Thanks to Windows 8, the hype of having a laptop with touch screen seems to have lived, this has also given manufacturers choices of making various hybrid form factors on their products. Dell isn’t new to the hybrid laptop game as well, with the introduction of the Inspiron 13 7000 Series 2-in-1 laptop, which challenges competitors by having an extremely solid hardware quality and great performance under the hood. The Inspiron 13 7000 series is now in our labs and our hands are starting to get dirty on it.
Dell Inspiron 13 7000 Series Full Review is up, click here!
Dell Inspiron 13 7000 Series 2-in-1 Laptop First Look Video
A premium looking hybrid laptop that packs great potential
We tend to mention this every time we see a computer with a laptop and tablet form factor – it isn’t perfect. The Inspiron 13 sure looks extremely appealing in its design language, visually you will think that its chassis is a machined aluminum just like the DellXPS 15 we reviewed a while ago. In fact, the chassis is a plastic material with a matte surface which feels really good and premium. Our review unit is the high spec model, which comes with a Core i5 4210U processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB Hard Disk and 13.3” Full HD Touch IPS LED display.
The device isn’t the slimmest out there but it weighs very light at 1.66KG according to official numbers, it doesn’t have an optical drive and Dell isn’t selfish on the device’s input ports, we have 2 USB 3.0 ports, a USB 2.0 port, a HDMI port and a SD card reader. The Inspiron 13’s speakers are located on both left and right sides of the device and it produces a pretty loud volume on first impressions. Because it can also be used as a tablet, you’ll also find the device’s power button and a volume rocker located on the right.
One of the great things that we like about the Inspiron 13 is the ability to perform upgrades on the hardware internals, we removed the backplate without any issues with a standard Philip screwdriver. We find a 43Wh 3-Cell battery being fixed to the laptop and performing a hard drive swap is as simple as removing one screw supporting it. Unfortunately, there’s only one RAM slot available which means you are very much limited to a maximum 8GB of RAM.
To our surprise, the Inspiron 13 comes with a nice capacitive stylus onboard, we are so going to try using it when we do some design work out there.
The Inspiron 13 features a 13.3” Full HD (1920×1080) IPS display, color saturation and viewing angles are good. On first impressions, we are already in love with it’s great hybrid form factor, the hinges are also very solid, Dell has even mentioned on its website that the hinges have been twisted more than 20,000 times so we aren’t afraid of breaking it when we twist the display around.
Another great feature that we love on the Inspiron 13 is the spacious and clean backlit chiclet keyboard, the spaces between the keys are excellent which will greatly reduce typing errors in fast speeds and the wide touchpad is also a great one for performing gestures around Windows 8.1.
To find out our final verdict on the Inspiron 13 7000 Series 2-in-1 laptop, stay tuned for our full review coming right up.
