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Dell’s latest Vostro business laptop is more evolution than revolution, as it uses the same outer chassis as last year’s V130 model. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the combination of black plastic and silver metal looks as sleek as ever, especially in the compact 20mm-thick chassis.
Weighing 1.8kg and equipped with a 13.3in display, the V131 is aimed at business travellers who want something light yet powerful to use on the move. The 1,366×768 display resolution is fairly standard for a screen of this size, but the semi-gloss finish strikes a good balance between displaying vibrant colours and combating reflections. Unfortunately viewing angles aren’t particularly wide, but there’s a decent amount of screen tilt to counter any problems. In the configuration we saw, the laptop comes with an integrated 3G modem and prepay SIM for easy online access on the move.
As this is one of the entry-level models in the V131 range, the laptop has a basic Core i3 processor. The version we tested had a dual-core i3-2330M running at 2.2GHz, but Dell has just upgraded the laptop to a 2.3GHz i3-2350M without changing the price.
The chip doesn’t have Turbo Boost so can’t overclock itself automatically for increased performance. Its Hyper Threading technology does double the number of cores seen by Windows and can help in multi-threaded applications, but an overall score of 38 in our multimedia benchmarks shows this is only of limited help – the new version will be around 5% faster. The laptop will also struggle to run multiple applications without slowing down, as it only has 2GB of RAM.
The laptop uses the processor’s built-in graphics, but it’s mostly limited to video playback. It can handle 720p footage on the laptop screen, or 1080p video on an external display using the HDMI port, but playing modern games is almost out of the question. The V131 could only manage 13.3fps in our Dirt3 test, so you’ll have to stick to older titles.
At least the low-powered components help prevent the battery from draining quickly while on the move – in our light-use test, the V131 managed to last over eight hours away from the mains. This means you should be able to get close to a full working day from the six-cell battery. This is a major improvement over the old model, which struggled to reach four hours on a full charge.
Dell has also made other improvements to the new Vostro – all its ports have moved from the rear, where they were difficult to reach, to the sides of the laptop. Now, the single USB and two USB3 ports, HDMI and VIGA inputs, memory card reader and headset audio jack are easier to reach.
We liked the V131’s Chiclet-style keys, which are spaced widely apart and have plenty of bounce. There’s no numeric keypad, but the punctuation keys were all in the places we would expect. The laptop’s touchpad feels compact, even when controlling the small 13in display, as we couldn’t span the desktop in a single movement. A quick trip to the driver settings menu solved the problem, but we would have preferred a little more room to manoeuvre. At least the touchpad buttons felt firm and responsive, registering our clicks consistently.
In the configuration we saw, the Vostro V131 felt slightly underpowered for intensive tasks, but was still ideally suited to web browsing, word processing and other work-related tasks. With this specification, it’s also good value for an ultra-portable laptop, and if you don’t need the 3G modem and specify Windows 7 Home Premium rather than Professional, you can knock the price down to a bargain £514 including VAT. If an ultrabook is out of your price range but you want a laptop for travel, the Vostro V131 is a great buy.
