Dell Latitude 13 Education Series

The Dell Latitude 13 Education Series (3340) ($ 769 as tested) is a great choice for K-12 students in your life, and would make an excellent general-use PC for anyone with tendency to be a bit rough on his equipment. Adding to its appeal is the fact that the Latitude 13 Education offers 10 hours of battery life and a 10-point touch screen. As our new Editor's Choice 'for entry-level desktop replacement laptop, you should be on your short list for back-to-school shopping this

Design and Features
The laptop has a size of 1.4 by 13 by 10 inches (HWD). A rubberized coating around the screen and the bottom lid protects the system from scrapes and dings that students can provide. Coating also helps you grip the case when rushing from class, the library, and return home. The chiclet-style keyboard and touchpad are completely sealed against accidental spills. Covered by Corning Gorilla Glass NBT 13.3-inch 1366-by-768 resolution touch screen, protecting the LCD panel from scratches and impact.

Our review unit has a touch screen and Windows 8, but is only available in black. There is also a non-touch-screen version available in Windows 7, and can be ordered with red or blue border around the standard black body. The system weighs 4.28 pounds, which is lighter than imperceptibly 'Choice for small business laptop, the 4.44-pound Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E431 and within a hair of our Editors' Choice for our editors the entry level Ultrabooks, the Lenovo IdeaPad U430 £ 4.2 Touch.

The LCD screen has an anti-glare coating to increase readability in bright classroom or outside. Its display resolution 1366-by-768 is much tighter than the more expensive system with 1920-by-1, 080 resolution (1080p HD), but still enough. In any case, students are not likely to be working with multi-page spreadsheet or professional-grade photo editing, where a 1080p HD screen begin to make more sense. Because the system is designed for use in the classroom, an innovative network status light at the top of the lid allows teachers and parents if the system uses the 802.11ac Wi-Fi or Ethernet.

Education Series Latitude 13 has a stable, forward-looking set of I / O ports, including a Gigabit Ethernet port, an HDMI port, mini DisplayPort, an SD card reader, a security lock port, and two USB 3.0 ports . This is an improvement over our previous Editors Choice 'for entry-level desktop replacement, the Dell Inspiron 14R-5437, which is less mini DisplayPort and USB 2.0 port instead of a second USB 3.0 port .

We evaluated the system with Intel Core i3-4005U processor, 4GB of memory, a 500GB hard drive, and Windows 8 Pro. Other configurations of the Dell website has the option for Intel Celeron and Core i5 processors. Schools have a wider selection of options, such as mobile broadband and solid-state drive, but it is off the table for parents buying just one laptop. Thank focus educational Latitude 13, no bloatware or preloaded software, in addition to Windows 8.1. The system has a one-year warranty which can be extended up to five years for $ 350.