Dell Latitude 14 3420 – Top 5 Pros and Cons

Business machines were really needed back in 2020 and 2021, and many will argue that they still are in high demand. Working from home has become the norm in many industries and many parts of the world, with the repercussions being that even when the world comes back to normalcy, we will still have a significant part of the workforce in their homes.

With that comes a need for all kinds of devices, which is now easing, as many people have got themselves something to work on. Today we have the Dell Latitude 14 3420, which offers decent hardware options, with both power-efficient and decently powerful hardware. Cost-cutting measures are a must with laptops like this one, but here they are used on some less important characteristics of the device.

Today we are presenting you with LaptopMedia’s top 5 picks about the Dell Latitude 14 3420.

Dell Latitude 14 3420: Full Specs / In-depth Review


3 reasons to BUY the Dell Latitude 14 3420

1. Upgradeability

For a smaller 14-inch device, the upgradeability is great, with there being two SODIMM RAM slots, which can support up to 32GB of DDR4 RAM in total and work in dual-channel mode. For storage, you have a single M.2 PCIe x4 drive slot.

Here is our detailed teardown video, which shows how to access both the RAM and SSD slots.


2. I/O

The I/O has a lot of ports and consists of one USB 2.0 port, two USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) ports, a USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 2) port, an HDMI 1.4a port, a MicroSD card reader, an Ethernet port, and a 3.5 mm audio jack.


3. Battery life

The laptop packs a 54Wh battery unit, which lasts for 11 hours and 29 minutes of Web browsing, or 10 hours and 25 minutes of video playback. Now, we conduct the battery tests with Windows Better performance setting turned on, screen brightness adjusted to 120 nits, and all other programs turned off except for the one we are testing the notebook with.


2 reasons NOT to buy the Dell Latitude 14 3420

1. Design and build quality

The whole laptop is made of plastic, which isn’t a surprise. With a weight of 1.52 kg and a profile of 17.6 mm, we have a compact 14-inch laptop, which cannot pride itself on its structural support and durability. The base and keyboard deck show a considerable amount of flex.

Look over to the lid, and it’s the same story. It also cant be opened with one hand. Opening it reveals a display with slim bezels and an HD webcam on top.


2. Display quality

The laptop offers two 14-inch displays with either an HD (1366 x 768p) TN display or a Full HD IPS display. We tested the latter panel, and it came with comfortable viewing angles, a max brightness of 273 nits in the middle of the screen, 255 nits average across the surface with a maximum deviation of 12%. The contrast ratio is very good – 1600:1.

The panel struggles when it comes to color coverage and accuracy, delivering 53% of the sRGB color gamut.

The dE value didn’t go below 2 with both the factory settings (left) and with our Design and Gaming profile applied (right).

Lastly, the panel uses PWM to adjust brightness up to 67 nits, but even then it’s at a high frequency, meaning that the panel is still safe to use for prolonged periods of time. If you still want to have that peace of mind, installing our Health-Guard profile eliminates the issue completely.


Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each individual display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for Dell Latitude 14 3420 configurations with 14.0″ Sharp XWXRY-LQ140M1 (SHP1542) (FHD, 1920 × 1080) IPS.

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

In addition to receiving efficient and health-friendly profiles, by buying LaptopMedia's products you also support the development of our labs, where we test devices in order to produce the most objective reviews possible.

Office Work

Office Work should be used mostly by users who spend most of the time looking at pieces of text, tables or just surfing. This profile aims to deliver better distinctness and clarity by keeping a flat gamma curve (2.20), native color temperature and perceptually accurate colors.

Design and Gaming

This profile is aimed at designers who work with colors professionally, and for games and movies as well. Design and Gaming takes display panels to their limits, making them as accurate as possible in the sRGB IEC61966-2-1 standard for Web and HDTV, at white point D65.

Health-Guard

Health-Guard eliminates the harmful Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) and reduces the negative Blue Light which affects our eyes and body. Since it’s custom tailored for every panel, it manages to keep the colors perceptually accurate. Health-Guard simulates paper so the pressure on the eyes is greatly reduced.

Get all 3 profiles with 33% discount


All Dell Latitude 14 3420 configurations:

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