13 ms·

Dell XPS 15 9560 Review

174 points by mcone 9y ago

NedIsakoff 9y ago
It looks good, but seriously one big thing that's a no-no for me is only HDMI1.4 (not HDMI2.0). It means that you can't do 4K@60Hz.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > seriously one big thing that's a no-no for me is only HDMI1.4 (not HDMI2.0). It means that you can't do 4K@60Hz. You can, using the Thunderbolt 3 port. I run my XPS 13 at 4K@60Hz using the mini-DP port, and Thunderbolt 3 is capable of that and more.
  - ClassyJacket 9y ago
    Not to a TV, tho, which makes it a deal breaker for me. They should put a proper HDMI port.
    - chimeracoder 9y ago
      > Not to a TV, tho, which makes it a deal breaker for me. They should put a proper HDMI port. I'd rather have an extra Thunderbolt 3/USB-C port, to be honest. HDMI 2.0 is bigger and clunkier as a port, and Thunderbolt 3 is strictly better as a protocol (we're not even talking about HDMI 2.1). Maybe if you're talking HDMI 2.1, but the protocol can still be carried over a USB-C connector anyway, so keeping the standard connector interface is preferable in my books. My bet is that TVs will soon start to have USB-C ports built-in (with whichever protocols they're willing to support). In the meantime, an adapter will do the trick; it can even live with the TV, since that's not meant to be portable.
      - ClassyJacket 9y ago
        Sorry I shouldn't have said port. They should've put in HDMI support. Over the USBC port. I agree that extra ports are superfluous.
    - JamesMcMinn 9y ago
      Well, yes to a TV with a cheap USB-C -> HDMI 2.0 dongle.
- JoshTriplett 9y ago
  The USB-C port provides Thunderbolt/DisplayPort, which can easily do 4K@60.
- foepys 9y ago
  Even Kaby Lake only supports HDMI 1.4, so there is no Intel-based laptop without a dedicated GPU on the market that is capable of HDMI 2.0. Your only choice is DisplayPort which you can use here via Thunderbolt 3.
chimeracoder 9y ago
I've used the XPS 13 Developer Edition (ie, running Linux) as my daily driver since 2012. For me, it's been way more reliable than either the ThinkPad X1 or even the MacBook Pro, both of which I used as my work laptops during that same time (running Linux and OS X respectively). I've been hoping to upgrade to the 15-inch for a while, because I like larger screens. It's nice to see the review of this point release version.
- clvx 9y ago
  I have the xps13 2016 dev edition too, and it's a solid laptop. Let me ask you which dongle do you use to connect to external hdmi monitors? I got this one[1] a while ago, but it doesn't output more than 800x600. I use the wd15 at home without issues, but it's not suitable for traveling. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Adapter-Type-Ethernet-470-ABQN/dp/B012DT6KW2 https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Adapter-Type-Ethernet-470-ABQN/d...
  - rootbear 9y ago
    I have the same laptop and I'm happy with it, but I'm not happy with the dongle madness that universal adoption of USB C is foisting on us. I also want a reliable travel dongle for external HDMI for this laptop but the reviews of the units I've looked at are not encouraging. The current obsession with thinness (looking at YOU, Apple) is forcing useful connectors off the main system board onto expensive, unreliable dongles. Yuck.
    - marsRoverDev 9y ago
      I have the VicTsing 1080p USB C to HDMI dongle and it works fine on Ubuntu and Windows 10. The standard dell one doesn't seem to work as well on both (yeah...).
    - neverminder 9y ago
      I don't really understand this adversity towards USB Type-C as a single connector for everything. I was around when pretty much every single device had it's own dedicated port and it looked like a snake nest under a desk until USB came along. Yeah, LPT1 for printer, PS/2 for mouse and keyboard, VGA for monitor, etc. We're in a transitional period now to something better, so some people will need dongles for a while and I don't think it's a big deal.
wslh 9y ago
If you want to buy one you should extend your analysis beyond the hardware specs because the software and operating systems are not ready yet. I can give the example of the latest XPS 13 2-1 where Office applications like Outlook cannot recognize a monitor with a different resolution and the fonts are blurred. Look for example at https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Office-apps-appear-the-wrong-size-or-blurry-on-external-monitors-bc9f7279-4e42-4b15-a949-46ab8bcfe44f https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Office-apps-appear-... high DPI is a whole issue. I can give many other examples with drivers support. For example, if I unplug the notebook from the dock the audio playback doesn't work again if I don't reboot the computer or remove/reinstall the driver. It would ve nice to hear about a critical analysis in Linux.
- oulu2006 9y ago
  Very true, the previous XPS 15 had huge problems with the Killer NIC card because the drivers for it took months to stabilise and its only recently been that a driver update has made the Wifi somewhat stable and the machine has stopped crashing every few days. What other people seem to have done is get Dell to swap the Killer NIC with an Intel one which has much better driver support.
  - masklinn 9y ago
    Colleague recently bought one of these, has a Killer NIC, still not stable, machine hard crashes every time they boot a VM.
    - dz0ny 9y ago
      Intel card is the one recommended. Even Dell uses it in Linux pre-installed version of XPS. I don't know what these guys are doing but even in Windows, I would get IRQ_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL after deep sleep.
    - qyv 9y ago
      FYI: Don't use the killer drivers, let windows install it's own driver.
  - 9y ago
remotebug 9y ago
That looks like an amazing machine. Is it the same as in this review https://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS-15-9560-i7-7700HQ-UHD-Laptop-Review.200648.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS-15-9560-i7-7700HQ-UHD... from 4 months ago? I had lots of annoyance with a previous Optimus based notebook. How has the situation of bumblebee and primusrun and dualbooting improved in the past two years?
- pricechild 9y ago
  I've given up on bumblebee. I have upgraded an Ubuntu laptop over a few years and every upgrade it broke, requiring some new incantation to fix it the next time. I don't think it's considered the future? I believe the future is called "Prime Synchronisation", announced a few years ago. Good luck getting it to work though: https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/957814/prime-and-prime-synchronization/ https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/957814/prime-and-pr... I gave up after a while. We're probably nearing the time when I'll give all the methods another go, but currently I'm back into the "change setting and log out + in" camp. As an aside, bumblebee also seems to break my i3 environment... I get hangs & magic sysreq won't recover. I've had to go back to the default DE.
- JoshTriplett 9y ago
  > I had lots of annoyance with a previous Optimus based notebook. How has the situation of bumblebee and primusrun and dualbooting improved in the past two years? Very slightly, but you're better off getting a notebook that actually has FOSS graphics drivers, for a much more stable and reliable experience. It's unfortunate that you can't upgrade the XPS15 to the 4K display or a quad-core processor without getting the nVidia graphics along with it. IIRC, some previous models included 4K configurations without that.
jarym 9y ago
I've all but given up hope on Apple bothering with 32Gb RAM. Been researching the Dell alternatives (XPS and Precision) for a couple of months now. Very tempting machines indeed. I just want to see one in real life to see what the build quality feels like. Pssst.. Mr Schiller... it seems it is possible to stick 32Gb of RAM into a laptop AND have decent battery life. Well, that is unless you're intent on giving your products anorexia which it seems you are. </end rant>
- marsRoverDev 9y ago
  I own a Dell XPS 13 and it seems to be fine build quality wise. Others have not been so lucky. To be honest though, if I had the budget and Apple weren't being ridiculous with the specs I'd still consider a mac a much better development machine; specifically due to Adobe's refusal to port photoshop to ubuntu. If you do not have any need for photoshop, then XPS developer edition is much better value. My only concern with the dell line is that drivers really are a problem. For some reason, the audio works perfectly fine under Ubuntu and is really half baked on Windows 10 (with the newest drivers from dell). It's like upside down bizarro world.
- manyxcxi 9y ago
  I'm in the same boat. I have a serious analysis paralysis when it comes to figuring out what my next laptop will be (assuming the MBP keeps hardware specs relatively similar). I just don't know how to find a good laptop model that will definitely run trouble free with a Linux distro. I really like OS X because of the *nix like OS with a high level of 'just works'. I absolutely won't go back to Windows, my workflow is so far beyond it- so what're my best resources for finding a high spec laptop that will be compatible with a modern Linux distro? I've got Windows 7 and Mint running on an old Lenovo T430 (pretty sure it's a 430) and Ubuntu 16.10 on my old 2009 MBP after Apple stopped shipping OS updates for it. Excluding the fact they're on old hardware, I still don't think they 'just work' enough. Power save, WiFi, graphics drivers, fan control, all things that took a LOT of fiddling. Don't really love Ubuntu's desktop either.
- rayiner 9y ago
  Did you read the review? The Surface Book (which uses LPDDR3 and has the same 16GB limit) gets double the run time per watt-hour of battery.
masklinn 9y ago
> They’ve opted to go with the same Killer Wireless-AC 1535 as they use in the smaller XPS 13. FWIW this NIC is a huge liability, wifi instability is common and it will bring some machines down hard (bluescreens/kernel panics, just check /r/dell). Dell US apparently has instructions to replace this POS by a compatible Intel NIC (7200 or 8000 series) if you have issues and complaint, that seems not to be the case for Dell EU. An Intel NIC costs $20~30, some folks just order a 8260/8265 at the same time as the laptop and install it before even booting.
- nonamechicken 9y ago
  This is what I don't get. Don't they do basic testing before releasing these?
- rocky1138 9y ago
  I have a Killer NIC in my MSI gaming laptop. Opening the Killer wifi desktop configuration app would bluescreen my desktop every time :( The only thing that worked was uninstalling all Killer software and just letting Windows install the wifi driver.
neverminder 9y ago
XPS is great, having said that I'm waiting for one with USB Type-C charging only and as far as I'm concerned it's time and all sockets should be USB Type-C. I have my Chromebook Pixel for 2 years now and I got used to plugging in a charger from either side.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
