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Falhófnir

macrumors 603
Original poster
Aug 19, 2017
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So I got he 13 and 15 inch XPS, I’ve had a ton of issues so far with slow booting, I did a fresh install to avoid issues but there’s some hardware and bios issues, I’m having fan noises on idle, hot temps, some throttling, but the slow restarts are getting to me.

trackpad is okay, keyboard great.

the screen seems to have some ghosting that isn’t much different from the MacBook, so I think the whole thin laptop screen industry has gone this way Or something.

debating on keeping the Mac, as calling and dealing with dell support has been to say the least extremely frustrating. they have some issues to sort out with the new units or the ones I’ve gotten.p but the basis of their service is concerning as I don’t have much confidence in them.
will give it another week to decide.
If it's new maybe it's doing something similar to the indexing Apple's computers do once they've been set up or updated? It might settle on its own once that behind the scenes stuff is finished.
 

grmlin

macrumors 65816
Feb 16, 2015
1,110
777
One thing I noticed that would probably drive me crazy: the keyboard layout. END/HOME hidden behind a function key? The cursor block with these half height up down keys. I hated the arrow keys on my 2019 MBP.

We (as a business) also can't test the device for 14 days and send it back if it disappoints. Too bad, no Dell then :/
 

Falhófnir

macrumors 603
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Aug 19, 2017
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XPS 17 reviews are out, Dave Lee suggests the vapour chamber cooling in the 17" isn't as great as he was hoping, though allows for decent sustained performance. Really makes me want to see an AMD version with the 35W H chip!
 
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TSE

macrumors 68040
Jun 25, 2007
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St. Paul, Minnesota
XPS 17 reviews are out, Dave Lee suggests the vapour chamber cooling in the 17" isn't as great as he was hoping, though allows for decent sustained performance. Really makes me want to see an AMD version with the 35W H chip!

I saw that. Overall, big improvements on design, not so much on performance. It's about as expected. No miracles this go around.
[automerge]1592529462[/automerge]
 

Falhófnir

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Aug 19, 2017
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MobileTechReview have reviewed the 15" XPS, sounds like Lisa is generally positive on the changes, though a lot of the limitations from the previous machine seem to carry over (mainly thermals & sustained performance, but that we already knew).
 

TSE

macrumors 68040
Jun 25, 2007
3,998
3,400
St. Paul, Minnesota
MobileTechReview have reviewed the 15" XPS, sounds like Lisa is generally positive on the changes, though a lot of the limitations from the previous machine seem to carry over (mainly thermals & sustained performance, but that we already knew).

Great review as always by Lisa. She's a gem.

I think this is really the limit of Intel rather than Dell's engineering. It actually seems Dell took a step back in the battery department with this redesign - it has a much smaller one with no increase in efficiency. Literally every laptop in this class has the same problems, including the MacBook Pro. The only ones that don't are the ones that are using AMD's latest and greatest. An AMD version of the XPS 15 with a GTX 1650 / 1660 Ti would have been perfect.

Every manufacture should really be trying to leave Intel for the workstations and IT computers where consistency and proven-ness is worth more while using AMD for everything else, because when Apple starts using their CPUs for the Mac, the power-per-watt game is over for Intel, unless they have a trick up their sleeve. I am guessing the only reason manufacturers haven't turned to AMD is that AMD's manufacturing isn't scaled yet.

And if I eat crow and Intel has a trick up their sleeve that they've been hiding for the past 6-7 years and they reveal a 7nm processor that destroys everything out there, I just want to ask everyone if they really want to support a company that does that?
 
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Falhófnir

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Aug 19, 2017
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Great review as always by Lisa. She's a gem.

I think this is really the limit of Intel rather than Dell's engineering. It actually seems Dell took a step back in the battery department with this redesign - it has a much smaller one with no increase in efficiency. Literally every laptop in this class has the same problems, including the MacBook Pro. The only ones that don't are the ones that are using AMD's latest and greatest. An AMD version of the XPS 15 with a GTX 1650 / 1660 Ti would have been perfect.

Every manufacture should really be trying to leave Intel for the workstations and IT computers where consistency and proven-ness is worth more while using AMD for everything else, because when Apple starts using their CPUs for the Mac, the power-per-watt game is over for Intel, unless they have a trick up their sleeve. I am guessing the only reason manufacturers haven't turned to AMD is that AMD's manufacturing isn't scaled yet.

