At CES 2022, Dell has revealed a new entry into its XPS series of laptops, the Dell XPS 13 Plus. Together with a more powerful CPU option, this laptop also has an all-new chassis.
The Dell XPS 13 has been one of – if not the – best laptops on the market for years. A brilliant design and excellent performance made it one of the easiest devices to recommend to anyone. But at CES 2022, Dell took this classic design and tried to transform it into something even more portable and modern – and ruined its best laptop completely. The Dell XPS 13 Plus at CES 2022 is Dell’s attempt to make a laptop that was already as thin and light as it needed to be, and make it even thinner by sacrificing utility and accessibility. And because it’s more expensive than a standard XPS 13, you’re essentially paying for less – even if the CPU is going to be marginally faster. It’s cliche at this point to say “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”, but it really applies here. Dell took trends started – and since abandoned – by Apple, and tried to work them into its most iconic product, rather than trying them out on a new product line. And in the process made our favorite line of Ultrabooks, our least favorite. The Dell XPS 13 Plus will be available a little later in 2022, and Dell hasn’t shared much about pricing, only that it will start at $1,199 (around £900, AU$1,600). Given how this is clearly supposed to be an even more premium version of the Dell XPS 13, we’re going to go ahead and say it’s going to be a bit more expensive than other versions of the laptop when you start configuring it with more powerful processors and extra RAM. You do get a higher-power P-series Intel processor with a power budget of 28W, but that likely won’t make a big enough difference in day-to-day performance to be worth it for most people. The Dell XPS 13 Plus is more thin and light than ever before. It measures just 0.60-inches (15.28mm) thick, and weighs in at just 2.73lb (1.24kg). That might sound amazing, and it might even prove so if you need something super lightweight to fit into your bag. But it’s led to plenty of cut features and the implementation of the lamest feature Dell has ever put into a product. The Dell XPS 13 Plus has a Touch Bar. It’s not called a Touch Bar, but rather a “capacitive touch display”, but anyone that has seen a MacBook Pro that’s come out between 2015 and 2019 will recognize it as a Touch Bar, only without the OLED and any actually useful features.
