I purchased this laptop after only brief research. I was somewhat skeptical and almost did not buy it. I was worried about the poor reviews here and couldn't wrap my head around how a laptop with so many features could be sold at such a low price ($359 during a pre-black Friday sale). Many other reviews state that this laptop is slow. It's simply not true. I'm not a computer wizard or IT professional, but I do sit in front of a PC for 6 to 8 hours a day in my job. I primarily work with Microsoft Excel. I use Excel in ways that most people are not familiar with. I create complex models which have over a million formulas, sometimes way more. The way I figured it, running my most complex model would quickly test the capabilities of this laptop. To get this laptop up and running, you must first plug it in, then press a button on the case. The screen will not display for the first use unless it is plugged in. I thought this was a bit odd, but not important. After plugging it in and pressing the button, you will be prompted to run through a series of set-up steps. These are guided with a female voice and basically insulting to anyone who knows even a small amount about computer setup. There does not appear to be any way to skip these steps. This process takes about 15 to 20 minutes. During the setup, you will be asked about your region, language preference, email address, name, and other information. I can only assume that Dell wants this information so they can update the software and offer owners additional services. It would have been my preference to skip all of this, which appears unnecessary. Perhaps... other bad reviews about slow performance are referring to the set up process. Set up is annoying, but you only need to do it one time. After setting it up, I uninstalled a handful of programs that I don't intend to ever use. Thereafter, I activated Microsoft Office using the subscription which I purchased with this laptop. This was easy and quick. I then installed Chrome and made it my default browser. Now for the test.... I downloaded the most complex Excel workbook that I have. It includes about 40 worksheets and easily over 1 million cell calculations. There are lots of graphics tables and formats. The calculations are activated via a button. When running it on my Dell laptop, it takes about 3 minutes. On this laptop, it took about 2 minutes to run. I was hoping it would be no more than a little bit slower than my desktop, but was very surprised and pleased to find that it was FASTER than my desktop. I am not a gamer and have no intention of using this for anything except financial analysis, email, web browsing and maybe Netflix. This is an outstanding laptop for the low price. I am shocked at how good it is and applaud Dell & Best Buy for making it available at this low price. In fact, I am so impressed that I bought a second one the same day. Do not hesitate. BUY IT

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