Dell Latitude E5570

I received a "scratch and dent" E5570 from Dell Outlet a few days ago. The spec is i5-6440HQ, 16GB RAM, Liteon 256GB M.2 SSD , AUO FHD display, Intel 8260AC WLAN, Dell 5811e WWAN, backlit keyboard and the 6 cell 84Whr battery.

My initial impressions were positive. The "scratch and dent" appeared to be a few very small paint chips on the lid but, after a few hours, the screen froze, turned a steadily darkening beetroot colour and ending in black after about 10 seconds while the rest of the computer appeared to stay on.

A hard reset with the power button got the computer back into life. I updated the BIOS and graphics driver and it kept running for a few hours before turning beetroot again. I then phoned Dell support and we agreed to try a new display and display cable. However, next day I had the inspiration to connect a VGA monitor to see if that stayed functioning. It didn't, and immediately lost signal when the next incidence of the bootroot colour appeared. This pointed a mainboard problem so it was on the phone again to Dell to request that a new mainboard be added to the parts list. The parts are on the way to the service agent but the "next business day" service is likely to be two days.

I suspect that this problem is why the computer went back to Dell and, because it is erratic (can appear anywhere between a few minutes and several hours) it hadn't been identified when the computer was checked before sending to me. Anyway, one way or another we will get to the bottom of this or it will have to go back and I get another one.

So what are, setting aside this hardware problem, my impressions? It's a bit heavier than I expected at 2.35kg but the big battery managed nearly 8 hours of mp3 video playback with the display at half brightness so it should be good for at least 10 hours of light usage. Whether I will get the benefit of the quad core CPU remains to be seen but 3.1GHz with 4 cores loaded is a useful boost to my current i5-5300U. Under light usage the CPU is quite frugal.

My eyes definitely appreciate the larger display (the reason for up-sizing from my E7450) and the 15.6" AUO doesn't have any hint of the screen door effect which was noticeable on the 14" screen of my E7440. I can't hear any whining from CPU or other sources. The fan does get moderately loud when the CPU is under load. I hope that the screen and mainboard replacements don't leave me worse off.

One minor detail I have noticed that opening the computer requires at least two hands: The front edge of both the display and the chassis are straight with no noticeable bevel (unlike my E7450) and consequently there is no convenient finger-hold for lifting the display (E7450 on top of E5570 in this photo).

John

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Dell Latitude E5570