Or maybe they're being smart by adding RAM themselves rather than paying dell an overpriced markup?
2. the markup is often warranted. There's a vast difference between "business" laptops and "consumer" laptops. I can't speak for dell's precision line, but lenovo's thinkpads are leagues better (build quality, support, etc) than the consumer crap you get at best buy.
Razer is one kinda-exception that I can think of, where they have fairly solid laptops that can be more minimal, but the build quality is still not quite up to mobile workstation standards.
TL;DR I wish I could get a MBP with TOTL hardware instead of having even the highest-end config still shoot for thin-and-light.
But on the other hand, they are clearly thought more as "hybrids" than other gamer laptops: - The UEFI lets you decide if you want to enable/disable the intel chipset (Useful when you want to be sure everything goes to the GPU/want to use things that don't work well with NVidia's Optimus) - Lightweight and easy to put in a bag. Not one of those 5 inches thick laptops that weight 5 kilograms - The look is made not to scream "gamer laptop !". - Wide configuration range for a single chassis.
Also not that expensive, even for consumer-grade standard. Got one with i7-9750h/RTX2060/16GB/512GB NVMe for 1100€/1350$ one year ago.
All mobile workstations, regardless of vendor, are overpriced in comparison with gaming laptops, because those who buy mobile workstations are forced to buy them for a few features that are missing in gaming laptops.
As another poster has already written, a common strategy when buying a Dell Precision mobile workstation is to buy them with the minimum RAM of 4 GB and with the minimum SSD of 128 GB, with the intention to dump the original RAM and SSD and buy something like 64 GB of ECC RAM and a fast 2 TB SSD, at much lower prices than from Dell.
The only reason for the 4 GB RAM configuration is because Dell will not sell a laptop without RAM or without a SSD or HDD.
The economy from buying yourself the RAM can easily be up to one thousand USD or even more, even after paying for the mandatory 4 GB.
To be honest, considering we're talking about Dell, I must say I'm nearly surprised they did not put a DRM in the BIOS/UEFI to forbid using more than the quantity the laptop shipped from without paying a license. I assume it's that then, all the customers that do buy the cheap lines and update the RAM themselves would go to other shops ?
If you’re cost sensitive, you upgrade yourself.
If you’re paying an overworked IT department to buy laptops, you pay the premium to Dell instead of hiring an employee to deal with upgrades like this, and then hire another person to scream at multiple people (instead of one) when all the laptops start BSODing because of some Microsoft update combined with Murphy’s Law.