Alienware Laptops

Marky · 2 Nov 2009 at 23:16

Why hello thar...

In my quest to find the ultimate laptop as a desktop placement for myself, I have fallen upon Alienware...

My budget falls around the £1500 mark and for that I can get...

Alienware M15x said:
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 Processor 720QM (1.60Ghz, 6MB L3 cache)
Operating System: Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit- English
Screen: 15.6-inch Wide Full HD Display (1920x1080)
RAM: 4096MB 1333MHz Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM [2x2048]
Hard Drive: 250GB (7,200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive
Graphics Card: 1GB NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX260M graphics card
Optical Drive: DVD+/-RW (DVD, CD read and write) Slot Load Drive
Battery: 6-cell 56Whr Lithium Ion battery

Total Cost: £1,432.01
Total Cost (Minus QuidCo 5% Goodness): £1360.41

This leaves me extra moola to grab a nice external hard drive to complement.

My question - or questions - are:

* Does anyone have any experience with Alienware laptops? Are they reliable?
* Can you recommend a similarly sexy laptop with similar specs for a cheaper price?
* Will the spec above suit my needs? (Needs being, I use my PC for video/music and need it to be able to play Call of Duty 4 (And its upcoming sequel), Flight Simulator X and other games of its kind)

Thanks muchly

Marky

SDK^ · 2 Nov 2009 at 23:25

Hard Drive space is lacking

Stalker_26 · 2 Nov 2009 at 23:39

From what i hear, with Alienware, all you are really paying for is normal components, in (have got to admit) a nice case. and great after sales, a friend of mine has a gaming rig through Alienware, and it looks like no other, pure eye candy, but essentially, its components are the same spec as mine (custom built with quite a few parts from OCUK actually)
Im not saying they are bad, jut that you pay the extra money for the after service and custom build quality.

EDIT - yes, COD4 will run nice, and MW2 also if im not mistaken

Marky · 2 Nov 2009 at 23:57

SDK^ said:
Hard Drive space is lacking

As mentioned - I would have enough dosh for a nice spacey external hard drive

I want to have an internal hard drive (or SSD) for the system files etc. and I'll use the external hard drive for all my music, videos and games etc.

Stalker_26 said:
From what i hear, with Alienware, all you are really paying for is normal components, in (have got to admit) a nice case. and great after sales, a friend of mine has a gaming rig through Alienware, and it looks like no other, pure eye candy, but essentially, its components are the same spec as mine (custom built with quite a few parts from OCUK actually)
Im not saying they are bad, jut that you pay the extra money for the after service and custom build quality.

EDIT - yes, COD4 will run nice, and MW2 also if im not mistaken

Thanks amigo

Anyone actually have a Alienware laptop here?

dfl · 2 Nov 2009 at 23:59

Being in the market right now for a beastly laptop which doesn't weight a ton, I've opted for the Asus G51J-A1. For the same money or less you get better specs (2 hard drives, put your OS and other s/w on SSD, super advantage imo), in less than 3kg - a whole kg less than the 15" AW.
I compared the top machines from dell, hp, asus and sager and found that the G51J-A1 had the best specs, with raving reviews.

Marky · 4 Nov 2009 at 09:00

Doesn't look too bad - where can you get ASUS laptops from in the UK?

iaind · 4 Nov 2009 at 09:05

I'd get an SSD instead of the 250gb if you're not bothered about space and have some budget to play with

Marky · 4 Nov 2009 at 09:23

I did look but it doesn't seem Alienware do SSD's for hard drive space

I've also been looking at Kobalt Laptops... anyone had any experience with them?

Lokai · 4 Nov 2009 at 09:24

I had the model before this one, the Aienware m15x and its going strong after two years no problems at all, its actually running better than my vaio.

Reeve · 4 Nov 2009 at 17:19

Marky said:
I did look but it doesn't seem Alienware do SSD's for hard drive space

I've also been looking at Kobalt Laptops... anyone had any experience with them?

I've ordered a g860 from them but it wont come untill the end of next week or so. They've had a bit of trouble getting hold of the mobile i7 processors but theyre finally in now.

