No longer stodgy: Dell notebook and tablet bring sex appeal

Edward C. Baig | USA TODAY

NEW YORK — Seductive is rarely the first word that leaps to mind when you think of Dell. But the descriptor aptly applies to the svelte new Dell XPS 13 notebook that was unveiled last week at the Consumer Electronics Show. In fact, I used it to write this column.

Dell separately showcased a new Android tablet that has sex appeal, the Venue 8 7000, which the company claims as the world's thinnest tablet (at least by a hair). Venue 8 has a beautiful 8.4-inch OLED display, but what is really intriguing, if challenging to master and not quite perfect, is an Intel camera feature that lets you measure the depth information in a picture, such as the height of a subject.

Here's a closer look at the latest Dells:

*Dell XPS 13. Dell has designed a thin, lightweight, snappy and smartly crafted beauty of a machine that follows the relatively recent path of the XPS series. Back in 2012 with its first generation XPS 13, Dell managed to squeeze an ultrabook with a 13.3-inch display into a package more typical of an 11-inch machine.

Dell repeated the feat this time around by shrinking the bezel framing the screen even more dramatically. It's now down to a barely noticeable 0.2 inches. The original XPS 13 measured 12.4 inches wide and had a depth of 8.1 inches. The latest model shrinks the width to just below 12 inches and the depth down to 7.88 inches.

The skinny near edge-to-edge borders on the new Dell makes the comparatively large bezel on my 13.3-inch MacBook Air appear as a wide as a 1970s-era necktie.

Review: Dell XPS 13 is a stylish Windows laptop Dell's new XPS 13 laptop with a sleek, sexy design is a far cry from the company's older laptops. USA TODAY's Ed Baig takes a closer look. Full review: http://usat.ly/1II5DX4

At just more than 2.5 pounds, the new Dell is also a tad lighter than the MacBook Air and considerably more compact.

Apple's Air has been the very notebook that defines elegance in the thin and light notebook category. It is the model rivals are chasing.

Of course, you'll pick the Apple if you prefer the Macintosh operating system to the Windows 8 software that runs on Dell.

But if you're sticking with Windows, the XPS 13 represents an excellent choice. It starts at $799.99, but you'll have to spend at least $1299.99 to exploit Windows with a touch screen, worth doing if you can afford it. My test unit costs $100 more than that and was configured with an Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM, and a 256GB solid-state drive.

I really like the feel of the computer, which was made of carbon fiber and aluminum, and Corning's protective Gorilla Glass technology. The ultra-thin bezels means all eyes peeled on the XPS screen and the vibrant Quad-HD display (resolution 3200x1800) is a winner.

You can say the same for the solid, comfortable-to-type-on backlit keyboard.

What's more, Dell is touting up to 15 hours of battery life. In Dell's tests, the screen brightness was set at 40% and the wireless was on. I ran a harsher test with wireless on, the brightness cranked all the way up and a Neflix stream on constantly. The battery fell just shy of six hours. You can expect to get through a full day under most common usage scenarios.

Among my quibbles is the placement of the camera at the lower left corner of the display, just above keyboard, presumably a trade-off against the thin bezels elsewhere. If you happen to be typing while on a video chat, your fingers may get in the way. Moreover, the speaker quality was on the tinny side.

*Dell Venue 8 7000. There's good reason to be attracted to Dell's $399.99 Android KitKat 4.4 tablet. You'd be hard-pressed to find a thinner tablet. It's light (0.67 pounds). And it's got an awfully lovely OLED display (resolution: 2560x1600).

What sets it apart, though, is as the first tablet to take advantage of Intel's RealSense camera technology, which means a picture need not be flat. The Dell has a rear-facing 8-megapixel-camera as well as two rear 720p stereoscopic cameras.

Depth photography opens up all sorts of possibilities, though I found shooting with the new Venue awkward at times and I wasn't always wild about some of the pictures I shot, especially in low light. What's more I kept inadvertently placing my hands in front of the lens.

Among the tricks is an editing feature, similar to the one found on Lytro cameras, that lets you alter the focus in a picture after the fact. You can drag a slider to alter the blurring effect.

What's really neat — in theory, anyway — is the ability to capture reasonably accurate measurements of a person, piece of furniture, building or other object in your photo.

You can determine length by drawing a line between two points in a picture. You can determine the square footage in an area by tapping four points.

You must be between 3 feet and 15 feet from the object you're shooting and shoot straight on, not at an angle, and there's some trial and error involved here. Indeed, not every measurement was precisely on the mark — consider that a friend who is 6-foot-1 was measured by the tablet as closer in size to Shaquille O'Neal.

Despite such, um, growing pains. Dell has gotten a lot right here, in both its tablet and new notebook.

Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow @edbaig on Twitter

THE BOTTOM LINE

Dell XPS 13

$799.99 on up, www.dell.com

Pro. Sleek design. beautiful screen, good battery life.

Con. Odd camera placements, weak speakers. Must pay up for touchscreen.

Dell Venue 8 7000

$399.99

Pro. Lovely 8.4-inch OLED display. Thin. RealSense depth camera technology is promising.

Con. RealSense is not quite all there yet.