiming to push the Blu-ray format over the competing HD DVD format. The laptop's basic specification includes Windows XP Media Center Edition, 1080p support on its internal display, 7.1 audio channel output, an Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 2.33GHz CPU, 1GB RAM, 80GB HDD and a 512MB nVidia GeForce Go 7950 GTX graphics card. While the Sony Blu-ray model features a slightly lower spec graphics adaptor and CPU, it comes with a larger 200GB HDD and 2GB of RAM, selling for $700 less than Dell's model with the Blu-ray option included.
