Price: £2,698 from fave.co/3qTkZL8
The big-screen laptop trend of recent has been moving from a 17.3in display with a widescreen 16:9 aspect ratio to a 16in 16:10 panel that results in a more compact and portable package with nearly the same screen real estate.
Despite numerous refreshes over the past few years, the Dell XPS 17 (9730) still resides between these two popular panel sizes, with a 17in 16:10 display that’s roomier than the 16in equivalent but not quite as wide as a 17.3in 16:9 panel. The result is a massive display for media editing, multitasking and perhaps some light gaming.
Inside, the XPS 17 serves up the latest Intel and Nvidia silicon. Our test system pairs a 13th-gen Core i7 CPU with RTX 4070 graphics, but Dell has opted for a low-wattage version of the latter. That means it can’t match the frame rates of gaming laptops with fullwattage RTX 40-series GPUs.
While the display’s sheer size is certainly impressive, its 60Hz refresh rate is underwhelming. Further, it’s merely an IPS panel and not an OLED, which graphics pros and enthusiasts can rightly expect at this price. As a result, content creators may be better off elsewhere.
