Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook Review & Owner's Thread

I have a whining sound all the time. i5-3337U 1080P.

 

Have one of these ordered from Dell's Outlet with the 30% coupon. Can you kind folks tell me what touchpad drivers and/or software is best to install on this to attempt to improve the touchpad performance?

N

 

At that price you got a steal! For about $200 more I've seen that version for sale with a 256GB SSD, but if 128 is enough for you it's a great machine, got lots of accolades. I'm a high res screen junkie, but nothing wrong with Hd at 13". Enjoy!

 

I agree your machine has the finest ultrabook keyboard at that size - recall it's a chassis made for a 12"

 

Thinking of getting a L322x 1080p, are there still trackpad issues even with the latest drivers?

 

I keep trying to install v15.6 WiFi driver, but Device Manager still showing 15.4, cannot get it to update. Anybody has same issue?

 

Hi everyone! I have two problems with this laptop (FHD version, i7, bought in Norway). First, as mention several times I have annoying high pitch electric noise. It disappears if screen is off. Do you think it is coil or has something to do with screen? Second, specs says xps 13 has 1.3 mpx webcam, and I have 0.9, and it is horrible. It is so dark, I just dont see my face, and room has decent light in it... Anyone has the same problem?!

 

Same question I have seen a few times without answer.
Bought a (refurb) FHD I7 xps 13. screen looks great, keyboard is fantastic. touchpad is garbage!

it becomes unresponsive intermittently, can anyone tell me what the fix is?

Thanks

 

I'm not sure what the fix might be as I too just got my XPS today and the touchpad is decent when it works. But occasionally it just doesn't detect my touches (or maybe it's an overzealous palmcheck?) I need to look at the touchpad icon in my notification bar the next time it happens so I can see if it's actually detecting a touch or not.

 

I've been trying it with palmcheck turned off today and it has been behaving much better - tap to click now appears to work reliably and so far no jumpy pointer with how I use this thing
scrolling is still sucky though and I don't know if it still messes about with the application focus yet

 

Yeah I've been messing with it today too and it looks like it works well.

In any case, anyone have issues with the wifi? The signal seems much worse than on my Sager with the same exact card (Intel 6235). Then again both are worse than my old Vaio Z's 6300... (anyone know if it's possible to swap this card out for the 6300?)

 

Anyone else with an XPS 13 notice that only the lower half of the trackpad physically 'clicks' much, much easier than the upper half? Not sure if that's intentional or sign of a fault?

 

Yep that's true of mines too. I think it's intentional as the buttons are near the button.

 

Bios A08 is out!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

Aha, having never had a click-pad before I wasn't sure. Always assumed the entire pad would "click", rather than just hinging along the top!

 

Found here: Product Support for XPS 13 (L322X) | Dell US

under the drivers & downloads tab.

I don't believe it's "new" in that it's been out about 2 weeks already. But a heads up to those who don't know.

I think it's only this touchpad that does that. Macbooks have a synaptics touchpad that clicks anywhere on its surface. I wish these ultrabook manufacturers would use synaptics, they're much better than cypress or alps, and it bet it only costs a few dollars more per ultrabook, but it'll get rid of major issues... I mean what's the use of a fast laptop when you can't even navigate it because the touchpad sucks?

 

Folks, can anyone recommend a good screen cleaner for the XPS's glossy screen? My screen is a mess, I was looking on Amazon (this: HQ LCD TV Laptop Computer Screen Cleaning Kit: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics) but I don't trust cheap stuff on such an expensive device, though I guess as it is just standard Gorilla Glass it should be OK...

 

I personally recommend this:

Amazon.com: Philips SVC2548G/27 Screen Cleaner for TV's, Plasma, LCD, LED and Computer Screens: Electronics

Use it for all my screens (2 laptops, monitor, cell phone, etc)

 

Try the connector that Dell sell(Cable : DC Power Cable 7.4 to 4.5mm DC Converter Cable for XPS 12/XPS 13/XPS 13) on their website. I use this with a Kensington charger as well as an older Dell charger for a different laptop.

 

Just ordered one from the dell outlet new with 256ssd and the i7 for 1100, hope its good when it gets here.

 

Thinking about getting this as my first ultrabook - getting tired of lugging around my L502x. I know this must be asked a lot, but would anyone like to share their recent experienes with the newest XPS 13 FHD?

 

I too wanted an ultrabook because my previous notebook (a 14" Sony Vaio) was just too thick and heavy to really take anywhere.

