Competition: Dell XPS or Macbook Pro for a student?

which is good for students Dell XPS or Macbook Pro for a student?

Today we’re going to solve this issue by giving the 10 results tests that we made on dell XPS and MacBook pro.

Our tests are going to cover:

• battery life
• price difference
• flexibility
• weight
• thickness
• noise
• CPU performance
• storage
• operating system
• warranty
• touch screen support

In our tests, we made a comparison between XPS-13 and MacBook pro 13 inches. So all the results that you’re going to access depend on these 2 models.

Battery life test

We made 2 tests of battery life:

==> The first test of intensive use but without gaming, it comprises reading, browsing on the internet, watching videos, and running programs it only except gaming

==> The second test is pure gaming nothing else.

and here are the results that we found in the table below.

as we notice from the table above, MacBook Pro has shown significant results in battery durability. But if we look at what normally students use or do with their laptops we don’t find a big difference.

45 minutes is the difference between XPS-13 and MacBook Pro so for students. So, there is nothing to worry about XPS or MacBook Pro for normal tasking.

But in the test of Gaming battery durability, we notice the difference between MacBook Pro it last 2 times than XPS–13.

So students who love playing games outside XPS 13 is not a good option compared to a MacBook Pro.

According to many tests that we made we only find the MacBook Pro is in the first position in terms of battery durability and here is why:

• MacBook Pro has the most efficient CPU in the world. The M1 appple chip consume 50% less energy that intel CPU laptops do, like any windows laptop in the market including dell XPS.

• When you paly games the processor Dell’s xps consumption reaches 50 watts per hour while MacBook Pro dosen”t Exceed 30 watts per hour. So this is what makes MacBook Pro last for longer times.

• Apple has its own operating system and its own CPU this allows the company to create the most efficient and suitable hardware for its own operating system.

This is a strong point that makes Dell XPS doesn’t last long as Macbook Pro for student activities.

Storage

If we compare the Dell XPS 13 and MacBook Pro both have the same standard storage. both start with 256 SSD GB so there is nothing too special between Dell XPS-13 or MacBook Pro for a student.

price difference

The price comparison that we’re going to find in the table below is for the basic or starting versions of these laptops. That is to say the lower configuration available in the market for XPS 13 and the MacBook Pro 13 inch.

The price of laptops can vary from time to time for each version but we can notice that’s MacBook Pro is providing today more competitive prices compared to it was before.

As we’ve seen from the table we find that MacBook Pro is cheaper than the Dell XPS-13 by $180.

So if you buy the MacBook Pro instead of XPS-13 you’re going to earn good quality headphone and earbud together. So for students, $180 is something very encouraging and noticeable.

flexibility

The MacBook Pro M1 processor chip has shown the amazing performance of power efficiency but if we look at the flexibility we find shortcomings and some drawbacks.

Hardware difference flexibility

MacBook Pro has an HDMI port while the xps13 doesn’t. So you will be forced to buy a dock to run a dell with an external monitor. But the interesting thing using a dock in XPS allows you as a student to drive up to 3 monitors.

That is impossible with MacBook pro 13 inches you can’t drive more than one monitor, even if you buy a dock that won’t increase the number of external monitors to drive.

But if you have:

MacBook Pro 14==> between 2 to 3 monitors depending on the configuration

MacBook Pro 16==> between 3 to 4 monitors depends on the configuration

This question is so important for computer science students if you are a CS student we recommend reading this article For CS students MacBook pro or Thinkpad? (proved)

Software difference flexibility

XPS-13 is running in windows so you will have the freedom and the total flexibility of using any program you want. This is not the case for MacBook Pro users, especially after the release of the M1 Apple chip processor.

students should know that MacBook pro doesn’t support all the IDE’s or software that you can run with a windows laptop like Dell XPS 13. This problem can be critical for computer science students.

having a MacBook Pro means you won’t able to run theses following apps:

• VMWare
• Parallels Desktop
• VirtualBox
• Homebrew ==>dosen’t work properly
• Eclipse ==> can work but doesn’t include many features
• JetBrains IDEs
• Android Studio ==>doesn’t work properly

you can find more detail in this article.