bhouston 9y ago
This is my current laptop and I love it. I finally replaced my desktop PC with a laptop. I use it with a 4K 32" monitor via the docking station (I have the exact same setup at work and at home, I just bring the laptop with me each day.) Having a single machine saves me so much time regarding the complex development setup. I have a dual boot setup with Ubuntu and Windows with no issues. I bought it for $1699 CAD for the 7700HQ + Full HD Screen (not 4K) + GTX 1050 + 256GB HD + 16GB RAM and immediately upgraded the disk to 1TB and the ram to 32GB.
- markeissler 9y ago
  Which display and which dock?
rtnyftxx 9y ago
I tried the XPS 15 Kaby Lake UHD touch version - coil whine - ctrl key on the most left part of the keyboard - sound - no notch for opening - fan noise - led bleeding - touchpad - surface coating + touch display + UHD/GPU/RAM/CPU
trzeci 9y ago
Hi, I've had lots of problems with the previous version of XPS15 - 9550 (More info @ https://trzeci.eu/dell-xps-15-9550-was-the-most-problematic-device-for-me/ https://trzeci.eu/dell-xps-15-9550-was-the-most-problematic-... ) It was included: problem with CPU and random freezes, Coil Whine, Swollen Battery, SSD problem and problem with misaligned Jack port with a hole in case. In total, my device was repaired 3 times (within 10 months) and from the original device I have a case, touch-pad and screen only. I'm not here to complain, because after the battery fix was done, it works perfectly. The Dell Service is super helpful and reactive, D2D warranty is just awesome. My question is: Have somebody seen any indicators of problems listed above in 9560?
- jrimbault 9y ago
  Did you get yours near the launch ? Maybe it was a manufacturing issue ? Hopefully ?
  - stinos 9y ago
    They're definitely not all of them that bad, a colleague has one which functions perfectly and overall reviews seem on the positive side. But yeah, once in a while sh*t happens. E.g. I've had/used multiple Dell devices without any problems whatsoever but I recommended some Dell precision latop to a friend and it came basically DOA.
- masklinn 9y ago
  /r/dell lists serious issues with the Killer NIC, coil whine, thermal limitations (when playing), speakers are bad ("average android 4.0 device sounds"), Win10 scaling make 4K display still not great (especially with external low-density displays), backlit keyboard disabling itself, some people get absolutely dreadful battery life.
  - velobro 9y ago
    I really don't know why anyone would order a laptop from Dell, or any other OEM for that matter. Dell and their like, obviously, aren't at the for-front of laptop design. They are still using plastic and calling Carbon fiber a "premium" laptop material (it isn't). They are using second rate network adapters. They are using second rate SSDs which have terrible write speeds. Windows trackpads arent any better than they were 10 years ago. To top it all off? You'll need to do a whole damn Windows reinstall to get rid of the tons of bloatware they pack in.
post_break 9y ago
I wish business laptops still existed. I bought a 5 year old laptop because you can't get anything today with serviceable parts or design that makes sense. The thinkpad retro can't get here soon enough (assuming it actually has function keys and isn't slimmed down just to be slim).
- cm2187 9y ago
  The lattitude E74xx series is pretty good, I upgraded the RAM and disk on every model I owned. And they still come with win7 drivers. But the latest generation (E7480) has dropped the full Ethernet port with the same sort of foldable port that Sony used on its z-series and they break too easily. You should try a E7470 which has a full Ethernet port while still being an ultra book. Also they haven't tried to be creative with the keyboard layout, which includes page down/up keys which the xps lacks, quite important for shortcuts.
  - post_break 9y ago
    I'm rocking a thinkpad x230 and I will probably continue to do so until they stop making decent batteries for it. I will weep when I can no longer use it.
    - mwambua 9y ago
      I use an x230 as my primary as well... but I can't seem to suppress my desire for a FHD screen. Do you know if any of the newer X-series are worth the money?
      - post_break 9y ago
        Nitrocaster FHD mod. I just had an X250 with a FHD screen and I hated it. I sold it just this weekend. https://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=122640 https://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=122640
curiousgal 9y ago
Sure sucks being a poor college student.
- hyperbovine 9y ago
  A lot of people reading this would trade places with you. Enjoy it for what it is :)
highace 9y ago
As a developer I can't imagine buying anything other than a Macbook Pro, and I mainly use Windows. The build quality is top of the line, the drivers are solid, and everything just works. The trackpad is industry leading, and the keyboard is great too. Performance is exceptional, especially in the 15" which comes with a HQ processor (not ultrabook-grade) and a discrete graphics card. It has a PCI-e SSD. The price is reasonable compared to the competition. But despite being IMO the best laptop available, the main reason I choose them is because every so often I need to boot into OSX for testing, or to do something Mac-only. And nothing else can do that.
- sp00ls 9y ago
  Same..Look at the comments for an XPS/whatever manufacturer flagship device release and you'll find mostly 'this works great except sometimes it explodes' and then back and forth a bunch of times where someone claims that it works for them, while someone else brings up something else that randomly doesn't work for them. No thanks..
  - kalleboo 9y ago
    Heck just look in the comments on this very Hacker News post...
- Mahn 9y ago
  Most of what you said applies to Surface Books and Surface Pros, you should check them out if you work on Windows. I'm pretty happy with my SP4 myself.
  - highace 9y ago
    I don't doubt that, I've tried them and they're good too. No native OSX though.
- Arzh 9y ago
  I use the XPS 15 in an office with only mac users and this machine is just more powerful since Apple wont update the Macbook Pro line with developers in mind. I hated working on an under performing laptop when I was using the macs.
avenoir 9y ago
This is the laptop I have. The biggest (and the only) complaint is that after about 3 or 4 days of use the track pad stops scrolling and starts doing a "click-and-drag" instead. A restart takes care of this.
- post_break 9y ago
  How the hell is the acceptable ugh.
  - dmamills 9y ago
    5-10 minutes every 72-96 hours. Behold the unwieldy struggles of the modern man!
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - mustacheemperor 9y ago
      For $1500 I don't want to regularly spend 5-10 minutes fixing my trackpad, and the anguish of that task relative to the turning of the cosmos is irrelevant.
hyperbovine 9y ago
The line about the 99 watt-hour battery limit caught my eye. I wasn't aware of this: https://www.cnet.com/news/macbook-pro-october-2016-battery-life/ https://www.cnet.com/news/macbook-pro-october-2016-battery-l...
artursapek 9y ago
I was considering this laptop last fall but because of the coil whine reports I ended up going with a Thinkpad X1 Carbon. Glad I did.
ralphc 9y ago
I'm looking for a (possibly) portable machine to do some deep learning exploration on. Would a developer edition of this with Ubuntu pre-installed, be a good choice? Is the NVidia powerful enough and accessible via drivers?
cm2187 9y ago
I bought one in February. Horrible experience. It couldn't display any video in the browser without freezing. Apparently an intel driver issue. The solution was to manually install an unsupported version of the video driver from the intel website. That solved it but left me with an unstable wifi and a noisy fan. I had much better luck with the Lattitude E74xx series.
blunte 9y ago
My experience with my 1-month-old maxed out 9560: - less precise trackpad than my 3 year old rMBP - palm-sensitive trackpad - failure that politely states that I need to reboot (if I try to use fingerprint reader to login too quickly after opening the laptop) - unplanned reboots due to updates - laggy and choppy video on a single external 4k monitor (compared to no apparent lag when the old rMBP drives 2x 4k monitors) - very slow Bash (ubuntu subsystem) - but at least they're making an effort - Cortana seems less effective than Siri, and she wasn't great; and Cortana still only uses Bing search and displays results in Edge browser - louder and more frequently spun up fan compared to old rMBP (which was also an i7 with an Nvidia GPU) - occasional crashes when opening laptop or logging in - very slow unzipping of files (on new 1TB PCIe SSD), regardless of whether 7z is used or built-in unzip is used, and regardless of where I unzip/extract to In summary, it's just a sexy little game machine. In that regard, it does pretty well. You do have to wear headphones to game because the fan is so loud. And you can't play on an external monitor... too laggy and limited to 30Hz refresh. Too bad Apple no longer caters to my crowd. Thankfully this old rMBP I use is still running well (despite the screen covering deterioration in weird spotty ways).
- stuff4ben 9y ago
  > Too bad Apple no longer caters to my crowd What is "your crowd"? Only thing I wish my rMBP had was more than 16GB of RAM for some of the dev I do. Other than that, I can't see switching anytime soon.
  - StavrosK 9y ago
    I don't know about the GP, but my crowd is upgradable RAM.
    - maxxxxx 9y ago
      Same here. At least let me upgrade RAM and disk. I don't want to have to buy a 1TB disk now just in case I may need one later.
  - alvarosevilla95 9y ago
sp0ck 9y ago
This laptop looks like mixed bag of opinions. I'm looking something to switch from rMPB 2013 (need more RAM, storage). That laptop i still on my list but on last position. I had rMBP2016 for 3 months and I could't write on that keyboard. After 1-2 hr's I felt pain in my fingers because constant contact of my nails with that keyboard. And I don't have some bear nails :) Sold it and now my short list is 1. Lenovo X1 carbon WQHD - best keyboard I ever written. 2. XPS 13 (coil whine, spongy keyboard) 3. XPS 15 - problems described in many places .. Still can't make decision :/
- cm2187 9y ago
  I suggest the lattitude E7470 or E7480 (if you don't see a laptop as a fashion statement). Light, practical, enough ports (the E7470 has a full Ethernet port) and a boring keyboard (which is what I expect from a keyboard).
  - sp0ck 9y ago
    My friend have one of lattitude models (12.5") and those Dell business screens are not the best ones IMO. Maybe I'm wrong but it is hard to find reseller that have those on the shelf to touch and feel :/
    - cm2187 9y ago
      I never felt like it was a cheap screen but I am probably not the best judge. I own a E7270 too but I find that format to be too small for any serious work. 14in is a good balance between being portable and comfortable.
