DELL Refurbished Latitude E7270 Core I5 6th Gen 8GB RAM 256GB SSD-Black

Refurbished Latitude E7270 Core I5 8GB RAM 256GB SSD-Black

Case

At first glance, Dell has barely modified the casing compared with the former Latitude E7250. However, when looking closer it is seen that Dell has reworked some places. The basic design language is identical with that of the predecessor: The casing is virtually completely black. The large, silver hinges that look connected via a thin metal strip on the lid's rear and the blue FN function lettering on the keyboard are the only noteworthy colorful accents. The casing has rounded edges, but the base is not as curved on the sides as its predecessor was. That gives the device an even more serious appearance. The keyboard bezel's shape is also a bit different. The clear edge along the keyboard frame has been omitted; the bezel runs evenly around the keys. That looks more attractive and more elegant in our opinion.

The E7270's display lid and base unit are made of magnesium. That is not very evident at first glance as Dell covers it with a thin, rubber-like surface that has a pleasant feel and also provides a bit of grip when carrying the laptop around. However, the surfaces are also somewhat susceptible to greasy spots and fingerprints. We hardly find plain plastic; only the display's bezel is made of plastic. Only attempted warping make it obvious that the casing is composed of magnesium. The base resists twisting attempts very well, and it does not yield even when higher pressure is applied to the wrist rest. The wrist rest only bends very slightly above the touchpad and between the hinges. The display is naturally not quite as stiff, but the E7270 is on a good level here. Pressure on the display's back does not have an effect on the screen. Only the display lids of the non-touch models, like our review sample, are made of magnesium is noteworthy. E7270 models with a touchscreen feature carbon-reinforced plastic here. What this will presumably look like can be seen in our review of the predecessor.

The aforementioned hinges under a metal cover not only make a robust impression, they are robust. The display barely rocks even in shaky surroundings; the hinges always have a firm control. On the other hand, it also has a drawback: Although the hinges operate relatively smoothly, the lid can only be opened using both hands. The positioning of the status LEDs in the E7270 is clever. Dell still used two identical sets of the same status LEDs (standby, battery, hard drive) on the display lid and inside in the predecessor. This unnecessary doubling has been omitted in the E7270 by simply installing the LEDs on the casing's front edge. Thus, they are visible in both a closed and opened state, and the design looks a bit more structured.

Connectivity

Compared with the predecessor, the interface count has not changed much, but their positioning has. The casing's left is almost unchanged, and only the Kensington Lock slot that was formerly on the right is found here. The same is true for the front edge that now accommodates the aforementioned status LEDs. The positioning of the rear-sided ports has been modified. The mini-DisplayPort has been moved to the rear and the SIM card slot that was situated under the battery is now on the right. All other rear-sided ports have been moved slightly, but that hardly makes a difference in utilization.

Dell simply has to be praised for the interface positioning. Both right-handed and left-handed users should not have problems with the interface positioning when using an external mouse. Most ports are situated on the rear. This is possible because Dell, unlike HP or Lenovo in their 12.5-inch models, does not use so-called drop-down hinges where the display's edge drops behind the base when opened. Instead, Dell relies on the traditional design where the hinges are on the base leaving the rear free for interfaces.

Both rear-sided USB ports are a bit too close to each other. Large USB peripherals cannot be connected simultaneously in both neighboring ports. That should rarely be a problem in practice since the right also harbors a USB port.

The E7270 does not feature either a USB Type-C or Thunderbolt 3 port. Therefore, it is not quite as future-proof as the XPS 13 or Latitude 7370 that both offer Thunderbolt 3. The Elitebook 820 G3 by HP at least provides USB Type-C without Thunderbolt, and the ThinkPad X260 has neither port like the E7270. Dell has announced that it will completely rely on Thunderbolt docks as of next year; the E7270 cannot be connected to these. Instead, it offers a traditional, mechanical docking port on the underside.   

Display

The laptop has the following three different screen options to choose from; HD (1366x768 pixels) non-touch, FHD (1920x1080 pixels) non-touch and FHD touch. However, the glossy-touch model is presently not offered in Germany. The review sample sports the FHD non-touch version. Interestingly, resolutions higher than FHD are generally still uncommon in the 12.5-inch sector. Solely the Razer Blade Stealth offers 2K (2560x1440 pixels) and 4K (3840x2160 pixels), but it is presently not available in Germany. HP and Lenovo also only offer their 12.5-inch devices with a maximum of FHD; the 13.3-inch XPS 13 and Latitude 7370 models are available with QHD+ (3200x1800 pixels).

The FHD IPS panel comes from LG and Dell specifies it with 300 nits. The screen clearly surpasses this rate with a maximum brightness of 353 cd/m² and an average brightness of 334 cd/m². The screen is within a good range with a contrast of 751:1, but very good IPS panels achieve rates beyond 1000:1. The contrast is derived from the also middling black level of 0.47 cd/m². The colors are vivid enough and black is relatively dark but it could be even better. The biggest weakness of LG's FHD panel is definitely the color space. 58% sRGB and 37% AdobeRGB are very weak results. However, it is on par with the ThinkPad X260 also furnished with an FHD screen that is not much better with 65% sRGB. The colors look pale compared with better screens due to the limited color space. The panel is certainly not suitable for professional image editing. At least the screen does not present any weaknesses in the illumination of 91%. PWM is not an issue, just like backlight bleeding (not present). The screen's resolution of 176 PPI is quite fine even if it cannot compete with the sharpness of a 2K or 4K panel. Subjectively, the panel presents a good image quality.                                                                                 

Storage Device

As just said, Dell does not install a PCIe SSD but rather a conventional 256 GB SATA III SSD in the M.2 form factor. It comes from LiteOn and carries the model name L8H-256V2G. Too bad that Dell waives a PCIe SSD even if it would have let the price skyrocket even more. We assume that it would easily be possible to retrofit a PCIe SSD since these are listed as an option in the data sheet.