Dell XPS L501x: An Excellent Mainstream Notebook
by Jarred Walton on November 10, 2010 12:01 AM ESTDell XPS L501x Gaming and Graphics Performance
After so many 768p "midrange" laptops, it's strange to have a different native resolution, especially in light of the GPU performance. We've run our low, medium, and high detail tests at our standardized 768p, 768p, and 900p resolutions. We've also added in 1080p results for those who want to upgrade to the better quality LCD. We're putting all the graphics results on one page, because honestly this review isn't really about gaming and graphics, but we still wanted to see what the L501x could do. We'll start with the easy stuff first.
Low detail is playable in most titles at 1080p, with the lone exception being Mass Effect 2. In keeping with our recent reviews, we also ran Mafia 2 and Metro 2033, but we don't have enough comparison points to make graphs meaningful. Both titles are far more demanding than the rest of our test suite, perhaps an indication of things to come. Mafia 2 tops out at just 32FPS, running minimum detail settings and 768p; at 1080p the frame rate drops down to just 19.3FPS. Metro 2033 is even worse, starting at a less than impressive 24FPS at 768p with DX10 "Low" settings and dropping to just shy of 16FPS at 1080p.
As for comparisons with the GT 335M, the GT 420M gets one tie (BFBC2), several titles where it loses by around 10%, a massive 30% deficit in Call of Pripyat, and then to cap it all off there's a 35% lead in StarCraft II. It's possible the 260.89 driver is the culprit with SC2 (and perhaps some of the other titles as well), as the N82Jv was tested with the now-outdated 258.96 driver, but the general consensus of gaming results is that GT 420M is roughly 10% slower than GT 335M at low settings (give or take).
The move to our medium detail settings drops performance a bit, but nearly all of the tested games stay above 30FPS at 768p. Only Mafia 2 (27.5FPS) and Metro 2033 (22.9FPS) fail to reach playable levels. Of course, at 1080p more than half of the tested games fall under 30FPS (including Mafia 2 and Metro 2033, naturally). L4D2 is the least demanding game in our test suite, and it's joined by STALKER (barely) and StarCraft II. That last is an important win, as SC2 looks pretty awful at low settings but improves dramatically when you switch to medium, so it's good to see it stay above 30FPS.
Looking at the N82Jv comparison once more, things get a bit more interesting. We now have two ties, a ~10% lead by the 335M in two other titles, and a still-large 27% lead in STALKER; however, L4D2 now favors the 420M by nearly 40% and the SC2 lead drops to 25%. Looking at the low and medium detail results as a whole, if "mainstream gaming" means 768p low to medium quality, the XPS L501x (and GT 420M) will do the trick. However, if you want medium to high quality at higher resolutions, you'll need something with a bit more potency.
Wrapping up the gaming and graphics charts, we've got the high quality 900p comparisons and 3DMark—both comparisons equally "useful". Three of the games (DiRT 2, L4D2, and Mass Effect 2) come close to the 30FPS mark but fall just short. All of the remaining titles are far below the playable mark, with dips into the teens and even single digits. The 420M can get a few of the test games to break 30FPS at 768p and high detail settings, but it's simply inadequate for 1080p—or even 900p—gaming with the most recent releases. 335M maintains a slight lead at high settings, but it's mostly academic as neither GPU is really able to handle our high settings.
As for 3DMark, take the results for what they're worth. We've stopped including the charts for 03 and 05, since they're quite outdated, but if you just want the numbers the L501x got 15552 in 03 and 12275 in 05 (about 11% lower than the N82Jv in 03 but just 2% slower in 05). 06 gives the 335M a 21% lead, which is a bit more than our gaming suite, and 7% in Vantage (at the awful-looking Entry Level setting). Vantage also scored 3364 at the "Performance" (1680x1050) defaults.
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Goblerone - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Still waiting for clarification for why the GTX 580 review compared against reference clocked competitor cards whereas the Radeon 6870 review compared against factory overclocked cards.Cool thanks!
