These two laptops reveal the big difference between AMD and Qualcomm

The newest laptop chipsets are focused on AI, with the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite officially supporting the Microsoft Copilot+ PC initiative and the AMD Ryzen AI 9 having a faster neural processing unit (NPU), but not yet an official Copilot+ chipset.

The Dell XPS 13 (9345) is a Qualcomm machine and the Asus ProArt PX13 runs AMD. They’re both very fast, although the Asus has a discrete GPU option, and they’re both well-built. But the XPS 13 has longer battery life. Do either of them land on the list of the best laptops you can buy?

Specs and configurations

There are just two configurations of the ProArt PX13. The base unit is $1,700 with an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 chipset, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 GPU, and a 13.3-inch 3K OLED display. For $2,000, you can opt for an RTX 4060 GPU.

The XPS 13 costs less. It starts at $1,000 for a Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite chipset, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and a 13.4-inch FHD+ IPS display. You’ll spend $1,600 for a 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD, and $1,960 to upgrade to a 3K OLED display.

Design

The XPS 13 shares the newest XPS laptop design. It’s incredibly sleek on the outside, with an all-metal chassis available in silver and black colors. Open it up, and it’s ultramodern with an all-glass palm rest, a hidden haptic touchpad, a zero-lattice keyboard, and a row of LED touch function keys. The ProArt PX13 comes in just black, and it’s a lot more conventional on both the outside and the inside. Given thee powerful components inside, it has more aggressive venting and looks a lot more like a miniature gaming laptop.

Both laptops are very well-built. They’re all-metal and solid, with the XPS 13 being just a little more rigid in the lid, but with both laptops resisting bending and flexing in the chassis and keyboard deck. They both have well-designed hinges that open the lid with one hand, and they both feel great in hand.

In terms of their keyboards, the XPS 13 has no key spacing, but large keycaps, and its switches are light and snappy, though quite shallow. It’s comfortable, once you get used to it. The ProArt PX13’s keyboard is more traditional, with large keycaps and tons of spacing. Its switches are deeper, but just as springy, and it’s easier to get up to speed with more quickly. The XPS 13’s hidden haptic touchpad feels better than the ProArt PX13’s mechanical version — except, it’s easy to lose track of its edges. Finally, the XPS 13’s LED touch function keys are a misstep. They don’t provide any haptic feedback and so you have to look at them to activate them, and even then it’s not obvious that you’ve hit the right one.

Connectivity is much stronger on the ProArt PX13. The XPS 13 has just two USB4 ports, while the Asus has that many and then a couple of legacy ports as well. It also has a 3.5mm audio jack and a microSD card reader, neither of which are available on the XPS 13. And both have the latest in wireless connectivity.

Finally, both have 1080p webcams with infrared cameras for Windows 11 Hello facial recognition. They both support the Microsoft Studio Effects software via their NPUs, which are roughly the same speed, but only the XPS 13 supports the enhanced version.

Performance

The ProArt PX13 uses the latest AMD chipset, the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, with 12 CPU cores, 24 threads, and 16 GPU cores. It’s a 28-watt part by default and can be ramped from 15 watts to 54 watts depending on configuration. It uses a mix of Zen 5 and Zen 5c cores, with the latter being just as fast ,but more compact.

The Dell XPS 13 9345 runs on the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 chipset with 12 cores (eight performance and four efficient), with the Adreno GPU. The Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 has an NPU capable of up to 50 tera operations per second (TOPS) compared to the Qualcomm chipset’s 45 TOPS. For now, only the XPS 13 is a Microsoft CoPilot+ PC laptop and can utilize its NPUs to speed up that initiative’s AI features.

The laptops are evenly matched when running CPU-intensive tasks, and they’re both very fast for demanding productivity workflows. The ProArt PX13 has a much faster GPU, though, specifically the discrete Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 or the faster RTX 4060. I tested with an entry-level RTX 4050, but it’s still a lot faster than the Adreno graphics. The Asus will be faster at games and at running creative apps that can utilize the GPU. And if you choose the RTX 4060, it’ll be a real diminutive powerhouse.

Display

There’s just one display option with the ProArt PX13, a 13.3-inch 16:10 3K (2880 x 1800) OLED panel running at 60Hz. The XPS 13 has several 13.4-inch 16:10 options, including FHD+ (1920 x 1200) and QHD+ (2560 x 1600) in IPS and 3K OLED. The two IPS panels run at a faster 120Hz refresh rate.

The XPS 13’s IPS display tested very will for the technology, and it was brighter than the ProArt PX13’s OLED panel. But, you can’t beat OLED’s bright and accurate colors or deep contrast with inky blacks.

You can get similar display quality with the XPS 13 if you opt for its OLED display. But, that will come at a price in battery life (see below).

Portability

The XPS 13 is thinner, lighter, and smaller than the ProArt PX13, but the difference isn’t all that significant. Both are highly portable laptops

However, the XPS 13, thanks to running Windows on Arm with the Arm-based Qualcomm chipset, lasts a lot longer in all but the most demanding tasks. It’s much more likely to get you through a full day and more when doing productivity work. The XPS 13 does benefit from a low-power IPS display, but it also has a significantly smaller battery. The Qualcomm chipset is a lot more efficient than the AMD chipset.

The ProArt PX13 is faster, but the XPS 13 lasts longer

The XPS 13 is a fast productivity machine, has several compelling display options, and gets great battery life. It’s also well-built, although some of its design elements are controversial and of questionable value. It’s not a cheap laptop, but it’s less expensive than the ProArt PX13 at the low end.

The Asus, though, is a lot faster for gamers and creators with its discrete GPU options. Its one OLED display option is excellent. And at the high end, it’s roughly the same price as the XPS 13. That makes it the better option for most buyers, even if the XPS 13 remains the longer-lasting option.