Dell Pro 14 Premium

The Dell Pro 14 Premium is still one of Dell's best subnoteooks for businesses and an improvement over the Latitude 14 predecessors, but it could use some extra oomph to push it past competitors even further.

I’m not sure Dell marketing has the name of this product up to the speed that XPS and Latitude once meant. This hardware offers exceptional battery life, but it’s not a great CPU and is expensive for a machine that doesn't feel robust. A good option, then, for many business pros and PC users, though the security features may be overkill for non-business users.

At this level, little mistakes matter, and Dell has made a few unforced errors. The display is mediocre, and the touchpad is merely okay. While software updates may possibly improve the latter, the only solution for the former is to wait for the promised OLED upgrade. That's the caliber of display a laptop of this quality deserves – although, frankly, a more color-accurate IPS display would have done just fine, too.

Ultimately, the Dell Pro 14 Premium (PA14250) excels in portability, build quality, connectivity, and battery endurance. It’s a fantastic choice for mobile professionals whose primary needs revolve around these aspects and standard productivity tasks. But the significantly compromised color performance of the display prevents it from being a universally recommendable premium ultrabook, especially for anyone with creative leanings or expectations of vibrant visuals.

The Dell Pro 14 Premium is a capable Windows business laptop with a zippy processor, sublime battery life and a solid port selection. Against key rivals, though, it is lacking in some multi-threaded performance and is a fair bit dearer.

The Dell Pro 14 Premium is a fantastic laptop. It's main problem is where it's positioned, which is among the HP EliteBook Ultras and Lenovo ThinkPad X1s of the world. Frankly, if I was ranking the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, the EliteBook Ultra G1i, and the Dell Pro 14 Premium, the Dell would come in third. While it does have a far superior webcam to the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, both HP and Lenovo are using best-in-class keyboards.

Dell's Pro 14 Premium is a worthy new star in what used to be the Latitude constellation, scoring points for style and battery life but losing some for a funky keyboard.