Shooting itself in the foot: Dell should not put cheap screens into €1,500 laptops

The Dell Pro 14 Plus is available with some very nice screens. This includes a WQXGA (2,560 x 1,600) IPS screen with 90 Hz refresh rate, and a Low Power WUXGA (1,920 x 1,200) screen - both have a brightness of 400 cd/m² and both cover the small sRGB color gamut, making them suitable for basic photo editing.

There is but one problem: The Dell Pro 14 Plus PB14255 which we recently reviewed does not feature either of those two screen options. Instead, our review sample featured the most basic display that Dell offers, a WUXGA IPS screen with 300 cd/m² of brightness.

In our review, the screen did not even quite manage to reach the 300 cd/m² mark, and even worse was the color gamut coverage: With just 56 percent of the sRGB gamut, the colors look dull and they are incorrect, so the screen is not usable for any work with colors. Of all the 14-inch business laptops we compared the Dell Pro 14 Plus with, it clearly had the worst screen.

Now, you could say: Why did we test such a version, why not pick a different model with the better screen option? Such a model is simply not available. The only way to buy the Dell Pro 14 Plus with a better screen option in Germany is to configure it directly from Dell, which is very expensive. If you get your units from a regular reseller, like we do, even the maxed out version of the Dell Pro 14 Plus PB14255 (available on dell.com), which cost around €1,500, still uses the most basic screen option.

If the manufacturer has better screen options, they should be made available - having a basic, cheaper screen as an option is OK, but it should not be the default for a laptop that costs €1,500.