There's $440 off my beloved XPS 13 in Dell's Black Friday laptop deals
These aren't gaming laptops. Though I suspect, like me, you probably have something else going on in your life besides PC gaming. I have to go to work and stuff, which currently entails finding great deals this Black Friday, including deals on the device I'm using to find said deals, the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1.
What I'm trying to say is I'm a huge fan of the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 and Dell XPS 13 laptops. I've travelled to many a trade show with my XPS 13, and once I fell asleep with it next to me and kicked it off my bed. Yet it still works like it did the day I got it, and honestly that's the highest praise I can sing of a laptop that has been through the wringer.
I'm actually using the Dell XPS 2-in-1 with Intel's 10th Gen Core i7 1065G7 housed within it. That's one generation behind the XPS 13 laptop deals laid out for you below. Basically, it's been long enough since Intel's 11th Gen processors launched that they've all but entirely replaced my older unit, and now we're seeing greater discounts on these devices instead with Dell's Black Friday deals.
Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 | 13-inch |Intel Core i7 1165G7 | Integrated Intel Xe Graphics | 1080p | 16GB RAM | 512GB SSD | $1,719.99 $1,273.99 at Dell (save $446)
This XPS 13 2-in-1 is the newer model of my treasured personal laptop, which means it's simply a better version of a laptop I used daily and rate very highly. It's slim, quick, the screen is vibrant as heck, and the keyboard is surprisingly decent to type on for a thin device. The only thing is that it's quite a bit more money than your usual XPS 13, and if you're really not going to use it as a tablet then your money is better saved on the cheaper, conventional laptop.
Dell XPS 13 laptop | 13-inch |Intel Core i7 1165G7 | Integrated Intel Xe Graphics | 1080p | 16GB RAM | 512GB SSD | $1,299.99 $979.99 at Dell (save $320)
The XPS 13 is one of our favourite compact Windows laptops. It comes packed into a sleek and smart chassis, and it's pretty touch given its compact stature. This particular model comes with plenty of RAM and the top graphics chip from Intel's mobile 11th Gen. The SSD is a little slim on this model, but having used the XPS 13 2-in-1 with the same size SSD day-to-day myself, it's not so bad if you're largely relying on files up in the cloud.
They're essentially the same device, when you get down to it. Though the newer 11th Gen processors have me a little envious. The reason for that is I manage to play a handful of games on my Dell XPS 13—yes, even this tiny laptop can manage a frame or two—such as Crusader Kings 3 and World of Horror. That's achieved through the relatively decent onboard graphics on offer with my 10th Gen chip (64 EUs).
Intel's 11th Gen 'Tiger Lake' processors offer more powerful graphics than that. The 11th Gen processors have up to 96 EUs within them, and those are fancy Intel Xe EUs nowadays. So if you want to get hold of Intel's graphics architecture ahead of the Alchemist launch next year, this is one way to do it.
I once tested a slightly different processor to the Core i7 1165G7 listed below, at a higher wattage, though it's still a good marker for performance in gaming from Tiger Lake.
So that's gaming, which arguably these laptops aren't particularly cut out for. Rather what these do exceptionally well is act as a gateway to your many cloud file storage services, and web services, such as Google Drive and Google Docs.