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Dell 2015 XPS 13: Smallest 13" Notebook With Broadwell-U, QHD+ Display Reviewed
MojoKid writes Dell's 2015 XPS 13 notebook made a splash out at CES this year with its near
bezel-less 13-inch QHD+ (3200X1800) display and Intel's new 5th Gen Core
series Broadwell-U processor.
At 2.8 pounds, the 2015 XPS 13 isn't the absolute lightest 13-inch
ultrabook book out there but it's lighter than a 13-inch MacBook Air and
only a few ounces heavier than Lenovo's Core M-powered Yoga 3 Pro. The
machine's Z dimensions are thin, at .33" up front to .6" at its back edge. However, its 11.98" width almost defies the laws of physics, squeezing a 13.3" (diagonal) display into an 11.98-inch frame making it what is essentially the smallest 13-inch ultrabook to hit the market yet. Performance-wise, this review shows its benchmarks numbers are strong and Intel's Broadwell-U seems to be an appreciable upgrade versus the previous generation architecture, along with lower power consumption.
This is the form factor the 13' Macbook Pro should be.
I love my Mid2014 13", but the form factor needs an update. Especially with competing models like this coming out.
I'll still take the build quality and metal construction of my Macbook though.
I suspect that in a computer of that size you wouldn't want anything other than integrated graphics. Sure, AMD or NVIDIA could provide a part low clocked enough, or cut down enough, to fit within the size and thermal constraints; but once they've done that they probably won't be much better than the already-integrated graphics.
Unless you have enough room for a proper GPU, low end discrete GPUs are increasingly somewhat pointless, since they always add complexity and cost; but don't necessarily outperform integrated ones by all that much.
The question is if it does make an electric noise like the 2013 model did. http://en.community.dell.com/s... Otherwise I think even the 2013 model is a good laptop and runs Linux great. I own one of those and it makes that noise but it's not that bad. It's just that 1k5€ laptop shouldn't have such issues.
Umm Minecraft seems playable on a Intel HD 5500 to me.
That's called compromise. And what you have to do in a small package.
Can you fit a V12 in a Mini?
If you can fit a V-12 lambourghini engine with all-wheel drive into a 1971 Fiat 500, then you can probably find someone crazy enough to do the same for the new mini cooper.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Wow, squeezing those 13 inches into a 12 inch chassis almost defies the pythagorean theorem!!!
Just wow.
Well, you and the other four of you can still buy the Lenovo Thinkpad line, like the Yoga 12.5" or Yoga 14", or the Helix...
I've had Thinkpads several times over the years and use one now. I've accidently hit the pointing stick while typing more than I've used it. They're solid machines so that's why we continue to buy them, but the pointing stick is definitely a niche feature.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
It may compete with discrete GPUs in terms of showing pixels on the screen, but not in terms of keeping your knees warm.
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Cut them some slack, it's the only nipple they get to touch.
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I normally avoid hardware review posts but I'm on my 2nd Dell XPS 13" laptop so wanted to check this out.
I have been super happy with these devices. The first one was the XPS M1210, which in all seriousness was one of the best computers I've ever owned. It's a bit dated now - it was pre-Macbook Air, so by comparison looks huge and chunky, but compared to previous lappys it was a joy to travel with.
The first battery piked after a couple years but this is back in the Good Old Days when buying replacement parts was easy.
The screen crapped out after about 4 years - still usable but had weird patterns all over it. I could have replaced it but by then the newer model was out, and the change in weight profile was significant enough to justify the change.
I've had the new one for over two years and have been really happy with it. I basically only use it when I travel, and it's slimline form is great.
The model I have (2012 I think) only has 4GB of RAM, which has been a bit of a hassle, and the CPU is a bit on the slow side compared to my desktop - but this new one with 8GB looks like it would be great.
It has a nice keyboard with broad, easy to press keys, making it as not-terrible as possible to type on for extended periods (if I'm using it for ages I still plug in a real keyboard though).
If you're looking at a slimline laptop and don't want a Mac, then I seriously recommend checking the XPS series out.
AMD doesn't have a CPU with that level of performance with appropriate TDP.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
Go into the Dell "Work" section of the site - you can get this with i7 CPU, more SSD capacity options, etc.
Cooling hi-perf components in such a small package is a nightmare. There was a review a while back of a Samsung ultra portable, the specs were pretty impressive, but performance was identical to the previous model with less powerful GPU and CPU. Because they made so much heat they had to be throttled down.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
Here are game benchmarks for the Intel HD5500, nVidia 820m, and AMD R7 M265 (older 35 Watt tech I throw in only for comparison since their current lowest-end R9 is equivalent to an 840m).
The 820m is a 15 Watt part, and best case hits nearly 2x the framerate of the HD5500. Probably about 1.7x faster on average, with a few titles being CPU-bottlenecked. The R9 M265X is also a 35 Watt part like the 840m and performs slightly better, so I imagine if/when AMD puts out 15 Watt version of the R9 to compete with the 820m, it'll roughly double the HD5500's FPS as well.
Having a discrete GPU does complicate the cooling solution (the iGPU on the Intel gets cooled by the CPU's cooler). But if you're planning to do some gaming, you should still opt for the dGPU over the iGPU if at all possible. The exception would be if you only play titles not needing powerful GPUs, like Sims, DOTA, LOL, WoW.
"8GB was something acceptable back in 2008... but a laptop should be at 16, if not 32 gigs of RAM."
On what basis are you saying that? What are these deal-breaker applications that will need 32 or 16 gigs of RAM? Mind you, this post is about an ultra portable 13" laptop - I would assume that no one in their right mind would want to use this as a full blown workstation. I would imagine most users would use a laptop like this for standard stuff like browsing, Office apps, for presentations, etc.
Maybe a few would run Photoshop or Visual Studio or Eclipse. Is 8GB not enough for Photoshop or Eclipse anymore?? And I do feel that with HD 5500, 8GB RAM, and a speedy SSD, Photoshop would run just fine.
And back in 2008, Windows XP 64 bit had barely come out and almost no one was using 64 bit apps. From what I remember, almost everyone had between 2GB - 4GB RAM in standard laptop builds. Much less 8GB.
I'm honestly scratching my head to try and imagine why 32 GB or 16GB would be considered bare minimum for an ultraportable laptop.
I'm writing this on a Dell Latitude with 16GB of RAM. I'd like twice as much. I do OpenStack development and regularly run a couple of controller nodes and a couple of compute nodes. That uses pretty much all of my RAM.
I'd like to be able to simulate a couple of storage nodes as well, and I'd like to be able to have multiple NUMA nodes per compute node to test out the code for simulating NUMA in the OpenStack guest instances.