Removing physical F keys was a huge mistake on the new XPS laptops. Like someone else said: It’s the TouchBar that does nothing new, while doing the original worse. RIP XPS laptops. Press F to pay respects.
No one liked the apple touchbar and they removed it? No one liked the capacitive buttons of the XPS 13 plus? Let's make it the default on our 14 and 16 models 😇
The Alienware is fine. The XPS look like they got a downgrade. The loss of upgradable parts as well as the loss of actual physical keys for the function row doesn’t seem good at all
NGL the alienware is the better laptop here, but still a downgrade in the sense it went from gaming beast to portable gaming with lower max specs. I'd rather get the R1 personally
@@emmanuelh2304 Nope the SSD hasn't been soldered for 2 years at least on the 15 and 17 that I know. Not sure about the 13 but the normal 13 should have upgradeable storage
I believe that Dell's explanation for the touch bar on the XPS 13 plus was that capacitive buttons take up less internal volume than physical keys, freeing up more room for them to pack a cooling solution that can handle the 28W CPU they stuffed in there. I don't really think that excuse flies for the 14 and 16.
You're right on that one. There should have been more ports as well. the 14 and 16 line up main focus shouldn't be on the thin side, but rather a balance of both. They should have made it thicker so they could accomodate everything else. I personally love the keyboard of the xps 14, but fuck why do they have to go to an extra mile to make it so thin???
As Alex showed the fans are larger and there is a vapor chamber inside. Mind you the vapor chamber was only used in the 17 and not the 15 of old. So putting it in the 16 would require more space. That's why the touch bar is justified in the 16, and it just makes sense to leave more room for cooling in the 14
@@RM-el3gw justified actually. No other laptop has the edge to edge bezels of the XPS 14 and 16 so therefore they are not 'small' for their sizes unlike the XPSs. Therefore for these other laptops, there is more space to put the vapor chambers. But if you search, not many 16" laptops have vapor chambers. also keep in mind the size of the battery, and other component arrangements as well as the other things like the chassis specifications, like its thickness feature, the actual design of the chassis and other things that we both don't know of. keep in mind that from our point of view, we just say 'why didn't they just do this or this' but in actuality its much more complicated. We as consumers havn't done R&D so we don't know how to develop things to include what we want.
He didn't mention anything about the god awful 'haptic' trackpad on the plus so I think you're correct. Also Alienware has failed to make a laptop survive more than a year or even months in my experience. For those reasons alone I think you're right.
This isn't a review. It's a showcase or a "first look". The Dell rep is on the set. It's also not sponsored by Dell except that they provided the laptops.
@@SuperchargedShift As an owner of an Alienware laptop, I can agree. He talked about the fans. I have an older Alienware r4 17, and the fans lasted only just out of warranty before one of them blew a bearing, and quality wise the replacements are not much better at all and come from china with poor reviews all around. I have yet still to get around to replacing them. Edit: I have just mostly been using my Steam Deck now when I want to game on the go & a cheap $100 laptop for RU-vid & MS Word/Documents
it's not a review, it's a preview. these are not retail laptops so it's not fair to benchmark them (and the manufacturers do not allow benchmarking because of this). ps, I've used the haptic touchpad and it's fucking awesome. these still aren't for me though. the port selection is still awful.
Been buying (and recommending) XPS laptops for years but that came to an end when they removed the function keys from the Plus. They're clearly doubling down on that stupid design choice so I'm out for good.
Yep same. My XPS 13 has lasted me so many years, but now that I need an upgrade I cannot stay with dell making the capacitive function row standard along with other issues like increases in price. I’ve honestly been looking at the Asus zenbook 14x Oled as a replacement. Seems to have an unbeatable price and a great display that comes standard too.
Odd considering the constant build quality problems that iirc, Alex experienced himself with XPS laptops. Icing on the cake for the overheating 2000+$ laptop....
@@joelconolly5574I have looked at the XPs lines and premium window computer, but objectively they are just as over priced as Apple haters complain about Mac’s. The fact that you can get an M2 Air for less than $1000 and it has better build, web came, processor, and just experience cause windows is not as great anymore is sad. I left windows for Mac and can’t go back.
...who uses that much of MicroSD? Full size SD card is used in camera systems and its pretty big market, but micro? i suppose drones or security cameras are using MicroSD now...
@@raineheartily4580 Got a microSD card? just stick it in an adapter and use it in the full size SD card slot Doesn't work that well the other way around unfortunately
That's his natural speaking level. I prefer people like that than the loud ones that bark at you like you're the other side of a busy highway, when you're standing right next to them.
