Dell XPS 15 - FHD vs UHD - Photo Editor

I originally posted this in the owner's thread but couldn't figure out how to delete post. I just thought a new thread is easier for me to follow! Anyways!

New to the forum here, I am pretty much set on the Dell XPS 15. I am going to tell you right now I will primarily use it for photo editing (no video), photo manipulation, and art. I will also be watching movies on it, word processing, showing photographs, etc... on the go. So battery life is important to me.

I ordered the FHD version (97WH, i7, 512GB SSD), but I am now reading it is only 97% sRGB, and 4k is 100% sRGB. I also love matte and dislike glossy touch, but can live with it if the battery life isn't too affected.

Here are my questions.

Is that 3% in sRGB really going to make a difference (my monitor had home is 100% sRGB)? And how much is the battery life compromised from FHD to 4K? Lastly, I am using an older version of Photoshop (CS6) , and heard there are scaling issues. Are there scaling issues with Microsoft Office and other programs?

Thanks a bunch!

 

That 3% sRGB is going to be as irrelevant as humanly possible. The bigger question is whether you're a digital arts professional and require pitch perfect colours or if you're a hobbyist who uses PS and similar products on the side.

 

I am mostly a hobbyist, but I have been contracted with photography studios in the past to do photo editing and right now I am contracted with a bigger company who throws at me photo retouching projects once every couple of months.

 

Check the detailed display analysis over on NoteBookCheck and see if they are to your liking compared to your current screen. That's the best advice I can offer. Look for Delta E values lower than 4, ideally under 3.

 

My photo editing screen at home is an ASUS PB278Q. The Delta E Value for Dell XPS 15 FHD is around 7.1 , while the 4K is 4.84? But then its telling me it can be calibrated down to 1.5? What do these values tell me?

 

The 3% in sRGB accuracy won't make much of a difference. So as far as color accuracy goes, it doesn't really matter. I would say that for general application use (not gaming), the 4K screen is a better option in terms of image quality. The sharper pixels are nice.

Expect about a ~25%-33% drop in battery life with the 4K screen.

As for matte / glossy... it's up to you to decide if you value matte screen over sharper text / image quality. The touch is nice, too. I used to be a die-hard believer that touch on laptops is just a marketing gimmick that manufacturers threw in there because "touch" is such a buzzword. But after using a laptop with a touchscreen, it's one of those subtle changes that you don't notice until you don't have it anymore.

Most scaling issues are either resolved, or live-able. The situation today (especially with Windows 10) is that scaling issues exist as an annoyance in just a few programs; compared to about 2-3 years ago when scaling issues made a much larger number of applications become nearly unusable.

I looked it up here:
http://www.colorwiki.com/wiki/Delta_E:_The_Color_Difference

Delta-E is the "distance" between two colors. The idea is that a dE of 1.0 is the smallest color difference the human eye can see.
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So it sounds like how close a screen displays a color, compared to the true color itself. Calibrating a screen down to Delta-E 1.5 is excellent.

 

Thank you kent! I play a lot of old games (Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines), can I downscale a 4K screen to 1080p? And does downscaling it save more battery life?

I am hoping that I can get at least 6 hours on a single charge unplugged - doing word processing, watching a movie, etc... light stuff.

 

You can run a 4K screen at 1080p but it looks blurry in most cases. Add to that the low resolution of older games and you are likely not going to be happy with gaming under those conditions. Also no, running a 4K panel at 1080p does not affect battery performance - it still needs to power 8 million pixels vs 2 million pixels @ 1080p.

 

Yes, you can downscale a game. Just set it to run at 1920*1080. It works pretty well on this screen because 4k is a perfect multiple of 1080p (3840x2160 vs 1920x1080).

Downscaling does not save battery life. You are still illuminating the same number of pixels on-screen.

As for battery life... Expect 5-8 hours depending on the workload and screen brightness.



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5-8 hours depending on the screen you choose*

 

Ok, if I plugged my 4k laptop into my 1080 TV (hdmi) how would it look?

I can get 5-8 hours out of a 4k?

 

Out of the 4K screen, I'd say 5-6.

 

Hi,

My XPS 9560 UHD can definitely go around 6-8 hours on battery, running Unity and Visual Studio, switching back and forth Dell and High performance power mode. It isn't as lengthy as the FHD, but still, it is better than most laptops with a 7700HQ.

The extra colour gamut won't make a night and difference, but the extra resolution is handy. You get to have a photo opened at least 1080p and plenty of space for menus in PS and LR.

 

Thanks Athonline!

Now if I can live with the glossy screen, lol.

 

It isn't that bad once you get used to it. It takes some time, but eventually you stop caring. It is, obviously, an issue if you work outside. However, the XPS has a really bright panel, thus, you just set the brightness to 100% and usage outside isn't that difficult.

Oh. I nearly forgot, another reason to pick the UHD is the best colour accuracy (not just coverage). ;-)

 

Well, it is really glossy, if I hade to use that as my main display, I would never go with the 4K. That said, I would never use a 15" as my main display unless I was forced to.


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It is indeed the glossiest screen I've ever used. Yet, I personally got used to it and I accepted it in favour of having this awesome image quality. Each on their own...

 

There 4k screen is 100% aRGB. That's a whole different spectrum and it's much more colors than 100% sRGB. My wife uses the 4k version for photography and it works fine except for scaling issues with older versions of Adobe creative suite. Great screen though. The max brightness more than makes up for the glossiness, if glare is a concern.

