Dell has always been a pretty consistent name when it comes to the consumer computing end of the spectrum. They may not necessarily have the most powerful machines or the sexiest products, but they’ve done a good job at keeping the prices reasonable while still offering you a decent package. And that same fundamental philosophy is continuing with the Dell Inspiron 14z. It’s a step above the most entry-level range of laptops, giving you a “thin and light” laptop that’s still “packed with power.”
Specifications and Features
As can be expected with just about every other Dell laptop, the Inspiron 14z comes in a huge variety of configurations. For the purposes of this review, we were provided with a unit that runs somewhere in the middle of the model’s spectrum, if not leaning toward the slightly higher end.
Pricing starts at about $600, but this particular model lists closer to $770. For that price, you get a Intel Core i5-2430M (2.4GHz) processor, Intel Graphics 3000 (integrated), Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, 6GB dual-channel DDR3-1333 SDRAM, 14-inch (1366×768) LED display with Tur-Life, and a 500GB SATA hard drive at 5400rpm.
You can spec down to a Core i3 or reduce the amount of RAM to save some cash, should you choose, but the chassis remains the same. You still get a webcam, USB 3.0 ports, a dual-layer DVD+/-R optical drive, and so on. The standard six-cell battery is rated at 65 WHr.
What’s in the Box?
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-K_yWIU-t8?hd=1&w=500&h=284]
You may have caught my Dell unboxing video a short while back, but in case you missed it, I have embedded the video above for your viewing pleasure.
There’s not much that’s exciting about the box and contents. In addition to the notebook PC itself, you get the power supply and power cable. The video might be useful, though, for you to get a better sense of dimensions, layout, and feature arrangement.
First Impressions
The Dell Inspiron 14z is pretty much what you would expect from a Dell laptop at this price range. It’s a step up from the cheapest of the entry-level notebooks, but there’s no way that it’s going to compete with anything in the slightly higher range.
The build quality is, to put it nicely, sufficient at best. Dell has marketed the Inspiron 14z as “slim and light,” but it’s probably not as skinny or as lightweight as you may have hoped. One thing that I did notice was that the chassis felt too flimsy. The upper lid (with the screen) could easily be flexed, for example.
The other thing that hit me immediately was the “junk in the trunk” look. Behind the screen is a significant “bump” from the lower portion of the notebook. This is quite unsightly, to be honest, and takes away from what would have otherwise been reasonably clean lines. All that said, I did like the metallic finish and the overall attractiveness of this low to mid-tier notebook.
Keyboard and Trackpad
As is the fashion these days, the Inspiron 14z makes use of a “chiclet” keyboard, which is sometimes also called an island keyboard. Much like the Samsung Series 9, this keyboard offers just right amount of key travel (in the context of a laptop) and the layout works quite well. I am pleased to see both the left and right shift keys are full sized; the smaller shift keys have always been a pet peeve of mine.
I can’t say that I’m quite as happy with the trackpad, though. While the trackpad itself is reasonably responsive and you can use it for certain multi-touch gestures like scrolling, the two mouse buttons underneath are far too stiff. You have to press pretty hard, which is why I found myself tapping the trackpad rather than using these buttons. I prefer the mouse buttons to have the same kind of clicking travel as keyboard keys.
As an aside, you’ll also notice that the metallic palm rest areas pick up fingerprints and palm prints very easily. You’ll want to keep a cleaning cloth on hand to wipe that down, as well as the lid of the laptop itself.
Display and Viewing Angles
For the most part, you use a notebook PC looking straight onto the screen. That makes sense. However, it’s still a pain when the viewing angles on said screen offer a very narrow “sweet spot” for visibility. Unfortunately, that seems to be the case with the Inspiron 14z.
I understand that a laptop isn’t going to have 178-degree viewing, but with as little as a 30-degree deviation from straight-on viewing, I experienced significant loss in quality and “washing out” of the image on the screen. You can see that in the image above, taken during the Street Fighter IV benchmark (which I’ll get to in a moment). This can prove very frustrating when you have a “hey check this out” moment with your nearby friends.
Similarly, the vertical viewing angle on the 14-inch display left something to be desired. The same kind of “washing out” was experienced at the same minor deviations from a “straight on” viewing angle. The now standard 1366×768 resolution isn’t the best either; my four-year old Inspiron 640m had 1440×900 and it was similarly $600 (or so) at the time.
