I had to replace the Killer wifi card with an Intel card, as the OEM one was flaky and this seemed to be a known issue that wasn't acknowledged by Dell.
The battery failed on me 3 times, and I eventually gave up on the warranty and bought a third party battery which I installed myself.
The power connector got loose, which required replacing the motherboard.
The case itself is not very stiff, so putting it over the edge of a knee or table means the touch pad won't click due to the flex.
Perhaps newer models have addressed these sorts of issues, but I'd be wary of buying another considering the Thinkpad I got for work has been very solid.
BUT I also had to replace the battery after a year or two (it was swollen to the point that I couldn't close the laptop anymore).
And finally the rubbery coating of the case degraded badly and turned into a gooey, sticky mess (apparently a known issue with this kind of material, for those living in tropical weather).
So I'm done with Dell for a while.
That happened to me too with the first one, but they actually on their own initiative sent me a new battery. I've had no problems with the second laptop.
If you want a larger screened Dell for Linux you should definitely go with the Precision line that you mentioned as you can order them with Linux out of the box.
You might be OK with an XPS 15 or 17 but I've heard of issues with the GPU on the XPS 15 so might be a bit of a crap shoot. So personally I would avoid them.
My advice for buying any Linux laptop would be always get one that comes with Linux out of the box even if you're going to replace it.
They won't refuse to repair it. It's identical in all ways except for the screen size, so. If something really weird happens, they might kick it back to you, but nothing really weird is going to happen.
> My advice for buying any Linux laptop would be always get one that comes with Linux out of the box even if you're going to replace it.
Or get a Dell XPS 17 and install your own ;)
All the parts of the XPS 13 are expected to work well with Linux. They've been selected specifically for that and they’ll receive firmware updates to improve that situation.
That’s not the same on the XPS17. On an XPS 17 the parts just have to work with Windows. They might work or they might not.
If something doesn’t work with Linux on the XPS 13 or Precision model it’s someone at Dell’s paid job to fix it. On an XPS 15 or XPS 17 it’s your job.
Get an XPS 17 if you want one obviously but you're not buying the same experience.
Between the sleep, the bad mic, fan noise, I think my next one will be a ThinkPad (my 10 year old ThinkPad is still rocking, gave it to other family who just needed a browser).