When i ordered my laptop i had a i720qm, 4gb ram, 128gb ssd with win 7 for £1550 or so, not sure if prices have gone up now. I ended up changing the 720qm to an 820qm and its around the £1700 mark. The kobalt notebooks also have the gtx280m as standard which is a step above the 260.

Im not really too fond of the look of the alienware laptops, kinda looks to me like the person using one is saying 'look at me, im a geek'

but each to their own i guess

Alexrose1uk · 4 Nov 2009 at 19:05

I cant recommend Alienware in the slightest, sorry been itching to respond to this but got a 2 day ban for my signature being too big (jeez it showed OK as per forum rules on 3 machines!!!)

You are NOT paying for service in the slightest with Alienware, if they cant immediately help you over at Alienware thier tech support and customer care are absolutely shambolic. Right now I cannot recommend them in the slightest. I owned a 4850m equipped M17 for 3 weeks before it died (loved the machine, was fast and also didnt have stuff all over it, so was fairly non-descript, and not that flashy, certainly not the typical AW 'look at me look at me my owner's a tool' stylisation), and it took well over 2 months to get it refunded, as they messed me around incredibly badly on any repairs, sent it back from repairs DOA, lied to me, tried to deny UK consumer law, I had to threaten to take them to small claims court, and a whole load of other stuff happened as well. Build quality on thier new laptops is acceptable, but again nothing special. You're paying for the look, reasonable components and some customisability, and name, nought else.
Stressful, despairing process, and I wont be buying from Dell/AW again after experiencing thier attitude to the average customer.

I've ordered a Kobalt machine...
Kobalt seem reasonably decent, thier machines are decently specced and priced, thier phone lines are fairly friendly, the only downside is they're a small, family owned business and ordering one of thier machines can be a little slow (takes a few weeks for it to arrive).
I ordered my Commanche 2 weeks ago yesterday, its expected from email conversations with them some time in the next week (I still haven't got the email confirmation as it seems to keep getting forgotten, plus I ordered over the phone not website haha). I was going to call them tomorrow as Im off work but thier lines are shut due to press event haha!
Oh, they're fitting my QS X9100, RAM and 2 hard drives I bought for my M17 and did me a price without them via email; and then actually paid to get them couriered from my place to thier office at no charge to myself.

Feedback from people who've got a Kobalt machine however seem to be largely positive, and thier machines, even though built from the same chassis as a OcUK rival who now employ an old OcUK majordomo and others, are apparently very high quality and put together with a lot of care compared to the majority of the other resellers with few flaws when you finally recieve the machine.

The experience hasn't been perfect...but its certainly a lot more human than the 'Alien' experience Dell/AW have given me!

Stalker_26 · 4 Nov 2009 at 19:57

sorry to hear about the shambolic customer service, its annoying how, this day in age companys are still allowed to take the customer for a royal ride :mad:

my friend has had great customer service any time he contacted them, perhaps he was just lucky?

Alexrose1uk · 4 Nov 2009 at 20:02

Quite probably, theres at least 5-10 of us over at Kobalt who've been on thier forums who've had similar experiences with Dell/AW and thier are others on NBR, and some on the money saving experts forum.

If I thought it was bad luck, I'd say so, but its not the impression I get, it seems thier CS in general is appalling.

Hell I got lied to point blank via email to tell me replacement parts were sent, it wasn't until 3 weeks later of nagging over the phone etc that the parts were even despatched.

Absolutely appalling...hell shambolic is perhaps being nice.

I was dealing with the M17 team (apparently the same as the M17x team)...dont know whether your friend is lucky enough to be able to use a different team or not?

Alexrose1uk · 4 Nov 2009 at 21:40

On another note...I hope my Kobalt machine is ready on Friday/Monday as currently expected! Thanks to Alienware (!) I've not had my own machine since mid August!

So much stuff to do, play and catch up on

I dont have the spare cash lying around to just go build a new desktop in the meantime!

Reeve · 4 Nov 2009 at 22:13

Alexrose1uk said:
On another note...I hope my Kobalt machine is ready on Friday/Monday as currently expected! Thanks to Alienware (!) I've not had my own machine since mid August!

