{"id":9240,"date":"2017-11-02T00:01:01","date_gmt":"2017-11-02T07:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=9240"},"modified":"2017-10-28T18:25:57","modified_gmt":"2017-10-29T01:25:57","slug":"the-dell-xps-13-i-didnt-want","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=9240","title":{"rendered":"The Dell XPS 13 I Didn&#8217;t Want"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Costco had quite the selection of laptops. The price range for full-powered Windows 10 laptops ranged from $500 up to $3000. The models were varied, including one from my favorite, Lenovo. Some laptops were light and diminutive, some where as large as serving trays.<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/>\nI knew I had I leave in two days, so I was a beggar not a chooser. After reviewing the lot, I settled on the Dell XPS 13. The price was $1300, which is usually what I end up paying for a laptop, though I felt it was a bit high.<\/p>\n<p>Honestly, I would have taken the $500 laptop, but it was quite large and looked dumb. The Dell XPS had an i7 processor, which is what I wanted. It had plenty of RAM and SSD storage. It fit the bill nicely. A second model was available for $1700, which had a touchscreen and better graphics, but it didn&#8217;t fold flat like a tablet.<\/p>\n<p>I filled marched the register, dinged my credit card for $1300, then walked to the cage to pick up my laptop. Unlike other computer purchases, I wasn&#8217;t giddy: I needed the laptop, so the purchase was more of a trial than a celebration.<\/p>\n<p>And . . . they were out of the low-priced model. Figures. I could have the floor model, but Costco doesn&#8217;t offer a discount. Even if they did, I could have taken it, used it on vacation, then returned it. Still, I need a laptop, if not for the one trip to replace the Ubuntu Thinkpad that could die at any time.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than stew over another model, I ponied up the $400 difference to get the other Dell XPS model, the one with the touchscreen.<\/p>\n<p>I spent the rest of the day updating the laptop&#8217;s software. I installed Office 365 plus my cloud services. I switched from Microsoft Edge web browser to Chrome. In fact, I think Microsoft should give up and just set the Get Chrome Now website as the default Edge homepage.<\/p>\n<p>The laptop worked wonderfully during the trip. I was able to get work done. I admire the top graphics and touchscreen, but more importantly it&#8217;s light, tiny, and has incredible battery life. I am pleased, though still not 100 percent happy because I feel I overpaid for something I didn&#8217;t really want.<\/p>\n<p>The new laptop is shown in Figure 1, resting atop the old Ubuntu Thinkpad.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_9241\" style=\"width: 500px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9241\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1102-figure1_dell-laptop.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"490\" height=\"490\" class=\"size-full wp-image-9241\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1102-figure1_dell-laptop.jpg 490w, https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1102-figure1_dell-laptop-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1102-figure1_dell-laptop-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 490px) 100vw, 490px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-9241\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Figure 1. The Dell XPS 13 that I paid too much money for.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Yes, I know that Costco&#8217;s price is discounted from what the XPS actually costs (but not by much). And the thought did cross my mind to return the thing and get back my money. But I do need a laptop every so often as I go out of town. This one is it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rushed into buying a new laptop, I busted my budget.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[16],"class_list":["post-9240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-main","tag-laptop"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9240"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9247,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9240\/revisions\/9247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}