20 PCWorld JULY 2020NEWS DELL DEBUTS XPS 17
Dell uses top-firing speakers, a 1.3mm travel keyboard, and
a really big trackpad on the XPS 17 9700.are offered with the new XPS 17. A 90-watt
brick is available for those who buy the laptop
without discrete graphics. Laptops with
GPUs get a Dell 130-watt USB-C charger.
Technically, power delivery over USB-C tops
out at 100 watts, so Dell’s charger checks first
to confirm the laptop is a Dell and can handle
it before breaking the 100-watt rule.
Even with Dell’s neat trick, we do wonder
whether the 130-watt PSU is a tell on just how
far the XPS 17 will push it in performance.
Most laptops we’ve seen with H-class CPUs
and GeForce RTX 2060 GPUs (both Max-Q
and non-Max-Q) typically have 180-watt
power bricks. We’ll have to wait for reviewunits to check this out.KEYBOARD, MOUSE, AND
WEBCAM
Dell doesn’t say much about the keyboard,
but those worried it might have a low-travel
MagLev 2 keyboard will be glad to know it’s a
standard rubber-dome keyboard with 1.3mm
of travel. The trackpad is huge and supports
Microsoft’s Precision Touch drivers.
The laptop features an integrated
fingerprint reader in the power button as well
as a biometric login IR camera. That camera,
as well as the microphones, are mounted on
the top-bezel. As with the vast majority of
laptop webcams, the
resolution is 720p.SPEAKERS
We’ll have to wait to hear
the speakers to render
judgment, but Dell said they
feature Waves Nx 3D audio
tuned by Grammy-award-
winning producer Jack Joseph
Puig. Dell also takes advantage
of the size of the laptop, firing
the sound through 7,622 holes
drilled on the left and right
sides of the keyboard. Many
laptop makers have resorted to
firing the sound from the side
or the bottom of the laptop to
save space.