The pad's smooth surface made navigation a breeze, and Windows gestures, such as swiping from the left to switch apps, were easy to perform. Its single-click button was snappy and responsive, and a small line on the surface makes it easy to distinguish between left and right clicks. Using the Key Hero Typing Test, I chopped away at a brisk 97 words per minute with 97 percent accuracy, but the 1.5-millimeter keys felt too stiff to keep me comfortable during long work sessions.įortunately, the notebook's generously sized, 3.6 x 2.2-inch touchpad fared far better in my testing. The Inspiron 15's keyboard is serviceable but shallow. My only complaints were the weak bass, and the occasional muddiness that I heard when the song's powerful chorus kicked in at max volume. When jamming The Gaslight Anthem's 'Get Hurt,' Brian Fallon's soulful croon came through clearly, as did the somber guitar plucks behind him. The notebook's stereo speakers look tiny, but they were more than powerful enough to fill a small meeting room with music. The laptop registered 167 nits on our brightness test, a score that pales compared to the Lenovo G50 (238 nits), the Acer Aspire E5 (230 nits) and the 192-nit average of other budget notebooks we recently tested. The Inspiron also underwhelmed in terms of brightness. Larger action scenes such as a TIE Fighter-Millennium Falcon dogfight looked crisp enough to be entertaining, but character close-ups revealed the screen's lack of detail. The trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens was watchable on the Inspiron, but not stunning. The typically colorful Windows 8.1 Start menu looked somewhat pale, and the blue orbs in the laptop's default background looked pixelated. I found the Inspiron's 15.6-inch, 1366 x 768 display to be a little lackluster.

Dell inspiron s/n ftxsk22