Dell's sometimes confusing mix of brands and sub-brands can sow confusion, especially as the same drab design philosophy ties low-end and high-end products together in a sea of similar matte gray and black.
That said, the newly revamped XPS 15, from Dell's high-end product line, is a spectacular laptop, matching the premium features of Apple's also-excellent 15-inch MacBook Pro almost blow for blow.
The $1,899.99 starting price for the XPS 15 includes a fourth-gen Intel Core i7 processor, Nvidia GeForce 750M graphics, and a better-than-HD 3,200x1,800-pixel-resolution touch-screen display, all in a very slim ultrabook-like package. The only down note for components is the 1TB hard drive, with a 32GB solid-state drive (SSD) cache. For that kind of money, it should be all-SSD.
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By way of comparison, the current 15-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,999 with a Core i7 processor, a 256GB SSD, and a similar higher-res screen. But the MacBook does not have a touch screen, and to add the same Nvidia GPU, you have to jump to the $2,599 version (which also includes a 512GB SSD). Here the XPS 15 really is a better deal, giving you a 512GB SSD in a $2,299.99 version of the system.
This is probably the closest thing we've seen to a Retina MacBook Pro in a 15-inch ultrabook-like design, and that's intended as a compliment. Your preference for Windows 8 over OS X (or vice versa) surely overrules a few hundred dollars' price difference between the two, depending on the configuration. The main issue holding the new XPS 15 back is that it shares the same bland design as XPS systems from the past couple of years, which in turn look a lot like Dell's less expensive Inspiron products. This is truly a machine that's more beautiful on the inside than the outside.
| Dell XPS 15 | Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 2 Pro | Apple MacBook Pro 15-inch (October 2013) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $1,899.99 | $999.99 | $2,599 |
| Display size/ Pixel resolution | 15.6-inch, 3,200x1,800 touch screen | 13.3-inch, 3,200x1,800 touch screen | 15.4-inch, 2,880x1,800 screen |
| PC CPU | 2.2GHz Intel Core i7-4702HQ | 1.6GHz Intel Core i5-4200U | 2.3GHz Intel Core i7-4850HQ |
| PC memory | 16GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz | 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz | 16GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz |
| Graphics | 2GB (dedicated) Nvidia GeForce GT 750M | 1,792MB (shared) Intel HD Graphics 4400 | 2GB Nvidia GeForce GT 750M + Intel Iris Pro |
| Storage | 1TB, 5,400rpm hard drive, 32GB SSD | 128GB SSD hard drive | 512GB SSD |
| Optical drive | None | None | None |
| Networking | 802.11ac wireless, Bluetooth 4.0 | 802.11b/g/n wireless, Bluetooth 4.0 | 802.11ac wireless, Bluetooth 4.0 |
| Operating system | Windows 8.1 (64-bit) | Windows 8.1 (64-bit) | OS X Mavericks 10.9 |
Design and features
The current XPS design goes back a few generations of hardware and features a matte gray lid and chassis border, with a matte black interior that blankets the keyboard, keyboard tray, touch pad, and wrist rest for a monochromatic look.
The current XPS design goes back a few generations of hardware and features a matte gray lid and chassis border, with a matte black interior that blankets the keyboard, keyboard tray, touch pad, and wrist rest for a monochromatic look.
The thin silhouette is excellent, and considering the spinning-platter hard drive and GPU inside, the XPS 15 is very slim and lightweight (it's still 4.4 pounds, but distributed over the wider surface area of a 15.6-inch laptop, that doesn't feel heavy). The aluminum and carbon fiber construction feels solid and well-machined, with no ill-fitting joints or rough edges.
With all that in mind, however, a high-end system such as this deserves a fresher look than the same palette Dell has used for the past few years in the XPS line across all price ranges. At first glance, this could be a $800 laptop, or it could be one that costs more than $2,000, and differentiating between the two is one of the tasks good industrial design is supposed to accomplish.
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Dell's backlit keyboard is also unchanged from the past few generations of XPS systems. I like the rounded corners of each key in the island-style keyboard, and the generous Enter, Shift, Ctrl, and other useful keys, but the keyboard itself feels small in the 15-inch body. Some 15-inch midsize laptops fit in a separate number pad, but in this case, you get a lot of dead space on the sides and below the keyboard.
