Dell Latitude XT2 Battery Life and Conclusion

Battery Life
The Latitude XT2 didn't give as impressive battery life as I had hoped. Dell aimed for a clean flush mount design, which also has a hard drive mounted in the middle of the battery cavity. This only allows for a 42Wh battery, less than other business-class tablets. With the screen brightness set to 70%, wireless active, and Vista set to the Balanced power profile, the Latitude XT2 managed 3 hours and 24 minutes before it shut down. Dell also offers a 45Wh slice battery, which should in theory more than double the battery life.

Conclusion
The Dell Latitude XT2 packs some of the latest touch technologies in an extremely well built and good looking chassis. Build quality is above and beyond even similar Latitude series notebooks, with a very rugged chassis. The keyboard is comfortable to type on and feels almost better than the legendary ThinkPad keyboard. System performance would get a significant boost with a faster drive since the 1.8" model gets an average transfer speed of 28MB/s while most SSDs of the same size would be above 100MB/s. Overall, if you are looking for a very portable tablet designed to hold up to the rigors of daily business use, the Dell Latitude XT2 is a clear winner. The only big downside to this model is the high price tag and lower battery life, but if you can live with those it is hard to find a superior model.

Pros:

• Excellent build quality
• Thin chassis and business-grade color scheme
• Very easy to upgrade and service

Cons:

• Slow hard drive
• High price
• Largest internal battery is only 42Wh