Even if a MacBook Pro has an option to run a Windows operating system, not like MacBook air but this isn’t related to an operating system alone it has relation to the processor the apple M1 processor.

So to summarise dell has more flexible software and hardware than a Macbook Pro.

weight

if we look at the weight of each device we don’t find a difference only 80 grams between XPS-13 and MacBook pro 13 ich, but the significant difference is in a charger weight.

Students don’t take this point into consideration they ignore the charger weights.

but as a student, most times you will use a laptop in school or college which means carrying a charger in your bag. owning as a student a dell XPS-13 instead of MacBook Pro means reducing 400 grams of additional weight.

it is the equivalent of carrying 2 additional medium size notebooks on your backpacks so the difference is not easy to ignore.

Thickness

both XPS and MacBook pro 13 inches are thin, 1 mm isn’t something to take into consideration. But in terms of comparison, it will be noticeable to know finally which is the winner laptop in our competition between XPS 13 and MacBook pro 13 inches.

15mm is great for students it is 2 times less than a normal notebook and 3 times compared to a textbook, this indicates how thin are these laptops, students can put their laptops in anywhere they want.

They can put these laptops in their backpacks or even stretched messenger bags, they won’t take space it is like holding a thin textbook in your bag.

Touch screen support

The great thing about dell XPS 13 is, it is a 2 in 1 device, which means it has a touch screen that is great for students to:

• browse with finger-like tablet on the internet
• replace a mouse
• access and customize anything fastly and easy.
• take notes with stylus
• draw
• highlighting informations

But the second thing that makes XPS beat totally a MacBook pro, is with an XPS 13 you can rotate a screen up 360° which means transforming it into a tablet without buying an iPad in case of having a MacBook pro.

unfortunately, MacBook Pro doesn’t support the touch screen option and doesn’t exceed 110° of screen rotation.

CPU performance

we made a test to compare a CPU performance between MacBook pro and xps13 and the test that we found is in the table below:

To simplify it at the maximum :

• the single-core test is the ability to run lighter programs and applications faster like browsing wring or reading etc.

• The multi-core test is the ability to run heavier programs and applications faster like rendering 2 or 3d images, video editing, etc.

so we can find that the MacBook Pro has a more powerful CPU than XPS-13, which is more powerful by 40%. But according to other tests that we made between others laptops that you can find in this article we found this classification.

1. MacBook Pro is in the first position
2. XPS 13 is in the second position
3. windows laptop studio
4. ThinkPad X1 carbon
5. Hp dragonfly in the last position

you could find more details in this article.

as we said before in our article apple has a powerful CPU it beat even gaming laptops.

Noise

To make a test noise you can use a decibimeter ( device to calculate a sound intensity ). Or install some apps to measure a sound with your phone.

we made this test when laptops are quiet, that is to say without running heavier programs. It is like writing or reading a document on a laptop. So here are the result that we found.

MacBook Pro is quite by 25% than XPS-13 but both are good. To clarify, having a range between 20 to 40 dB is good and acceptable. While gaming laptops can reach up to 60 dB which means 2 to 3 times than these laptops.

But when you run heavier programs like 3d design or edit a video fans get louder and numbers will increase.

The amazing thing about MacBook is the MacBook air version, it doesn’t produce any sound it is completely silent. To clarify it generates 0dB you can know more about that in this video.

warranty

In terms of warranty, both XPS and MacBook Pro have a one-year warranty. But, there is a solid competitor of these laptops that has a 3 years warranty you could discover more about in this article.

Conclusion

To summarize and determine which is the winner laptop Dell XPS or MacBook pro, we will collect all the 10 test results from the article and expose them to this table below.

1 ==>means better than

0 ==> means lower than

so as you see the 10 results tests have shown the equality between XPS-13 and MacBook pro.

So as a summary we can say the Dell XPS or Macbook Pro for a student both are good.

But we found that the important thing that makes MacBook pro better than XPS are:

• longer battery life
• powerfulness of the CPU
• less noise

And we found that the important thing that makes dell XPS better than MacBook pro are:

• less weight especially for charger
• The flexibility, you won’t face compatibility problems
• It is a 2 in 1 decide it can be used a tablet is completely foldable and has touch screen

So these 6 elements are going to determine which is the best laptop for you to pick up as a student.