    - manaskarekar 9y ago
      Actually the matte FHD (1920x1080) displays on the E7450/7470/7480 are some of the best displays with no pwm etc. They're not the widest color gamut but they're solid. Can't speak for the touchscreens.
- noir_lord 9y ago
  I'm ordering the T470P today, 7700HQ (4C/8HT) with a 2560x1440 screen. No thunderbolt 3 (strange one that) but otherwise exactly what I wanted and with discount comes in around 250 cheaper than the XPS15 with a 1080 screen.
SideburnsOfDoom 9y ago
Is the webcam back at the top of the screen, or is it still at the bottom-left "I can see right up your nose" position. edit Yep, on page 2: > The smaller bezels really do reduce the bulk of the notebook, with the one downside in Dell’s case of a poorly positioned webcam at the bottom of the display. Dell wants to keep the top and side bezels the same size for aesthetics, and heavy webcam users will not appreciate this, with a less than flattering up-the-nose result.
rasengan 9y ago
If you use Linux like arch please make sure to set kernel mode parameters to get your video to work. I also had a lot better luck swapping in an intel 8265 but the one it comes with works fine when you have a good signal. All in all the 9560 has replaced my Mac as a daily driver. Edit: Incase, to save time for someone, put this in kernel mode parameters in the file /boot/grub/grub.cfg and rerun grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg. nouveau.modeset=0 acpi_rev_override=1 enable_psr=1 disable_power_well=0
pier25 9y ago
Did Dell fix the coil whine problems?
- vladimir-y 9y ago
  No as far as I know, Latitude line is also affected.
  - IronBacon 9y ago
    I have an XPS 13 and the coil whine is one of the things that annoyed me the most, seems like they don't care at all. I've briefly used a Thinkpad and on that front is dead silent. If they continue to provide a model with a Linux distribution installed, I would like to support them and purchase their products again, but that defect is the only thing I would like to see it fixed.
    - vladimir-y 9y ago
      > seems like they don't care at all It's proven for me that they don't, as it's a long standing and massive problem. Consumers should stop buying poorly engineered/manufactured devices, that would be the reasonable reaction. > If they continue to provide a model with a Linux distribution installed, I would like to support them and purchase their products again, but that defect is the only thing I would like to see it fixed Normally Thinkpads support Linux very well though don't come with it preinstalled.
mysterypie 9y ago
Any driver issues or other advice about running Windows 7 on this? (I don't want to use Windows 8 or 10 because of telemetry, nor do I want to spend countless hours trying to figure out how to disable all telemetry, and worry about future updates that introduce more telemetry. I'm happy staying at Window 7.)
Roritharr 9y ago
If anyone cares, I just got a Toshiba Portege X30, it's the lightest machine that can be equipped with 32GB Ram, has 2 Thunderbolt 3 ports and a matte fhd touchscreen. Sadly only a dual core U processor (they launch quad-core U processors in just a few months)
jvehent 9y ago
I have this laptop and run archlinux on it. It's a great machine, and almost everything works straight out of the box (even the external docking station).
- charlespwd 9y ago
  Same here. Precision 5520 (the business edition of the XPS). Only thing I wish I took was the better GPU. 4K screen + external screen can be a lot to ask from the onboard graphics. Other than that, it is so much more performant than my old MBP. Couldn't be happier to have 32GB of ram and the infinity display.
rocky1138 9y ago
> The XPS 15 was never a gaming laptop With a full GTX 1050 it pretty much can be. This looks like a great machine. How is Linux support?
- nonamechicken 9y ago
  I have the older xps 15 9530. If you try to run any decent game (spec wise easy for the laptop to handle), it will throttle down to 10 fps or less within 5 minutes. When I contacted customer care, they said since this is an ultrabook, this is expected and that they couldn't do anything. So, my advice would be to research thoroughly if you are buying an XPS for gaming.
  - rocky1138 9y ago
    That is such bullshit. If the machine can't keep up with its own hardware running at 100% then it shouldn't be in there.
  - JamesMcMinn 9y ago
    The XPS 9560 shares the same thermal design as the 9550, both of which are considerably better than the 9530. I'm able to game for hours on my XPS 9560 with no thermal issues.
    - nonamechicken 9y ago
      I guess different people have different experiences. Googling "xps 9560 throttling" shows up quiet a few results which sounds very similar to what I face. For example, this is from the 4th link in my search result: When I play a game (overwatch, fallout 4, gta v), after some time my gpu throttle and i lost between 20-30% fps. And after more time, my CPU throttle to aroung 0.80 ghz and I lost all my FPS, the game become unplayable.
jorgemf 9y ago
This is a great laptop if you are not using the gpu and the cpu at the same time and you don't care about the screen response. So basically you put a game in this PC and after some minutes you see the great faults of the computer. The 4k screen has low response and it is a bit more blurry with movement than usual displays, although you will only notice this if you have another display to compare. The biggest issue is the power throttling. When the CPU and the GPU get a bit hot, the VRMs area get hot too and they drop the CPU to 0.7GHz. You play for few minutes and you are amazed, you can play last gen games quite good. But suddenly everything is crap. The VRMs area is hot and is dropping the voltage of the CPU to cold down. Really bad air flow design. Where I said games you can say another application that uses GPU and CPU like deep learning, or maybe watch a video and compile the kernel.(Message for Dell: why do you put a great CPU and GPU in a laptop if we cannot use both for more than few minutes?) The other minor issue with this laptop is the thunderbolt with 2 PCI lanes. If it had 4 PCI lanes it could be you all day computer as you could connect external GPUs without losing too much. But 2 PCI lanes is not enough. As a side note some people also have problems with the Wi-Fi. I had to buy another Wi-Fi card for my router as it couldn't connect, but with others routers that it connects it works quite good. P.S. I run Windows 10 Pro and Archlinux in this computer. The fingerprint does not work on linux yet, everything else is fine.
- gizmo686 9y ago
  In my (anecdotal) Dell laptops have been crap at heat management. My current laptop (about 4 years old at this point) had the problem you described, except once the CPU throttling turned on, the BIOS was extremely conservative in turning it off, to the point where I would often reboot to get it running at speed again. Eventually they released a BIOS update that fixed the issue, (and started throttling earlier to avoid dropping to .8ghz) Point being, when buying a laptop, always ask about the thermal.
m52go 9y ago
I really wanted to love this machine but couldn't find one that wasn't a lemon. Went through 3 of them. A well-specced model with 4k screen, 16GB memory, and 512GB SSD. First had a bad screen, second had sticky keys, and third had faulty video card. Third time I took it back, I was still willing to get it repaired but the support staff wouldn't do it. They told me they've had so many XPS 15s returned for service that they just recommended getting a totally different machine... But it was a brilliant machine when it worked.
rocketon 9y ago
Dell is trash and thats why I will soon release www.shitdell.com - to let people around the world to know what kind of shitty product they are getting. I'm from Brazil and over here everything that Dell sells is trash. Dell Inspiron's hinge breaks usually after 1 year, so you better buy an extended warranty... but why in the hell would you buy an middle to expensive notebook that you know it is made with bad quality and that you need to pay more for extended warranty? Dell doesn't deserve to exist as a company and soon I will help more people learn about how trashy are Dell's products...
- PopsiclePete 9y ago
  Inspiron is not great, yeah. But my XPS 13" 9350 rocks. No hinge problems. I have a feeling it's your country's insane import tariffs that are the real problem...
  - rocketon 9y ago
    The import taxes are insane and, yes, I would agree that they are so high that they could generate the blue screen of death for some... but never heard of taxes causing hardware problems lol A quick scan through the comments and you can see that Americans aren't that happy with Dell's hardware neither... and the hinge problem, tons of reports at Dell's USA community forum. So if I were you, would start getting careful with the hinge... or, like customer support from Dell suggested me one time: not open and close the notebook that much.
sametmax 9y ago
I have had a XPS 15 9550 as my main machine for almost a year now, and I can say I'm disatisfied. It needs a very specific combinations of driver update and bio flashing to work, charging using USB-C sometimes just stops, making it work with a dock took me a good month to figure out, the battery last only a few hours, the webcam is weirdly placed. Worst of all, the sound has suddenly started to act wildly and is now full of cracks. Given the price I paid for it (2500 € to include a 1 To hard drive and 32 Gb of RAM), I found it less than satisfactory. But what is infuriating is that some very big problems (like BSOD level) where brought to the attention to the Dell staff on their support forum and the post have been dormant without clear answer from their part for months. My previously positive perception of the dell brand have been seriously ternished. This is not just bad manufacturing, it's really bad marketting.
- cnahr 9y ago
  I've had serious reliability issues with every Dell or Alienware product I've bought. Yes, the specifications look great and they seem to work fine at first, but quality is simply ridiculously bad for such expensive products. Case reports: http://news.kynosarges.org/2017/04/23/dell-alienware-reliability-issues/ http://news.kynosarges.org/2017/04/23/dell-alienware-reliabi...
vladimir-y 9y ago
I'd rather get Thinkpad Carbon X1 5th gen or Thinkpad T470.
- Matthias247 9y ago
  I got a T470s for work and I can't recommend it. My current major issue is that the main screen attached to my docking station (Dell 4k 27") goes off for a second in random intervals. At some times as often as every minute, which makes it super annoying to work with it. After Win10 creators update I had another major issue where the video driver did not work anymore after standby. That was at least fixed with some driver updates. Besides that I experienced more bluescreens with it in 2 month than with any other PC that I owned. Besides the stability issues the screen and the keyboard are quite good. However the touchpad is no comparison to the one on a Macbook. I can work without a mouse on a Macbook without missing anything, but not on the Lenovo. According to some reviews the T470 should be better in that area than the T470s, but I don't have one for comparison.