Well, I would have bought xps15 but, like Alex said, they killed it. Small screen and battery for 14, too heavy for 16. I think 15 was at the best spot. Physical function keys and upgrade ability? I actually don’t mind much. Just hoping they fixed QC problems.
Alex! Blink twice if you'rte being held hostage. I really enjoy your reviews and it was you who made me notice the xps and buy it in 2020. I hope this is just because these aren't officially out yet but I sure hope you give your honest reaction when you're doing a full review on them. This is stuff you wouldn't remark as great if it were different brands/laptops.
Dell has lost me completely with the XPS now. I think the plus design they have brought over to the normal lineup is horrible. touch buttons are a horrible choice, dropping the fullsize SD to Micro is a big backstep. The hidden touch pad seems annoying and I like to have a physical click not a haptic feedback. I will be buying a laptop this year and was excited to see the refresh for the xps lineup but this has completely put me off now. Will be looking at other brands.
@@azur1o I want to see what Asus Zenbooks are like at ces this year. They caught my eye last year but reviews said battery life was very poor. If they can fix that with the Core ultra chips it might sway me.
Exactly the same situation! I’ve been wanting to buy myself a new laptop either good specifications and decent portability/battery life. The older Dell XPS models had been very good either that but I thought to wait and see if they would up the battery time using new chips and bigger battery and maybe add proper WiFi 6e. However, when I saw this new monstrosity I was extremely disappointed. Looks like I will have to turn to other brands which will be an interesting time for market exploration. I’m a a huge security freak (not afraid to admit it) so Lenovo is a no go after their root kit controversies. Framework is not available in my region and indirect shipping isn’t an option for me. I’m looking to see what ASUS announces this year. A sensible competitor would be the ZenBook line of products however I found myself looking at the ROG Flow X16 which seems to be a happy midpoint of both good performance and portability and decent battery life (from what I read ASUS has good power saving and eco mode features in ROG laptops). Really disappointed in what I saw from dell this year…. The touchpad for function row, the trackpad, the lack of upgradability, worse IO, the copilot button all seem like downgrades to me.
@@franeknowak6084 whats the lenovo flaw? I just watched Dave 2ds video on the new lenovo yoga 7i and pro 9i, they look pretty good as an alternate options to the xps.
Damn that's laying it on thick. I kept waiting for...but wait, there is more...for a limited time only Dell will include this amazing set of steak knives.
Ouch! Lack of physical f keys and soldered ram 😬 The major benefit of an xps, and I've been running the same xps 15 since about 2019, has been their conservative but well thought out design choices. There have always been things lighter, fancier and more feature rich, but they're built like tanks, pleasant to use, and very serviceable to replace batteries, or clean out keyboards. I fully expect several more years of not overly demanding multiple windowed productivity out of this laptop, in between being shoved into a bag, hauled between desks, jammed in an overhead locker on flights etc. with a few fixable things going wrong between now and then. I'm not sure I could expect the same from the latest gen for the same price. As a example, when the barrel plug gave out on mine the motherboard got swapped out and the old ram, mem stick and WiFi card got swapped over to a fresh board that basically only had the processor on it. This cannot happen on the new one.
No. I want function keys. I want a touch pad. I want two CTRL keys. I don't want an "AI" key. I don't want a touch bar. I don't want half the things they think I want and I do want them to stop dumping conventions for the sake of it. Until manufacturers get it, I'm stuck with a - very excellent - three-year-old XPS-13.
I foresee a trend this year with laptops. "We had to solder the RAM to make them look so cool and thin and if you don't want soldered RAM then buy the old product." Until the old product is sold out and then they will claim that the market demands soldered RAM... Gonna be a no from me on XPS products this year.
The XPS devices do look very modern, especially the trackpad, but physical buttons would have been well appreciated. If I wanted touch buttons I would get a dial screen laptop like the zen whatever.
As someone who owns the last gen Alienware... I am dissapointed in the new verison. Like, this might sound crazy but that chunk on the back had a handle that made the laptop easy to grip that way I can use the laptop while I am standing up. As someone who works in IT that hand grip is so useful that it's pretty much mandatory for any laptop I buy going forward. As for the fitting in your backpack claim? What the hell? I have zero issue fitting mine in my backpack. If you can't fit it in your backpack then your backpack is too small.
