Dell XPS 15 Gets Coffee Lake CPU Upgrade

The best 15-inch consumer laptop is about to get better. With Intel taking the wraps off its new 8th Gen "Coffee Lake" processors today (April 3), Dell has announced a new version of the XPS 15 based on the new chips.

The laptop retains the same design and luxurious carbon-fiber deck as previous models, but throws in a more-colorful 4K panel.

Starting at $999 and due out in May, the Dell XPS 15 9570 will come with your choice of Core i5, Core i7 or Core i9 Intel H series CPUs. These new processors have six cores and twelve threads, 50 percent more than the 7th Gen Core processors in the previous XPS 15 model (9560).

In addition to its new processors, the XPS 15 9570 will be available with a new GPU option: the Nvidia GTX 1050Ti. You'll also be able to get it with Intel integrated graphics or the slightly-slower GTX 1050 chip.

We had a chance to spend a few minutes with the new XPS 15 at a recent Dell press event. The laptop looks and feels just like last year's model, but we were struck by the colorful display.

The new laptop will be available with both a 1080p non-touch and a 4K touch screen. Both panels will operate at a luminous 400 nits of brightness, but the Ultra HD display is designed to reproduce 100 percent of the Adobe RGB color gamut. Meanwhile, the lower-resolution model can only hit 100 percent of the more-restrive sRGB gamut.

The XPS 15 starts at a mere 4 pounds, with a 1080p screen and a 56 Whr battery. However, with a larger, 97 Whr battery and the 4K display, that weight jumps to 4.5 pounds. Dell claims that the laptop can last up to 21.5 hours on a charge. Last year's model lasted 8 hours and 23 minutes on our Laptop Mag Battery Test 1.0 (surfing the web at 100 nits of brightness) so we're taking that claim with a grain of salt.

The new model has two USB Type-A 3.1 connections, HDMI out, an audio jack, an SD card reader and a Thunderbolt 3 port, which will work with eGPUs. There's a fingerprint reader for Windows Hello logins built into the power button. Unfortunately, the XPS 15 9570 still has Dell's infamous nosecam which points up at you from the bottom bezel.

We look forward to testing the XPS 15 9570 closer to the time when it ships in May.

Correction: A previous version of this article stated that the XPS 15 would be available with an optional, black lid. Dell has not announced plans to offer that color at this time, but you can get it on the XPS 15 2-in-1.

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The official Geeks Geek, as his weekly column is titled, Avram Piltch has guided the editorial and production of Laptopmag.com since 2007. With his technical knowledge and passion for testing, Avram programmed several of LAPTOP's real-world benchmarks, including the LAPTOP Battery Test. He holds a master's degree in English from NYU.

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