Dell XPS 15-9530 Touch Pro Reviews

With its brilliant screen and serious components, the luxury-minded Dell XPS 15 (9530) is Dell's showcase PC meant to go up against high-end laptop offerings. Unfortunately, its price and battery life keep it from taking the top spot.

Dell’s XPS 15 is a system of extremes. The display provides incredible sharpness, but its quality is well below average. The processor and video card perform well, but the fan struggles to cool them at full load. The 512GB solid state drive is massive, but contributes to the notebook’s hefty $2,349 asking price. The Apple MacBook Pro 15 with Retina is the XPS 15’s only direct competitor. The upgraded version of the Pro, which boasts an Intel Core i7 quad core CPU, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and Nvidia GeForce GT 750M graphics, sells for $2,599. Apple’s alternative is better overall, but the gap between the two mostly comes down to the display. The Retina display has fewer pixels and lacks touch, but makes up for those flaws with far superior image quality. We doubt that the $250 gap between the two will make buyers think twice given that both sell above two grand, but one runs Windows, and one runs OS X. That alone is a significant difference, and with no other direct competitors available, the operating system becomes a deciding factor. Do you need a beastly Windows notebook and aren’t fazed by the prospect of paying more than $2,000 for one? Buy the Dell XPS 15. Don’t need a Windows laptop? Buy the MacBook Pro 15 with Retina. The choice really is that simple.

If you're interested in buying the Dell XPS 15, in fact, we'd suggest you skip our test configuration and go for the $2,349 model with the larger battery and 512GB solid-state drive. The high-end desktop replacement segment is a place to splurge, after all, and the substantially longer battery life and quicker storage are in our opinion worth the money.But what if you're torn between the XPS 15 and the MacBook Pro With Retina Display? It's a choice between two excellent, sensationally screened laptops, and if you're a Windows fan, the Dell is the best high-end Windows notebook we've ever tested. But the Apple has longer battery life, cooler bundled software, a slightly better keyboard, and slightly nicer scaling or presentation on its high-res screen. We'll pick the MacBook Pro.

With its brilliant screen and serious components, the luxury-minded Dell XPS 15 (9530) is Dell's showcase PC meant to go up against high-end laptop offerings. Unfortunately, its price and battery life keep it from taking the top spot.

The XPS 15 delivers gaming power with Ultrabooks looks. Yeah, it's pricey, but consider all you're getting for the money.

Dell’s XPS 15 is a valiant attempt to compete with the best premium notebooks but, ultimately, it falls a bit short. The blame for this lies with the display, which pads the price but doesn’t add much to the user experience. Is it sharp? Certainly. But poor black levels sap contrast and ultimately sour the overall package. The system’s expensive $1,899 MSRP is supposed to be justified by the display, so we’re disappointed to see that, beyond pixel count, it doesn’t live up to expectations. Still, the XPS 15 deserves credit for delivering excellent performance in a thin and light chassis. Samsung’s ATIV Book 8 is still our top pick among 15.6” premium laptops in spite of its continued use of a 3rd-gen Intel Core processor, but it’s a full pound heavier and two-tenths of an inch thicker. Dell has managed to match the size of the MacBook Pro 15 for $100 less ($500 less, if you go with the base model), and some buyers will find that a very attractive trait. Dell also deserves credit for strong storage performance in spite of this system’s 1TB hard drive. Most other systems of similar size come with a standard 128GB solid state drive that simply isn’t large enough for many users. The XPS 15, however, provides plenty of space. This system isn’t the best value around, and the display’s resolution writes a check its performance can’t cash, but the XPS 15 is a good choice for anyone who needs a light, yet powerful and versatile, workhorse.

Apple MacBook Pro 15 vs. Dell XPS 15, Windows or MacOs? While the second part of the question merits its own discussion, we at least want to take a look at the first part. Let's proceed step by step. In our opinion, the chassis of the XPS 15 doesn't give up anything when compared to the MBP 15. With a rubberized aluminum casing, carbon bottom shell, and silver and black accents, the Dell notebook has its own style, although there are similarities. As far as build quality and rigidity are concerned, both notebooks are top notch. In our opinion, Apple is a step ahead as far as the hardware is concerned. Not only does Apple integrate more potent processors, but also offers more configuration options for the CPU, RAM, and SSD (this is true for Germany - in the US, Dell has several different versions), so the MacBook can be tailored to the user's needs. The Dell system does have an advantage as far as pricing is concerned: a comparably equipped (2.0 Ghz, 512 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM) MacBook cost about 2400 Euro (~$3300). As far as the price-to-value ratio is concerned, the XPS 15 has the upper hand. We don't have any display measurements for the new MBP 15 yet. Assuming that the new MacBook makes use of the same panel as last year's Retina model, the displays should be neck-on-neck. Dell has a few more pixels resolution as well as better brightness and contrast (and a touchscreen, if that should be important), but trails the Apple notebook in color accuracy. Of course, we have to wait for the upcoming review to make a final verdict. Apple also has an advantage as far as the integration of the high-resolution display is concerned, as issues similar to what we experienced with Windows 8.1 are very unlikely to happen.