Warm Winter Good Thing Award
The Dell Precision 5680 is a 16-inch workstation aimed at professionals who want a powerful laptop that's easier to carry around than the typical 5-pound or more behemoths you typically see when buying a workstation.
While the Dell Precision 5680 is a great 16-inch laptop, our tests have shown that its performance in key areas like battery life can't match the best laptops on the market. Nonetheless, I think this Dell Precision 5680 review will help you better understand the pros and cons of this elegant workstation.
Surprisingly slim and easy to carry for a 16-inch laptop.
Narrow bezels make the screen stand out.
Our Dell Precision 5680 review device has an attractive, streamlined design, and despite the size and weight of this 16-inch beast, I found it surprisingly comfortable to pick up and move.
Whereas, Dell advertises this workstation (139 x 9.4 x 0.87 inches, 42 pounds) than the MacBook Pro 16 inches (14.).0 x 9.7 x 0.6 inches, 47-8 pounds) is smaller and lighter, which I shouldn't be so surprised that it is, it is, even though Apple's 16-inch Pro laptop is slightly thinner than the Precision 5680.
In terms of internals, Apple's big-screen monster can't match the practicality of the Dell Precision 5680's optional 4K OLED touchscreen. The narrow bezels around the display of our review device give a premium feel and help emphasize what's on the screen, as there are no thick black bars around the edges to distract you. The top bezel is slightly thicker than the others, which makes sense since the camera array is built into its center. It's worth noting that there is no physical privacy shutter on the camera.
Underneath the display, you'll see a nice keyboard flanked by speakers, decent key travel (if short), and a large, spacious trackpad. There's also a fingerprint reader built into the power button in the top right corner of the keyboard.
Close the lid and you'll see a striking reflective Dell logo embossed on a grey brushed aluminum chassis that's very easy to mount on a table, lap or coffee table. While this 16-inch workstation isn't lightweight, I've found it to be more comfortable to carry around than many similarly sized laptops I've tested over the years, including the 16-inch MacBook Pro.
The 4K OLED touchscreen upgrade looks great and worth it.
Highly saturated colors look good, but not the most accurate.
I really like the 4K OLED touchscreen on our Dell Precision 5680 review device because it looks good (as long as I'm diligent in wiping down smudges) and I have the option to reach out and tap something when I want to give my hand off the keyboard.
While it's not as bright as other laptops I've tested, in day-to-day use, I never find this to be a problem unless I'm trying to work outdoors in direct sunlight. The colors look accurate without oversaturation, and I like to play games and watch movies on a 16-inch (3,840 x 2,400 pixels) 60Hz OLED display.
Plenty of ports for professional-grade use.
The lack of USB-A is a bit of a sting, but Dell provides an adapter
The Dell Precision 5680 comes with a range of reliable ports for professionals, but lacks a USB-A port for traditional peripherals. However, Dell comes with a USB-C to USB-A adapter in the box that you can use if you want to plug in your favorite old mouse or keyboard.
On the left side of the laptop, you'll find a pair of Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports, an HDMI output, and a 35mm audio jack. You can also install an optional smart card reader on this side, just like our review unit does, but there's no need to spend money on additional slots unless you have a business or personal reason to use a smart card.
There is a full-size SD card reader, a USB-C port, and a laptop lock slot on the right side. Instead of using the charging port, you can simply plug the charger into one of the three USB-C ports on your laptop.
While it feels a bit silly that this big, expensive professional laptop doesn't have enough room for a single USB-A port, we're approaching our 10th anniversary of USB-C, and it's a growing possibility that many people don't have a USB-A device. If you do, then a free adapter is fine, and if you need more ports, you can always plug in a USB hub.
Mixed performance test results with other 4K workstations.
Can't beat the M3 Max MacBook Pro
Designed to handle professional workloads, this laptop comes with a 13th Gen Intel Core i9 CPU and an NVIDIA RTX 5000 ADA laptop GPU with 32GB RAM.
This is enough for basic daily work and entertainment, with more than 20 tabs open,** and apps running in the background without stuttering or stuttering. When the work was done, I enjoyed playing games on the Precision 5680's beautiful 4K display, although to my little surprise, this powerful device still couldn't match the best gaming laptops in terms of performance for demanding games like Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Freedom.
In our tests, the battery lasted less than 8 hours, which isn't great.
Don't worry about too many calories.
Our Dell Precision 5680 workstation lasted less than 8 hours in our internal battery tests, which is how long the laptop spent endlessly surfing the web via Wi-Fi on battery power with the screen brightness set to 150 nits.
The Precision 5680 lasted about 7 hours and 42 minutes, which is good for a powerful gaming console but not so good for a consumer-grade Windows laptop. It's nowhere near as efficient as the best MacBook's incredible battery drain.
The Precision isn't as hot as the most powerful gaming laptops. In our thermal tests, which consisted of having the laptop work at high intensity for 15 minutes and then scanning it with a heat gun, we measured surface temperatures ranging from 77 to 97 degrees, with the hottest spot being 97 near the hinge3 degrees.
I love using the Dell Precision 5680 because it feels like a larger, more powerful version of the elegant, streamlined laptop I've come to expect from Dell. With its easy-to-carry frame, large screen, and powerful performance, it's probably the closest I've seen to a Dell XPS 17 with OLED.