A small review of the m11x

Since I finished what I had to do early and I had a snow day from school I thought that I should do something productive and write a review for the community since there are only two reviews on the forum I believe. I am also testing out the keyboard on the m11x by typing this review so that’s another purpose.

I ordered the m11x on 2/11/2010. The m11x got delivered on 2/25/2010. I think this caused some members on the forum to get angry with dell since I was able to move ahead so fast. I think I would have been able to get the netbook sooner if I didn’t cheap it out and order 5 – 7 day shipping. I love you Dell



The specs for my m11x are

SU7300 1.3 Ghz Core 2 Duo
4 Gigs of DDR3 1066 Ram
320 Gig 7200 rpm hard drive




Umm I think those are all the specs that matter since the rest is the same as all the other m11x's

Please don’t shoot me for stealing notebook review’s format also .

Build Quality and Design

The look of the m11x is pretty unique. It basically looks like a miniturized M15X and M17X. There are 5 different lighting zones. That is the Alienware logo, the Alien power button, the LEDs on the top left hand size of the keyboard indicating wifi and caps lock, the keyboard, and the speakers. These can be customized to 19 different colors although you can’t tell some of the colors from one another. You can make the laptop have 1 solid color for the different lighting zones, morph between colors, or turn it into the coolest looking seizure machine ever.

The laptop’s paint job has a matte feel that is very nice to touch. I tried pressing the back of the screen to produce ripples and none could be made. The laptop has no gaps any where and feels very solid. The laptop has no flex anywhere. You can press as hard as you want on the keyboard and the laptop won’t flex at all. The only way I could get the keyboard to flex was to keep pressing down on the s key until it finally decided to flex. I tried to shake my desk as much as I could to get the screen to wobble. The screen does not seems to wobble. Shaking the laptop would cause it to wobble slightly.

So basically if you get angry at someone and the only thing in your bag was this netbook you can take it throw it at him/her and the laptop should still be fine. Not recommended though.

Screen and Speakers


The screen is a 16 : 9 screen and has a resolution of 1366 x 768. The screen is very bright and the colors seem pretty bright and vibrant to me. The left and right viewing angles are pretty good on the laptop and the top viewing angle is decent. Looking at the laptop on the bottom wasn’t as good though but then again who does that.

Top



Side



Bottom



Credit goes to sandrum from deviant art for that gundam picture

The speakers actually sound decent compared to other notebook speakers. They are better than the m15x and NC10’s speakers but they are not as good as dedicated speakers. Sadly these speakers won’t shake my house down. The speakers themselves seem to be lacking in the low end which is expected because I haven’t seen any notebook speakers that have decent bass in them. Even the ones with built in subwoofers don’t sound that great to me.




Keyboard and Touchpad


The keyboard is not a full size keyboard but I would say it’s a good 85% of a full size keyboard since the NC10 has a 91% full size keyboard and the on the m11x is slightly smaller. The feel of the keyboard feels very responsive and very comfortable to type on. The keys have a slight concave surface on top of the keys which is very nice touch. The keyboard feels a bit cramped because the keys are smaller than what I am used to but I will get used to this over time. In fact I’m already getting used to it. A couple hours of Typing of the Dead and you will become a m11x keyboard master.





The m11x uses a pretty large Synaptics touch pad. The dimensions of the touch pad is 4.5 cm(L) x 8 cm(W) or 1.8 inches (L) x 3.3 inches(W). The touch pad also supports multitouch if you install the latest synaptics drivers. The touchpad also has a nice textured surface that feel pretty similar to a basketball but a bit smoother. The touch pad is dented into the case so you can feel when you reach the border of the touchpad. The m11x has a dedicated left click button and dedicated right click button. They are not too stiff and they feel like you are pressing slightly stiffer seimitsu buttons for a fight stick. They feel exactly like the buttons that come with the hori tekken 6 stick that comes with the limited edition bundle of tekken 6.




Ports and features


Left Side
Kensington lock slot, VGA, Usb, Ethernet, HDMI, Display Port, Memory Card, Fire Wire



Back Side
Power Jack Connection



Right Side
2x Usb,1 microphone, 2 headset jacks



Front Side
Nothing





Battery Life

The m11x has a 8 cell lithium ion battery. I did not get to test but the m11x has been rated to have over 8 hrs of battery life. I have hear people get 4 hours of so if they are on dedicated graphics.

On battery using the nvidia gpu on max performance i am getting 3 hours

Benchmarks and Games

3Dmark06 score

6112 Points
slightly short of that 6200..




3dmark06 score of the integrated graphics card


and since i had some time i decided to go ahead and play Sonic All Stars racing on it for an hour. The game is pretty fun amazingly and actually a bit better than mario kart.