deleted 9y ago
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inertial 9y ago
Can anyone help me understand the pricing on this one. An Inspiron with core i5 / 8GB RAM / 256GB SSD costs about $500, whereas a similar spec'd XPS 15 retails for more than twice. Is the "premium" really worth the extra $500-$800 or Dell is overcharging because there's hardly any good Windows machine in this space (except maybe Thinkpads) ?
- PascLeRasc 9y ago
  They're upcharging for a really nice screen. It'll make all the BSODs super sharp.
sraquo 9y ago
Earlier this year I bought a Developer Edition (Ubuntu) of Dell Precision 5520, which is the business version of XPS 15 9560. Same chassis and hardware, better factory QA and different GPU options. I very much regret this decision. I spent ~100 hours trying to get it to work properly and to configure Ubuntu (including supposedly simple things like switching Alt and Ctrl keys). At the hourly rate I'm charging, this is more than enough to buy ANY laptop. Next time I'll swallow my pride and just buy a top of the line Macbook Pro. Out of the box Ubuntu works great, but it is very fragile to updating. For example, updating BIOS to a version that fixes an important CPU bug causes the computer to freeze and shutdown every few minutes at random. Updating the OS itself caused weird bugs such as being unable to click on app menu items with a USB touchpad. Ditching the default Unity for Gnome3 fixed this particular bug. The recovery image that Dell provides for Ubuntu simply does not work a few months after release – craps out when it's unable to either fetch or install some package. So I don't even have a way of getting a working version of Ubuntu on this laptop if anything happens to my hard drive. Oh and the touchpad configs are appallingly bad out of the box. Impossible to use. I fixed 98% of palm interference issues with a few lines of xinput config. I don't know why Dell didn't do that themselves. And of course, Dell only provides only 7 days of Ubuntu support. After that you're on your own. Now I'm trying to sell this laptop, but no one on craigslist wants it even at 35% ($900CAD) off the original price. A few months old laptop in perfect condition that is still on warranty. Speaking of Ubuntu itself, it has been a profound disappointment as well. I will not be trying Dell or linux on desktop for another 7 years at least. My 9 year old Macbook Pro is far superior to this mess. PS I also tried hackintoshing this laptop, and it worked 95% of the way, but it requires the latest BIOS to work, and that causes random shutdowns regardless of the OS.
- satysin 9y ago
  Try Fedora on it. I switched from Ubuntu to Fedora a while back and couldn't be happier. Not saying you will have a perfect experience but it is worth a shot if you at least like the hardware?
  - sraquo 9y ago
    I don't think so. A lot of my issues are with BIOS and various linux apps or the window manager, not technically the distribution flavour itself. Also, I'm done spending time on this :)
zero_k 9y ago
Mine came with: * space bar double-registers once in a while. There is a well-known issue with the space bar, extremely well-documented: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/3ebe6t/dell_xps_13_2015_space_bar/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/3ebe6t/dell_xps_13_20..., http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R333HXzT7Ws http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R333HXzT7Ws http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/20014634 http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/... and so on * Killer Wifi BSOD'd 5 times in 1 week. Also well-documented, fix is apparently to complain and get an engineer to change it to Intel: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5r1fu5/xps15_9560_wifi_problems/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5r1fu5/xps15_9560_wif... * Sound was choppy (driver-based issue), apparently this is again well-known: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5yvsng/xps_15_9560_audio_driver_poppingcrackling_noise/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5yvsng/xps_15_9560_au... there is no fix, the fix is to send it back (potentially also caused by Killer Wifi, Dell will never recognise that so you'll not get a WiFi card change) * Mouse has a lag on the screen in 3D applications. Apparently, this is due to partially the XBox app that wants to record and isn't optimized to 4k + possibly McAfee + some other Dell boatware. So, I returned the laptop. The 2nd thing in my life I ever returned. It was too much, and I wasn't sure I could fix all of the above in 2 weeks (return period in UK). I used Linux for my main OS, where everything but the space bar double-tap was a real issue. But that was painful. I was afraid that the replacement keyboard would be more or less the same. You can apparently just go to a random retailer, and it often double-taps there too (i.e. it will break). Worst about it is that Dell offered a BIOS update to "fix" this. The Dell Knowledge Base (KB) article detailing this has been pulled, BIOSes now come pre-updated (yes, I did update my BIOS, no, it did not fix it). When a BIOS update "fixes" such a basic hardware bug, you really ought to wonder about their quality control.
- PascLeRasc 9y ago
  I can't believe that a machine as high-end as this has all those bugs. I've had an Asus $400 boondoggle from Best Buy for 4 years now and the worst thing it does is occasionally unmount the optical drive. It seems like Dell just has very poor quality control.
256cats 9y ago
I really don't know guys, I have both XPS 9550 and Precision m5510 for more than 1 year and had 0 problems. Yes, touchpad is not as good as MBP, but you can get used to it. Now I'm looking for 13" laptop with 32gb ram. Do they exist at all?
noir_lord 9y ago
I would have plopped the money down on one of these on saturday but I tried the one on display and the keyboard was horrible. So I bought the 7560 (which had a much better keyboard and was 650 pounds less)..that went back after 6 hours when the hinge broke. Shop didn't even quibble so I suspect it wasn't the first they'd seen. Now I'm buying a Thinkpad.
- seabrookmx 9y ago
  I've been pretty happy with my Precision 5510 (which uses the same chassis as the XPS 15) but I agree, the keyboard is a low point that the reviews seem to miss. I prefer the keyboard on my old HP Folio 1040, which admittedly is very Macbook-like. That and the webcam are my only complaints though. I love the speakers, screen, trackpad.. and the single-cable thunderbolt dock is great.
  - noir_lord 9y ago
    For me it was that the keys actually rattled if you ran your fingers over them, that would drive me crazy, with the backlight on the spacings where all over the place because they moved around so much and the typing experience was sub-optimal, if the XPS15 had had the keyboard on the 7560 I'd have bought it there and then. The 7560 was a nice looking/nice spec machine at 950 but the damn chassis bent just from opening and closing the lid in the first day. Dell can make good machines but mostly by luck I think sometimes. My current Laptop is an old Vostro 3750 I paid 500 quid for new (stacked discounts on the Dell site) and it has a better keyboard after 5 years of abuse. Damn thing just won't die.
JamesMcMinn 9y ago
I've had the XPS 9560 since February. I mostly run Fedora (26), but have also run Solus and various versions of Ubuntu. I have a Windows 10 install which I use for Photoshop, Lightroom, and some mobile gaming. Specifically, the version I have comes with a i7 7700HQ, 32GB RAM, 1TB SDD and 4K screen. Hardware wise, the laptop is lovely, and the build quality of mine is good, although it hasn't been perfect as I'll get to later. The screen is honestly the best I've ever used, although I do sometimes notice ghosting due to slow response times, I understand in that regard it's comparable to the retina displays used in MBPs. Performance wise, the hardware speaks for itself. It's a very powerful machine. I haven't experienced any of the lag or video issues that others are reporting. It'll happily play games and crunch whatever data you throw at it, without any thermal issues. My model was a very early version, and came with which I can only describe as a mushy keyboard which often did not register key-presses. I contacted Dell support, who after a short over the phone test, agreed it was not satisfactory and arranged for an engineer to be at my house the next day to replace the keyboard. This fixed the issue, and the keyboard has been fine ever since. Compared to the new MBP keyboards, I much prefer the 9560 due to the extra travel. I've also had the GPU fan replaced due to it developing a grinding noise. Again, after a short phone call, Dell agreed to send an engineer to replace the fan the next day. The issue has since re-appeared, and although it's not a critical issue, I'll be getting Dell to replace the fan again. This does seem like a somewhat common issue, although I can't find any recent reports which would hopefully suggest it has been fixed on the manufacturing side. On the topic of noise, my particular machine has no coil-whine. The webcam position is frankly bad. It's not an issue for me personally, but I do tend to place the laptop somewhere higher if I'm doing a video call - I can't be trimming my noise hair for every call I do. I did try macOS on the 9560, as a bit of fun more than anything else, and it seemed to be usable after some effort. However I generally dislike macOS, so I'm back to using Fedora 26 which runs perfectly. Some older apps have slight scaling issues with the 4k screen, however nothing has proven to be unusable (yet). I haven't had any issues running a clean version of Windows either. Overall, I'm very happy with the 9560.
praulv 9y ago
Had a Dell 7537 (non XPS) and it is honestly the worst machine I have ever used, from physical reliability (broken hinges and parts) through to flat out non-functional components including numerous issues with Wifi. After falling for the looks, I've vowed never to get a Dell again.
JaggerFoo 9y ago
I was looking at this laptop with 32Gb RAM for development work, where I would be using multiple VirtualBox VMs to simulate (small) clusters. I also would need it to travel well and connect to foreign wifi AP's. I have a MacBook Pro with Retina display, but I don't like it for developing - it's mostly gathering dust. My workstation and personal laptop are running OpenSUSE Tumbleweed/KDE, which I love. I don't mind using a Windows OS as long as I can launch a VM for my development. But I guess the Dell XPS 15 9560 may not be my best choice given the real-world problems I am reading here.
ta444888g 9y ago
Swing apps under Windows 10 are especially unreadable on this beast.