I am not a fan of the "streamlined" design here. Sure its shorter, sure it does look less tacky but there was nothing wrong with the older setup aside for the thickness. This change seem pointless.
Now we can wait a generation or 2 until they bring back function keys, because they are vital to any developers/creators workflow, maybe bring back the full size SD card reader (don't lie that there is no space) and then they will be actually worth buying
@@Dude_truthteller it's a premium laptop for professionals and creators. Guess what type of storage solution most cameras use? And it's not CFExpress just yet
The new precisions (5680s) are not based on the XPSs and you will be super sad. They're huge in comparison, gain only an HDMI port, and the cooling is so poorly designed and the fans are so poorly tuned for noise that you'll be missing the 5560 when your employer forces you over. I've been buying precisions for so long, and I went HP over it. Not one person likes the 5680 in the office. Oh yeah, the mouse pad is smaller and the keyboard is smaller and the screen bezels are larger. I hate it.
I hoped the function keys being capacitive was some special for the XPS 13 plus, not happy seeing it on the rest of the lineup. Any idea if the AI key can be returned to function as CTRL in bios? Seems like the whole series is unsuitable for power users now
I disagree on new Alienware - the reason the old one was so big was because of that massive heatsink to help it cope with temperatures. It was an appreciated feature absent in most other laptops that instead were power limited and thermal throttled. This is an ongoing issue since GTX 900M series up to this day - it's bad to the point where you can buy laptops with exact same spec with noticeably different performance. All in pursuit of questionable form factor aesthetics. I'm sorry but if I'm buying a high performance laptop, I'd rather compromise on volume rather than performance - I expect every $ of performance to be squeezed out and not choked down because someone wanted to brag about 2mm slimmer chassis in their marketing slides...
Imagine developing new XPS - apparently a laptop for power users - remembering now people reacted to TouchBar and removal of function keys and then doing the same on your product. What the actual f
Whelp, after my last two laptops being XPS, I think the next one isn't going to be one. They seriously removed everything that made the old XPS special, RIP to the SD Slot, the user replacable ram and of course the function row.
People seem really keen on the full size SD, is is actually the much of a thing? All the new sd cards seem to be micro and adaptors for full size sd. I normally tell people not to use the onboard reader if they are doing lots of photography, only because the SD slots wear out and it's best to keep the internal one as a backup. I told my mother this too, she ignored me then ripped the sd socket off the motherboard lol. She has special skills.
Nah, if anything, Nvidia no longer forces them to offer the 4090 as an option, or the pricing gap increased between the models - perhaps because it's now used in both the 4080S and 3070TiS. The unobtainium laptops still have 4090 mobile GPUs. If you listen to the TDP of the 4070 mobile GPUs, you'd figure out that the chassis and cooling systems of those laptops are unfit for a higher class GPU.
why you want 4090 on laptop? power and heat limitation will hampers its performance. not as convenient but GPU external case with proper power and cooler works better for people who absolutely need 4090 in somewhat mobile station.
I think the big issue with the 4090 is it's HUGE. These laptops could easily cool a 4090 at fairly high wattage, as they'll push the 4070 well past 100w, but the physical chip takes up so much space that they can't package it without making massive compromises to the usability of the laptop.
If there’s one thing I’m glad Dell changed is moving to haptic trackpads, because those trackpad sizes on the XPS 17 was way too big for a diving board mechanism, but yeah, this generation looks cool, but it feels very form-over-function; a XPS 15/17 with a haptic trackpad would’ve made the chassis relevant for a while
Dell-Alienware should be called "Dalien-ware" by the PC community so that they can't pretend to be different companies. And it's shorter than saying the full combined name.
If there's one thing that sucks, it's ports on the back of a laptop... I feel like it's fine for someone who's mainly plugged in, but if you're mainly plugged in you're likely better with a desktop.
Kudos to Linus Tech Tips for reviving the kitchen set! Even though it looks like a set not an actual kitchen anymore, it's awesome to see it come back. The nostalgia hits hard, and it's incredible how far this channel has come. Looking forward to the creative content that'll come out of this revamped space!
Why oh why are so many laptops missing the numpad? The numpad is SO SO important for data entry and just usability in general. What's the point of a bigger laptop if you're just going to shrink the keyboard? Even the XPS 9710 17 inch model does NOT have a numpad! It's a massive behemoth of a laptop but yet the 15 inch Latitude laptops have more ports, a 10key numpad, but for some stupid reason the XPS 17 inch notebooks DON'T have a bigger keyboard, and have far fewer ports? So much wasted space.
