Dell XPS L502X review

Just as impressive was the score in our Call of Duty 4 benchmark. The 900MHz Nvidia GeForce GT 540M graphics card may not be as powerful as a desktop card, but it managed 38fps in Call of Duty 4, which should be fast enough for most 3D games – though not at the screen’s native resolution. The latest first-person shooters might require lower graphical settings to get playable frame rates, but older games and more sedate genres should run fine.

If we had any complaints, it’s that the 15.6in screen simply isn’t big enough to make the most of its Full HD resolution in video playback. However, you’ll appreciate that detail in more sedate moments, like when working on a digital image. You can always attach a larger screen via HDMI or DisplayPort. There are only three USB ports, admittedly, but one is a shared eSATA/USB port and the other two are USB 3.0; plus they’re spread out, with one at the back and one on each side.

Build quality overall is excellent, and the case feels solidly built. We especially like the metal panel around the keyboard, which should stop the laptop from getting shabby-looking where your wrists rest while typing. The keyboard itself is firm and has comfortably moulded keys, and the action is perfect – light, but with a crisp bite at the top of the keystroke that provides excellent feedback for touch-typists. The touchpad is large and responsive, with two large buttons that also have a light action.

A battery life of six hours and 19 minutes is impressive, but the 9-cell battery stuck out from the bottom, adding almost 20mm to the height and a fair bit to the weight as well. Mind you, it also angled the keyboard comfortably. As it stands, we wouldn’t want to regularly carry its 3kg bulk around; which makes the long battery life rather moot. You could opt for the smaller 6-cell battery, which makes the laptop neater and a little lighter, but would still provide over four hours of charge.

Any criticism is just nitpicking, though. Where it really counts, we’d go so far as to say that the L502X is the best 15.6in laptop we’ve ever seen. It’s key weakness is the lack of a larger screen to show off the beautiful RGB LED colours and the Full HD resolution – the inevitable reworked Dell XPS 17 will solve these problems of course.

At £929 it’s not cheap, but when it goes on sale you should be able to configure it without the Blu-ray drive or with a slower graphics card – no loss if you don’t watch HD movies or don’t play games. If you have the money, however, we don’t think you can buy a better laptop, so it wins our Ultimate award.

We have now received a Dell E-value code for this specification. This is 123456-N00X5M59, and you can enter it now on the Dell E-value page. Better still, the price has been dropped from the original £999 to £929, making it even greater value.