I’m getting ready to replace my Dell Latitude D420 laptop. I love it. It’s very light, very portable, has an extended battery that gets 3-5 hours of life. If I could change only two things it would be a slightly larger screen (or more specifically, a slightly lower DPI) and a standard dual core cpu rather than the ultra-low voltage (ULV) dual core cpu. Dell and Apple both offer a computer that meets my requirements but to my surprise, the Apple is cheaper almost identical (corrected, see below) .

In Dell’s line of computers the natural upgrade path is to the Latitude E4300. Base model with 2GB RAM, 160GB Hard drive and a 3 year warranty + additional 802.11n, webcam and bluetooth is $1,409.

These add-ons to the dell give it near feature parity to the new Mac Book Pro 13 inch which sells for $1,199.

Do you get anything for the additional $210? Well, the Dell is 1.2lbs lighter, or 26%, which is nice. You also have the availability of a docking port and accidental damage warranty. The Apple has a backlit keyboard, a better video chipset and a multi-touch trackpad. The Apple also gives you the ability to develop iPhone and iTouch applications. I’ve heard it will be unlikely to see this capability ported to Windows, so that may be a big selling point.

The good news? Ubuntu works well on both computers.

Correction – the Dell has a 3 year warranty, the Mac has only 1 year. You have to add AppleCare which makes the Mac about $40 more expensive to bring it to 3 years. But that also gives you technical support which is an add on for Dell, which brings up the cost of the Dell a bit too, I think giving the Mac about a $50 advantage. All of this is a moot point because it used to be that there was a 30% price premium for the Mac and now they’re too close to call.