The_Assimilator - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Maybe because there weren't any overclocked GTX 580s available at launch? And please, stop with the whining about the comparisons.JarredWalton - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Because everyone complained about the use of an overclocked card so Ryan and Anand chose to not use any overclocked cards in future comparisons. I thought that was pretty clear, in light of all the complaining that occurred, and the overclocked results for 6850 are available. Besides, GTX 580 is going up against 6900 next month or whenever, and that will be the real comparison.As I see it, imagine NVIDIA came out with GTX 560 right now, instead of AMD with the 6800. Imagine AMD's partners had a ton of highly overclocked 5870 parts and we put one in as a reference point for what the competition could do. Then we concluded that the GTX 560 was still a good card and worth purchasing, based on power and performance and price, but that the overclocked 5870 was highly competitive. That's basically what happened in reverse, and I'm still surprised at how upset people got.
But this is neither the time nor the place for that discussion so I'd appreciate it if we could avoid bringing up separate articles that have nothing to do with this review.
Or if you want another example, imagine I reviewed an ASUS laptop, and in the conclusion I put the whole package into the grand scheme of the market. What if I then said that while the performance was good, other factors were so neglected that need work. Or what if I discussed something like a MacBook, Envy, etc. in a review of a Dell laptop? The horror!
Personally, I view my job as a journalist/hardware reviewer to be one of coming up with the best recommendations, regardless of manufacturer. If HP suddenly priced the Envy 14 at $850 just to compete with the L501x, but it was a limited time offer, I'd still happily mention the option in my review. Giving more detail and points of reference has never been a bad thing to me (unless it gets to the point where my graphs become unwieldy of course). That's my two cents, for what it's worth.
Evil_Sheep - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Actually the Envy 14 was dropped to $850 about a week ago in a limited time deal (already expired), only available through Logicbuy. It was actually a $400 off coupon on any config over $1250, which meant some decent specs as well.I wouldn't be surprised to see more offers like this from HP in the future to keep them competitive, especially after disappointments like the loss of the Radiance panel and, on the Beats edition, the removal of the included headphones.
khimera2000 - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Isint this already covered??? its like beeting a dead horse for a week strait. they goofed, and now there doing there best to make up for it. thats all i need.erple2 - Friday, November 12, 2010 - link
I'm also waiting for clarification about the global economic recovery plan put forth by the G20 Summit meeting in S. Korea!a1trips - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
I didn't weigh into the debate earlier but i would tend to support your position that all information must be given the reader on the assumption that they are mature adults who can make up their own minds.I still don't see what the hullabaloo was about regarding the overclocked card and i thought those who didn't care were in the majority, but that's just my take.
~atr
Osamede - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
Let's face it Dell still doesnt get it. Shipping a 15" unit with a 6 cell battery that isnt going to last all that long is no good. And the "option" of a 9-cell that sticks out like a sore thumb is just outdated.I'm no Apple fan but at least they understand that a quality laptop is one that doesnt leave you worrying about your battery AND doesnt have huge lumps sticking out of it.
In any case this 15" brick unit is a sideshow and is no change really, as Dell has always had 15" units with a decent screen that were ugly like this one.
The real point where we will know that PC makers are actually interested in upping their game is when they start producing lightweight laptops at 13" or 14" that have top notch screens. At that point we can discuss. But really only Sony is making a play there. The rest are jokers, Dell included.
strikeback03 - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
There are plenty of users for whom 3-4 hours of battery life is plenty, as they use the system mostly as a DTR and not on the go. No point in making the system large enough to hold the 9 cell battery when a large number of users don't need that capacity.Better battery life by default in Windows would be nice, but if it is a choice between having all the varied hardware available and better battery life tweaks I would definitely take the hardware choices. I also don't consider Apple's integrated battery to be at all an option.
pieterjan - Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - link
This thing must be the ugliest notebook Dell ever pooped out. Okay, it has some aluminum panels, but so do street poles.