Dell's Inspiron 14, Latitude 5455 Make AI Affordable With 8-Core Snapdragon X Plus
This is shaping up to be a big week for Microsoft's Copilot+ initiative. Yesterday, we covered Intel's official Core Ultra Series 2 launch (otherwise known as Lunar Lake), which will bring the Copilot+ branding to the x86 side of the pond in November. Now a day later, Qualcomm announced it is expanding its Snapragon X Plus silicon with cheaper 8-core models (plus another 10-core SKU) to make AI more accessible. Dell is readying products based on both designs, including the refreshed XPS 13 that we already covered, along with a pair of laptops that will infuse Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon chip, the Latitude 5455 (pictured above) and Inspiron 14.
Dell actually introduced these laptops earlier this year, though at the time it was mostly mum on specs and pricing. Now we have a little more information to pass along.
Starting with the former, the Latitude 5455 is billed as a "premium AI laptop" offering up to 21 hours of battery life. It's also an official Copilot+ PC, as designs built around Qualcomm's Snapdragon silicon still have first dibs on the Copilot+ branding, at least for a little while longer.
In addition to featuring a 10-core Snapdragon X Plus (X1P-64-100) chip, users will also be able to select a config sporting the more affordable 8-core variant (X1P-42-100). What's nice about the 8-core option is that it retains the same 45 TOPS of AI performance from the dedicated NPU.
Either chip will power a 14-inch IPS display with a 1920x1200 resolution and 300 nits of brightness. Other specs include up to 16GB of LPDDR5X-8448 RAM, up to 1TB of M.2 2230 form factor solid state drive (SSD) storage, dual USB4 ports (40Gbps, power delivery, and DisplayPort 2.1), a single USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port, a microSD card reader, and a 3.5mm headset jack. And for wireless chores, the laptop boasts a Qualcomm FastConnect 7800 Wi-Fi 7 model (2x2) with Bluetooth 5.4.
Curiously, there's no mention of pricing, though the Latitude 7455 with the 10-core Snapdragon X Plus SKU starts at $1,719, so expect the MSRP to be somewhere below that figure.
Meanwhile, the Inspiron 14 configured with the new 8-core Snapdragon X Plus is aggressively priced, with an MSRP starting at $899. That sub-$1,000 price tag should help get Qualcomm's Arm-based Snapdragon into more hands, which in turn will put the pressure on AMD and Intel to attack the mainstream segment with x86 alternatives.
The Inspiron is similarly configured with the same display specs, same Snapdragon X Plus options, same RAM and storage configs, and the same connectivity. Dell's Inspiron is more consumer-oriented, however, and don't employ as many premium materials.
Dell says you'll be able to order both the Inspiron 14 and Latitude 5455 with the new 8-core Snapdragon X Plus option on September 24.
Dell says you'll be able to order both the Inspiron 14 and Latitude 5455 with the new 8-core Snapdragon X Plus option on September 24.