And if I eat crow and Intel has a trick up their sleeve that they've been hiding for the past 6-7 years and they reveal a 7nm processor that destroys everything out there, I just want to ask everyone if they really want to support a company that does that?
I think mainstream AMD is coming, Intel have manufacturers locked into agreements years in advance, Dell will have ordered the chips for these laptops a year or more ago, before the 4000 series debuted. One potential hitch for the likes of Dell could be the prospect of AMD's current performance being an unsustainable flash in the pan - with Intel implicitly making it known they will remember who their friends are if they regain their superlative position (though that is looking ever more unlikely now, as you say if they have a secret silver bullet to get back ahead of the game, it's been so long in the making that it risks being a damp squib by the time it gets to market). In terms of solid pipeline, Tiger Lake catches Intel up to AMD (maybe, just?) but it certainly doesn't get them back out ahead, and they're still more expensive and they're still more power hungry.
 

Alex W.

macrumors 6502
Apr 18, 2020
351
189
Okay my conclusion is this, I returned 5 xps 9500's and 3 17s and all of the 13's in the office.

The following issues
-Trackpads began to fail and work unreliably - their garbage.
-Software BSOD, updates pushed from dell that break the PC.
-Speakers failing, software BSOD
-USB-C Charging issues
-Fan issues
-Battery Drain
-Display / GPU failing
-Hinge Failing

No solutions, buying new product and waiting for parts etc is just BS.


The issue is completely widespread, i've researched and talked to some reviewers on youtube via DM and found out that almost every review you see they are apart of dells private review program -- They are given the laptops to sell and do what they wish with, and in some cases are paid. They are provided engineering qualified product that enters a QA office and is looked over and fixed/corrected before being sent to them. They are told to give a good review while being critical or they will be kicked out of the program.

Basically all the reviews are ******** on these is what a major youtuber told me who has 500k+ views on his review.
Dell is smart, their using youtube reviews in a manipulated manner to screw the consumer over.

After learning this, and having endless problems with my company using these i've gone MBP 16", boot camped them and their perfect zero issues vs the dell. Additionally, ive lost all faith in youtube reviews after this and in the future will buy two competing lines and test them myself.

I've put $35,000+ in finding this out, and learn from my honest advice -- Dell is the worst PC manufacturer to support besides Huawei. Their customer service is garbage and dishonest. Their product is all show and little long term follow through, these are not professional units -- these laptops will fail within a number of years. They have cheaped out on almost every aspect of these laptops, from PCB Components, Battery, PCB Design, Power Design, Physical Long Term Design.

For the price MBP is a better value. Dont make the mistake i did. Thankfully i returned what i could and am donating the rest of the XPS's to a local school where these issues are less vital.
 
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sbarton

macrumors 6502
May 4, 2001
263
65
Okay my conclusion is this, I returned 5 xps 9500's and 3 17s and all of the 13's in the office.

The following issues
-Trackpads began to fail and work unreliably - their garbage.
-Software BSOD, updates pushed from dell that break the PC.
-Speakers failing, software BSOD
-USB-C Charging issues
-Fan issues
-Battery Drain
-Display / GPU failing
-Hinge Failing


I agree that a lot of the reviews are crap, but the handful of reviewers i trust, plus my own experience owning the 15 version is in stark contrast to your experiences. I have none of those issues and the quality of my unit is on par with my 2017 mpp (don't own a 16). In fact even in full tilt gaming, the fans are much quieter than my mbp.
 

sbarton

macrumors 6502
May 4, 2001
263
65
I agree that a lot of the reviews are crap, but the handful of reviewers i trust, plus my own experience owning the 15 version is in stark contrast to your experiences. I have none of those issues and the quality of my unit is on par with my 2017 mpp (don't own a 16). In fact even in full tilt gaming, the fans are much quieter than my mbp. The trackpad is just as high quality build-wise and i would say 95% in tracking which is about as good as it gets with Windows laptops. Speakers Failing? From a software side, sounds like you are not prepared to manage maintain a windows machine either if you are having those types of issues. Bottom line is that part of using a pc requires higher maintenance than a mac...You need to know how to manage your updates and restore points, etc. What sort of charging issue? There have been no widespread reports that i'm aware of of hinge, gpu, or displays failing. Build of mine is just as solid as my mpb and i'm not gentle with my laptops either.
 