I got an average of 45 fps on it with low of 30 and max of 60 because i left vertical sync on. I used a resolution of 1366 x 768 the native resolution of the screen and everything on high. There wasnt an option for aa though. Its definitely playable and I was amazed it ran so well for a netbook of this size.

According to HWMonitor the GPU reached a maximum temperature of 55 C while running the game which is amazing.

More to come....

Other Thoughts and some information

The Alien head is a button now instead of a touch button found on the m15x. Even though the button on the m15x was too sensitive it was still cooler.

The Alien head on the back of the screen can’t change color because it uses the lcd’s lighting to light up the alien head just like a Mac. It’s a pretty innovation way to save energy but then the why not just not give me the light for the fan and put it in the alien head instead. No one can see that the fan lights up anyways and the light isn’t bright enough to make a neon effect like the ones found on cars.

The fan light and keyboard light are the same color. If you change the keyboard light you will also change the fan light.

The LED indicators for wifi and caps lock is a bit too light and hard to see.
The plastic used on the palm rest is the same plastic found on the Antec Twelve Hundred Case which is pretty cool.

Fn F10, Fn F11, Fn F12 which are the keys for previous track, play/pause, next track respectively do not work in winamp. They work in windows media player though.

You can morph between more than 2 colors, while you can do it on the bigger versions of this laptop
EDIT i just found out you can morph between more than 2 colors after playing around with command center somemore
disregard that complaint lol

There was some speculation to whether the Build 12 – 13 inch laptop case would fit and yes it does fit and it has around half an inch of space to spare.

The name on my nameplate did not screw up. The nameplate is also improved because the font that they used is bigger than the one they used on the m15x. The crappy thing about it is that it’s all in capital letters but oh well.

Random Size Comparisons





Well if you read up to this point looks like I haven’t put you to sleep yet . Since I can think of anything else to say, if you have any questions just post them and I will try to answer them. I will get the benchmarks when I have more time I guess. Sorry if the pictures aren’t the best. The camera isn’t really the greatest but if you have any more picture request I can try to fill them. I can do size comparisons to everyday items if people want to see that and give me some ideas as to what to compare them to.

 

nice quick review and great detailed pics. do you mind running the sfiv benchmark when you have the chance? native res, highest details, both stock cpu and overclocked? thanks!

 

These have to be the most detailed pics of the laptop I've seen so far. Thanks and great job!

I have 2 suggestions:

(1) post pics with all 5 different lightings. Maybe it would be nice to have them all at one spot (smaller is good as well).

(2) I read a lot of reviews where people have been benchmarking battery life when watching DVDs or something from external DVD player. I appreciate the effort for doing the benchmark, but it just seems useless to me. If one is going on a trip with m11x, I assume it's way more practical to just rip everything on the HD. (And I can't remember last time I actually watched something of DVD....)

So I'm wondering what would be the maximum run time you could squeeze from the laptop with say everything unnecessary turned off (WiFi, lighting, etc.) and just watch 720p video.

Thanks again, +rep.

 

Wish I got the silver now.... Black is still wack though

 

Yea i will be installing that game either sunday or monday. I will run in game benchmark to test it out.

Do you want me to post pictures of each individual lighting zone or just a bunch of the different colors?

Im going to try to install a program that will tell me how much time i have before my battery runs out since for some reason the power options isnt telling me.

Yea there is some glossy black where the speakers are and those places are finger print magnets. I wipe that part of the laptop alot lol. The only way for me to get a black laptop is if it is matte lol.

EDIT: I will be benchmarking different games from the other ones posted since repeating gets boring lol. On monday i think i can also get up Sega All Star Racing and Battlefield Bad Company 2 if that game is even playable on the m11x. My desktop has Quad Core oced to 3.16 ghz and a GTX 275 oced too and i get 35 fps average with no aa at 1920 x 1080. I have next to no hope for Battlefield Bad Company 2 running on the m11x.

EDIT2: I should also post the 3dmark score on monday too. I have a test on monday morning so thats why I will be doing the benchmarking and game test on monday.

 

I meant just a bunch of pics with different colors. It's still possible to play with it online on the flash application with m15x, but you can't see how ti *really* looks like in reality.

 

WRT Media Keys in Winamp, go in to Winamp's settings and check Enable Global Hotkeys. That will 90% of the time fix any problems with media keys.

 

this should cover just about every color. Some of the colors are hard to tell apart since the camera isnt the greatest to capture all the different shades. You can tell them apart much more easily in real life though.

@Random Suffix - Thanks for the tip. i will try it and see what happens

Since i can only do 6 attachements at a time i think i have to double or triple post....sorry if i break the rules

 

Wallpaper please

Great mini review, and love the pics!

 

again sorry for double posting

 

triple post

 

ok last one to finish all the attachements

 

purple is not bad.. not bad at all

 

Perfect!!! Yeah, I like the blue a lot.

