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Dell pokes Apple’s Retina with a 4K MacBook Pro competitor for less cash

By Adrian Diaconescu Published March 5, 2015

Seeing as how Dell’s glory days of towering above its PC manufacturing rivals are but a distant memory, you’d figure they’d first look to steal some market share away from fellow Windows computer creators and only then go after Apple’s well-oiled money-making machine.

And yet the just-announced Precision M3800 upgrade is squarely targeted at dethroning the uber-successful MacBook Pro. Dell doesn’t shy away from taking potshots at Cupertino’s 15-inch flagship, stressing its new “mobile workstation” eclipses the much-hyped “Retina” panel on even the highest-end MacBook.

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The 15-inch display on the Precision M3800 can deliver eight million pixels at once, which is 3.4 million more than what Apple offers with the 15-inch MacBook Pro. Translated in numbers you’re probably more familiar with, that’s 3,840 x 2,160 and 2,880 x 1,800 pixels respectively.

The breathtaking touchscreen’s jump in image quality isn’t the sole upside Dell is gloating over the MacBook Pro, as the newest Precision family member offers up to 2TB hard drive storage. Or 1.5 terabytes of solid state space. Or countless hybrid combinations.

DDR3 RAM caps off at a colossal 16GB, while the only CPU and GPU options are a quad-core 2.3GHz Intel Core i7-4712HQ Haswell and 2GB GDDR5 Nvidia Quadro K1100M. That’s really the best a graphic professional could ever ask for.

Thunderbolt 2.0 is used to achieve data transfer speeds of up to 20Gbps and easy 4K video viewing and editing with instantaneous backing. Needless to mention the Thunderbolt port can pull double duty, switching to a miniDP when you need it. And then you have HDMI, a bunch of USB 2.0 and 3.0 hubs, a media card reader, 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0 support.

Constructed out of sturdy and sleek aluminum and carbon fiber materials, the Precision M3800 somehow keeps bulk in check, tipping the scales at just 4.15 pounds and measuring 0.71 inches at its thickest point.

Not impressed yet, and still not convinced Dell actually pulled off a MacBook Pro “killer”? Then head over to the company’s website, where you’ll find the Windows workhorse listed at $1,649 and up. The cheapest 4K model is $1,719, and one with a 128GB SSD and 12GB RAM is still more affordable than the least expensive 15-inch MacBook Pro currently on sale.

Adrian Diaconescu

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Adrian is a mobile aficionado since the days of the Nokia 3310, and a PC enthusiast since Windows 98. Later, he discovered…

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