Alex W.

macrumors 6502
Apr 18, 2020
351
189
I agree that a lot of the reviews are crap, but the handful of reviewers i trust, plus my own experience owning the 15 version is in stark contrast to your experiences. I have none of those issues and the quality of my unit is on par with my 2017 mpp (don't own a 16). In fact even in full tilt gaming, the fans are much quieter than my mbp.


In boot camp I set the Max cpu to 99% in battery profile to stop turbo and I never hear the fans anymore, while gaming the onboard speakers generally overpower the fan noise making it none existent. Just tested, the Dell's I had the body's would flex in strange ways causing fan noise due to hardware flex. If they were in a bag flexing due to books etc the flex fan noise would come and go.

Overall, there's just too many issues to justify the cost. MBP I did an experiment and liquid metal'd one, put heat resistant silicon around the heatsink and die to prevent any leaking dropped temps 15-20c while maxing the system so this is an option.

Also did a retim with AS5 and this dropped temps 9c so this may be a better option.

Besides this, I think long term for anyone doing real work the Dell's will cause an issue these laptops were crippling my company with downtime. And their brand new, I had one of my engineers go over a unit and spec out everything and their using under spec resistors, capacitors and inductors on the PCB, like the entire system is under engineered to fail was his opinion.

The usb-c isn't optically isolated either so you can easily kill these units; weird design with their USBC on the right side and left side use some knockoff chips that cause a slew of issues from charging, adapters not detecting unless you trigger it with a usb-c based storage device etc. Right side has alot of sketchy behaviour.


Lenovo, Apple, Microsoft are better options.

Dell = Asus = Acer - Avoid these.
 
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nikster0029

macrumors 6502a
Jul 21, 2010
699
458
Okay my conclusion is this, I returned 5 xps 9500's and 3 17s and all of the 13's in the office.

The following issues
-Trackpads began to fail and work unreliably - their garbage.
-Software BSOD, updates pushed from dell that break the PC.
-Speakers failing, software BSOD
-USB-C Charging issues
-Fan issues
-Battery Drain
-Display / GPU failing
-Hinge Failing

No solutions, buying new product and waiting for parts etc is just BS.


The issue is completely widespread, i've researched and talked to some reviewers on youtube via DM and found out that almost every review you see they are apart of dells private review program -- They are given the laptops to sell and do what they wish with, and in some cases are paid. They are provided engineering qualified product that enters a QA office and is looked over and fixed/corrected before being sent to them. They are told to give a good review while being critical or they will be kicked out of the program.

Basically all the reviews are ******** on these is what a major youtuber told me who has 500k+ views on his review.
Dell is smart, their using youtube reviews in a manipulated manner to screw the consumer over.

After learning this, and having endless problems with my company using these i've gone MBP 16", boot camped them and their perfect zero issues vs the dell. Additionally, ive lost all faith in youtube reviews after this and in the future will buy two competing lines and test them myself.

I've put $35,000+ in finding this out, and learn from my honest advice -- Dell is the worst PC manufacturer to support besides Huawei. Their customer service is garbage and dishonest. Their product is all show and little long term follow through, these are not professional units -- these laptops will fail within a number of years. They have cheaped out on almost every aspect of these laptops, from PCB Components, Battery, PCB Design, Power Design, Physical Long Term Design.

For the price MBP is a better value. Dont make the mistake i did. Thankfully i returned what i could and am donating the rest of the XPS's to a local school where these issues are less vital.

Thank you for saving me from the hassle
 
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Newfiejudd

macrumors regular
Jul 8, 2010
217
26
Okay my conclusion is this, I returned 5 xps 9500's and 3 17s and all of the 13's in the office.

The following issues
-Trackpads began to fail and work unreliably - their garbage.
-Software BSOD, updates pushed from dell that break the PC.
-Speakers failing, software BSOD
-USB-C Charging issues
-Fan issues
-Battery Drain
-Display / GPU failing
-Hinge Failing

No solutions, buying new product and waiting for parts etc is just BS.


The issue is completely widespread, i've researched and talked to some reviewers on youtube via DM and found out that almost every review you see they are apart of dells private review program -- They are given the laptops to sell and do what they wish with, and in some cases are paid. They are provided engineering qualified product that enters a QA office and is looked over and fixed/corrected before being sent to them. They are told to give a good review while being critical or they will be kicked out of the program.

