I recently purchased a new laptop and wanted to give a quick first impressions as compared to my old laptop.

For the past 3-4 years I’ve been using a Dell Latitude 6430u with an i5 and 8GB and an HD screen. I think I paid around $1000 off of Dell outlet.

The new laptop is a Dell Latitude 7480 with an i7 (has thunderbolt yay) and 16BG and an HD screen. With a $225 coupon off models over $999, I ended up paying $890 with a 3 year warranty and free 2-day shipping from Dell Outlet.

Overall I like it a lot and while I’m still getting used to a few changes from the old one, I am really pleased. I would highly recommend you look at Dell Outlet. This laptop was a “Scratch and Dent” but looks brand new to me!

Screen

I was going to try out a greater than HD resolution but all of the options had a glass screen and from my few encounters with that, it is way too glossy for me and much prefer the anti-glare screen like this one has.

Keyboard

I’m still adjusting to the new key feel but I think it is a step down. The keys feel a bit gummier than before and a few of them seem to rub against their cutout which makes for some extra resistance.

Update

I took apart the whole laptop and discovered that the keyboard was slightly misaligned due to a plast alignment pin which was pulling the keyboard out of alignment (so it was an anti-alignment pin). I tried to delicately shave it down, but ended up just snapping the whole thing off - whoops! Anyways it ended up working out fine and the keys don’t hang up anymore. That being said, I am still not a huge fan of this keyboard because the keys travel a bit too much and are harder to press. I wish I could have the 6430u keyboard on here.

Trackpad

The trackpad is a bit wider than before which is nice, except that my palm tends to bump the edge scrolling (I’m a fan of the edge scrolling because you can do it with your thumb while the rest of your hand stays on the keyboard). I will have to look into palm rejection.

Update

I don’t have the patience to track down palm rejection on Wayland at this point so I just switched back to the default 2-finger scrolling.

Linux Support

I installed a fresh copy of Fedora 26 and experienced zero issues. This laptop has an Intel Wifi chip and I had no issues. Really pleased with this.

Battery Life

Superb.

Weight, Size, & Feel

Lighter and thinner than before. The outside finish is a bit smoother. The hinge is much stiffer but that’s fine.

Performance

The only reason I got an i7 & 16GB is because the deal made it ~$100 to upgrade from an i5 & 8GB, otherwise I probably wouldn’t have bothered. I do most of my work on a desktop so having the extra memory and performance is just icing even though I probably won’t fully utilize it.

Closing

The only thing I wish is that the keyboard was the same as before but that’s something I can live with. If you’re in the market for a laptop, check out Dell Outlet for a Latitude.

Update 2024-04-19

Reviewing old posts and saw this was from 2017 wow. Laptop is still in great condition. Replaced the battery (F3YGT from ifixit) 2022-11 and also the charging port (8GJM9) 2024-01