MacBook Pro M1 13 vs. Dell XPS 13

Intel really wants to check out the Apple M1 processor.

Intel’s Intel Get Real Go PC campaign is designed to show that laptops with 11th-generation Intel processors work well against MacBooks M1.

Since I use both a Dell XPS 13 9310 with an 11th generation processor and a 13-inch (16GB) MacBook Pro M1 indiscriminately, here’s my idea of ​​how Intel handles the M1.

Battery life: M1 MBP goes and goes

—M1 MacBook Pro: Full Day: With day-to-day use and shutdown, I can get a full day of battery life on my MacBook Pro M1. It’s 9-10 p.m. If I don’t do heavy lifts, more than a day. The only other laptop I have that comes close to the resistance of the M1 MBP 13 is my Google Pixelbook Go Chromebook.

—From XPS 13 9310 (4K + screen): half a day + or more than 6 hours. I am using the 4K + model (also known as UHD +) for this review. I can stretch it a bit more if I get away from things like long video conferencing sessions (Zoom), overly active Chrome tabs, and keep the screen brightness down.

Note that the Dell XPS 13 9310 with a lower resolution FHD + display has a longer battery life than the 4K + XPS 13. More * about that at the bottom.

Yield:

There are many benchmarks for the MacBook Pro M1 and the Dell XPS 13. This video comparing the MacBook Pro M1 and the Dell XPS 13 includes the multi-core Cinebench R23 CPU stress test (at 2:40 p.m. ), favoring the M1 over the i7 with scores of 7,704 against 4,816 respectively.

Geekbench 5 single-core and multi-core also show significant advancement for the MacBook M1. (See these Geekbench scores for M1 MacBook Pro and Dell XPS 13 9310.)

Benchmarks are useful up to a certain point. For me, performance in most used apps (like the Chrome browser where I spend a lot of time) is what matters most.

In the actual tests of more conventional workloads, Dell’s XPS 13 9310 with Intel’s latest Intel Core i7 “Tiger Lake” 11th generation is still slow. I didn’t notice any significant performance gap with the two day-to-day systems. I found them quickly and neither of them had any thermal issues, although the MacBook Pro M1 stays very cool.

(To me, “real world” means Microsoft Office, Google Docs, more than 20 Chrome tabs, social media, videos, video conferencing, comparison apps, and photo editing).

Summary:

Apple has redesigned the MacBook M1 to deliver impressive high performance and uptime with battery power while keeping it very cool. Intel will have to work harder than usual to maintain parity.

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NOTES:

*Why the battery life difference between Dell XPS 13 9310 FHD + and UHD +? The XPS 13’s 4K display has a 4x number of pixels to push than the FHD + (1,920 by 1,200), so you’ll always get more power, according to Dell.

To find out, here’s what the Dell product page says about battery life:

“Up to 14 hours and 11 minutes on a Full HD + model during transmission … or up to 8 hours and 12 minutes of transmission on a 4K + model “.

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