Basically all the reviews are ******** on these is what a major youtuber told me who has 500k+ views on his review.
Dell is smart, their using youtube reviews in a manipulated manner to screw the consumer over.

After learning this, and having endless problems with my company using these i've gone MBP 16", boot camped them and their perfect zero issues vs the dell. Additionally, ive lost all faith in youtube reviews after this and in the future will buy two competing lines and test them myself.

I've put $35,000+ in finding this out, and learn from my honest advice -- Dell is the worst PC manufacturer to support besides Huawei. Their customer service is garbage and dishonest. Their product is all show and little long term follow through, these are not professional units -- these laptops will fail within a number of years. They have cheaped out on almost every aspect of these laptops, from PCB Components, Battery, PCB Design, Power Design, Physical Long Term Design.

For the price MBP is a better value. Dont make the mistake i did. Thankfully i returned what i could and am donating the rest of the XPS's to a local school where these issues are less vital.
Sorry to revive a dead thread but that has not been the case for us. We have the 9500/9310 rolled out to our engineering and field deployment teams. Besides for a few machines with the defective trackpad (and accidental damage) we have not seen any of these widespread issues you are reporting, of course we had some issues but nothing widespread as you have reported. Our engineering teams are also field staff, meaning planes, trains and helicopters in the worst possible environments imaginable. Hell most of the team being the geeks they are have added a second SSD and are running Linux or Mac OS. We even have operators and wellsite supervisors utilizing the 13" version with none of these complaints you speak of. The team wanted something with a good screen while being small and portable so we went this way. For reference we are a privately owned company with ~148 employees in multiple operating countries. I will stress we are an oilfield operator/service company and no one treats machines worst than our team members. From the Australian outback, to the middle east deserts all the ways to north slope of Alaska and every oilfield in between and we have not seen these widespread issues with these systems. I have been a mac user for a long time and will always say the longest lasting system for me has always been a macbook pro, but I seriously can't fault these new XPS systems. I handed down my 16" MBP (it was a replacement for multiple keyboard failures) to my daughter as I was using windows more these days and honestly the same annoyances with the MBP's is there with the XPS systems. Ports and a god awful webcam. So I would say pick your poison, as even MBP's have serious professional user issues. Even with Cvid running wild I still travel and for reliability my 9500 has been excellent. I always carry my Ipad Pro, my XPS and my iPhone and I have never been let down or stranded yet.
 
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Falhófnir

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Aug 19, 2017
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11th gen upgrades have now been released, Dave Lee's review of the 17" below. I agree Dell have surpassed what Apple is doing with the MBP on design, and a big part of that is the minimal bezel aesthetic. I was somewhat agnostic on this trend, but I think these just look so modern that you look at the MBP and it's nice but kinda dated looking. It's also a shame about the trackpad issues persisting. It's good to see the thermal issues have been addressed, hopefully Dell will relent and add AMD options, I wonder if one of their lower 35W TDP CPUs would allow a 3070 in the 17", or at the very least let the 3060 stretch its legs more!

 
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GoldfishRT

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Jul 24, 2014
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I am strongly considering the 15. There is a 3.5k OLED 16:10 option which seems killer, and the 3050Ti, even in it's nuked 45w form is a pretty substantial upgrade over the 1650Ti. And the frost white looks money. I had a pretty bad experience with my 9560 and 9570 however so I'm very cautious of Dell products in that sense. But they are extremely cool devices. The '18 MBP annoyingly continues to work perfectly, despite all the things I don't particularly like about it.

The 17" with a high dpi OLED option and the 3060 at the right price would be the most tempting option on the market - if all goes to plan and my life becomes something nomadic again.
 
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TSE

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Jun 25, 2007
3,998
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St. Paul, Minnesota
I am strongly considering the 15. There is a 3.5k OLED 16:10 option which seems killer, and the 3050Ti, even in it's nuked 45w form is a pretty substantial upgrade over the 1650Ti. And the frost white looks money. I had a pretty bad experience with my 9560 and 9570 however so I'm very cautious of Dell products in that sense. But they are extremely cool devices. The '18 MBP annoyingly continues to work perfectly, despite all the things I don't particularly like about it.

