The new Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 has been a great mainstream laptop to use for the last few weeks, and I really like how it’s better than the last one. The screen is 16:10, and there are some cool changes to the design, such as a touchpad with three sides. There is also a lot of value. This unit costs a little more, and it’s the top model. You can still get a laptop with a Full HD webcam for as little as $649.99.
With the latest generation of Intel mobile CPUs, the Intel Core i7-1255U in the Inspiron 14 2-in-1 has both low-power Efficient cores (E-cores, there are eight of them) and multi-threaded Performance cores (P-cores, there are two of them). This is similar to the BIG.little architecture that most ARM processors use.
Its Performance cores top out at 4.7GHz and support thread-doubling, but the E-cores don’t. This gives it up to 10 cores in total and lets it run up to 12 threads at once. Because of this, this Inspiron can run on a small, 54-watt-hour battery with only four cells. On the Inspiron 16 2-in-1, the more powerful Intel Core i7-1260P CPU uses more power and is paired with a six-cell, 87-watt-hour battery.
The keys on the keyboard of the Inspiron 14 have plenty of space between them, and the touchpad is bigger than usual for a laptop with a 14-inch screen. The 16:10 touch screen has a resolution of 1,920 by 1,200 pixels. That’s the only way to see the screen, which is too bad because a brighter screen would be nice. The side bezels of the panel are thin, which makes the screen look bigger than it is.
The top and bottom bezels are thicker. The enclosure is 0.62 inches tall in front and 0.7 inches tall in back. It is 12.4 inches long and 9 inches wide. The weight at the start is a reasonable 3.5 pounds. Considering that the average textbook weighs 3.5 pounds, that’s not too much to carry around campus.
Brightness (278.7 cd/m2) and contrast (859:1) of the matte 14-inch display (1,920×1,200 pixels) in the 16:10 format fall short of their goals. More is expected from a mobile 800 Euro ($811) laptop here. We think that values greater than 300 cd/m2 or 1,000:1 are good.
At least, there was no PWM flickering found. If there’s one thing the Dell Inspiron 14 is good at, it’s how long its battery lasts, which is a good thing for a business laptop. The Inspiron 14 lasted 12 hours and 37 minutes on our battery test, which consisted of constantly browsing the web over Wi-Fi with the screen brightness set to 150 nits.