Dell on Tuesday ventured into new territory with the release of the XFR D630. As the first completely ruggedized notebook from the Texas company, the XFR is strong enough to match US military-grade specs for dust, temperature, and water resistance and is shock-proofed against most bumps. Storage is also tougher. While traditional hard drives used with the system are shock-proofed, the computer is also just the second after the Precision M4300 to support faster solid-state hard drives, which render data effectively skip-proof. An extra-bright, 500-nit display also suits the XFR to use in the field even in broad daylight.

The base system starts at $3,899 with a 2GHz Core 2 Duo and just 512MB of memory, but runs on Windows XP rather than Vista; an 80GB ruggedized hard drive and a DVD/CD-RW combo drive are also standard. In addition to 32GB and 64GB SSD storage, the system can also be equipped with a resistive touchscreen, a DVD burner, or a faster 2.2GHz processor. It comes in a mainstream black or military-friendly desert tan color and ships in mid-April.