You can finally buy a 10th gen laptop: Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 hits the shelves

Dell's 10th-gen XPS 13 2-in-1 7390 promises a 2.5X performance increase.

Gordon Mah Ung (PC World (US online)) on 08 August, 2019 09:20

The long wait for Intel's 10nm CPUs officially ended Wednesday, when Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 went on sale on Dell.com. Once ordered, the company says the first wave of product should be ready by late August.

As the first laptop (that we know of) to go on sale with Intel's 10th-gen processor, Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 7390 ushers in a new era. Well, the first real era, anyway. Intel actually "sold" small numbers of its first 10nm Cannon Lake CPUs earlier this year, but that doesn't really count.

We actually got an early hands-on with Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 7390 at Computex in Taipei. It isn't just a sequel to the current XPS 13 2-in-1 9365 model—it's a major upgrade. The new model's standout features are its use of the 10th-gen, 10nm Core i7-1065G7 CPU, along with LPDDR4X memory and one thing that will anger some: a soldered-on SSD.

As we saw in our performance preview of the 10th-gen CPU, it's likely to be significantly faster than its predecessor, which tops out with an 8th-gen Core i7-8500Y. That's essentially a dual-core, low-power 8th-gen Amber Lake CPU running in a fanless mode. With two fans in the newest XPS 13 2-in-1 along with a vapor chamber, with think the quad-core 10th-gen CPU will likely hit its claim of 2.5X performance improvement.

Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 10th gen Core i7 Ice Lake — The newest XPS 13 2-in-1 eschews the fanless design for a dual-fan cooler.

The XPS 13 2-in-1 is available with CPU options ranging from 10th-gen Core i3 to 10th-gen Core i7. Memory options range from 4GB to 32GB of LPDDR4X/3733.

Storage options range from 256GB to 1TB of PCIe SSD. In a break from the previous model, which used an M.2 drive that can in theory be replaced, Dell will pull an Apple and solder the SSD onto the motherboard. That's raised some eyebrows, but the company said it prioritized saving a bit of space over accommodating the relatively rare need to upgrade storage.

The battery is a decently sized 51 watt hours. Dell says the laptop will run nearly 17 hours on a charge.

Plenty of 8th-gen and 9th-gen laptops will still be sold while the 10th-gen laptops trickle in. If you're wondering whether you should wait for a 10th-gen laptop, we go over the pros and cons for you in that linked story.