Dell XPS 13 (Q1 2013) Ultrabook Review: What a Difference 1080p Makes
by Dustin Sklavos on March 21, 2013 5:00 AM ESTSystem Performance
Jarred has been heavily revising our notebook/ultrabook benchmarking suite for 2013, essentially lining up our tests with the convergence between tablets and notebooks and allowing for more direct comparison (as discussed here). This is a good thing moving forward, but unfortunately means that good comparison points between notebooks are presently a bit few and far between. I've included information on the 2012 model where possible, though, so you can see how the generational difference has impacted the XPS 13.
Despite operating at roughly the same clocks, the Ivy Bridge i5-3337U runs absolutely roughshod on last generation's high end i7-2637M. Additionally, the HD 4000 in the i5-3337U is DirectX 11 capable where the HD 3000 was not, allowing us to run 3DMark11.
What's also interesting and helpful is to note the difference between the current high end ULV part, the i7-3517U and the i5-3337U. Or, more accurately, the lack thereof. The XPS 13 can be upgraded to an i7-3537U (another 100MHz clock jump), but as you can see it's an exceedingly incremental improvement and not worth spending money for.
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wicketr - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
Shortfalls of this laptop IMO:1. Vent on the bottom getting blocked. I'm rarely at a desk on my LAPtop.
2. No SD Card or HDMI out
3. No dedicated Home/End/PageUp/PageDown
4. 16x9 screen dimensions aren't optimal at this price point. 16x10 would be preferred.
Frankly I'd like to see a XPS 14 that had this same look and feel as this XPS13 but with the above issues fixed.
jeffkibuule - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
16:10 has sailed. 16:9 won. End of story. Move on. Sorry.Modernape - Friday, April 5, 2013 - link
Except the MacBooks, which are all 16:10 apart from the 11"NeBlackCat - Monday, March 25, 2013 - link
Why do you need HDMI? It has mini-DP which you can easily dongle to HDMI. Plus DP supports higher resolutions than HDMI's maximum of 1080p.My complaint would be that it should have *two* mini-DPs so I can drive two higher-than-1080p external monitors (as the chipset allows) when not working mobile.
+1 to the various complaints about the vent, crappy touchpad and lack of 16:10/1200p option. It beggars belief that I am typing this on a 6-7 year old Dell laptop purely because it has a 16:10/1200p screen and a great touchpad, areas in which Dell etc have gone so far backwards since then. Which unfortunately also leaves me stuck with its Pentium-M CPU and 2GB RAM, and unable to take advantage of the great strides that Intel and DRAM/Flash vendors have made in in getting the guts of these machines up to scratch in the same period.
Come on Dell get your act together. Its not like your sales are booming and you can afford to ignore the professional part of the market (or those who just want to see more vertical space in their desktop and web pages). The casual user side of the market (those who originally wanted the now ubiquitous 16:9 1080p for their light browsing and movies) has spoken, and they increasingly want phones, phablets and tablets anyway, hitting your sales. So get back to thinking about us!
while having to tolerate its Pentium-M CPU. All because Dell etc have gone so far backwards in that time, I can't buy a product with the former features all these years later
NeBlackCat - Monday, March 25, 2013 - link
oops, last time was a mis-edit.NeBlackCat - Monday, March 25, 2013 - link
oops, that should have been "last line" damn these tiny pixels... ;-)Can we have an edit function Anand?
doubledeej - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
Why does every computer manufacturer insist on removing the Home, End, Page Up, and Page Down keys from their keyboards these days? It sure makes life for developers and writers miserable. And Fn+Arrow keys doesn't count... it makes it a two-handed operation, which becomes very difficult when doing multi-key combinations like Control+Home or Control+Shift+End.Th-z - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
Windows 8 SP1? It must be a typo.darwinosx - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
Who cares about 1080p? Where are the retina display PV laptops? Also you couldn't give me a Dell.Mitch89 - Thursday, March 21, 2013 - link
The comm badge on the Acer wouldn't happen to be from the TNG VCR board game would it?