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Dell XPS 14 (Video Review)

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What's hot: Attractive design, good quality materials, very long battery life.

What's not: The TN display panel has higher than average resolution but not very wide viewing angles.

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Reviewed October 24, 2012 by , Editor in Chief (twitter: @lisagade)

The Dell XPS 14 is a bigger and badder Ultrabook. It has a 14" display that slightly outclasses the 13.3" Ultrabook standard and it weighs 4.6 pounds rather than the usual 3. That added weight gets you serious battery life thanks to the internal 8 cell, 69 wHr Lithium Ion battery. In our tests, the laptop averaged 8.5 hours of mixed use, which is 2 hours better than most Ultrabooks. The XPS 14 looks much like its little brother the Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook and the full size Dell XPS 15, and that's a good thing. From the precisely machined edges to the aluminum casing with magnesium palm rest, this is a classy looking machine. It has that signature Dell soft touch black interior and silicone coated bottom and an excellent island style keyboard with backlighting.

Dell XPS 14

Since this is an Ultrabook, it runs on third generation Intel Core i5 and i7 ULV (ultra low voltage) CPUs with Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics. Things get interesting if you opt for the upgrade to switchable dedicated NVidia GeForce GT630M graphics with 1 gig DDR5 VRAM. That's not a killer gaming GPU, but it gives enough umph to make some current 3D games like Skyrim playable at native resolution. The notebook now ships with Windows 8 if you order now, but we take a look at the Windows 7 version in our review (the hardware is the same).

Dell XPS 14

The XPS 14 has a 1600 x 900 Gorilla Glass display. This is a TN panel, so viewing angles aren't stellar, but they are better than the 720p Dell XPS 13's and many competing Ultrabooks. That resolution also tops the standard 1366 x 768 resolution found on slightly smaller 13.3" Ultrabook displays. The 300 nit brightness display has good contrast, though blacks aren't wildly deep. Overall it's quite sharp with pleasing color saturation and movies look good, so we won't complain.

Dell XPS 14

 

Dell XPS 14

 

Dell XPS 14

 

Dell XPS 14

 

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Dell XPS 14 Video Review

 

Benchmarks

PCMark Vantage: 6,374

3DMark Vantage: 2581 (GPU 2109, CPU 7,866)

Windows 7 Experience Index:

Processor: 6.9
RAM: 5.9
Graphics (for Aero): 4.7
Gaming Graphics: 6.2
HDD: 5.9

Benchmark Comparison Table

  Dell XPS 14 (Core i5 ULV, 4 gigs RAM, HDD, HD 4000) Dell XPS 13 (FHD, Core i5, SSD) Dell XPS 15 Core i7, GT640M Lenovo ThinkPad X230 Core i5, Intel HD4000
PCMark Vantage 6,374 4517 (PCMark 7) 10,304 8152
3DMark Vantage 2581 N/A 8731 3209

 

The Dell XPS 14 starts at $999 for the 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U with Intel HD 4000 graphics, 4 gigs of DDR3 RAM and a 500 gig 5400 RPM hard drive augmented with a 32 gig caching SSD. The machine has gigabit Ethernet, dual band Intel WiFi N-6235 and Bluetooth. Moving up to the Core i7 ULV with NVidia graphics will set you back $1,499.

Price: $999 to $1,999

Website: www.dell.com

 

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Specs:

Display: 14", 1600 x 900 TN LED backlit display. Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics, Nvidia GT630M switchable dedicated graphics optional. HDMI and mini DisplayPort.

Battery: Lithium Ion rechargeable.

Performance: Third generation Intel Ivy Bridge ULV CPUs, Intel Core i5-3317U and i7-3517U available. 4 or 8 gigs of DDR3 RAM. Available with a 500 gig HDD + 32 gig solid state caching drive or 128 gig (and larger) SSD drives.

Size: 13.2 x 9.2 x .81 inches. Weight: 4.6 pounds.

Camera: 1.3MP with dual array digital mics.

Audio: Built-in stereo speakers (4 watts total), mic and 3.5mm standard stereo headphone jack. Waves MaxxAudio 4.

Networking: Integrated dual band WiFi 802.11b/g/n, wired Ethernet and Bluetooth 4.0.

Software: Windows 8 64 bit.

Expansion and Ports: 1 SD card slot. 2 USB 3.0 ports, HDMI, mini DisplayPort and 3.5mm audio.

 

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