Alienware M17X

[g1981c]

Alienware M17X R4

what is the reliability / customer service like ?

everybody seems to be saying stay away from Alienware and Dell and reviews on most M17X on Amazon are dismal ... but the reviews on the latest Ivy Bridge one ( the one i would be getting obviously ) are all positive !

???

also would like to hear if there are any problems with that system ( like a low quality screen or audio or bad wireless reception, noisy fans etc )

also, how much Ram should i order it with ? should i just go for the base 6 gigs and then upgrade it myself ? i believe half the ram is on the bottom of mobo and half on top under the keyboard ?

TIA !

 

[g1981c]

so once again its either Retina MBP base model or Alienware M17X with 32gb SSD cache and 1080P screen for a total of $1799.

i just can't seem to justify NOT getting the retina MBP. it just seems like it should be worth double but it only costs 10% more.

???

 

[Meaker10]

The alienware is competent gaming machine, hence why its price is raised. In terms of graphics performance it can be up to 8 times faster with some tweaking.

 

[g1981c]

in any case i ordered it ...

what i ordered:

Alienware M17X R4

CPU - base
Graphics - base
Ram - 8 gig dual channel ( 2 dimm )
Hard Drive - 256 Gig SSD
Screen - 60 hz 1080P
Wireless - "Killer" MIMO
OS - Windows Professional

i would also note that when i was checking out it listed a 180W power brick in the list of what i am supposed to get. this is of note because most people receive a 240W brick but most people get at least a Radeon 7970M graphics while i went with the base 660M which apparently doesn't need much juice.

compared to the 85W power supply that comes with Macbook Pro however 180W is still a lot

thanks everybody for your input !

 

[Meaker10]

Why are you thanking us when you picked the worst possible config for the task at hand and completely ignored everyone's advice?

CPU - Poor
Graphics - Kepler is terrible at 64bit floating point.
Ram - Hardly any for cad.
HDD - tiny for professional work
Screen - OK.
Wireless - OK
OS - OK

 

[g1981c]

Why are you thanking us when you picked the worst possible config for the task at hand and completely ignored everyone's advice?

well first of all i already canceled that order. but let's go through your allegations:

CPU - Poor

why ?

Graphics - Kepler is terrible at 64bit floating point.

i know, but it was a more economical solution in terms of $$$

Ram - Hardly any for cad.

its upgradeable to 32GB. its cheaper to install your own ram than to configure it with the ram you want.

HDD - tiny for professional work

it has two HDD bays, i would have installed a second HDD on my own - most likely a 750 GB.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

I could build a computer that's like 3x better than this.

Alien wares are overpriced pieces of junk

 

[TheStu]

I could build a computer that's like 3x better than this.

Alien wares are overpriced pieces of junk

Could you build a laptop that is 3x better than this at the same price?

 

[Meaker10]

NP9150

3720QM
16GB DDR3
750GB 7200rpm HDD
HD 7970M

 

[g1981c]

NP9150

3720QM
16GB DDR3
750GB 7200rpm HDD
HD 7970M

yeah i love the options on Sager and Origin ... but their design and build quality is not quite up to snuff. small touchpad, poor mic placement, so-so speakers, power brick that is about twice as thick as on alienware ...

for $2,000 i sort of want better quality than an average laptop in best buy, not just better performance

 

[Meaker10]

Mic placement is right next to the touchpad so you dont need the lean into the screen to speak lol. The touchpad is not that small, no smaller than the alienware IIRC, the speakers are not great but then again MSI are much better than alienware while the brick may be bigger the machine is much smaller than the M17X.

Also many people prefer the understated clevo over the gaudy alienware (though this is personal preference).

The build quality is very solid on the p150em, no keyboard flex and no flex on the casing.

 

[Sentry2]

NP9150

3720QM
16GB DDR3
750GB 7200rpm HDD
HD 7970M

I'd shy away from the NP9150 / 7970M combo until they get the Enduro issues sorted out. I'm currently running a 7970M in my NP8150 with no issues since it doesn't support Enduro.

I would say Sager has the better screen options if you're only interested in 60Hz panels but... Alienware is probably going to edge out most Clevo machines in the build quality department.

 

[g1981c]

Mic placement is right next to the touchpad so you dont need the lean into the screen to speak lol. The touchpad is not that small, no smaller than the alienware IIRC, the speakers are not great but then again MSI are much better than alienware while the brick may be bigger the machine is much smaller than the M17X.

Also many people prefer the understated clevo over the gaudy alienware (though this is personal preference).

The build quality is very solid on the p150em, no keyboard flex and no flex on the casing.

i decided i wouldn't go with MSI based on the fact that it only has one fan. it's probably enough but considering that most others have two ( even apple, which uses half the power and therefore needs only half the cooling ) i would just feel cheated if i only got one.

in any case a few days ago i ordered Dell Precision M4700 with the base model i7 ivy bridge quad core cpu and Nvidia Quadro K2000M graphics ( this graphics solution is more or less comparable to 650/660M, but with slow DDR3 memory and drivers optimized for CAD over games ).

dell estimated delivery is 20th of August.

i feel that Dell Precision is basically overpriced Alienware minus fancy keyboard and speakers, and with a useless webcam. yeah ... too bad Alienware doesn't offer Quadro graphics.

since i never play games it simply wouldn't make a lot of sense to go with a gaming GPU. the Quadro in my estimation is twice as slow and four times as expensive than 650M for example but i figured for my needs i would rather go with better support than speed.

also i think if you're going to go for raw power you should go with a desktop and perhaps SLI. the Quadro K2000M has approximately 50W TDP which is approximately the same as the i7 quad core ivy bridge. so the CPU and GPU have roughly equal power dissipation and both have their own fans of roughly equal size - i felt that was a good thing - i like symmetry. of course this would also be true for 660M ... but it wouldn't be true for 680M for example.

i think if you need a 680M you might as well get a desktop. but that's obviously just my opinion.