Alienware 13 - looking for reviews with fan sound levels reviewed?

Anyone come across one? The only thing I can remember seeing was some source that said it was surprisingly quiet, but it's strange that reviews are not mentioning this one way or the other currently...

 

Hey Thanks for open this tread! I have the same ?!

 

I want to order one, but no with out seeing a real review. What's happening with Alienware?

 

Gizmodo have had a review out of the 13 + GA for quite some time. Alienware 13 Review: The First Futureproof Gaming Laptop

Maybe not the best review but they do have some interresting points.

Edit: oops, my bad.. Didnt read the title AFTER clicking the thread, I thought it only said " Alienware 13 - looking for reviews ".. Imma keep it here though incase you havent read it, it might be interresting.

 

I don't think a lot of professional reviewers have gotten an Alienware 13 to review, so we'll have to wait. The laptop does ship out late this month/early next month.

 

I've found 3 recent ones on laptopmag, Gizmodo and Techradar, but curiously none mention sound levels. Not too surprising considering the question is totally avoided with units like the Razor, but still...

 

I'm just waiting for notebookcheck's review since their's is more comprehensive than the norm.
Anandtech and Engadget, as far as I have read, have a review unit.

 

I would prefer to as well - it's interesting that if Anandtech has a unit they haven't done a full review now that its up for sale. Is there any word on on when NBR will do a review? I hope we don't have to wait until mid-December for a review

 

Hmm. Don't know why they're takings so long to do A review!?��

 

If I remember correctly,Laptop Mag had some issues with their Graphics Amplifier unit (driver issues), so reviewers may be doing more tests with latest drivers.
Notebookcheck does have the 13 in its database.

 

It'd better run cool, giving the low TDP of all the internals. Here's hoping...

Oh, and if my battery life is only ~3 hours, I'll be returning it.

Also, Dell messed up my order again. This is the second time I've ordered an alienware system and been charged for 3. Does this ever happen to anyone else??

 

Does no-one have a 13 yet?

I really want an answer on the fan noise before plonking down the cash.
The Clevo P650se with IPS screen in the same price (with a 970m), but I'd rather go with something super quiet if possible. Being able to use the GA is just gravy.

 

I don't think as of this writing anyone has, at least not on NBR. By the sounds of it several people may have them around the 12th of this month then trailing off from there. Oddly, I just posted a note about this, it seems pretty obvious to me that Dell gathers orders and when it hits a threshold they order in lots for the best price on parts, builds then send the systems out, hence why you can order in October but not actually get anything until mid-December (and yes, factory scheduling is a factor too)

In playing with builds and watching the delivery date shown on the order screen, it was at one point showing 12/22... then it suddenly flipped back to 12/17 and has moved around like that back and forth a couple times earlier. I think the date is just some estimate based off the rate of orders to when they have enough to order and build.

 

Got my 13 today. Haven't had much time to test it just yet. So far so good though. It is very quiet under normal use. The fans don't even spin up at all. So totally silent atm.

Cheers.

 

Pictures, pictures.

 

First thing you should do is test it with some games!

 

Awesome! Hurry get some pictures in!

 

Wish someone would answer this.

Literally itching to know whether pairing the i5 with the 860m has resulted in a thin, semi-silent laptop.

 

Fan noise usually just comes up when playing games.
Normally, when you play games the volume is turned up - drowning the fan noise

According to reborn, it does stay quiet when doing normal stuff - web surfing, doc processing.

Oh if you are into video editing and other CPU intensive task that will spin those fans and mess up your focus then you'll have a problem =)

 

Reborn said it gets pretty loud during games, FIFA he said was quite loud. Kind of disappointing, was hoping for a quieter system with two fans and an i5 ULV. In retrospect I guess the thinness means no matter what it has to be loud

 

Any laptop will be somewhat loud during games. There's no such thing as a silent gaming laptop, yet.

 

Thanks Doc, exactly the information I wanted to know. +Rep

I have a p157sm right now (780m), and as much as I love it, it's annoying to my sig other when playing games on the desk next to her.
Was really hoping Alienware had nailed a quiet gaming rig that can be supercharged (via the AGA) when needed.

 

True, but not all laptops are created equal in this respect.
Doc nailed my thoughts exactly. Maxwell GPU + i5 ULV + twin fans had me hoping for the best.

 

So far the 13 is silent when not gaming. During different games or benchmarks it can get quite loud.
I think it depends on the game as well. I tried raising the 13 a bit with some bottle caps and that seemed to quieten down the fans a fair bit.
I hope to test and play a few more games over the next few days. Then I can comment more about how annoying the fan noise is or not.

I might be able to try Far Cry 4 later.

One thing that is quite impressive atm is the battery life.
I am running a test now just general usage to see how I go. The 13 is definitely a great on the go option atm. Loving it! :thumbsup:

 

Good idea to raise it ... like it's predecessor, the M11x, tilting it up on the back edge with a book or (in my case) a notebook cooler helps a lot with cooling and therefore fan noise. I would do it anyhow as it helps cooling and the keyboard angle is more comfortable to boot!

