Dell Latitude 14 7000 (E7450) Review

A year had passed since I bought my Dell Latitude E7440 and I started to look out for something even better. I wanted a larger touchpad and a quieter fan (not that it is exceptionally noisy but I’ve been spending much of my time in a quiet room). My previous concerns about my eyes wanting a larger screen have proved to be unfounded. Consequently, I started watching the available inventory at the Dell UK Outlet and when an E7450 with the Nvidia 840M GPU appeared at a relatively reasonable price, I decided to buy it. Not that my usage pattern needs the extra graphics power but comments in the relevant notebookreview forum indicated that this version of the E7450, with a higher rated cooling system, ran more quietly under light usage. A potential extra hour or more of battery time was another justification for an upgrade.

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Excellent review, John. I used the 12.5" version of this notebook, the E7250 for a while this summer and enjoyed the quality and all-around design. I have an E7440 for work as well and agree in full the keyboard feels better on these newer models. Relegating the Home and End keys into the arrow key cluster however is a shortsighted decision on Dell's part; for that reason alone, I wouldn't personally consider this notebook.

Charles

 

I don't find my E7440 LCD to be sparkly at all, so could be just bad luck. I would love to have that keyboard, but don't type enough to give up the mSATA SSD.

 

But is your LCD AUO or LG? Dell use both sources but the AUO panel (B140HAN) seems to be more common.

And for anyone reading your remark and getting confused: IIRC ZAZ has both a 2.5" HDD and an mSATA SSD in his E7440. The E7450 doesn't currently have the option of two drives but maybe an SSD will appear that is compatible with the WWAN slot.

John

 

Great review! I do wish they offered a lighter lid color or something.

 

I was wondering what to do with the empty WWAN card slot and discovered that the previous generation 5570 card is available in M.2 format as the 5570e which is marketed as for the Venue tablet and is somewhat more affordable than Dell's options for the E7450 WWAN. I applied the old proverb "nothing ventured, nothing gained" and bought the 5570e plus a 200MB 4G SIM. The card went into slot without any hesitation but I had to find a screw (2Mx3, I think) from my bag of assorted notebook screws (available off ebay) to hold it down. Fixing the antennae cables was challenging and needed a small pair of pliers to bend, rotate and align the plug on each cable to the appropriate socket on the card (white cable to main, black cable to aux) before pushing plug into socket.

The next step was to install the driver: Windows 10 has the basic hardware driver but not the supporting software. The WWAN card driver offered for the E7450 doesn't work, but the 5570e driver for the Venue from here knows how to talk to the card. Speedtest only measured a download speed of 5Mb/s which isn't really 4G (although faster than many people get with their wired broadband connection) and the speed problem more likely lies with the network provider than the hardware. Spending double, or more, the money on the latest 4G card is unlikely to result in better performance if, as I suspect, the network is the bottleneck. A 200MB was enough for the testing. It won't last very long in normal usage, but it expires after a month.

John

 

I thought I would check how the E7450 behaves when connected to a Dell PA20 45W PSU (part No. GM456). When I tried this PSU with the E7440 the CPU locked itself down to a low speed.

The E7450 is more tolerant of the under-rated PSU. It gives a warning about the PSU and says it will use the battery if the power requirement exceeds the PSU output. When connected to the 45W PSU the CPU is running at full speed according to HWiNFO. In fact, it seems to be stuck there although I'm using a performance on demand power plan, but I won't lose sleep because the CPU package power consumption is only a few Watts unless it gets loaded. And the battery can be charged when the computer is running, albeit only a few Watts (but faster if the computer is off).

So, the 45W PSU appears to be a viable option for when wanting to travel light or just carry a spare PSU in case of emergency. The PA-20 is delightfully small - 3.5" x 2.5" x 0.5" - and uses a Fig-8 cable which is also thinner and lighter than a cloverleaf cable. Get an old one off 'bay and give it a try.

