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Dell XPS 11 review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £859
inc VAT

Disappointing touch keyboard and average screen ruin what could be a good laptop

Specifications

11.6 in 2,560×1,440 display, 1.1kg, 1.5GHz Intel Core i5-4210Y, 4.00GB RAM, 128GB disk, Windows 8.1

http://www.dell.co.uk

If you’ve ever wondered what a Lenovo Yoga laptop might look and feel like without a traditional keyboard, the Dell XPS 11 has an answer. With a screen that can fold back 360 degrees and a lightly embossed keyboard reminiscent of a Microsoft Surface touch cover, the XPS 11 certainly feels much more comfortable to hold in tablet mode than the Yoga.

Dell XPS 11

You can still feel the keys underneath your fingers, but they’re much less intrusive than those on Lenovo’s Yoga and their rubbery soft-touch finish provided a welcome level of grip when we were holding it. You don’t need to worry about pressing them accidentally in tablet mode either, as the keyboard and touchpad are automatically disabled when you fold back the screen.

It’s a far more beautiful object to behold, too, as the laptop’s chassis tapers from 15mm at its thickest point to a mere 11mm at the front and weighs a featherweight 1.1kg, making it one of the lightest Ultrabook convertibles we’ve ever tested. We certainly found it much easier to hold for long periods of time than other hybrids we’ve seen, including the Dell XPS 12. Switching from laptop to tablet mode is also incredibly easy thanks to its smooth, flexible hinge.

Dell XPS 11

The embossed keys are certainly a good idea in theory given the XPS 11’s design, but in practice they’re terrible for typing, as they provide no tactile feedback. This is an issue we’ve come across with Microsoft’s touch covers as well, but at least we could type accurately with the touch cover. With the Dell XPS 11 we were never sure if we’d pressed the correct key and we were constantly making mistakes because the keyboard repeatedly failed to register our touch unless we were heavy-handed.

Dell XPS 11

We tried adjusting the sensitivity of the keys, but both Light and Heavy Touch made no difference to our typing accuracy. This made touch-typing almost impossible and we preferred to use the onscreen keyboard instead. Thankfully, the large all-in-one touchpad was much easier to use. Its smooth and responsive surface was perfect for browsing the desktop and we could perform Windows 8 shortcuts and multitouch gestures without any problems.

The XPS 11 compromises badly on raw processing power with its 1.5GHz Intel Core i5-4210Y processor and 4GB of RAM scored just 30 overall in our multimedia benchmarks. It particularly struggled with the multitasking section of our test, but the XPS 11 should cope with many everyday tasks as long as you don’t have too many programs open at the same time. The processor’s integrated Intel HD Graphics 4200 chip isn’t powerful enough to play 3D games either, but should cope well with casual games such as Angry Birds.

You do however get a good selection of connection ports that include two USB3 ports, a full-size HDMI video output, an SD card reader and a combined headphone and microphone jack. That’s an excellent selection of ports for such a small laptop and gives you freedom to use it as your main PC without the need for pesky adaptors when copying over photos from SD cards or attaching external hard-disks over USB3. A full-size HDMI port is also useful if you use a second monitor.

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Basic Specifications

Rating**
ProcessorIntel Core i5-4210Y
Processor clock speed1.5GHz
Memory4.00GB
Memory slots1
Memory slots free0
Maximum memory4GB
Size15x300x201mm
Weight1.1kg
SoundRealtek HD Audio
Pointing devicetouchpad and touchscreen

Display

Viewable size11.6 in
Native resolution2,560×1,440
Graphics ProcessorIntel HD Graphics 4200
Graphics/video portsHDMI
Graphics Memory128MB

Storage

Total storage capacity128GB
Optical drive typenone

Ports and Expansion

USB ports2
Bluetoothyes
Wired network portsnone
Wireless networking support802.11n
PC Card slotsN/A
Supported memory cardsSD, SDHC, SDXC
Other portsheadphone, microphone

Miscellaneous

Carrying caseNo
Operating systemWindows 8.1
Operating system restore optionrestore partition
Software includedN/A
Optional extrasN/A

Buying Information

Warrantyone year next business day
Price£859
Detailswww.dell.co.uk
Supplierhttp://www.dell.co.uk

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