Dell is completely revamping its PC line-up to make buying a laptop, desktop, monitor, or accessories less confusing for shoppers, and more akin to purchasing a smartphone.
In a series of announcements at CES 2025 in Las Vegas, the company confirmed PC products would be sold under three distinct categories: Dell, Dell Pro and Dell Pro Max. It means the end of the company’s recognisable consumer brands, such as XPS, Latitude, and Inspiron.
The company says the big rebrand, which follows the nomenclature used by Apple for selling iPhones, will make the buying process less confusing for consumers for customers with differing power needs. However, somewhat undermining the push is the three sub brands that sit within each category: Base, Plus and Premium. Let Dell explain it below.
“We’ve also made it easy to distinguish products within each of the new product categories. We have a consistent approach to tiering that lets customers pinpoint the exact device for their specific needs. Above and beyond the starting point (Base), there’s a Plus tier that offers the most scalable performance and a Premium tier that delivers the ultimate in mobility and design,” the company says in a media release.
Let’s delve into the new laptop branding for Dell and highlight some fresh models revealed at CES.
The new ‘Dell’ brand
The standalone ‘Dell’ brand will represent consumer machines designed for play, work and school. They replace the XPS range. New products include the Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 and Dell 14 Plus laptops which fall under Microsoft’s Copilot+ distinction for high performing AI PCs. These sound like they will be the most suitable for the majority of users.
They still pack a hefty punch on the spec sheet thanks to the Intel Core Ultra (Series 2) processors that can handle the latest AI experiences thanks to an integrated NPU that provides up to 48 TOPS.
The Dell 14 Plus, for example can be configured from the Ultra 5 (8-core 4.5GHz) to the Ultra 9 processor with 8 cores up to 5.1GHz). That’s joined by Intel Arc graphics, up to 32GB RAM and 2TB of SSD storage and Wi-Fi 7. The display is 14.0-inches and can be configured to full HD with touch, or 2.5K (2560 x 1600) as a non-touch option.
The Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 (pictured above) with a 360 degree hinge offers a similar spec sheet, but it has a larger display with a QHD mini-0LED option that offers a minimum of 600 nits of brightness. Dell also says there’ll be be AMD and Snapdragon X Series options arriving at some point.
Dell Pro
The Dell Pro range also fits the bill for the Microsoft Copilot+ distinction and is described as being “designed for professional-grade productivity”. It combines a small and light design, a durable and reliable build, epic battery life and both Intel Ultra and AMD Ryzen processing options.
The Dell Pro 13/14 Premium models (below) are among the first off the production line and are described by Dell as the “world’s most premium commercial laptops” and run off the Intel Core Ultra 2 200V series processors with integrated Intel Arc graphics.
The improved performance over the predecessor is measured as 36% in multithread, 19% in single-thread, 82% in graphics rendering, and 3.5 times faster AI than the previous generation. There’s up to 21.2 hours of battery life.
These devices, at the top end of the Pro range also have IPS displays (13.3-inches or 14.0-inches) with 16:10 aspect ratios with up to QHD+ resolution, and the option for a Tandem OLED screen on the 14-inch model, which is 24% more power efficient. Dell touts this as the first commercial notebook to boast such a display.
The design is lightweight, starting at just 2.36lbs and it reaches the military standard for durability. Dell says these machines have a new dual-fan system with 20% more airflow and a quieter run overall.
Dell Pro Max
As you’d expect, the Dell Pro Max is designed for maximum performance and the most remanding applications. Dell reckons it has achieved new performance heights thanks to a “new, patented thermal design” with options for the highest-performing Intel Core Ultra Series 2 U SKUs, as well as AMD’s Ryzen and Threadripper options, and pro-level graphics from the NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Generation Laptop GPUs.
The company reckons: “You can power intensive workloads, from animation to video rendering, run AI inferencing and fine-tune large language models (LLMs), while maintaining security and managing costs”
The first examples to be showcased at CES 2025 are the Dell Pro Max 14 and 16 options (both pictured below) with an upto 16-inch display with QHD resolution. There’s also a touchscreen option for the 16:10 aspect ratio.
Dell isn’t confirming all of the specs for these heavier duty machines just yet, but there’s Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, upto 4TB of SSD storage and superfast 6400MT/s memory.
