Dell Latitude E6320 cannot be rated as the prettiest ultraportable laptop, but it definitely serves your purpose of a laptop. It is a great performer and has many little features that all business professionals will appreciate. It has a spill-proof keyboard, business rugged design, fast charging battery, docking station connector as well as bright LED screen.
The model is priced at $1519. It comes with a second-generation Intel Core i7-2620M processor, 4GB RAM and a 320GB hard drive with a spinning rate of 7200rpm. It also includes a built-in webcam, microphone, has Bluetooth connectivity and 64 bit Windows 7 Professional.
In WorldBench 6 banchmark tests, Dell’s Latitude E6320 was given a score of 125 which is excellent for a ultraportable laptop which is majorly due to its Core i7 processor.
The laptop cannot be rated well in the graphics test since it has no discrete graphics card. Latitude E6320 is not a multimedia-oriented device hence the graphics test hold low priority. It is on par with the other laptops of the Latitude E6320’s category. At high settings the laptop reaches a frame rate of 12.3 fps in Far Cry 2 while 30.9 fps on low settings. Sony VAIO SB series reach 30.3 fps at high quality even after it has a Radeon HD 6630M discrete graphics card and has a price of $2500.
Latitude E6320 is business rugged thus has a sturdy case design. It has a tri-metal casing instead of the regular plastic casing. It also has reinforced metal hinges and a spill-proof keyboard. Unlike other ultraportables, Latitude E6320 is around half a pound heavier, measuring 4.6 pounds along with its six-cell battery.
Though a business machine, Latitude E6320 is still slightly svelte. The cover has a black brushed aluminum panel that tapers off at the sides serving as fingerprint magnet and also has a matte silver magnesium alloy bumper. The device is not very slim but is small with a thickness of 1.2 inches, width of 8.8 inches and length of 13.2 inches.
The six-cell battery generates a battery life of over 6 hours but is slightly big in size for the laptop, thus it protrudes out about an inch at the back. It does not get in way of the hinges or ports and also does not push the laptop up. Thus it only increases the size of the ultraportable laptop by an inch.
Dell has worked more on the inside of the laptop than its outside. A thin sliver surrounds the keyboard that is the soft, rubbery wrist rest. Latitude E6320 has two pointing devices that are the touchpad (with two discrete mouse buttons) and the rubbery pointing stick (with three discrete mouse buttons). On the right side of the keyboard there are the volume-up, volume-down and the mute keys.
The blacklit keyboard regular style keys that are slightly raised compared to the thin border around it giving it a semi-chiclet appearance. The key faces are thus smaller compared to those on the regular keyboards, making typing difficult.
The stick is easier to use compared to the touchpad which is slightly small. The mouse buttons are big and thus easy to press. You can disable the touchpad and its buttons when not in use using a Function key.
The laptop is not port-heavy but has features that a business laptop must have such as one USB 2.0 port, one USB 2.0/eSATA combo port, a SmartCard reader, an ExpressCard reader, an SD Card reader, a gigabit Ethernet port, a combination microphone/headphone jack and a Kensington lock slot. It also includes two display connectors, VGA and Mini HDMI, and also a docking connector if you wish to use it on a desktop with an external display.
Latitude E6320 has a 13.3 inch matte LED screen subsiding any issues of glare or reflection. The display can be very bright making it easier to work in direct sunlight. The color representation is also good. There is not much to complain at the standard resolution of 1366×768 pixel (standard resolution for a laptop of this category).
The multimedia playback on the device is not good. High-streaming video plays smoothly but there is blockiness in dark and transitioning scenes. Since E6320 is not a multimedia device hence a few artifacts are expected but they are much more glaring on this laptop. The laptop is thus not suitable for movie watching.
Like other ultraportables, E6320 does not have loud, high-quality speakers. The speakers in the laptop are located on the front and have such a low volume that it seems as if we are listening to the music through headphones that are on your neighbour’s head.
Dell Latitude E6320 is not a multimedia device but is an excellent business laptop for the professionals who travel often. It has many additional features that are loved by business people. The ExpressCharge battery that charges upto 80 percent within an hour, the spill-resistant keyboard and the rugged exterior are a few features that can make working life quite easy.