Why you can trust TechRadar We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.
As previously mentioned, the Dell XPS 15z packs in an Intel Sandy Bridge processor, specifically a Core i7-2620M running at 2.7GHz. With a mighty 8GB of DDR3 RAM on board also, we had high hopes for our benchmarking tests.
Running Cinebench, we realised the full extent of this laptop's power. It's one of the most capable machines we've tested, able to multitask with any number of resource-hungry applications. Even the most demanding editing software runs perfectly.
Dedicated Nvidia GeForce 525M graphics make for great multimedia performance on the Dell XPS 15z also. HD movies stream smoothly, you can edit all of your media and even the latest games run well. But more intensive titles may need their detail levels tweaked to get an acceptable frame rate. Basically, this laptop can do it all and won't become out of date any time soon.
With all that power we expected the Dell XPS 15z to heat up quickly. However, the chassis remained cool at all times even after hours of use, with all of the settings turned right up.
We also expected the battery life to suffer, despite the XPS 15 lasting a long time between charges. However, our tough Battery Eater benchmark, which runs the battery down by playing HD video on a loop with the settings turned up to maximum, still came out at a very impressive 214 minutes.
If you simply use the Dell XPS 15z for browsing the web or belting out that novel you've been meaning to write, it'll last for five hours easily.
Benchmarks
3DMark: 19561
Cinebench: 11474
Battery Eater 05: 214 minutes
