Dell XPS 13-9343 Touchscreen Ultrabook Review

[Redaktion]

Refusal to compromise... You can't have it all—or can you? Dell's latest XPS 13 pushes the envelope in a number of different critical categories, but most notably portability: this is the smallest 13.3-inch notebook we've reviewed. Could we be witnessing the best ultraportable to date?

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS-13-9343-Touchscreen-Ultrabook-Review.135817.0.html

[Tom R]

Great review, but your dimension measurements differ from the ones on Dell's website.

[Steve Schardein]

Hey Tom,

Thanks for reading first off, and thank you for the kind feedback!

Yes, you're right; we do our own measurements separately from the manufacturers, and my height measurement is larger than theirs.  It might be wrong however; I'll double-check it now that you mentioned it and make sure.

Thanks again, and I hope you found this review informative and helpful!

Steve

[TommyGun]

What about the infamous coil-whine? How can a review like that not mention that? Is it present or not? Please answer.

[Steve Schardein]

Hey there Tommy,

Neither we nor our testing equipment noticed it.

[jpetso]

Now if this thing had the ThinkPad X250's trackpoint and separate PgUp/PgDown keys instead of, you know, *empty space*, it would be a no-brainer for me to go with that one. Instead, I'll probably still go with the Lenovo. Sorry Dell. It pains me when I see a great product and I'm almost, but not quite, their target audience.

[illusion]

Well TommyGun,

they also failed to mention the horrible image retention (ghosting) that affected all XPS 12's in their review. They seem to "not notice" alot of major issues in Dell computers.

[Steve Schardein]

Howdy illusion,

We're working hard on a rubric which will guarantee that nothing ever goes overlooked ever on any product we ever review.  But until that's launched sometime in the next century, I hope you'll find the reviews informative regardless.  ;-)

Steve

[illusion]

Sarcasm is great and all but if you actually cared about having accurate and reliable reviews then you would dump the attitude and investigate concerns from customers of the products you review.

[Puppy]

I suspect the high contrast ratio value is result of "dynamic contrast" feature that is useless in reality and should be disabled when measuring real contrast ratio.

[Vangelis]

Thank you guys for the great review.

I note in all the Dell XPS 13 reviews that it is compared to the MacBook Air, however the higher spec model, like the one you reviewed, should surely be compared to the Retina MacBook Pro 13 which has similar specs and price. How would you say it fares against it?

[Steve Schardein]

@illusion:

My personal two cents on your gripe:

Sorry, it isn't about attitude, it's about realism.  The fact is that these are complex products.  Armchair critics are a dime a dozen (it's an easy job), and every product has its own assortment of idiosyncrasies, some of which are not noticeable to all users, and others which do not become apparent until quite some time later.  It is unfeasible to expect any editor of any publication to cover 100% of these anomalies, or to continually research post-publication to assess the relevance of their claims thereafter.  If you think you're up to it, perhaps you have a very successful position as a product reviewer in your future. ;-)

Bottom line, it's my personal opinion that the reviews here at Notebookcheck are some of the most scientific and comprehensive anywhere.  If we miss something, sorry, we're human.  The image retention issue you mention regarding the XPS 12 was subsequently widely reported by users, but it wasn't unique to that machine.  It appears to have affected anything using those LG panels, including, but not limited to also a number of Lenovo machines (i.e. the X220).  But the fact remains that almost no reviewers initially noticed it, and it also doesn't bother most users outside of that vocal minority.  That's why.  It is just such one of those aforementioned idiosyncrasies.

Getting back on topic, what was it you were so worried about in this particular review anyway?  Isn't that the entire focus of this discussion?  There is no image retention and no CPU whine.  End of story.


@Puppy:

Is there such a feature that's enabled on these units?  We always disable graphics power savings, adaptive brightness, and other such dynamic video adjustments before performing our measurements, so unless it's an uncontrollable feature of the machine it should not have affected our readings.  I will say that it is immediately evident to the naked eye that the black level on this machine is fantastic. :-)


@Vangelis:

Great question.  Although the MacBook Pro 13 is considerably heavier and larger, the XPS 13 technically encroaches upon the territory of its specs.  In brief, I'd say:

Screen:  Toss-up  (MacBook Pro: Better color coverage, brightness distribution; XPS: Better brightness, contrast, resolution)

Case: Toss-up

Weight/size/portability: XPS

WLAN/communication: MacBook Pro

Maintenance/upgrades: XPS

Input devices: Both are excellent, edge to the MacBook however

Performance:  MacBook Pro (CPU by wide margin, storage by a less significant one due to 4K R/W differences, GPU almost equivalent)

Noise levels:  Depends on use, but probably equivalent

Temperature:  XPS

Speakers:  Toss-up

Battery life:  Again, depends on use.  Toss-up

Price:  Difficult to compare value due to features such as touch on the XPS and the fact that some people may not need more than 1080p (which is < $1K on the XPS)... the lower-spec model easily would win out on battery life as well.

----

So yeah, it's hard to recommend one over the other, as both have their relative strengths and weaknesses.  I believe it most is up to the user's preference and intended use.  You seriously cannot go wrong with either machine, and in my opinion that speaks to just how excellent this XPS 13 actually is.

Steve

[jb14]

Hi Steve many thanks for the review. Any update on the height measurement difference and any plans for reviewing the 1080p screen version?

Great review thanks for all your efforts.

[Steve Schardein]

Hey jb,

Thanks for the kind feedback!

I did remeasure the machine.  It looks like at its thickest point, it's probably closer to 18 mm in fact, so I will update that measurement.  It's probably give or take a millimeter however as my measurements surely lack that degree of resolution.  One of the complicating factors is that the very back of the unit sits higher than the front as it is angled and wedged -- so behind the rear rubber foot, the unit is slightly higher off the surface it is measured against.  Measuring at the rubber foot instead reflects the 1 - 2 mm thickness difference, which is in fact more accurate.

I hope this helps. :-)

Steve

[Steve Schardein]

Added some notes regarding CPU coil whine and Display Power Savings concerns to the review for anyone who is interested.  Thank you to all for the feedback.