 It's been three years since Dell shook up the laptop world with the XPS 13 and showed that you can have a full-sized laptop Display in a really compact footprint. So it's time for a proper update to the design and this is the new Dell XPS 13 Now the new model doesn't look hugely different from the prior version at first glance But Dell has made a number of tweaks and refinements some of them are good Some of them are bad that freshen up the appearance and functionality of the laptop Let's start with the good things the most impressive thing about the old XPS 13 was how small the border around the display was And the new models even tinier making it the smallest 13 inch laptop you can buy It's also slightly lighter Which is a good thing because the last model was considerably heavier than many of its more modern competitors And it's also slightly thinner it comes in two colors standard black and silver version or this very pretty rose gold and white model That I have here And despite the smaller profile the new model is not a crippled machine like last year's 2-in-1 version was It has full power eighth generation Intel Core processors up to 16 gigabytes of RAM and plenty of power for most any Productivity tasks you can do. Now you can't game on it But it does support Thunderbolt 3 so you can plug in an external GPU and game that way if you want The new display is really a stunner It comes in either a 1080p non-touch version or a 4k touchscreen option and thanks to those even smaller bezels it really pops It's bright colorful and just plain great to look at now I'd much prefer if it was a 3 by 2 aspect ratio instead of this 16 by 9 and it's disappointing The only touchscreen option is on the 4k panel which pushes the price of the XPS 13 up to over 1600 bucks But otherwise, it's a really nice display Dells also kept some other niceties like this battery gauge on this left side Let's you check the status of the battery without having to open the laptop The keyboard is also slightly less mushy with great travel and the trackpad is fast and smooth, too So what's not so great about this? Well for starters the webcam is still awful Now Dell moved it from the lower left corner of the display to the center and added Windows Hello IR login features But it still has an awful unflattering up-the-nose viewing angle and it still gets blocked by my fingers if I'm typing while on a conference call It's really kind of frustrating that Dell hasn't figured out a better way to do this by now The other big issue is the port selection on the XPS 13 It now comes with three USB C ports two of them are Thunderbolt 3 And then it's also got a headphone jack and a micro SD card slot now I love that I can charge the laptop via any of the USB C ports But it's still frustrating that there isn't a single USB a port for all of those accessories that still require it That means that yes, you'll be living the dawn of life and at least Dell is kind enough to throw in an adapter in the box For you, but I promptly and unfortunately lost it It's also kind of a bummer that the full-size SD card slot has been traded for that far less useful micro SD slot It's either give me a full-size slot or don't even bother the micro SD port is kind of a crummy compromise Now the other disappointment I've been having with the new model is that it has a smaller battery than the prior version and I've been averaging Just six hours of use between charges with the 4k touchscreen version That's a bit less than a full workday and it's lower than I'd really like from this level of computer So that's the new XPS 13. It's a couple of steps forward and a couple of steps back Which is overall kind of a bit of a bummer I'd have loved to see Dell Rethink the placement of that webcam and maintain some of the port options of the prior model while still shrinking the overall footprint It also would have been nice if the battery hadn't gotten smaller in the process either But if you don't care about any of those things the new XPS 13 is one of the smallest Nicest looking most portable full power laptops you can buy For more on the XPS 13 and Windows laptops in general check out the verge comm and youtube.com slash the verge