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I was reading on Notebook Check that the 4K model only has 88% aRGB, while the FHD has 78% aRGB. The sRGB percentages are 100% and 98.9% for those models.

@improwise , If I will be in brightly lit rooms most of the time, is the glare really that bad? I have rarely used glossy screens which is why I am afraid. My TV is 1080p Matte, my home editing monitor is 1440p matte, and my last laptop was 1080p matte. Only thing I own that is glossy is my phone (950XL Microsoft) , but I have to turn up the brightness to 75-100% to able to use it properly in direct sunlight.

My only two concerns at this point are the glare and scaling of older programs like Photoshop CS6. I do not want to upgrade to Photoshop CC as I am so used to CS6. I wonder what a 4K screen scaled down to 1440p looks like...

How much battery life can I expect on a 4K screen at full brightness vs a 1080p screen at full brightness if I am watching a movie, word processing, or photo editing (for class)?

Lectures or practical classes in my design school are usually 2-3 hours long + 1 hour tutorial after.

 

It is the most glary (if that is a word) laptop I ever owned, but it is definitely visible/usable in a bright room. Especially, if you crank up the screen up.

It won't look too bad, but not great either. Text maybe a bit fuzzy.

I have no clue about the CS6, but other programs I use, i.e. IntelliJ, are definitely more usable than they were in my 3K 13" one. Windows Creators' update helped quite a bit with scaling.

I will guess 4-5 hours. Maybe more with a balanced power plan. I will try tonight to have the brightness all the way up, while coding, and get back to you.

 

It looks like Dell cannot modify my order, I would have to return laptop, refund, then re-order. I am sure the 1080p is just fine as I have used it forever! lol.

 

Definetely, the FHD version is one of -if not the- best 15" screens out there. It is still more than enough for photography.

 

Well, it is bad, how bad is probably a personal preference. works for meetings etc but would never want to work on it with bad window placement etc. Its noticable more glossy than the MacBook Pro screen.

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If I didnt have an external screen most of the time, i would definately habe gotten the fhd instead. Now the 4k gives some extra pop when I couch surf

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Oh... that's a deal breaker for me. I could not ever stand the gloss of a MacBook Pro.

Seeing as how I never work in an Adobe RGB workspace (I never print anything), I always work in sRGB, I am sure the FHD will be fine.

 

The FHD screen is probably the best FHD screen on the market (on a laptop)

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Do you ever show prospective clients your work on the computer?
If so, definitely get the 4k screen. Have you seen the difference in real life? The 4k is quite impressive, photos look much better.

 

I have not seen the 4k in real life, as no nearby store has it, but I do want to ask, I have shown clients my work on my previous 1080p, and they are impressed, how is the 4k going to add "quality" to my work, if my work is already "quality"?

I am just curious. I have no problem going through the headache of returning the laptop and getting the 4k, but I have survived with 1440p and 1080p for awhile now.

I do plan on keeping the laptop for 4+ years. But I might lose my patience with reduced battery life and tons of glare.

 

So I went to a local best buy and they had the matte and 4k panel 2017 XPS 13. And the 4k although nice is way too glossy. That 1080p matte screen is so beautiful and color accurate. I couldn't believe it.

 

I have had both the FHD and 4K and in person the difference is staggering!! If you have never seen the 4K you will be fine with the FHD as it is a great screen, but once you see the 4K it will ruin how you feel about every other display on the market. The screen is glossy, but it is also very bright so unless you plan on using it outside all the time I would say the trade off is worth it.

 

I also have the FHD XPS 13 9343 and honestly I cannot even look at that screen anymore after using the XPS 15 4K. Sad thing is I used to think my 9343 FHD screen was amazing. The 4K is just so sharp and the colours pop so much it is hard to look at anything else.

 

So I was able to check out UHD dell xps 15 at Microsoft store and it is a beautiful screen and im considering swapping it but have a few last questions :

1. The lighting setting in the store was bright and the laptop at maximum brightness is not that bright. Why is that? I've seen glossy MacBooks get brighter.

2. I cannot see the quality of the 4K on a screen that small. On a 4K TV or monitor i can see it really well. Again, I don't know why.

3. Windows 10 has 200% scaling, which is perfect but does that mean older programs will scale too?

 

The MacBook is I would say 5-10% brighter than XPS 15 UHD version. XPS 15 UHD panel is super glossy, probably becuase it is from gorilla glass.
But glossy screen does usually have a more vivid color than matte displays.
2. 4k screen in a small panel might not be the biggest difference you have ever seen. But for me, 1080p panels makes the individual pixel more apparent, and look kinda blocky (is that the word?), which looks kinda ugly due to the premium aspect of the laptop. And when you want to look close at something at the screen, you can clearly see lines between each pixel. Which is kinda disgusting for things like content creation work.
3. Not all program will scale perfectly. And in some programs, the place you touch wont recognize correctly on screen itself. But programs worked fine.

 

@Sanfasteryler

"Disgusting", I think, is the wrong word to use. Curious, are you a content creator? Because having worked in the professional industry (I am a celebrity retoucher), gloss actually makes colors more inaccurate. And resolution does not matter, color gamut and display type does. This is why I am torn between the two displays. I could take that $600 extra dollars I saved and buy a nice 4K monitor and hook it up to my 1080p when needed. Right?

 

I am not a professional at this category.
Well 4k display isn't really that expensive, but they can suffer from low color accuracy, color gamut etc.