Further down the right edge are a WiFi enabler/disabler switch, a wireless locator button and two USB 2.0 ports towards the rear. The USB port location is perfect for most right-handed mouse users.

The left edge starts out with a microphone and two headphone jacks. The second headphone jack might be useful for sharing audio with a nearby companion, but some of us are old enough to remember when Sony ditched the second jack on its Walkman due to lack of use.

Further down the left edge are another USB 2.0 port, an IEEE-1394 "FireWire" port and a card reader that sits above the DVD burner. The LG HD-T21N optical drive is only capable of 24x CD and 8x DVD reads, but can burn +R and -R media at 8x, double layer +R at 8x and double layer -R at 6x. Dell also offers an optional Blu-ray disk player.

Towards the rear of the left edge are a DVI-I connector and an S-Video plus audio output. The DVI connector supports dual-link displays and accepts DVI to VGA adapters, while the S-Video output has three extra pins for breaking out a digital audio signal using Dell’s proprietary TV/digital audio adapter cable.

Dell’s use of a side edge for video outputs seems a bit strange, as this location is usually reserved for ports requiring additional convenience. Connections destined for stationary use are typically the rear edge for "clean" cable routing, in opposition to an XPS M1730 design.

A power cable jack, USB 2.0 connector and gigabit network port are found on the XPS M1730 rear edge. Again, we can compare this design to typical notebooks that place the gigabit network port on the side for convenience.

A closer look at the XPS M1730 design revealed a possible reason for Dell’s port location choices: All the exhaust vents have been moved to the back of the case. This blows heat away from the user and provides a more direct airflow path for the sinks within. Since most of the "convenience" connections are still on the sides, it’s difficult to further criticize a move that probably improved cooling performance.