Dell Latitude 12 5285 2-in-1 Convertible Review

[Redaktion]

Deja Vu. To the casual observer, the Dell Latitude 12 5285 2-in-1 bears more than a passing resemblance to Microsoft's well-established Surface Pro 4. From the screen size to the overall dimensions and looks down to the accessories like the detachable keyboard and active stylus - the tablet/convertible is a spitting image on many, but not all levels.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-Latitude-12-5285-2-in-1-Convertible-Review.216862.0.html

[Narayan]

Hi Mr. Bernhard Pechlaner,
     Thanks for a very detailed review of dell latitude 5285 2-in-1 model. I have a question regarding heating issue.  In the section 'Temperature', you mentioned, "the system gets very warm during prolonged load with Prime95 and Furmark". What do you mean by 'prolonged load'? How long? The main reason for asking this is that I am planning to get this model (i7) and I will mainly use it to annotate pdf files in the tablet mode holding in my hand. At a time, I may open pdf files, word documents, and browser tabs (maybe half a dozen of each of them; not very big files). I would like to know whether such an usage will make to laptop uncomfortable to work with in the tablet mode holding in the hand.  I look forward to your response.

Thanks,
Narayan.

[Bernie Pechlaner]

....you mentioned, "the system gets very warm during prolonged load with Prime95 and Furmark". What do you mean by 'prolonged load'? .... I would like to know whether such an usage will make to laptop uncomfortable to work with in the tablet mode holding in the hand.....

Hi Narayan,

We run the stress test with Prime95 and Furmark in parallel for at least an hour. I can't really answer your question as there are too many variables and the exact workload isn't known. That said, when running the CPU at around 50 % utilization, the Latitude reached around 43 degrees C on the back within 5 minutes...

Hope this helps

Bernie

[A.D.]

I'm comparing the Surface Pro i7 with 8gig of ram to the 5825 i7 with 16gb RAM. Because of Dell discounts, I can get that model of the 5825 for slightly less money. Which do you reckon is best, long-term, for a future-proof Microsoft Office and websurfing workhorse? At first glance, I'd say the Dell. But if it easily heats up, won't this wear on the hardware more over time? Thanks!

[Aaron Conlon]

"Prolonged load" is referring more to CPU-intensive tasks that extend over a period of time, like rendering a video, or playing a graphics-intensive game, etc... Editing docs, or even playing hi-def video back isn't much of a load at all on a device like this, so it sounds like you'd be fine.

[Laurie]

You say PWM is used and is about 201Hz, but you don't specify what brightness level that is at. Any chance you could confirm that detail with the reviewer?

[Jeff H.]

At my office we tested one of these for 5 days.  The build feels great, the screen is wonderful.  However - the HEAT was almost immediate and VERY pronounced.  We don't do anything that taxing.  Microsoft Outlook, documents with Word or Adobe, and occasional websites for research.  Also noted, the Power Adapter for charging also got Incredibly HOT.  We felt this would certainly impact users of this device. This worries us tremendously over the long term as heat is generally a big NO-NO on computer equipment.  ALSO - when the fan kicks on - it was quite loud when compared to a laptop....perhaps that is due to a generally closer proximity to the face?  Not sure.  Unfortunately, it seems like a good unit aside from the heat and fan... but those were major points for us, that I wanted to share here.  I'm surprised more professional reviewers have not mentioned the heat themselves.

[UneBoleeDAir.fr]

Great review as usual. The tear down pictures showing how to switch the M.2 SSD was partiicularly useful to me, now then I have a 1To drive in it !  ;D