Dell 14 Premium Review: Hello Old Friend

Undeniably sleek and modern design. Fantastic keyboard and trackpad. Sharp, vivid OLED display. Decent webcam and speakers.

Limited ports. Touch buttons are still frustrating. Discrete graphics is stuck connected anterior generation.

Dell is facing an uphill battle. It’s relaunching an already divisive laptop creation pinch nary important changes. The caller Dell 14 Premium retains nan constricted ports, touch-button usability keys, and nan invisible trackpad of its predecessor, nary of which were peculiarly popular.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t person nan XPS pedigree to thin on. The axing of nan XPS sanction was 1 of nan galore casualties successful nan company’s new, “simplified” brand. So, pinch a caller sanction and an aged design, I've been testing nan Dell 14 Premium to spot if nan XPS magic has been mislaid aliases if it tin revive nan glory days erstwhile Dell was astatine nan top.

New Name, Who Dis?

This is simply a divisive laptop. Most group either emotion nan forward-thinking aesthetics aliases detest nan snooty, form-over-function quality of nan design. I onshore location successful nan middle. I emotion nan invisible haptic feedback trackpad, for example. It gives nan laptop a ace sleek look, blending correct into nan thenar rests.

I besides bask nan edge-to-edge keyboard, filling retired nan abstraction pinch extra-large keycaps. It’s 1 of my favourite laptop keyboards to type on. Until you get to nan usability keys. I emotion nan look of nan glowing touch buttons, but Dell hasn’t done thing to make them much usable. They still don’t person haptic feedback and don’t consciousness astir arsenic responsive arsenic modular keys do. For me, they aren’t a deal-breaker, arsenic I don’t usage usability keys arsenic overmuch arsenic others. But if you’re a programmer aliases moreover conscionable personification who uses tons of keyboard commands, this is not nan laptop for you.

It is for you, however, if you want thing that feels undeniably slick. The trim bezels astir nan show are still unbeatable, particularly without nan request for an disfigured notch. Even nan simplified Dell logo connected nan lid gives a modern touch. It makes nan MacBook Pro look downright dated.

The larboard action is different creation prime that’s easy to kick about. On nan left, you get 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports, while nan correct broadside has 1 much Thunderbolt 4 port, a microSD paper slot, and a headphone jack. This is unchanged from last year’s model. I wasn’t expecting a move to Thunderbolt 5, though that would person been a bully astonishment for future-proofing. Thunderbolt 5 accessories and docks are yet here, truthful it’d beryllium bully to spot immoderate much laptop options different than gaming laptops that support those faster speeds. I miss having a full-size SD paper slot, and an further USB-C larboard aliases HDMI larboard would person been handy.

The different point worthy mentioning is nan thickness—0.7 inch isn’t overly thick, per se, but it’s thicker than nan MacBook Pro and Razer Blade 14. It matches nan thickness of nan Acer Swift X 14, and location aren’t galore 14-inch nongaming laptops pinch discrete graphics anyway.

Beautiful OLED

Displays person been an Achilles' Heel for Dell successful nan past. You’re often paying much for a higher-end show connected a Dell laptop aliases getting thing lower-quality. That’s particularly existent erstwhile you effort to make a nonstop comparison to MacBooks. The $1,600 14-inch MacBook Pro comes pinch a high-resolution, Mini-LED show that’s awesome for HDR. To get nan 3.2K OLED show connected nan Dell 14 Premium, nan value starts astatine $100 more. That mightiness not sound for illustration a large difference, but erstwhile you’re coming successful much costly than Apple, you’re playing a vulnerable game.

There are 3 superior configurations to take from. The guidelines exemplary has integrated graphics and a nontouch “2K” IPS display. You tin bump it to discrete graphics pinch nan Nvidia RTX 4050 paired pinch nan aforesaid display, aliases spell for nan full, touch-enabled 3,200 x 2,000 OLED panel. The RTX 4050 models travel pinch 32 GB of RAM and 1 TB of storage, but astatine nan clip of writing, Dell charges $200 for nan show upgrade. All show options person a move refresh complaint up to 120 Hz.

I tested nan high-end configuration, which costs $2,200. You tin besides adhd an other terabyte of retention for $200 much to get 2 TBs. Either way, this is an costly laptop. You tin surely bargain cheaper RTX 4050 laptops designed for creators, specified arsenic nan Asus Vivobook 15 Pro aliases Acer Swift X 14.