174 points by mcone 9y ago

It looks good, but seriously one big thing that's a no-no for me is only HDMI1.4 (not HDMI2.0). It means that you can't do 4K@60Hz.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> seriously one big thing that's a no-no for me is only HDMI1.4 (not HDMI2.0). It means that you can't do 4K@60Hz. You can, using the Thunderbolt 3 port. I run my XPS 13 at 4K@60Hz using the mini-DP port, and Thunderbolt 3 is capable of that and more.
- ClassyJacket 9y ago
  Not to a TV, tho, which makes it a deal breaker for me. They should put a proper HDMI port.
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > Not to a TV, tho, which makes it a deal breaker for me. They should put a proper HDMI port. I'd rather have an extra Thunderbolt 3/USB-C port, to be honest. HDMI 2.0 is bigger and clunkier as a port, and Thunderbolt 3 is strictly better as a protocol (we're not even talking about HDMI 2.1). Maybe if you're talking HDMI 2.1, but the protocol can still be carried over a USB-C connector anyway, so keeping the standard connector interface is preferable in my books. My bet is that TVs will soon start to have USB-C ports built-in (with whichever protocols they're willing to support). In the meantime, an adapter will do the trick; it can even live with the TV, since that's not meant to be portable.
    - ClassyJacket 9y ago
      Sorry I shouldn't have said port. They should've put in HDMI support. Over the USBC port. I agree that extra ports are superfluous.
  - JamesMcMinn 9y ago
    Well, yes to a TV with a cheap USB-C -> HDMI 2.0 dongle.
JoshTriplett 9y ago
The USB-C port provides Thunderbolt/DisplayPort, which can easily do 4K@60.
foepys 9y ago
Even Kaby Lake only supports HDMI 1.4, so there is no Intel-based laptop without a dedicated GPU on the market that is capable of HDMI 2.0. Your only choice is DisplayPort which you can use here via Thunderbolt 3.

chimeracoder 9y ago

I've used the XPS 13 Developer Edition (ie, running Linux) as my daily driver since 2012. For me, it's been way more reliable than either the ThinkPad X1 or even the MacBook Pro, both of which I used as my work laptops during that same time (running Linux and OS X respectively). I've been hoping to upgrade to the 15-inch for a while, because I like larger screens. It's nice to see the review of this point release version.

clvx 9y ago
I have the xps13 2016 dev edition too, and it's a solid laptop. Let me ask you which dongle do you use to connect to external hdmi monitors? I got this one[1] a while ago, but it doesn't output more than 800x600. I use the wd15 at home without issues, but it's not suitable for traveling. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Adapter-Type-Ethernet-470-ABQN/dp/B012DT6KW2 https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Adapter-Type-Ethernet-470-ABQN/d...
- rootbear 9y ago
  I have the same laptop and I'm happy with it, but I'm not happy with the dongle madness that universal adoption of USB C is foisting on us. I also want a reliable travel dongle for external HDMI for this laptop but the reviews of the units I've looked at are not encouraging. The current obsession with thinness (looking at YOU, Apple) is forcing useful connectors off the main system board onto expensive, unreliable dongles. Yuck.
  - marsRoverDev 9y ago
    I have the VicTsing 1080p USB C to HDMI dongle and it works fine on Ubuntu and Windows 10. The standard dell one doesn't seem to work as well on both (yeah...).
  - neverminder 9y ago
    I don't really understand this adversity towards USB Type-C as a single connector for everything. I was around when pretty much every single device had it's own dedicated port and it looked like a snake nest under a desk until USB came along. Yeah, LPT1 for printer, PS/2 for mouse and keyboard, VGA for monitor, etc. We're in a transitional period now to something better, so some people will need dongles for a while and I don't think it's a big deal.

wslh 9y ago

If you want to buy one you should extend your analysis beyond the hardware specs because the software and operating systems are not ready yet. I can give the example of the latest XPS 13 2-1 where Office applications like Outlook cannot recognize a monitor with a different resolution and the fonts are blurred. Look for example at https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Office-apps-appear-the-wrong-size-or-blurry-on-external-monitors-bc9f7279-4e42-4b15-a949-46ab8bcfe44f https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Office-apps-appear-... high DPI is a whole issue. I can give many other examples with drivers support. For example, if I unplug the notebook from the dock the audio playback doesn't work again if I don't reboot the computer or remove/reinstall the driver. It would ve nice to hear about a critical analysis in Linux.

oulu2006 9y ago
Very true, the previous XPS 15 had huge problems with the Killer NIC card because the drivers for it took months to stabilise and its only recently been that a driver update has made the Wifi somewhat stable and the machine has stopped crashing every few days. What other people seem to have done is get Dell to swap the Killer NIC with an Intel one which has much better driver support.
- masklinn 9y ago
  Colleague recently bought one of these, has a Killer NIC, still not stable, machine hard crashes every time they boot a VM.
  - dz0ny 9y ago
    Intel card is the one recommended. Even Dell uses it in Linux pre-installed version of XPS. I don't know what these guys are doing but even in Windows, I would get IRQ_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL after deep sleep.
  - qyv 9y ago
    FYI: Don't use the killer drivers, let windows install it's own driver.
- 9y ago

remotebug 9y ago

That looks like an amazing machine. Is it the same as in this review https://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS-15-9560-i7-7700HQ-UHD-Laptop-Review.200648.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS-15-9560-i7-7700HQ-UHD... from 4 months ago? I had lots of annoyance with a previous Optimus based notebook. How has the situation of bumblebee and primusrun and dualbooting improved in the past two years?

pricechild 9y ago
I've given up on bumblebee. I have upgraded an Ubuntu laptop over a few years and every upgrade it broke, requiring some new incantation to fix it the next time. I don't think it's considered the future? I believe the future is called "Prime Synchronisation", announced a few years ago. Good luck getting it to work though: https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/957814/prime-and-prime-synchronization/ https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/957814/prime-and-pr... I gave up after a while. We're probably nearing the time when I'll give all the methods another go, but currently I'm back into the "change setting and log out + in" camp. As an aside, bumblebee also seems to break my i3 environment... I get hangs & magic sysreq won't recover. I've had to go back to the default DE.
JoshTriplett 9y ago
> I had lots of annoyance with a previous Optimus based notebook. How has the situation of bumblebee and primusrun and dualbooting improved in the past two years? Very slightly, but you're better off getting a notebook that actually has FOSS graphics drivers, for a much more stable and reliable experience. It's unfortunate that you can't upgrade the XPS15 to the 4K display or a quad-core processor without getting the nVidia graphics along with it. IIRC, some previous models included 4K configurations without that.

jarym 9y ago

I've all but given up hope on Apple bothering with 32Gb RAM. Been researching the Dell alternatives (XPS and Precision) for a couple of months now. Very tempting machines indeed. I just want to see one in real life to see what the build quality feels like. Pssst.. Mr Schiller... it seems it is possible to stick 32Gb of RAM into a laptop AND have decent battery life. Well, that is unless you're intent on giving your products anorexia which it seems you are. </end rant>

marsRoverDev 9y ago
I own a Dell XPS 13 and it seems to be fine build quality wise. Others have not been so lucky. To be honest though, if I had the budget and Apple weren't being ridiculous with the specs I'd still consider a mac a much better development machine; specifically due to Adobe's refusal to port photoshop to ubuntu. If you do not have any need for photoshop, then XPS developer edition is much better value. My only concern with the dell line is that drivers really are a problem. For some reason, the audio works perfectly fine under Ubuntu and is really half baked on Windows 10 (with the newest drivers from dell). It's like upside down bizarro world.
manyxcxi 9y ago
I'm in the same boat. I have a serious analysis paralysis when it comes to figuring out what my next laptop will be (assuming the MBP keeps hardware specs relatively similar). I just don't know how to find a good laptop model that will definitely run trouble free with a Linux distro. I really like OS X because of the *nix like OS with a high level of 'just works'. I absolutely won't go back to Windows, my workflow is so far beyond it- so what're my best resources for finding a high spec laptop that will be compatible with a modern Linux distro? I've got Windows 7 and Mint running on an old Lenovo T430 (pretty sure it's a 430) and Ubuntu 16.10 on my old 2009 MBP after Apple stopped shipping OS updates for it. Excluding the fact they're on old hardware, I still don't think they 'just work' enough. Power save, WiFi, graphics drivers, fan control, all things that took a LOT of fiddling. Don't really love Ubuntu's desktop either.
rayiner 9y ago
Did you read the review? The Surface Book (which uses LPDDR3 and has the same 16GB limit) gets double the run time per watt-hour of battery.

masklinn 9y ago

> They’ve opted to go with the same Killer Wireless-AC 1535 as they use in the smaller XPS 13. FWIW this NIC is a huge liability, wifi instability is common and it will bring some machines down hard (bluescreens/kernel panics, just check /r/dell). Dell US apparently has instructions to replace this POS by a compatible Intel NIC (7200 or 8000 series) if you have issues and complaint, that seems not to be the case for Dell EU. An Intel NIC costs $20~30, some folks just order a 8260/8265 at the same time as the laptop and install it before even booting.

nonamechicken 9y ago
This is what I don't get. Don't they do basic testing before releasing these?
rocky1138 9y ago
I have a Killer NIC in my MSI gaming laptop. Opening the Killer wifi desktop configuration app would bluescreen my desktop every time :( The only thing that worked was uninstalling all Killer software and just letting Windows install the wifi driver.