General Everyday Performance
This notebook was never intended to be powerhouse. That said, despite the integrated graphics, you still get a second-gen Core i5 processor and six gigs of RAM in this configuration. That’s not shabby at all for a consumer-gear laptop in the low to mid-tier range.
For my part, everyday performance was perfectly adequate. Web surfing, media viewing, and even lightweight video editing was handled without too much trouble. The bootup time was a little longer than I would have liked though, especially the time after the login screen (a solid 30-45 seconds before the hard drive was idle again).
Not surprisingly, the Dell Stage user interface is loaded on this Windows machine too, but I never really used it. This loads automatically at bootup with large icons on the home screen, giving you quick access to games, photos, music, magazines, and so forth. Realistically, I don’t anticipate too many consumers would use that, resorting instead to the usual Windows way of doing things. This isn’t a tablet.
Battery Life Test
When using this notebook under normal conditions, the battery meter told me that it was good for about seven hours. That’s with fairly lightweight use.
To really test the battery life on the Inspiron 14z with the standard six-cell battery, I allowed it to fully boot up before removing the charger. Then, I loaded a 720p HD movie (about 90 minutes in length) in Windows Media Player and allowed it to play full screen at 70% brightness and 50% volume, set to loop constantly. The Wi-Fi radio was kept on, but the Internet connection was dormant.
Under these conditions, the laptop lasted a total of 5 hours and 30 minutes before automatically hibernating (the power options were set to do this at <10% battery life).
Benchmark: Street Fighter IV
This certainly isn’t a gaming notebook, but the Street Fighter IV benchmark offers a good way of seeing the graphical processing prowess of a machine like this. I ran the benchmark under two configurations: one at the higher end and one at the lower end.
At the higher end, I set anti-aliasing to 4x, a resolution of 1280×720, parallel rendering, and “high” quality settings for models, backgrounds, shadows, motion blur, and particles. At this level, the game would be unplayable. The Inspiron 14z got a rank of E with an average frame rate of 16.83fps.
I really wasn’t able to get a more playable frame rate until I severely dialed down the settings. This involved no anti-aliasing, 1024×768 resolution, low quality for models and background, and “off” for shadows and motion blur. With that, the rank was A with an average frame rate of 58.10fps.
Benchmark: PCMark05
A total score for PCMark was not able to be calculated, but the CPU, memory, and graphics were rated at 8313, 8517, and 5035, respectively. This is with the full benchmark as run by PCMark05 Professional Edition.
The CPU and memory scores handily beat something like the Asus G51VX, but the graphics score is handily won by the Asus. To be fair, the Asus had a 2GHz Core2Duo and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260M.
Benchmark: 3DMark06
Using 3DMark06 Professional Edition, the Inspiron 14z achieved an overall 3DMark score of 4375. Again comparing to the Asus G51VX (8793 3DMarks), the Dell simply can’t compete with dedicated graphics. That’s to be expected.
Benchmark: CrystalDiskMark 3.01
The 500GB hard drive in this laptop performs quite well. We tested it with CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1 x64 and found that the sequential read and write speeds on 1000MB blocks was rated at 82.07MB/s and 80.81MB/s, respectively.
Closing Thoughts
What happens when you look at the low to mid-range of consumer laptops is that these units end up with something of an identity crisis. They cheap out on certain aspects to keep the price low, but they spec up in other regards to improve performance and a level of quality.
And that’s precisely what happens with the Dell Inspiron 14z. You get that nice brushed finish that’s cool to the touch, but you also get a flimsy build for the lid. You get a more than adequate second-gen Core i5 processor, but you get stuck with integrated graphics. There’s USB 3.0 on board, but you also have an unsightly bump in the back where the battery sits. Performance is equally middle of the road.
At the $600-$800 price range, you have a lot of options when it comes to consumer laptops and there’s not much in the Inspiron 14z that would really make me want to recommend this over a suitable competitor. Shop around accordingly if you’re in this market.
Pros
- Comfortable chiclet-style island keyboard
- Two USB 3.0 ports
- Good battery life
- Almost premium feel with brushed aluminum finish
Cons
- Flimsy screen lid
- Flaps for ports don’t close in place easily
- Less than impressive graphics performance
- Unattractive bump in the back
Overall Rating: 6.5 / 10.0
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