I managed to pick up one of the highest-specced XPS 13 FHD (i7-3687U, 256GB SSD, 8GB RAM) from the Dell Outlet for just under £700. It's amazing how thin and light it is compared to my previous notebook - I love that about it! And also, even though the screen is physically smaller, I don't actually notice in day-to-day usage (mostly coding), and it is a LOVELY screen. Fantastic colours.

I am a bit miffed about there not being an SD slot, but I only really use an SD card maybe once or twice a month so it's not a huge deal.

The trackpad is good - the clicking action is a bit rubbish (it hinges from the top, so only the bottom half of the pad is actually 'clickable'), but I tend to tap-to-click and that works fine. Two-fingered scroll is nice as well.

FYI I'm running Ubuntu 13.04, in case it makes any difference to you.

 

I have to post here to add my opinion. I've seen it mentioned once before that that touchpad performs well under Linux and I won't debate that since I don't run Linux--instead, I will simply add my opinion that the touchpad performs very poorly on Windows. Without TouchFreeze, it would be a massive phantom-click nightmare and even with TouchFreeze it still produces phantom clicks frequently. Ratcheting down its sensitivity seems to help somewhat with phantom clicks--but on the other hand, it also makes it much less responsive so I frequently find myself moving my finger while the mouse pointer does nothing (the only option here is to pick up my finger and try again and sometimes it takes a couple of tries before the mouse pointer moves). It's an unpleasant experience.

 

This issue seems to be common on Dell laptops - I've seen it on two different models (neither the XPS 13 - one was an Inspiron) - and it makes me wonder if this is an attribute of Dell's touchpad drivers on Windows as I've yet to experience this issue on this machine (with Linux).

 

Hi, I'm looking to get a Dell XPS form the UK outlet store, I see that have both the L321x and L322x, what is the difference?

Thanks in advance

 

Yeah... I can't stand the touchpad, why can't these ultrabook manufacturers use Synaptics? It's the best and for the premium that an "ultrabook" commands, they should ALL have Synaptics touchpads. Seriously. This is one reason I'm sending my XPS 13 back, wonky touchpad, iffy wifi, mediocre battery life (3-4 hours), heat issues (it kinda gets hot), and the lack of ports is a deal breaker too. Even though I paid $830 for an i5 + 256GB SSD + 1080p panel, it just isn't perfect. I guess I'll have to wait for Haswell and pay probably double for an Asus, at least they seemed to have fixed their touchpads and battery life will be better. I guess I've just been spoiled by the Vaio Z... *sigh*

The L321x is the Ivy Bridge models WITHOUT the 1080p display options. I think they might even include the Sandy Bridge models, but don't quote me on that.

 

Thanks, how easy are these to upgrade the RAM and SSD. The outlet store is selling 4gb + 128SSD however on ebay there are a few 8GB + 256SSD. I'm confident in replacing these parts myself if it works out cheaper that way. But is it easy enough on these laptops?

 

I think I've answered my own question, RAM is soldered but SSD is mSATA card, so upgradable?

 

Hi,
I'm thinking of getting a L322x in replacement of my XPS Dell should take back. My main concern is about Wifi connection. Can someone give me some feedback (220 pages to read...pretty long)? Thanks.

 

I don't have any Wifi issues.

 

Did anyone hear of someone attempting an upgrade of the display from the TN 768p to the newer IPS 1080p panel?
I've seen just the 1080p IPS panel selling for about $120 (screencountry.com, laptopscreen.com), but it just the panel, not the whole display assembly.

I hate my crappy TN low-res screen, something needs to be done!

 

Yep, ram is soldered and ssd is msata (actually uses a samsung 830 msata version)

My wifi had an issue with range. In a room with about 30 other laptops this one could barely handle that. Whilst the sager was fine (and they both have the same intel card).

 

What is the difference between -

Dell XPS 13-L321x-MLK - (Price £829 / £1079)

and

Dell XPS L322X - (Price - £759.99)

Thanks

 

L321X is based on Sandy Bridge, uses 3rd party USB 3.0 host chip, only 720p panel, wireless card is Intel 6230

L322X is based on Ivy Bridge, native Intel USB 3.0. with option to 1080p panel, wireless card is Intel 6235

 

So the L322X is much better?

Why does Dell only offer the L321x-MLK @ Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook - but it looks like they are offering this with 1080p and Ivy Bridge?

