Dell Inspiron 13 5000 (5368) – Performance

The Inspiron 13 5000 is available in three configurations here in the UK, with the entry-level £499 model including an Intel Core i3-6100U, 4GB of RAM and a 500GB hard disk. Next is the £649 model that moves to an Intel Core i5-6200U, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. Finally, is the £799 version that I’m reviewing, which has an Intel Core i7-6500U, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. All three include the basic Intel HD Graphics 520.

Related: How to replace your hard disk with an SSD

The £799 model on review is a perfectly powerful package. The 6500U processor rattles through just about any task you can throw at it with ease, which is something demonstrated by its impressive PCMark 8 score of 3,456 points. That SSD is also a reasonably fast one with read/write speeds of 499MB/s and 465MB/s respectively. Even graphics performance is reasonable, with a score of 65,000 points in 3DMark Ice Storm. 

All told, this is about as typical as you can get for this type of device. While the likes of the Lenovo Ideapad 710S do offer slightly heftier graphics with some configurations, in most other regards it’s on the money and will be fine for any day-to-day computing.

Dell Inspiron 13 5000 (5368) – Battery Life

This laptop just about delivers the sort of battery life that’s typical of hybrid devices. Most struggle to quite last a working day and so it is here, with the 5368 only managing 6 hours 26 minutes in our PowerMark test – set to 40% screen brightness, with a loop of 10 minutes of web browsing and 5 minutes of video. In comparison, thin and light conventional laptops can push 8 hours or more.

So it’s not a bad result, but it’s not the saving grace that this device needs.

Related: Best laptops

Should I buy the Dell Inspiron 13 5000 (5368)?

Dell has got so many things right with this convertible laptop. It looks great, has a good selection of features and connectivity, provides adequate performance, battery life is just about good enough and its 360-degree hinge makes it a versatile touchscreen device. It also has a great keyboard, trackpad and speakers.

Unfortunately, the company has scrimped too much on arguably the single most important part of a product like this: the screen. It doesn’t get bright enough, colour accuracy is unimpressive and it looks distractingly grainy. As such the £799 version just doesn’t cut in the face of so many other choices with better screens at this price.

The £649 model makes a little more sense but is still struggling when the likes of the Lenovo 510S offers a great screen, better performance and longer battery for the same money, though that machine doesn’t have a touchscreen.

That just leaves the £499 model, and while it is hampered by having a slow hard drive and the screen drops even further in quality from an IPS panel to TN, it retains the other good qualities of this hybrid. Compared to many other laptops at that sort of price it actually offers reasonable value, as generally once you start getting below £500 you start to loose the keyboard backlighting, speaker quality drops and design and build quality become noticeably lower.

The £499 model isn’t a stand-out bargain but is worth considering if your budget can only stretch that far and you want a relatively thin and light laptop.

Verdict

Dell got so much right with this device, but then blew it all by fitting a poor screen. Only the cheaper models are worth a look.

Trusted Score