With its specifications, it’s hard for the Latitude 9330 to underperform. Whether used as a standard laptop, or flipped back to use purely in tablet mode, the 2-in-1 device, aimed at CXOs, always delivers and more — all for a substantial price.
The Dell Latitude 9330 2-in-1 is the latest in a long series of laptops aimed at business users — a subset of whom requires the raw computing power of a professional-grade laptop. However, according to Dell, the 9330 is aimed at C-suite executives — and to that end, does it do the job? I’ve had roughly three weeks to play with this super-compact, ultralight laptop — Dell was kind enough to loan me a unit for this review, and I have thoughts.
My review unit came equipped with a 12th Generation Core i7 processor with 16 GB of RAM and 512 GB of SSD storage. Plus, it sports a bright, punchy 16:10 touchscreen display with a 2K 2560×1600 resolution that is more than adequate to read emails, browse the web and do your typical C-suite executive stuff – don’t ask me what those are, I’m not even remotely close to operating at that level.
With specifications such as these, it’s hard for a device to underperform, and the Latitude 9330 is no exception. Whether used as a standard laptop, or flipped back to use purely in tablet mode, the device always delivers and more. I’m a heavy user of web browsers, plus word-processing applications – at any given point, there will be at least 20 Google Chome tabs open. And if there’s anything we know about Chrome, it just doesn’t sip power, it guzzles it. However, this laptop barely broke a sweat. In fact, I don’t think I ever heard the heat sink – the fan – kick in. The laptop is just that good.
I did wonder why C-suite executives, whose work I assume mostly entails answering emails, holding video-conference meetings and maybe work on a spreadsheet or 10 may require such horsepower. Keep in mind that I’m well aware my description of a CXO’s daily responsibilities is fairly reductive, but this was still a point that I pondered over a lot. This clearly was a professional grade laptop that has plenty of horsepower to possibly power your home.
This laptop is a good use case for CXOs for the very reason I listed above – it barely breaks a sweat while I’ve got some of the most power-hungry programs open. For that very reason, considering the stakes are much higher for CXOs, they’d want a laptop that will not roll over and quit on them no matter what – a device, in short, that has more power than they need so that their daily tasks can run without any sort of interruption.
If that was the intention, Dell has absolutely knocked this out of the park.
Ahh, yes. The ubiquitous keyboard. A component without which any computer cannot run, and I’m happy to report that the Dell Latitude 9330 has one of the best laptop keyboards I’ve used outside of the Apple ecosystem. It’s got a pleasant clicky feel to it, with a decent key travel. It takes next to no time to get used to this keyboard, especially if you are – as I was – coming to this from a similarly compact keyboard.
This is also a very key aspect of a laptop. Any mobile computer needs to have decent battery life, otherwise, the whole purpose of its being mobile will be rendered moot. On a single charge, with my regular usage, the Latitude 9330 lasted me seven hours from 100 percent to 0 percent. That’s pretty impressive for such a small laptop.
The display is designed for long hours of use – it is equipped with blue-light filters, has a sharp resolution and, despite its smaller screen – it is smaller than the 2020 MacBook Air by about 0.3 of an inch, which is still a considerable difference – it packs enough of a punch that your viewing experience, thanks to native HDR support, is extremely enjoyable.
Now, Dell has yet to give me an official maximum retail price for this laptop — but from my own research online, it is priced at around $2,000, which is around Rs 1.65 lakh.
Would I recommend this laptop for someone looking at lightweight, everyday tasks like writing, browsing the web and consuming media? Probably not. But, if you have cash burning a hole in your pocket, and simply need to spend upwards of Rs 1.6 lakh, and you don’t feel like dipping your toe in the macOS pool, then sure, buy the Latitude 9330 2-in-. It will last you several years.
If you are a CXO and need a laptop that will never quit on you, then this one’s for you.
If not, then there are several more-than-capable laptops for a fraction of the price that will be a better use of your money.
That said, this laptop is an absolute beast, and I hope whoever buys one enjoys using it as much as I did.
(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)
First Published: IST