 

L321X MLK = L322X

MLK = Mid Life Kicker, in Dell, it means refresh of mainboard without changing ID

 

On May 28, 2013, Dell released version 2.5.3.43 of the Cypress Trackpad driver software. I have installed it and used it for a couple of days. Pursuant to my previous complaint about phantom clicks with earlier versions of the software (see below for an abridged version of my post about the most recent previous version of the software), it appears that this new software does perform at least somewhat better in regards to the phantom clicks issue, though it doesn't by any means eliminate it completely.

A big change that has been made to this version of the software is one I noted as potentially being helpful in post below: you can now turn off "Tap to click" for the trackpad buttons and not just the trackpad. More specifically, now when you turn off "Tap to click" for the trackpad, it is in effect both for the trackpad and the trackpad buttons (as noted below, previously it was in effect only for the trackpad and not for the buttons).* And I believe it is this change that is the reason that the phantom clicks issue appears to be improved in this version of the trackpad software.

As you can see in my message below, I indicated that in the previous version of the driver, even when I would turn the trackpad buttons off I would still get phantom clicks and as a result I was not confident that eliminating "Tap to click" on the trackpad would eliminate the issue entirely--and indeed I can confirm that it does NOT eliminate the issue entirely. The ability to eliminate "Tap to click" on the trackpad buttons seems like it creates a good step forward in regards to the phantom click issue--but it doesn't eliminate the issue and my guess is that the issue remains that made it such that in previous versions of the software I would still get phantom clicks even with the trackpad buttons turned off. So there is still some work to do here, Dell and Cypress!

As noted in other posts in this thread, running TouchFreeze on this laptop with previous versions of the software is very useful (though it does not completely solve the phantom click issue). After installing this newest version of the software, I had uninstalled TouchFreeze as it did not appear that it was beneficial (that is to say, it didn't seem like I needed it with the new version of the software); however, as I found that I continued to experience phantom clicks with the new software, I reinstalled TouchFreeze and it does appear to again be helping to reduce the phantom click issue. But again I must stress that installing TouchFreeze does NOT eliminate the phantom click issue! Further, even if it did eliminate the phantom clicks issue, it wouldn't actually be a solution to the issue: only Dell/Cypress can solve the issue! Put another way: Dell and Cypress, you need to fix this issue! I appreciate the step forward here but this trackpad is still very bad. Get it together, please, Dell and Cypress!

One other note: in the new version of the software, I had to turn off "Reverse Scroll Direction" in order to get the scrolling to work in the opposite direction of the normal scroll direction on Windows where I would have expected to have needed to have this option set to on to have the scrolling work in the opposite direction of the normal scroll direction on Windows. Weird, but no big deal. I'll note that in the past, I have done some mucking around in the registry with the FlipFlopScrollWheel key (if I'm remembering correctly, at one point the software didn't provide the "Reverse Scroll Direction" option so the only way I could reverse the scroll direction was to set FlipFlopScrollWheel to 1); I don't think that has any impact because that's now set to its default value of 0 but you never know. Anyway, it doesn't really matter: just set the option whichever way you have to set it in order to get scroll to go in the direction you want it to go.

* I had suggested that they implement a new option for turning "Tap to click" on/off independently of the trackpad itself. Clearly they have this capability or "Tap to click" would always have applied to both the trackpad and the trackpad buttons and implementing a new option for turning "Tap to click" on/off independently of the trackpad would have given users greater flexibility and would therefore have been a better implementation than the one they chose. However, since I personally want "Tap to click" turned off for both the trackpad and the trackpad buttons (because having either on can induce phantom clicks) this implementation works for me.

 

after a long hiatus from this thread (had one of the original version XPS 13's before the refresh that I returned ulimately due to the screen/resolution and the trackpad), I'm returning to throw in another fresh opinion on the newer version.

Received mine today from the outlet (dang 30% off coupon finally brought me back in) and I'm pretty dang happy. The 1080 screen is a ton better and looks much more like I want it to compared to the previous version. I'm also finding the trackpad to be much more reliable. I turned the cursor speed all the way up and I'm having no trouble navigating using it. The only gestures I use are the two finger scrolling and that's working smoothly for me. I'll miss some taps every once in a while, but it's not a huge deal for me.

I've had my wireless drop internet access (not connection, it stayed connected to the network but I lost access) that was fixed by resetting the wireless adapter. I've had that happen with my other Dell (an Inspiron 17R SE) but only at work and not at home, while this drop was at home. Otherwise the wireless has been rock solid. So, I'll have to keep an eye on that.