The OLED show connected connection present is really pretty, though. Strangely, it comes pinch dozens of colour profiles successful nan Windows settings, only 1 of which nets you HDR: Dolby Vision. This is thing each institution does differently, but it was a spot of a messiness to benignant through. With HDR connected successful Dolby Vision, I measured a precocious of 615 nits successful a 4 percent window. That's not arsenic agleam arsenic Mini-LED laptops, for illustration nan MacBook Pro, which tin beryllium cranked up to 1,200 nits. These OLED displays besides aren't arsenic agleam arsenic nan QD-OLED monitors, which tin deed up to 1,000 nits. This Dolby Vision floor plan improves colour accuracy and SDR brightness, up to 393 nits.

Unfortunately, nan Dolby Vision floor plan reduces color abstraction coverage, meaning location isn't a awesome floor plan for contented creators who request amended colors, astatine slightest not without calibrating it yourself.

A Thin Line

If you aren't willing successful nan RTX 4050 model, I would not urge buying nan Dell 14 Premium complete nan Dell XPS 14, which nan institution still sells for hundreds of dollars little astatine nan moment. The only quality is simply a one-generation step-up successful Intel processors, from Core Ultra Series 1 to Series 2. In this case, it's nan Ultra 7 255H.

Unlike nan jump from V-series chips (as seen from nan Dell XPS 13 to nan Dell 13 Premium), these H-series chips don’t get a important summation successful ratio and artillery life. There is an summation successful performance, though it's not monumental. We're talking astir a 7 percent summation successful multicore capacity and a 17 percent bump successful single-core performance, arsenic tested successful Cinebench R24. I'm not penning that off, but I don't deliberation it's worthy an other $500.

The existent problem is that Dell didn't measurement up nan laptop from RTX 4050 to nan latest RTX 5050. Dell didn't supply a reason, but nan RTX 4050 type of nan Dell XPS 14 is nary longer available, and nan RTX 5050 is only configurable successful nan larger Dell 16 Premium. That's unfortunate, arsenic we've been waiting years for an RTX 50-series graphics paper to respire caller life into laptops.

The RTX 4050 is not precisely a banger of a GPU, either, particularly since it only has 6 GB of VRAM. The move to nan RTX 5050 astatine slightest gets you to 8 GB, successful summation to providing support for multiframe generation. There aren't galore nongaming laptops to clasp nan RTX 50 bid conscionable yet, but they're coming. When they do arrive, for illustration nan upcoming 2025 Acer Swift X 14, they will beryllium configurable up to an RTX 5070.

I tried to get Cyberpunk 2077 to play arsenic good arsenic I could connected nan Dell 14 Premium. Once I group nan solution to 1200p, I wasn't capable to get thing soft capable without nan usage of upscaling, which isn't excessively surprising. I dropped nan graphics preset to Medium and turned connected Nvidia DLSS to nan “Balanced” mode, and was averaging 74 fps (frames per second) without ruining nan image quality. You tin ever crank up nan framework procreation to execute complete 80 fps if you worth smoothness complete input lag and clarity. Point being, nan Dell 14 Premium tin walk disconnected arsenic a decent laptop for immoderate gaming connected nan side, moreover up to and including triple-A titles. But possibly not astatine a level you'd expect for this price.

And yet, for my money, location still isn’t a laptop arsenic charismatic arsenic nan Dell 14 Premium. There conscionable isn’t. That's still an accomplishment successful my book, moreover if not each of nan trade-offs are wins, specified arsenic nan light-up touch buttons. I wish Dell had recovered a measurement to get nan RTX 5050 onboard, though, because arsenic is, this doesn't consciousness for illustration overmuch of an upgrade.

If you're consenting to bargain a gaming laptop, you tin find them pinch nan RTX 4050 for good nether half nan value of nan Dell 14 Premium, and they'll apt execute amended acknowledgment to louder fans and a thicker chassis. The Dell 14 Premium is conscionable not a performance-first machine, and I don't deliberation it was ever intended to be. But pinch laptops for illustration nan MacBook Pro and Razer Blade 14 arsenic nonstop competition, it needs to be.