Product Listing

Dell XPS 13 - Fast, Compact and Portable

By James Lu - 15 Mar 2012
Launch SRP: S$1499

Battery Performance and Portability Index

 Battery Performance

Most of the space inside the XPS 13 is taken up by its battery. 

Ultrabooks are all about good productivity performance, sleek build and long battery life. When we took the carbon fiber base plate off the XPS 13 we saw that its 47WHr 6-cell battery takes up approximately two-thirds of the inside space. For our battery life test, we turned off all network connections and set both screen brightness and audio volume to 50% (which was actually still quite bright and loud on the XPS 13). We then played a repeating a movie trailer until the machine powered down.

Mobility Specifications Compared
Specifications / Notebook Dell XPS 13 Apple MacBook Air (Windows 7) HP Folio 13 ASUS Zenbook UX31
Battery 6-cell, 47WHr 6-cell, 50WHr 6-cell, 59WHr 6-cell, 50WHr
Dimensions 316 x 205 x 6-18mm 325 x 227 x 3-17mm 318.5 x 220 x 18 mm 325 x 223 x 3-17mm
Weight 1.36kg 1.35kg 1.49kg 1.31kg

All four machines proved they have the stamina to keep going, lasting over four hours. The Zenbook UX31's more power consuming Core i7 processor saw it die first, while the Dell lasting an impressive 270 minutes or four and a half hours (just enough to let the credits finish rolling on the 263 minute epic Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, Special Extended Edition). The MacBook Air (MBA) was slightly better, but not by a significant amount, with less than 3% extra battery life between them. HP's Folio 13 lasted nearly an hour longer, but the trade-off is the extra 140g of weight from its super-sized battery. 

All three Core i5 notebooks have quite low power consumption, with the Dell XPS 13 performing slightly better than both the MBA and the HP Folio 13.  


Portability Index

Our Portability Index is a measure of how portable a machine is, determined by its battery life, weight  and volume. Or in other words, how likely you are to throw it in your backpack and carry around for the day. Thanks to its small form factor and long battery life, the XPS 13 is one of the most portable machines on our chart, beaten only by the exceptionally lightweight (1.12kg) Toshiba Portege Z830. Considering our history of notebook testing and comparing these scores with relevant notebooks of similar size and class, the Dell XPS 13 is praise-worthy, even if it hasn't matched the Toshiba counterpart. There are very few notebooks that have crossed the 4.0 mark for the Portability Ratio and the XPS 13 has made it into this elite club.

In all honesty, the notebook feels a bit hefty from a pure weight to size point of view when we first started having a feel of this notebook. However, consider this - the XPS 13 rivals other 13-inch class notebooks with its more compact body (which Dell claims is equivalent of a conventional 11-inch laptop) and this is the reason for its perceived heft. After putting it through proper tests and crunching the numbers, the XPS 13 has definitely made a positive impression on us. Users looking to fit the most compact 13-inch Ultrabook in their backpack can surely rely on this Dell machine. Just don't expect it to feel lighter.

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8.0
  • Design 8.5
  • Features 7.5
  • Performance 8
  • Value 8
  • Mobility 8.5
The Good
Bright screen
Compact form factor
Good LED-backlit keyboard
The Bad
Lack of connectivity ports
Uninspired MacBook Air design
Standard 1366x768 resolution
Could be lighter
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