Dell 14" Midnight Blue Review

A budget 2-in-1 with great ports but weak guts. The 8GB RAM and poor graphics are major limits. Only worth it if you need a simple, portable touchscreen laptop and don't plan on doing much with it.

The Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 is a flexible, portable laptop that's trying to be an AI PC. It's got a decent AMD Ryzen 5 chip, a touchscreen, and a solid port selection. But the specs tell a different story. It's built for basic tasks and moving around, not for heavy lifting.

The Ryzen 5 8640HS CPU is solid for everyday stuff. It's in the middle of the pack for processing power, so you can handle office work and web browsing fine. The integrated Radeon graphics are a weak spot, though. They're near the bottom of our charts, so forget about gaming or serious photo editing. The 8GB of RAM is also disappointing, which can slow things down if you multitask too much.

At around $584, it's a budget-friendly 2-in-1. You're getting a flexible form factor and good connectivity for the price. But you're also paying for weak internals. The low RAM and poor graphics mean it won't grow with your needs. It's a decent value if you only need a simple, portable machine right now, but it's not a long-term investment.

Compared to a base model Surface Laptop, this Dell has more ports and a touchscreen, but the Surface likely has a better screen and build quality. Against a Lenovo Legion, this isn't even in the same league for performance. The real competition is other budget 2-in-1s. This Dell wins on ports, but loses on screen and RAM. If AI features are a must, newer Copilot+ PCs like the ASUS ProArt blow it away, but they cost way more.

If you need to do any real work, skip this. Graphic designers, programmers, or anyone who multitasks with more than a few browser tabs should look elsewhere because the 8GB RAM and weak GPU will choke. Gamers, obviously, should look at anything else.

Buy this if you're a student or casual user who needs a portable, flexible laptop for notes, web browsing, and video calls, and you absolutely need all those USB-A ports. It's a basic machine that gets the simple jobs done.