Dell has unveiled its first premium Qualcomm-based tablet business laptopthe Latitude 7455, at Dell Technologies World 2024. The device, which the PC manufacturer says is the thinnest Latitude laptop yet, features a Snapdragon X Elite or X Plus CPU, a souped-up variant of the chip used in popular smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S24Ultra.
Both Snapdragon X units come with one NPU (Neural Processing Unit) that can reach between 40 and 45 TOPS (trillion operations per second) and an Adreno 740 GPU; both essential for AI tasks. The slower Plus version has 10 CPU cores running at up to 3.4 GHz, while the Elite has two additional cores.
What further emphasizes its mobile roots is the presence of LPDDR5X memory (up to 32 GB on board) and optional 5G connectivity. Elsewhere, the laptop has a 14-inch, 16:10 QHD+ touchscreen and is likely a real one 2-in-1 convertible laptop (no non-touchscreen option offered).
Qualcomm is going to shine
The choice of Qualcomm hasn’t made the 7455 particularly portable compared to the competition. It weighs 1.44 kg and has a footprint slightly larger than an A4 sheet: 314 x 224 mm. The 17mm height is 1.2mm less than the Latitude 7450.
Dell hasn’t given any indication of the device’s expected battery life (it has a 3-cell 54WHr battery), but you can expect it to be in the double digits. Dell has also been keen to emphasize the eco features of this laptop, which uses recycled aluminum and the battery will ship with 50% recycled cobalt later this year.
Other features include four speakers, two microphones, a spill-resistant keyboard, up to 1TB SSD (Gen 4 PCIe NVMe), optional fingerprint reader, three USB ports, one microSD card reader, and a plethora of security features.
The laptop comes with Windows 11 Home Arm edition with a Windows 11 Pro variant offered – no mention of it Ubuntu, the popular open source Linux distribution. Pricing and availability will be announced later this year, though; at the time of writing, a Dell Latitude 7450 with a touchscreen costs more than $2,100 (about £1,650, AU$3,140).
Qualcomm has thrown down the gauntlet to Intel and AMD as it begins what looks to be an exciting year for the Arm-based CPU vendor. With the exception of Dell, all major PC vendors (and smaller ones) are expected to launch Qualcomm-based CPUs in the second half of 2024 as part of a major AI laptop/AI PC drive orchestrated by Microsoft.
A more mainstream version of the Latitude 7455, called the 5455, is expected to arrive later this year.