The 17" with a high dpi OLED option and the 3060 at the right price would be the most tempting option on the market - if all goes to plan and my life becomes something nomadic again.

After having an "OK" experience with my 9570, I would have to get an XPS at discount and it would have to provide me the best bang-for-buck to pull the trigger on one.

The design is top-notch, some of the build quality and dependability issues aren't. And I'm still pissed off that Dell BIOS updates disabled undervolting in a laptop that has issues with heat two years after it's release. It's a trade off that I am still happy with the choice I made. I've been working with this one for three years and it's made me a lot of money. If I HAD to get an XPS, I would get the 17 with the 3060 and i7. The 17s have vapor chambers and CPUs max out at 83 degrees celsius, the 15s have inferior GPUs, not vapor chambers, and their CPUs still get into the 90s. It's a no brainer imo.
 

Falhófnir

macrumors 603
Original poster
Aug 19, 2017
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I am strongly considering the 15. There is a 3.5k OLED 16:10 option which seems killer, and the 3050Ti, even in it's nuked 45w form is a pretty substantial upgrade over the 1650Ti. And the frost white looks money. I had a pretty bad experience with my 9560 and 9570 however so I'm very cautious of Dell products in that sense. But they are extremely cool devices. The '18 MBP annoyingly continues to work perfectly, despite all the things I don't particularly like about it.

The 17" with a high dpi OLED option and the 3060 at the right price would be the most tempting option on the market - if all goes to plan and my life becomes something nomadic again.
I keep getting tempted by the 17", the problem is fitting it into my usage pattern. It would probably be mostly a replacement for my now ageing gaming laptop - I don't need absolutely top performance, and what D2D says above makes it seem more than capable for the games I'd use it for... but being so expensive it would probably mean I would have to forego a new MBP and use it for working on as well, which I'm not sure of. Ultimately think the MBP and an actual gaming laptop is more suitable for me, but it's a beautiful machine and I'd love the 16:10 17" 4K display! Think the long wait for the 16"Apple Silicon MacBook Pro is what has me weighing it up so much.
 

Alex W.

macrumors 6502
Apr 18, 2020
351
189
Yea right, look at the XPS subreddit, the issues people have are insane.
Its not a quality product, its low end and you will have endless issues.


You have no idea, the apple atleast works zero issues.
They cant even fix a funadmental issue like trackpads because their margins on tooling arnt paid off yet.

Dells are not great, and with the M1X, i think its game over.
 

jrichards1408

macrumors 6502a
Nov 4, 2016
615
194
Yea right, look at the XPS subreddit, the issues people have are insane.
Its not a quality product, its low end and you will have endless issues.


You have no idea, the apple atleast works zero issues.
They cant even fix a funadmental issue like trackpads because their margins on tooling arnt paid off yet.

Dells are not great, and with the M1X, i think its game over.
ThinkPad X1 says hello
 

michael9891

Cancelled
Sep 26, 2016
3,060
3,945
Yea right, look at the XPS subreddit, the issues people have are insane.
Its not a quality product, its low end and you will have endless issues.


You have no idea, the apple atleast works zero issues.
They cant even fix a funadmental issue like trackpads because their margins on tooling arnt paid off yet.

Dells are not great, and with the M1X, i think its game over.
Had the 2020 XPS 15 since October and had zero issues. So for me, it's been a quality product.

In case you didn't notice, M1X is only available on Mac OS. So someone who wants a Windows machine isn't going to buy a Mac.
 
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Falhófnir

macrumors 603
Original poster
Aug 19, 2017
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Had the 2020 XPS 15 since October and had zero issues. So for me, it's been a quality product.

In case you didn't notice, M1X is only available on Mac OS. So someone who wants a Windows machine isn't going to buy a Mac.
People online do seem to have a tendency to overestimate how widespread manufacturing defects are if they happen to have a bad experience with a unit. For the XPS‘s it seems there’s a genuine issue with the trackpads being loose (and also speaker issues on the 17” in particular), but then we’ve just had 4 generations of MacBooks with auto-fail keyboards, dodgy display cables and speaker issues so I think it’s a bit facetious to suggest you’re somehow automatically better off with Apple. Maybe in terms of returns/ replacements if you do have an issue, but not in terms of having the issue in the first place.
 
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