Dell XPS 17 9710 (2021) review

Dell XPS 17 9710 (2021): a $739 photo machine hiding in an old flagship

The Dell XPS 17 9710 is a 2021 flagship that has aged into a bargain: $739 now buys a Core i5 11400H with a GeForce RTX 3050 Mobile and 64GB of memory. The graphics score of 72.55 is a high-tier reading — nearly nineteen times the ultrabook-class median of 3.84 — overall performance at 77.46 is high-band, and photo design reaches 93, top-tier. The cost is mobility: an index of 23, the verdict's named weakness.

Where it holds up

Photo design at 93 is top-tier — among this batch's big-screen machines, only the newer 9730 sibling's 95 posts higher — and office work at 91.91 is top-tier. Gaming lands at 66 in the high band; 3D modeling and engineering CAD both sit at 57, mid-band; and the 64GB memory ceiling doubles the class median. The value index of 76.3 is high-tier — on a $739 ask, that combination of capability and price is the batch's most quietly compelling receipt.

Where it falls short

Mobility at 23 — 64 percent below the class median of 64 — is the honest invoice for a 17-inch workstation-shaped ultrabook, and portability at 22 sits in the low band. The 3050's 4GB of video memory is a 2021 constraint that modern titles and heavy creative files will find before the chip itself runs out of steam. Value-adjacent caution: the depreciation schedule, while gentle at 9.44 percent, applies to a machine whose platform is now five years old.

Price and depreciation

No baseline price exists in the ledger, so the projection is rate-only at a modeled 9.44 percent per year — among the gentler schedules in this batch. On $739 that is roughly $70 of expected first-year loss. Buying this machine late in its life means the steep part of the curve is already behind it; the residual rests on condition and the XPS 17's enduring desirability.

Alternatives to consider

The XPS 17 9720 (2022) at $840 is the successor argument: the same 3050-class graphics at 72.55 but a 12500H processor and photo at 91, office at 94.46. The XPS 17 9730 (2023) at $954 escalates to an RTX 4050 with the batch's strongest GPU reading of 84.46 and photo at 95. If the money matters more than the panel size, the XPS 14 9440 (2024) at $1,084 offers the same 4050-class capability in a 1.68kg chassis with office at 96.05.

Bottom line

Fairly priced for the class — genuinely so. The 9710 is the batch's value pick among big creative machines: top-tier photo, high-band gaming, 64GB, and a 76.3 value reading at $739, with mobility of 23 as the known invoice. For a desk-based photo and media buyer, little else in this batch competes on capability-per-dollar.