It tracks a single finger well and at the right speed, but it’s clunky to use for multi-finger gestures like pinch-zoom.
Speaking of the trackpad: Moody might be the best way to describe it. Our reviewer expressed a rather intense dislike for the Inspiron 5547’s keyboard and trackpad. Two new things: First, the function keys (F1 through F12) didn’t behave as I expected (a 45-minute call to Dell’s tech support finally resolved that issue-more on that later.) Second, the arrow keys would intermittently stop working after I pressed firmly on the keyboard deck to the left of the trackpad. The Insert function would mysteriously switch to “Overwrite” mode. It sometimes misses keystrokes, especially the “e” key. My fingers slip on its slick, flat-topped keys. The Inspiron 5547’s keyboard is cursed with nearly every annoying feature I’ve ever suffered, and it tosses in a few new ones. Speaking of Wi-Fi, this machine’s dual-band 802.11ac Wi-Fi adapter is Intel’s 1×1 Wireless AC 3160 that supports maximum throughput of only 433Mbps (Intel’s 2×2 Wireless AC 7260 delivers 867Mbps). You get just three USB ports, only two of which are the faster USB 3.0 variety a memory-card reader HDMI a headset and-what’s this?-a 10/100 ethernet jack? It’s been years since I’ve seen any hardwired ethernet jack delivering speed of less than a gigabit (barring exceptionally thin-and-light notebooks that expect you to rely on Wi-Fi or a USB adapter). I expected to find plenty of I/O ports on a machine of this size, but the Inspiron 5547 has a surprisingly modest collection. That might help explain why its chassis flexes so readily. Nearly all of the construction is plastic. In fact, you see remarkably little metal anywhere in there. While inside the computer, I noticed it had very little metal framing. Just two screws fasten its bottom panel removing it grants access to its dual SODIMM slots (for memory), its 802.11ac Wi-Fi/Bluetooth combo card, and its 43-watt-hour battery. Like its smaller cousin, the Inspiron 5547 is easy to open up for upgrades. See that Ethernet port? Its top speed is 100Mbps (in other words, it’s not the gigabit Ethernet we’ve come to expect in laptops at almost every price point).