So much stuff to do, play and catch up on
I dont have the spare cash lying around to just go build a new desktop in the meantime!

If mines not on my doorstep before saturday of next week i wont be getting it for a month :eek:

.

I havent got my updated ETA for delivery yet which isnt a good sign if theyre going through them in the order they were placed. If it comes to it i could pick it up friday evening assuming it was ready at that time

Alexrose1uk · 4 Nov 2009 at 22:21

Yeah, if mines ready for Friday, I'll get in my car and go grab it (1-2 hours drive, so no major biggy). Will give them a buzz on Friday morning to see what the status is.
Remember I've got the Commanche SLI though, so if you ordered a different machine, we'll be in different build queues dependant on part status etc

Marky · 4 Nov 2009 at 22:22

I'm not in a mad rush to get the laptop - so waiting for it isn't a problem...

Also - when you get your laptop - I'd appreciate it if you took some snaps and showed us it

I also see the Kobalt computers have the option to have a SSD as primary drive which is a bonus...
I've been customising a few - it seems the G860 is nice within my budget....

i7 720QM 1.60Ghz - 2.80Ghz Processor
4GB RAM
GTX 280M
60GB OCZ SSD
8x DVD/RW (Does anyone know if this can burn Dual-Layer?)
Creative X-Treme Soundcard

£1591.65

Only thing that puts me off is that it's a 15" screen... Since it'll be a desktop replacement I'm worried that I will miss my current screen too much (I currently have a 24" 2407 monitor

)

For around £200 more I could go for the 17" but I'm not sure... Hmm... Decisions Decisions

Also - Any notes on the performance on the above spec? Will it be enough for me? Also will the performance take a real dive if I was to get the 17" with similar spec?

Alexrose1uk · 6 Nov 2009 at 02:25

Finally got all the paperwork earlier with an attached ETA of 11/11. If you want pics of my model when I get it let me know.
On your chosen spec it should be fine on your needs a GTX280m is a little under a desktop 9800gtx, if you game a lot stick with your 1600x900 res and you will get decent FPS.
The CPU is basically similar in performance to a QX9300, with the added bonus of being able to shut off unused cores and overclock the rest. Should play COD4 and FSX fine.

If its res you are worried about, get the 1080p screen, just be sure to have good eyes and be prepared to adjust game settings soon.

Marky · 6 Nov 2009 at 11:42

Alexrose1uk said:
Finally got all the paperwork earlier with an attached ETA of 11/11. If you want pics of my model when I get it let me know.
On your chosen spec it should be fine on your needs a GTX280m is a little under a desktop 9800gtx, if you game a lot stick with your 1600x900 res and you will get decent FPS.
The CPU is basically similar in performance to a QX9300, with the added bonus of being able to shut off unused cores and overclock the rest. Should play COD4 and FSX fine.

If its res you are worried about, get the 1080p screen, just be sure to have good eyes and be prepared to adjust game settings soon.

I'd really appreciate it if you would upload some pics when you get it! It would at least give me an idea of the build quality

I don't game massively anymore... However I like to return to Call of Duty and FSX every so often

Alexrose1uk · 6 Nov 2009 at 19:50

OK mate will take some pics etc.

Any particular ones you are after?

Oh on a related note they have the CPUs in so they are starting to ship the backlog of G860 now, was speaking to Andy (the MD) on the phone earlier as he rang me back following an answerphone message I left this morning and seemed a thoroughly decent guy. Apparently had read a bit about my Dell experience on here and notebookreviews, and from another bloke I was speaking to who had since bought Kobalt also, and we had a bit of a discussion on how they were being affected by the recession, Alienware seemingly trying to kill themselves and selling on reviews without any interest in customer care and how things were going with the laptop.

Order query became a ten minute conversation, what can I say, they've already got my money, but bar the order confirmation taking a long time, they bothered to collect my parts, fit them in thier machine and a 2 year warranty cost me £40 so they must be confident, Im very positive and they seem very good to deal with!

They have also come back to the majority of my emails within 6 working hours which is great (from about 15 emails).

Recommended!

Oh and my Vista to 7 upgrade pack from my M17 AW came today. Wonder if I can clean install off it...