Dell XPS One Review: form over function

January 15, 2013

Earlier this year, we took a look at Dell’s non-touchscreen version of the XPS One 27. Now Dell’s pretty all-in-one is back, with slightly updated specs, Windows 8 Professional, and, of course, a touchscreen. This version of the One is as gorgeous as ever, with the exact same design as its predecessor, and its Quad HD screen looks even better with multi-touch. But now that Windows 8 is out, just about every single computer out there has a touchscreen—so how does the One hold up? Our review model, which costs $2600 as configured, has a third-generation Intel Core i7-3770S processor, 16GB of RAM, and a 2TB hard drive (alongside a 32GB SSD boot drive). This all-in-one also has a discrete Nvidia GeForce GT 640M graphics card, built-in Bluetooth 4.0, and a slot-loading DVD-RW/Blu-ray combo drive. The XPS One runs Windows 8 Professional. Performance In PCWorld’s WorldBench 8 benchmark tests, the XPS One scores a very good 91 out of 100. This means that the One is just nine percent slower than our testing model, which sports a third-generation Intel Core i5-3570K desktop processor, 8GB of RAM, and a discrete Nvidia desktop-class graphics card. By comparison, the One has a low voltage, S model processor and an Nvidia GT 640M mobile GPU, which is why it’s a bit slower than our testing model (despite the fact that our testing model has an i5, and not an i7, processor). The XPS One performs well in individual tests, though it’s not quite up to speed with our testing model. It’s quick to start up (20.6 seconds), and reasonably snappy with video and audio encoding (148 seconds and 201.5 seconds, respectively). By comparison, our testing model starts up in 33.5 seconds, and encodes video and audio in 132 seconds and 202.2 seconds, respectively. The One doesn’t perform quite as well in the PCMark 7 productivity test, with a score of 2943 (compared to the testing model’s 4633). To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Link: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2023734/dell-xps-one-review-form-over-function.html