neverminder 9y ago

XPS is great, having said that I'm waiting for one with USB Type-C charging only and as far as I'm concerned it's time and all sockets should be USB Type-C. I have my Chromebook Pixel for 2 years now and I got used to plugging in a charger from either side.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

bhouston 9y ago

This is my current laptop and I love it. I finally replaced my desktop PC with a laptop. I use it with a 4K 32" monitor via the docking station (I have the exact same setup at work and at home, I just bring the laptop with me each day.) Having a single machine saves me so much time regarding the complex development setup. I have a dual boot setup with Ubuntu and Windows with no issues. I bought it for $1699 CAD for the 7700HQ + Full HD Screen (not 4K) + GTX 1050 + 256GB HD + 16GB RAM and immediately upgraded the disk to 1TB and the ram to 32GB.

markeissler 9y ago
Which display and which dock?

rtnyftxx 9y ago

I tried the XPS 15 Kaby Lake UHD touch version - coil whine - ctrl key on the most left part of the keyboard - sound - no notch for opening - fan noise - led bleeding - touchpad - surface coating + touch display + UHD/GPU/RAM/CPU

trzeci 9y ago

Hi, I've had lots of problems with the previous version of XPS15 - 9550 (More info @ https://trzeci.eu/dell-xps-15-9550-was-the-most-problematic-device-for-me/ https://trzeci.eu/dell-xps-15-9550-was-the-most-problematic-... ) It was included: problem with CPU and random freezes, Coil Whine, Swollen Battery, SSD problem and problem with misaligned Jack port with a hole in case. In total, my device was repaired 3 times (within 10 months) and from the original device I have a case, touch-pad and screen only. I'm not here to complain, because after the battery fix was done, it works perfectly. The Dell Service is super helpful and reactive, D2D warranty is just awesome. My question is: Have somebody seen any indicators of problems listed above in 9560?

jrimbault 9y ago
Did you get yours near the launch ? Maybe it was a manufacturing issue ? Hopefully ?
- stinos 9y ago
  They're definitely not all of them that bad, a colleague has one which functions perfectly and overall reviews seem on the positive side. But yeah, once in a while sh*t happens. E.g. I've had/used multiple Dell devices without any problems whatsoever but I recommended some Dell precision latop to a friend and it came basically DOA.
masklinn 9y ago
/r/dell lists serious issues with the Killer NIC, coil whine, thermal limitations (when playing), speakers are bad ("average android 4.0 device sounds"), Win10 scaling make 4K display still not great (especially with external low-density displays), backlit keyboard disabling itself, some people get absolutely dreadful battery life.
- velobro 9y ago
  I really don't know why anyone would order a laptop from Dell, or any other OEM for that matter. Dell and their like, obviously, aren't at the for-front of laptop design. They are still using plastic and calling Carbon fiber a "premium" laptop material (it isn't). They are using second rate network adapters. They are using second rate SSDs which have terrible write speeds. Windows trackpads arent any better than they were 10 years ago. To top it all off? You'll need to do a whole damn Windows reinstall to get rid of the tons of bloatware they pack in.

post_break 9y ago

I wish business laptops still existed. I bought a 5 year old laptop because you can't get anything today with serviceable parts or design that makes sense. The thinkpad retro can't get here soon enough (assuming it actually has function keys and isn't slimmed down just to be slim).

cm2187 9y ago
The lattitude E74xx series is pretty good, I upgraded the RAM and disk on every model I owned. And they still come with win7 drivers. But the latest generation (E7480) has dropped the full Ethernet port with the same sort of foldable port that Sony used on its z-series and they break too easily. You should try a E7470 which has a full Ethernet port while still being an ultra book. Also they haven't tried to be creative with the keyboard layout, which includes page down/up keys which the xps lacks, quite important for shortcuts.
- post_break 9y ago
  I'm rocking a thinkpad x230 and I will probably continue to do so until they stop making decent batteries for it. I will weep when I can no longer use it.
  - mwambua 9y ago
    I use an x230 as my primary as well... but I can't seem to suppress my desire for a FHD screen. Do you know if any of the newer X-series are worth the money?
    - post_break 9y ago
      Nitrocaster FHD mod. I just had an X250 with a FHD screen and I hated it. I sold it just this weekend. https://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=122640 https://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=122640

curiousgal 9y ago

Sure sucks being a poor college student.

hyperbovine 9y ago
A lot of people reading this would trade places with you. Enjoy it for what it is :)

highace 9y ago

As a developer I can't imagine buying anything other than a Macbook Pro, and I mainly use Windows. The build quality is top of the line, the drivers are solid, and everything just works. The trackpad is industry leading, and the keyboard is great too. Performance is exceptional, especially in the 15" which comes with a HQ processor (not ultrabook-grade) and a discrete graphics card. It has a PCI-e SSD. The price is reasonable compared to the competition. But despite being IMO the best laptop available, the main reason I choose them is because every so often I need to boot into OSX for testing, or to do something Mac-only. And nothing else can do that.

sp00ls 9y ago
Same..Look at the comments for an XPS/whatever manufacturer flagship device release and you'll find mostly 'this works great except sometimes it explodes' and then back and forth a bunch of times where someone claims that it works for them, while someone else brings up something else that randomly doesn't work for them. No thanks..
- kalleboo 9y ago
  Heck just look in the comments on this very Hacker News post...
Mahn 9y ago
Most of what you said applies to Surface Books and Surface Pros, you should check them out if you work on Windows. I'm pretty happy with my SP4 myself.
- highace 9y ago
  I don't doubt that, I've tried them and they're good too. No native OSX though.
Arzh 9y ago
I use the XPS 15 in an office with only mac users and this machine is just more powerful since Apple wont update the Macbook Pro line with developers in mind. I hated working on an under performing laptop when I was using the macs.

avenoir 9y ago

This is the laptop I have. The biggest (and the only) complaint is that after about 3 or 4 days of use the track pad stops scrolling and starts doing a "click-and-drag" instead. A restart takes care of this.

post_break 9y ago
How the hell is the acceptable ugh.
- dmamills 9y ago
  5-10 minutes every 72-96 hours. Behold the unwieldy struggles of the modern man!
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - mustacheemperor 9y ago
    For $1500 I don't want to regularly spend 5-10 minutes fixing my trackpad, and the anguish of that task relative to the turning of the cosmos is irrelevant.

hyperbovine 9y ago

The line about the 99 watt-hour battery limit caught my eye. I wasn't aware of this: https://www.cnet.com/news/macbook-pro-october-2016-battery-life/ https://www.cnet.com/news/macbook-pro-october-2016-battery-l...

artursapek 9y ago

I was considering this laptop last fall but because of the coil whine reports I ended up going with a Thinkpad X1 Carbon. Glad I did.

ralphc 9y ago

I'm looking for a (possibly) portable machine to do some deep learning exploration on. Would a developer edition of this with Ubuntu pre-installed, be a good choice? Is the NVidia powerful enough and accessible via drivers?

cm2187 9y ago

I bought one in February. Horrible experience. It couldn't display any video in the browser without freezing. Apparently an intel driver issue. The solution was to manually install an unsupported version of the video driver from the intel website. That solved it but left me with an unstable wifi and a noisy fan. I had much better luck with the Lattitude E74xx series.

blunte 9y ago

My experience with my 1-month-old maxed out 9560: - less precise trackpad than my 3 year old rMBP - palm-sensitive trackpad - failure that politely states that I need to reboot (if I try to use fingerprint reader to login too quickly after opening the laptop) - unplanned reboots due to updates - laggy and choppy video on a single external 4k monitor (compared to no apparent lag when the old rMBP drives 2x 4k monitors) - very slow Bash (ubuntu subsystem) - but at least they're making an effort - Cortana seems less effective than Siri, and she wasn't great; and Cortana still only uses Bing search and displays results in Edge browser - louder and more frequently spun up fan compared to old rMBP (which was also an i7 with an Nvidia GPU) - occasional crashes when opening laptop or logging in - very slow unzipping of files (on new 1TB PCIe SSD), regardless of whether 7z is used or built-in unzip is used, and regardless of where I unzip/extract to In summary, it's just a sexy little game machine. In that regard, it does pretty well. You do have to wear headphones to game because the fan is so loud. And you can't play on an external monitor... too laggy and limited to 30Hz refresh. Too bad Apple no longer caters to my crowd. Thankfully this old rMBP I use is still running well (despite the screen covering deterioration in weird spotty ways).

stuff4ben 9y ago
> Too bad Apple no longer caters to my crowd What is "your crowd"? Only thing I wish my rMBP had was more than 16GB of RAM for some of the dev I do. Other than that, I can't see switching anytime soon.
- StavrosK 9y ago
  I don't know about the GP, but my crowd is upgradable RAM.
  - maxxxxx 9y ago
    Same here. At least let me upgrade RAM and disk. I don't want to have to buy a 1TB disk now just in case I may need one later.
- alvarosevilla95 9y ago

sp0ck 9y ago

This laptop looks like mixed bag of opinions. I'm looking something to switch from rMPB 2013 (need more RAM, storage). That laptop i still on my list but on last position. I had rMBP2016 for 3 months and I could't write on that keyboard. After 1-2 hr's I felt pain in my fingers because constant contact of my nails with that keyboard. And I don't have some bear nails :) Sold it and now my short list is 1. Lenovo X1 carbon WQHD - best keyboard I ever written. 2. XPS 13 (coil whine, spongy keyboard) 3. XPS 15 - problems described in many places .. Still can't make decision :/

cm2187 9y ago
I suggest the lattitude E7470 or E7480 (if you don't see a laptop as a fashion statement). Light, practical, enough ports (the E7470 has a full Ethernet port) and a boring keyboard (which is what I expect from a keyboard).
- sp0ck 9y ago
  My friend have one of lattitude models (12.5") and those Dell business screens are not the best ones IMO. Maybe I'm wrong but it is hard to find reseller that have those on the shelf to touch and feel :/
  - cm2187 9y ago
    I never felt like it was a cheap screen but I am probably not the best judge. I own a E7270 too but I find that format to be too small for any serious work. 14in is a good balance between being portable and comfortable.
  - manaskarekar 9y ago
    Actually the matte FHD (1920x1080) displays on the E7450/7470/7480 are some of the best displays with no pwm etc. They're not the widest color gamut but they're solid. Can't speak for the touchscreens.
noir_lord 9y ago
I'm ordering the T470P today, 7700HQ (4C/8HT) with a 2560x1440 screen. No thunderbolt 3 (strange one that) but otherwise exactly what I wanted and with discount comes in around 250 cheaper than the XPS15 with a 1080 screen.

