Dell has finally found the magical balance between portability and screen real estate with the 2015 Dell XPS 13. With a 13.3-inch screen but the footprint of an 11 inch machine, this laptop is looking to be the first real competition for Apple's MacBook Air.
Inside the laptop, iFixit breaks down and open the inner workings for Dell's ultra-light laptop.
Although it is being touted as "Dell's MacBook Air," the exterior of the XPS 13 is nothing like a ripoff of the popular Apple laptop. In the name of Do-it-Yourself fixing, the folks over at iFixit put it upon themselves to open up the machine and create a blueprint for all who want to know what's going on under the hood and try their hands at repairing their own laptops.
On the outside, the XPS 13's screen is almost borderless, which is what allows the bigger screen real estate despite the smaller and slimmer body. The machine still has plenty of ports available -- 2 USB ports on the side and a Card slot - a feature which is sorely missing in the Apple MacBook Air.
Reportedly, the keyboard is also comfortable even for those with larger hands, although the backspace key is a tad smaller than usual.
"It's a good keyboard," said former Editor-in-Chief of MobileBurn.com, Dan Seifert.
The side-mounted speakers of the XPS 13 are also said to be up to par with bigger laptop models. Complaints, however, about the laptop include a mostly unusable trackpad, poor battery life, and an awkwardly placed webcam which give users unflattering worm's-eye-view shots when in a video call.
Still, experts say that Dell has brought the laptop design movement forward by great leaps with the innovations they put in the XPS 13. Apple's new rumored MacBook Air major redesign is actually expected to incorporate some of these changes that Dell has made.
Inside the machine, let's have a look at the in-depth teardown prepared by iFixit.