I think the Lenovo that is similar to the AW 13 (Y40?) appears to be fairly quiet and matches the AW 13 closely with a different GPU.

 

My 13 turns up today, and like you Doc I want something quiet to not annoy my other half.

I plan to undervolt cpu and cap fps to try and get a quiet mode for sofa/bed gaming. I will let you guys know how I get on and will provide DB readings with my phone

 

Really looking forward to your initial impressions / full results

 

well I have the painful wait for the courier yet

I have a small shop that sells Alienware systems so can compare it against the 14, 17 and 18 too if that is any help.

 

Waiting for some feedbacks as well

 

OK, just done a stock run of 3dmark11. Scored 4091.
The fans ran at 44db at 6" above the palm rest according to my phone DB reader. This is pretty loud for a sofa gamer so I am going to see how much I can reduce it by tweaking.

Also the laptop was pulling between 60-70 watts whilst running 3dmark11 so plenty of headroom for overclocking with the 130w psu

 

Bit of a shame. Do you have any other previous notebook rigs you can compare it against?

Let us know how you go with the tweaking.

 

haha you could say that, check my sig

It is much quieter than the AW14 with quad and 765m.
It is also quieter than a 17 with 780/880 but louder than a 770/860

So far not much has helped as as soon as the gpu hits 60c the fans really ramp up. Usually AW's have plenty of fan steps but on this one it seems to go from quiet to 40-44db. Maybe a newer bios will improve it in the future.
Raising the back did help and kept it at about 40db.

Under volting hasn't really helped as the cpu is using such a small amount of power and temps are already really good.

About to run BF4 and will cap frames, lift back and undervolt to see what the noise is like

 

typical...just installed BF4 and titanfall and now origin is down so I can't test them.....grrrr I hate origin

 

Thanks for your reviews, keep them coming!

 

Interesting about the Alienware 17 w/ 770m. I borrowed a family members the other day, and while it's SIGNIFICANTLY quieter than my P157SM (780m), it's still fairly loud.
I'd say that the best thing the 17 has going for it, is that the sound sounds like a steady woosh of air, whereas the P157SM is a little higher pitched.

I'm guessing the 13 would also be higher pitched, considering the size?

 

New owners - keep chiming in with your impressions please!

 

That's strange, the 770m I have here is really quiet. Are you sure it is not the cpu fan making the noise?
The Alienware 13 fans are definitely higher pitched.

I have decided to return mine, the ulv cpu is just not good enough for me. I am getting stutter in bf4 multi and titanfall multi. Dips into the 20fps range on 64 player bf4 maps. I am really sensitive to the drops so I am going to stick with the clevo p650 despite being much larger

 

Thanks for sharing Ninja. I've been toying with the idea of getting a 13, but a high'ish pitched fan and laggy BF4 are significant drawbacks for my purpose.

 

I'll put in a bit to say here.... I have actually had very little fan noise, but I am playing a less demanding game than BF4... I think the evaluation of the AW 13 really comes down to how you plan to use it. It is a replacement for the M11x, a system never intended to run the heaviest games at high settings, rather more modestly. This means either lower settings, or perhaps not the most demanding games or some combination of the two. For most games at reasonable settings, it should suffice, but it's just not a replacement for a stronger system without some compromise.

Ninja, out of curiosity what HDD are you using now? Also, did you tweak the compatibility settings at all? I actually had worse response (stuttering, etc) when I tried using Win 8 for a Win 7 game and turned on compatibility... not trying to sell you on the AW 13, but curious what the context of your experiences is.

 

I am using a Samsung 840evo 500gb ssd at the moment as I was hoping the hdd was causing the issues.

I totally get your point as an m11x beater and it really is but I wanted more, especially when other manufacturers can provide a quad and 860/870m in a 13". When I play strategy games such as wargame or shogun performance is great. It is only when I play fps games where I need 45+ fps for a smooth experience that I am not enjoying the aw13. I could even live with the fan noise if the performance was better.

I have tried bf4, titanfall and cod black ops. In both bf4 and titanfall there are major frame drops into the 20 fps quite regularly in multi player. In cod Bo I got terrible screen tearing and stutter in multi. I am using a fresh install of win8 and have not mucked around in compatibility settings. I have access to a lot of laptops as I run a shop and have not had this issue with any other machine so I would like to think it is not anything I have done to the install. I would be interested to hear from anyone else who play fps multiplayer games such as bf4

 

Due to work and some other issues I have yet to get BF4 on (though I did pull down Assassin's Creed: Unity) to see how it's going, my plan is to try to load it over the Christmas break and see how it goes. While I am sure I would play on my SLI desktop for serious play, I would like to see how it does with BF4 and AC:U since they appear to take the system to it's limits.