SideburnsOfDoom 9y ago

Is the webcam back at the top of the screen, or is it still at the bottom-left "I can see right up your nose" position. edit Yep, on page 2: > The smaller bezels really do reduce the bulk of the notebook, with the one downside in Dell’s case of a poorly positioned webcam at the bottom of the display. Dell wants to keep the top and side bezels the same size for aesthetics, and heavy webcam users will not appreciate this, with a less than flattering up-the-nose result.

rasengan 9y ago

If you use Linux like arch please make sure to set kernel mode parameters to get your video to work. I also had a lot better luck swapping in an intel 8265 but the one it comes with works fine when you have a good signal. All in all the 9560 has replaced my Mac as a daily driver. Edit: Incase, to save time for someone, put this in kernel mode parameters in the file /boot/grub/grub.cfg and rerun grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg. nouveau.modeset=0 acpi_rev_override=1 enable_psr=1 disable_power_well=0

pier25 9y ago

Did Dell fix the coil whine problems?

vladimir-y 9y ago
No as far as I know, Latitude line is also affected.
- IronBacon 9y ago
  I have an XPS 13 and the coil whine is one of the things that annoyed me the most, seems like they don't care at all. I've briefly used a Thinkpad and on that front is dead silent. If they continue to provide a model with a Linux distribution installed, I would like to support them and purchase their products again, but that defect is the only thing I would like to see it fixed.
  - vladimir-y 9y ago
    > seems like they don't care at all It's proven for me that they don't, as it's a long standing and massive problem. Consumers should stop buying poorly engineered/manufactured devices, that would be the reasonable reaction. > If they continue to provide a model with a Linux distribution installed, I would like to support them and purchase their products again, but that defect is the only thing I would like to see it fixed Normally Thinkpads support Linux very well though don't come with it preinstalled.

mysterypie 9y ago

Any driver issues or other advice about running Windows 7 on this? (I don't want to use Windows 8 or 10 because of telemetry, nor do I want to spend countless hours trying to figure out how to disable all telemetry, and worry about future updates that introduce more telemetry. I'm happy staying at Window 7.)

Roritharr 9y ago

If anyone cares, I just got a Toshiba Portege X30, it's the lightest machine that can be equipped with 32GB Ram, has 2 Thunderbolt 3 ports and a matte fhd touchscreen. Sadly only a dual core U processor (they launch quad-core U processors in just a few months)

jvehent 9y ago

I have this laptop and run archlinux on it. It's a great machine, and almost everything works straight out of the box (even the external docking station).

charlespwd 9y ago
Same here. Precision 5520 (the business edition of the XPS). Only thing I wish I took was the better GPU. 4K screen + external screen can be a lot to ask from the onboard graphics. Other than that, it is so much more performant than my old MBP. Couldn't be happier to have 32GB of ram and the infinity display.

rocky1138 9y ago

> The XPS 15 was never a gaming laptop With a full GTX 1050 it pretty much can be. This looks like a great machine. How is Linux support?

nonamechicken 9y ago
I have the older xps 15 9530. If you try to run any decent game (spec wise easy for the laptop to handle), it will throttle down to 10 fps or less within 5 minutes. When I contacted customer care, they said since this is an ultrabook, this is expected and that they couldn't do anything. So, my advice would be to research thoroughly if you are buying an XPS for gaming.
- rocky1138 9y ago
  That is such bullshit. If the machine can't keep up with its own hardware running at 100% then it shouldn't be in there.
- JamesMcMinn 9y ago
  The XPS 9560 shares the same thermal design as the 9550, both of which are considerably better than the 9530. I'm able to game for hours on my XPS 9560 with no thermal issues.
  - nonamechicken 9y ago
    I guess different people have different experiences. Googling "xps 9560 throttling" shows up quiet a few results which sounds very similar to what I face. For example, this is from the 4th link in my search result: When I play a game (overwatch, fallout 4, gta v), after some time my gpu throttle and i lost between 20-30% fps. And after more time, my CPU throttle to aroung 0.80 ghz and I lost all my FPS, the game become unplayable.

jorgemf 9y ago

This is a great laptop if you are not using the gpu and the cpu at the same time and you don't care about the screen response. So basically you put a game in this PC and after some minutes you see the great faults of the computer. The 4k screen has low response and it is a bit more blurry with movement than usual displays, although you will only notice this if you have another display to compare. The biggest issue is the power throttling. When the CPU and the GPU get a bit hot, the VRMs area get hot too and they drop the CPU to 0.7GHz. You play for few minutes and you are amazed, you can play last gen games quite good. But suddenly everything is crap. The VRMs area is hot and is dropping the voltage of the CPU to cold down. Really bad air flow design. Where I said games you can say another application that uses GPU and CPU like deep learning, or maybe watch a video and compile the kernel.(Message for Dell: why do you put a great CPU and GPU in a laptop if we cannot use both for more than few minutes?) The other minor issue with this laptop is the thunderbolt with 2 PCI lanes. If it had 4 PCI lanes it could be you all day computer as you could connect external GPUs without losing too much. But 2 PCI lanes is not enough. As a side note some people also have problems with the Wi-Fi. I had to buy another Wi-Fi card for my router as it couldn't connect, but with others routers that it connects it works quite good. P.S. I run Windows 10 Pro and Archlinux in this computer. The fingerprint does not work on linux yet, everything else is fine.

gizmo686 9y ago
In my (anecdotal) Dell laptops have been crap at heat management. My current laptop (about 4 years old at this point) had the problem you described, except once the CPU throttling turned on, the BIOS was extremely conservative in turning it off, to the point where I would often reboot to get it running at speed again. Eventually they released a BIOS update that fixed the issue, (and started throttling earlier to avoid dropping to .8ghz) Point being, when buying a laptop, always ask about the thermal.

m52go 9y ago

I really wanted to love this machine but couldn't find one that wasn't a lemon. Went through 3 of them. A well-specced model with 4k screen, 16GB memory, and 512GB SSD. First had a bad screen, second had sticky keys, and third had faulty video card. Third time I took it back, I was still willing to get it repaired but the support staff wouldn't do it. They told me they've had so many XPS 15s returned for service that they just recommended getting a totally different machine... But it was a brilliant machine when it worked.

rocketon 9y ago

Dell is trash and thats why I will soon release www.shitdell.com - to let people around the world to know what kind of shitty product they are getting. I'm from Brazil and over here everything that Dell sells is trash. Dell Inspiron's hinge breaks usually after 1 year, so you better buy an extended warranty... but why in the hell would you buy an middle to expensive notebook that you know it is made with bad quality and that you need to pay more for extended warranty? Dell doesn't deserve to exist as a company and soon I will help more people learn about how trashy are Dell's products...

PopsiclePete 9y ago
Inspiron is not great, yeah. But my XPS 13" 9350 rocks. No hinge problems. I have a feeling it's your country's insane import tariffs that are the real problem...
- rocketon 9y ago
  The import taxes are insane and, yes, I would agree that they are so high that they could generate the blue screen of death for some... but never heard of taxes causing hardware problems lol A quick scan through the comments and you can see that Americans aren't that happy with Dell's hardware neither... and the hinge problem, tons of reports at Dell's USA community forum. So if I were you, would start getting careful with the hinge... or, like customer support from Dell suggested me one time: not open and close the notebook that much.

sametmax 9y ago

I have had a XPS 15 9550 as my main machine for almost a year now, and I can say I'm disatisfied. It needs a very specific combinations of driver update and bio flashing to work, charging using USB-C sometimes just stops, making it work with a dock took me a good month to figure out, the battery last only a few hours, the webcam is weirdly placed. Worst of all, the sound has suddenly started to act wildly and is now full of cracks. Given the price I paid for it (2500 € to include a 1 To hard drive and 32 Gb of RAM), I found it less than satisfactory. But what is infuriating is that some very big problems (like BSOD level) where brought to the attention to the Dell staff on their support forum and the post have been dormant without clear answer from their part for months. My previously positive perception of the dell brand have been seriously ternished. This is not just bad manufacturing, it's really bad marketting.

cnahr 9y ago
I've had serious reliability issues with every Dell or Alienware product I've bought. Yes, the specifications look great and they seem to work fine at first, but quality is simply ridiculously bad for such expensive products. Case reports: http://news.kynosarges.org/2017/04/23/dell-alienware-reliability-issues/ http://news.kynosarges.org/2017/04/23/dell-alienware-reliabi...

vladimir-y 9y ago

I'd rather get Thinkpad Carbon X1 5th gen or Thinkpad T470.

