Thoughts on Venue 11 Pro

My thoughts on the Dell Venue 11 Pro 5130 (V11P) which I’ve had about 2 weeks now. My frame of reference comes from having used the Dell Latitude 10 ST2 (L10) for 11 months on a daily basis. First the V11P uses the Atom Z3770 processor. This processor is not a powerhouse but is pretty good for a tablet. It has good battery life and producing so little heat there is no fan necessary that a more robust processor would require and it runs circles around the L10’s Atom Z2760. The screen resolution is 1920X1080 with 10 finger touch compared to the L10’s 1366X768 5 finger touch but in reality both screens look great. The V11P has a full size USB 3.0 compared to a USB 2.0 on the L10. They both also have a micro USB to be used for charging although the main charging port for the L10 is a proprietary plug so I was happy that was eliminated in the V11P but the cord they supplied with the V11P is ridiculously short. I would have gladly paid the extra quarter to double the length. Plan on buying a longer cord. I also don’t like that it plugs in on the bottom left, it gets in the way trying to hold the tablet if you need to use it while plugged in. The charger is compact compared to the brick for the L10 but swivel outlet prongs would have been a nice touch to make it that much more portable. The V11P has a micro SD card slot which means at least for the time being, 64GB is the largest memory expansion available. The L10 has a full size SD card which sticks out slightly and is depressed to release it. I leave my 128 GB card in it all the time and occasionally I have bumped it, popping it out. To get the micro SD out of the V11P it takes a paperclip to stick in the little hole to release it. Even though it’s not a quick change needing the paperclip, I like this mounting better but I would prefer to have the 128 GB capability. They both have enough power to run an external hard drive. The V11P adds NFC but leaves out the GPS. I have nothing that uses NFC but I do sometimes use the GPS on the L10. Surprisingly, the Synaptic stylus the V11P uses is far superior to the Wacom used by the L10 even though it requires a battery and doesn’t have the eraser function. The battery life is quite good but not as long as the L10. With the screen on its brightest I get about 7 ½ hours of continuous heavy use compared to about 9 on the L10. The battery is replaceable on both but on the V11P the cover has to be removed to get to it. That’s not a bad thing but because the battery is on the outside of the L10, you can purchase a different battery that is twice the size. That’s not an option for the V11P because there’s no place for it to stick out. I suspect they are the same 8 MP camera for both tablets. The camera takes good pictures if there is bright light, the lower the light level the darker and grainier the picture. There is no flash. Overall, I think the L10 is better built, it just feels more solid though the V11P still has solid construction. The L10 has a rubberized coating that extends all the way around the edges to the front glass making it much easier to hold than the V11P. This also makes accidentally changing the volume harder to do than it is on the V11P. I am very pleased with both tablets but hopefully an engineer with Dell will read this and combine the best of both tablets.