Between this and the MSI creator laptops I have some options to upgrade around 80 employees from pandemic panic purchased junk latitude laptops. My only hangup is how dell and MSI are handling thunderbolt docks. WD22TB4 does dual display, multi usb and at least 3 1080p or FHD+ displays for dell machines but for ASUS and MSI creator or workstation grade laptops it lacks the ability to power on the laptops from the dock power button. Would love to see the lab test stuff like this to make more informed purchases that give my employees in manufacturing more flexibility with remote work
Weird question, you choose how the function keys light up in the bios, extremely unintuitive, but how do you get in the bios? What keys do you tap when it's waking up to go to the bios?
I don't understand why any laptop would have any less than 2x USB-C and 2x USB-A ports? Especially ones that aren't super thin and lights. Also I don't get why laptops don't all have some combination of USB ports on either side. Sometimes it's just more convenient to plug something in on one side instead of the other.
spectres have hinge issues and if you look at them funny they will break... ppl in my small town are selling a lot of these w hinges broken on fb marketplace. as well as keys popped out and broken usbc ports. was gonna get one but hard pass and also those do not play well w linux either.
Alex said it (more or less): the new XPS is now called "Alienware". The new Alienware is a good XPS. The new XPS, on the other hand, is a huge step backwards :/.
I could deal with the F-keys, but no full size SD-Cardreader is a dealbreaker for me as a photographer. Battery and performance would be so great pressumably.
I do a lot of photo editing on my Dell G5 15 SE laptop, and I love the full-size SD card slot. I don't think laptop manufacturers understand what people actually do with SD cards, but mine go back and forth between my laptop and my mirrorless camera. Sure, I could always use a dongle or put microSD cards in SD adapters and put those in my camera, but I shouldn't have to. MicroSD cards are easy to lose.
It sucks that they got rid of the RTX4080 and 4090 options for the M16. I'm glad I decided to go with the M18 last year. I only wish I could have jumped up to the 4090, though the 4080 is no slouch for being a laptop gaming machine. So far, it's been a great computer.
As a very long time XPS user, the missing function keys and non-upgradable SSD + RAM is a big no 😢 I hope they release their R&D modular laptop or I would be considering other laptops in the future.
strange coincidence that both asus and dell have stopped offering laptop 4090s (in the products weve seen today) and both now only offer 4070s, with big usability improvements. idk just kinda odd, i dont mind though :)
I like the new design but the overall package just isn't worth it anymore, especially without Function Keys, the G14 is probably going to cost the same and it's thin enough and small enough to compete with the XPS 14, especially since the only selling point to me was that the Xps was a 2in1 back in the day.
I just wanted to say that the reliability of Dell has taken a huge drop in the past few years. It's pretty bad and I wouldn't recommend them for much, I'm curious how HP is, but they aren't exactly known for being super reliable either. I'm talking in a commercial setting, we are seeing specifically the Latitude range drop like flies.
Is this the new LMG video quality control? On the webcam testing you call is the XPS15 2023, which it isn't and then right at the end you call it the XPS14 2024 which it also isn't (but better) it actually is the XPS16 2024. Seems like an easy thing to correct right?
As a longtime XPS fan, while it's a beautiful laptop, there's definitely a few really annoying things about this thing. Also why does the 14 inch have some weird resolution instead of 4K... Why is there no longer a 15 inch? Sheesh. At least they finally got rid of the terrible carbon fiber palmrest pattern that is an absolute fingerprint magnet and the air intake is now on the sides!
I'm actually glad I recently got a 4070 alienware laptop on a big sale. I didn't know new models were coming out, but price mattered most (followed by durability and cooling), and I think the m16 r1 fits my needs better. That trackpad though, my previous laptop was an aliemware r2, and was sad they no longer did anything with the track pad.
The 13 Plus XPS has always been for people with small hands. The 14 to 16 inch Dell XPS sizes for 2024 is aligned with most competitors (Apple, Lenovo, Asus, and HP).
I will never understand the removal of full size sd card slots from high-end pro laptops. As a photographer, I LOVE the screens on these but the lack of sd card slot and making the keyboard more clunky turns me away.
I have an XPS 17 9730. Sad to see it's the last 17" ultrabook laptop. I moved from a Lenovo X1 Extreme and that 17" screen was the primary draw, (plus Dell tends to refesh with the latest CPUs and GPUs much faster than Lenovo). I use my laptop for coding, so the extra screen real estate is important.