Matthias247 9y ago
I got a T470s for work and I can't recommend it. My current major issue is that the main screen attached to my docking station (Dell 4k 27") goes off for a second in random intervals. At some times as often as every minute, which makes it super annoying to work with it. After Win10 creators update I had another major issue where the video driver did not work anymore after standby. That was at least fixed with some driver updates. Besides that I experienced more bluescreens with it in 2 month than with any other PC that I owned. Besides the stability issues the screen and the keyboard are quite good. However the touchpad is no comparison to the one on a Macbook. I can work without a mouse on a Macbook without missing anything, but not on the Lenovo. According to some reviews the T470 should be better in that area than the T470s, but I don't have one for comparison.

deleted 9y ago

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inertial 9y ago

Can anyone help me understand the pricing on this one. An Inspiron with core i5 / 8GB RAM / 256GB SSD costs about $500, whereas a similar spec'd XPS 15 retails for more than twice. Is the "premium" really worth the extra $500-$800 or Dell is overcharging because there's hardly any good Windows machine in this space (except maybe Thinkpads) ?

PascLeRasc 9y ago
They're upcharging for a really nice screen. It'll make all the BSODs super sharp.

sraquo 9y ago

Earlier this year I bought a Developer Edition (Ubuntu) of Dell Precision 5520, which is the business version of XPS 15 9560. Same chassis and hardware, better factory QA and different GPU options. I very much regret this decision. I spent ~100 hours trying to get it to work properly and to configure Ubuntu (including supposedly simple things like switching Alt and Ctrl keys). At the hourly rate I'm charging, this is more than enough to buy ANY laptop. Next time I'll swallow my pride and just buy a top of the line Macbook Pro. Out of the box Ubuntu works great, but it is very fragile to updating. For example, updating BIOS to a version that fixes an important CPU bug causes the computer to freeze and shutdown every few minutes at random. Updating the OS itself caused weird bugs such as being unable to click on app menu items with a USB touchpad. Ditching the default Unity for Gnome3 fixed this particular bug. The recovery image that Dell provides for Ubuntu simply does not work a few months after release – craps out when it's unable to either fetch or install some package. So I don't even have a way of getting a working version of Ubuntu on this laptop if anything happens to my hard drive. Oh and the touchpad configs are appallingly bad out of the box. Impossible to use. I fixed 98% of palm interference issues with a few lines of xinput config. I don't know why Dell didn't do that themselves. And of course, Dell only provides only 7 days of Ubuntu support. After that you're on your own. Now I'm trying to sell this laptop, but no one on craigslist wants it even at 35% ($900CAD) off the original price. A few months old laptop in perfect condition that is still on warranty. Speaking of Ubuntu itself, it has been a profound disappointment as well. I will not be trying Dell or linux on desktop for another 7 years at least. My 9 year old Macbook Pro is far superior to this mess. PS I also tried hackintoshing this laptop, and it worked 95% of the way, but it requires the latest BIOS to work, and that causes random shutdowns regardless of the OS.

satysin 9y ago
Try Fedora on it. I switched from Ubuntu to Fedora a while back and couldn't be happier. Not saying you will have a perfect experience but it is worth a shot if you at least like the hardware?
- sraquo 9y ago
  I don't think so. A lot of my issues are with BIOS and various linux apps or the window manager, not technically the distribution flavour itself. Also, I'm done spending time on this :)

zero_k 9y ago

Mine came with: * space bar double-registers once in a while. There is a well-known issue with the space bar, extremely well-documented: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/3ebe6t/dell_xps_13_2015_space_bar/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/3ebe6t/dell_xps_13_20..., http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R333HXzT7Ws http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R333HXzT7Ws http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/20014634 http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/... and so on * Killer Wifi BSOD'd 5 times in 1 week. Also well-documented, fix is apparently to complain and get an engineer to change it to Intel: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5r1fu5/xps15_9560_wifi_problems/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5r1fu5/xps15_9560_wif... * Sound was choppy (driver-based issue), apparently this is again well-known: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5yvsng/xps_15_9560_audio_driver_poppingcrackling_noise/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/5yvsng/xps_15_9560_au... there is no fix, the fix is to send it back (potentially also caused by Killer Wifi, Dell will never recognise that so you'll not get a WiFi card change) * Mouse has a lag on the screen in 3D applications. Apparently, this is due to partially the XBox app that wants to record and isn't optimized to 4k + possibly McAfee + some other Dell boatware. So, I returned the laptop. The 2nd thing in my life I ever returned. It was too much, and I wasn't sure I could fix all of the above in 2 weeks (return period in UK). I used Linux for my main OS, where everything but the space bar double-tap was a real issue. But that was painful. I was afraid that the replacement keyboard would be more or less the same. You can apparently just go to a random retailer, and it often double-taps there too (i.e. it will break). Worst about it is that Dell offered a BIOS update to "fix" this. The Dell Knowledge Base (KB) article detailing this has been pulled, BIOSes now come pre-updated (yes, I did update my BIOS, no, it did not fix it). When a BIOS update "fixes" such a basic hardware bug, you really ought to wonder about their quality control.

PascLeRasc 9y ago
I can't believe that a machine as high-end as this has all those bugs. I've had an Asus $400 boondoggle from Best Buy for 4 years now and the worst thing it does is occasionally unmount the optical drive. It seems like Dell just has very poor quality control.

256cats 9y ago

I really don't know guys, I have both XPS 9550 and Precision m5510 for more than 1 year and had 0 problems. Yes, touchpad is not as good as MBP, but you can get used to it. Now I'm looking for 13" laptop with 32gb ram. Do they exist at all?

noir_lord 9y ago

I would have plopped the money down on one of these on saturday but I tried the one on display and the keyboard was horrible. So I bought the 7560 (which had a much better keyboard and was 650 pounds less)..that went back after 6 hours when the hinge broke. Shop didn't even quibble so I suspect it wasn't the first they'd seen. Now I'm buying a Thinkpad.

seabrookmx 9y ago
I've been pretty happy with my Precision 5510 (which uses the same chassis as the XPS 15) but I agree, the keyboard is a low point that the reviews seem to miss. I prefer the keyboard on my old HP Folio 1040, which admittedly is very Macbook-like. That and the webcam are my only complaints though. I love the speakers, screen, trackpad.. and the single-cable thunderbolt dock is great.
- noir_lord 9y ago
  For me it was that the keys actually rattled if you ran your fingers over them, that would drive me crazy, with the backlight on the spacings where all over the place because they moved around so much and the typing experience was sub-optimal, if the XPS15 had had the keyboard on the 7560 I'd have bought it there and then. The 7560 was a nice looking/nice spec machine at 950 but the damn chassis bent just from opening and closing the lid in the first day. Dell can make good machines but mostly by luck I think sometimes. My current Laptop is an old Vostro 3750 I paid 500 quid for new (stacked discounts on the Dell site) and it has a better keyboard after 5 years of abuse. Damn thing just won't die.

JamesMcMinn 9y ago

I've had the XPS 9560 since February. I mostly run Fedora (26), but have also run Solus and various versions of Ubuntu. I have a Windows 10 install which I use for Photoshop, Lightroom, and some mobile gaming. Specifically, the version I have comes with a i7 7700HQ, 32GB RAM, 1TB SDD and 4K screen. Hardware wise, the laptop is lovely, and the build quality of mine is good, although it hasn't been perfect as I'll get to later. The screen is honestly the best I've ever used, although I do sometimes notice ghosting due to slow response times, I understand in that regard it's comparable to the retina displays used in MBPs. Performance wise, the hardware speaks for itself. It's a very powerful machine. I haven't experienced any of the lag or video issues that others are reporting. It'll happily play games and crunch whatever data you throw at it, without any thermal issues. My model was a very early version, and came with which I can only describe as a mushy keyboard which often did not register key-presses. I contacted Dell support, who after a short over the phone test, agreed it was not satisfactory and arranged for an engineer to be at my house the next day to replace the keyboard. This fixed the issue, and the keyboard has been fine ever since. Compared to the new MBP keyboards, I much prefer the 9560 due to the extra travel. I've also had the GPU fan replaced due to it developing a grinding noise. Again, after a short phone call, Dell agreed to send an engineer to replace the fan the next day. The issue has since re-appeared, and although it's not a critical issue, I'll be getting Dell to replace the fan again. This does seem like a somewhat common issue, although I can't find any recent reports which would hopefully suggest it has been fixed on the manufacturing side. On the topic of noise, my particular machine has no coil-whine. The webcam position is frankly bad. It's not an issue for me personally, but I do tend to place the laptop somewhere higher if I'm doing a video call - I can't be trimming my noise hair for every call I do. I did try macOS on the 9560, as a bit of fun more than anything else, and it seemed to be usable after some effort. However I generally dislike macOS, so I'm back to using Fedora 26 which runs perfectly. Some older apps have slight scaling issues with the 4k screen, however nothing has proven to be unusable (yet). I haven't had any issues running a clean version of Windows either. Overall, I'm very happy with the 9560.

praulv 9y ago

Had a Dell 7537 (non XPS) and it is honestly the worst machine I have ever used, from physical reliability (broken hinges and parts) through to flat out non-functional components including numerous issues with Wifi. After falling for the looks, I've vowed never to get a Dell again.

JaggerFoo 9y ago

I was looking at this laptop with 32Gb RAM for development work, where I would be using multiple VirtualBox VMs to simulate (small) clusters. I also would need it to travel well and connect to foreign wifi AP's. I have a MacBook Pro with Retina display, but I don't like it for developing - it's mostly gathering dust. My workstation and personal laptop are running OpenSUSE Tumbleweed/KDE, which I love. I don't mind using a Windows OS as long as I can launch a VM for my development. But I guess the Dell XPS 15 9560 may not be my best choice given the real-world problems I am reading here.

ta444888g 9y ago

Swing apps under Windows 10 are especially unreadable on this beast.