John

 

Thanks for your review John

This point makes me worry about buying a latitude laptop...
I have been running my Samsung NP900X3C for nearly 4 years now, on a daily use without counting charge cycles, so I wanted to ask how bad the stamina has effectively decreased on yours since its first day of use ? My laptop is plugged in about like 4 hours a day on average so I would reach 300 charges very quickly

Does that mean that Dell Latitude does not use the battery at all when connected to AC ?! That would be fantastic, meaning there is no need to remove the battery when plugged in to save battery life (I am not used to care about this thanks to Samsung's BLE)

Did you notice such usage restrictions ?! Ctrl + trackpoint is such a common usage to me

And last, about the newest latitude you mentioned on my previous post, is it planned at a real 13 or 14 inches size ? With no dGPU it would be even better
I still can't find this "13" even on Dell US website
Thanks for your help !

 

1. I've never figured out how a charge cycle is measured but presume it is based on the equivalent of a full charge. So, for example, two 50% battery drain + charge = 1 charge cycle. I'm currently using a spare battery in my E7450. I had actually bought it well over a year ago for the E7440 (it's compatible) and use this battery when I'm at home (and keep the approx 10% higher capacity E7450 battery for when I am travelling). BatteryInfoView says the battery in the notebook is still like new but, to be honest, it hasn't had a lot of work. The E7440 / E7450 battery is external and easily changed. They are also reasonably priced. The battery on the new E7470 is internal but is considered to be user-replaceable with full instructions in the user manual (that's one of the good aspects of Dell - proper documentation).

2. I think all modern notebooks stop charging the battery once it is full so the battery is effectively a UPS. Most notebooks also have a threshold for a charge reduction before initiating a top-up charge. On Dell Latitudes the user can also set up custom charge behaviour using the Dell Power Manager.

3. I can't comment on the trackpoint operation. Most of the time I use a mouse (the very portable Logitech M187) although I find the touchpad OK.

4. I am also a little confused about the various current / imminent Dell Latitude notebooks. My purchasing strategy is usually to wait until the products have been on the market for several months and show up in Dell Outlet. You might want to consider sizes that are an inch each side of the 13.3" NP900X3C. You will certainly want to be looking for an IPS or equivalent high viewing angle display and probably FHD. You might want to consider even higher resolution if you have no older software which could have display scaling problems.

And for anyone else who just wants an update on my E7450: I'm still very happy with it. Nice keyboard, nice screen and quiet fan = contented user who isn't thinking of their next notebook.

John

 

Thanks again John !

It looks like finding a specific reference on Dell online store or by Asus is really time consuming...
On french website, the "new" Latitude 14 is still on Broadwell... likely not the real "new" edition of the laptop.
I am looking for a light notebook with a real 13 ou 14 inches display. The latest Dell Latitude 13 you talked about doesn't seem to be available yet (I could not find) and is not a real 13 (but a 12.5). I'll be waiting for the next iteration of their laptop to be available. Hopefully very soon !

Pfiuuu... finding the best laptop is quite a tough job !

 

The search is not made easier because each of us has different requirements. Start by making a list of what features you want in your next notebook (eg the non-glossy display) and classify those features as essential and desirable. Then follow the reviews (this site, notebookcheck, others...) and note how the computers fit your requirements. This information can all go into a spreadsheet which you progressively expand. I've used this method on several occasions and it has stopped me making a poor purchasing decision because I was about to overlook the absence of a feature I wanted.

John

 

I agree, the best laptop is definitely linked to each one's expectations.
I never thought about making a spreadsheet but that could be a good idea, the deal is, I am too exigent...

It looks like dell french online store finally came up with some fresh new models, however, I am still lost among them...
there are latitude 7000 new 13" ("nouveau 13" just like the "new 13" on the us store) but they are real 13.3 all equipped with core-M, whereas the preview mention core-I with actually a 12.5 inches display
do you know if we still have to wait for a later release or is it just a mistake from the review ?

Thanks in advance John ;-)