All in all, I'm pretty pleased. It's a brand new toy, so sure, I've got new toy optimism. But by this time on my first day with the original 13 I already had some buyer's remorse.

 

a follow up on my xps 13 experience: I did end up having major issues with the wifi connection. The intel card in these is just a horrible product, having these same issues in other machines than the xps 13. I replaced it with a Killer 1202 card and my connection has been excellent without a single drop since. I'm not very experienced with cracking these things open and changing parts out (only other thing I've done is install a SDD on my 17r se) but it was extremely easy to change out the wifi card on the 13. Just remove the back cover and there's easy access to it.

 

I also replace the built-in Intel 6235 (802.11n + BT 4.0) with an Intel 6205 (802.11n).
My wi-fi works just fine but the blueooth signal is bad.
So I just get a pure 802.11n card for overall better wi-fi performance.

 

Is the hard drive easy to replace for an average person? I saw it on the 2nd post. Has anyone try lately?

 

I'd say it is fairly easy, as long as you got one of those special torx screw driver.

 

Where can I get this one special torx scew driver? What size is it?

It takes a mSATA drive right?

Thanks!

 

See this is the best place for some advice and see what others are achieving?

For the first time I tried out my USB 3.0 Card reader for my Compact Flash and noticed it was painfully slow. So I did a bit of testing on both USB ports and the same output.

Grabbed a benchmark program and started recording the performance. On both states it said it was reading around 17/18 MB/s and thought that was quite slow. I plugged the reader back into my desktop computer and performed the same test and it came to a staggering 45MB/s !!!!

I've done some update drivers and only enable USB debugging from the bios and its increased to 22MB/s. Can anyone or experience the same problem?

Lucky I've got another XPS 13 with me and performed the same kind of test and its the same speeds (17/18MB/s) which I think is quite shocking for a USB3.0 device. Anyone looked at this issue and found a resolution?

Thanks


EDIT: Right, after a bit of googling I found there is a fix update for USB3.0. I updated my drivers from Intel site and did a comparison. from 17MB/S to 45MB/S. I'll write up my analysis later tonight as I think this is a wider problem as people's USB3 are not working at their full capacity.

 

Hey guys, has anyone tried dual booting and installing Lion or Mountain Lion on the XPS 13 720p screen with sandy bridge? Last time I couldn't get it past the apple logo when trying to boot up the installer, and yes I tried various boot flags. Can anyone help me out?

 

Could anyone recommend a clean install guide for the XPS 13? Windows 8 preferably but anything would be a great help

 

So what's the wifi replacement card people are having the best luck with to resolve the wifi issues?

 

Install the correct drivers for your USB ports. Tested on Dell XPS 13 (late model)

Being the geek I am, I was concered at the rate with my Lexmark Compact Flash Card USB was transferring photos from a full 16GB memory card. I did a few test and the numbers speak for themselves.

Dell XPS 13 with the most current or available drivers from the Dell site


As you can see from the transfer rate it was quite terrible and tried to do what was possible, power max mode, USB debugging, reset, switch between the two USB and none of which made a difference.
I was convinced at the fact this was not working correctly I did a similar test with my main rig USB3.0 ports and this is what it should be hitting.



As you can see there was quite a bit of difference.

So after goggling for a bit I came across this bit of info:

Windows 8 and Intel USB 3.0 Host Controllers | Plugable

I followed the instructions and now got my USB3.0 working to its full potential!



I'm quite disappointed how Dell has released a prestige laptop with premature drivers and not fully compatible drivers.
Anyway I hope this has resolved any issues you may have with your USB.

 

Hi,
Would like to know if someone has already calibrated his FHD screen and can post here the ICC profile? Thanks.

EDIT: Found here: XPS13 FHD ICC profile

 

I've just downloaded and installed the latest touchpad drivers - Cyprus TrackPad 2.5.1.41_A03 and the "phantom" clicks/focus problem is MUCH WORSE!

I only experienced this once or twice using the original drivers delivered with my laptop in April/May 2013 - but these new drivers are terrible. Every few keypresses and the window focus has randomly jumped elsewhere.

The touchpad has ONE JOB - I can't get my head around how something designed for such a specific purpose can be so incredibly badly implemented! TouchFreeze has helped the solution somewhat, but I basically have to spend all my time in Ubuntu now as the experience is so much worse with the Windows 8 drivers.