Cheers!

 

is that a sticker on the right hand side of the keyboard ?

 

Great quick review to read. Thanks for all the pictures, it looks amazing in silver. Has made my colour decision more difficult.

 

yes its a sticker made of nickel of that lifesize gundam statue that had in japan.

i will pm u the link to download it

This is how to sticker looks like for whoever is interested

 

the pink totally rocks!

 

the pink lights are my favorite color

most people dont use them which makes me more unique

 

Is it possible to make a video of the multitouch gestures? I'm curious to see and pleasantly surprised that it can handle that.

 

well since im lazy here is a series of videos from Scrybe app showing some cool commands

http://www.uscrybe.com/use.html

i guess i will try to find one of two finger scrolling etc..

 

Thank you for posting this. I love reviews by individual people and their pics. It never gets old, or too much of people reviewing their purchases!

The NC10 vs M11X picture was great for me to see... Good indication of the difference between a regular netbook and a M11X. Thanks for that.

 

here's the video you're looking for with 2 finger scroll
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29n2dyyAGnQ
2:05

 

thanks for the complements.

Updated with some benchmarks since i had time

updates are posted here too

3Dmark06 score

6112 Points
slightly short of that 6200..



and since i had some time i decided to go ahead and play Sonic All Stars racing on it for an hour. The game is pretty fun amazingly and actually a bit better than mario kart.

I got an average of 45 fps on it with low of 30 and max of 60 because i left vertical sync on. I used a resolution of 1366 x 768 the native resolution of the screen and everything on high. There wasnt an option for aa though. Its definitely playable and I was amazed it ran so well for a netbook of this size.

According to HWMonitor the GPU reached a maximum temperature of 55 C while running the game which is amazing.

 

so you need scrybe to get the multi touch?

 

yea you just have to download it and install it

Also new update

3dmark06 with integrated graphics

 

thanks for the stellar review!

 

could stop smiling
nice review... good to see more +ve reviews on m11x. Doesnt make me feel guilty in choosing this lappy.
BTW. did u OC ur CPU?? and what abt probs which other owners mentioned? u faced any??

 

Yeah good little review there. Would you be able to post a pic of the keyboard set to white in the dark please, ive heard the issue mentioned in another topic and wanted to see how bad it looks.
cheers

 

Thanks for the complement . Definitely oced the cpu lol. First time i did after i set up the os. I have never turned it off and have been using the computer all day yesturday. I played games for an hour or 2, did some benchmarking, and watched a 720p mkv movie. I havent seen a single blue screen at all yet. The Cpu also runs very cool. Right now its at 33 degrees.

well there is a slight pinkish tint in the picture but in reality its only the tab ctrl and shift key with spots of pink. In the Alienware logo the A and the L has a bit of pink in it too.

 

I think it's pink because you're usual setup is pink? If you use pink for a long time, does it affect the white colour? Like if your normal setup would be green, would that also effect the white colour?

I'm thinking we need an experiment here

ps can you show the ctrl and shift key as well?

 

The photos show white light as having a pink cast because the pictures don't appear to have any sort of white balance adjustment and the overhead room lighting appears to be the predominant light source. I'm sure the white setting on the LCD's will be very distinctly white.

 

Again, this is a limitation of the LEDs to blend colors. This same behavior is seen on the M15x and M17x. Remember, these LED's display a wide range of color - some colors will be off a bit since its a blend process. You will not achieve #FFFFFF completely.

 

it might be the case since blue was the primary color used and there was a blue tint on my white m15x keyboard. its definitely the limitation of the leds though so nothing can really be done about it

If you guys are trying to make the keyboard white like one that doesnt have color back lit its not really possible with the m11x. The speaker part did a good job. very white there

That was actually the darkest i could make my room at the time without taping garbage bags to my windows

 

Good to hear that... It ll really sux if my laptop gives me BSOD on OCing. Can wait to get mine ...

 

Yea can see what you mean by the white being abit off although the other keys werent tainted as the tab key. Are the speakers noticeably more white compared to looking at the keyboard?

 

the speakers are actually completely white. there was no tinting in the lighting area for the speakers.

its only the left most side of the keyboard having a bit of pink/red tint but the majority of the keyboard is white.

 

@exiled:

You posted pics of the screen at various angles, any chance you could post one straight on? ie as good a viewing angle as you can get, so we can get a feel for what the screen is like under normal viewing conditions.

 

here you go

sorry i took so long...been pretty busy

And oh yes another update. I tested Battlefield bad company 2 and its pretty unplayable even at low. Can only get 15 - 20 fps which is pretty bad.

 

KoukiFC3S
Notebook Consultant



Join Date: Feb 2010
Posts: 126
Rep Power: 1
Re: *OFFICIAL* M11x Owners Lounge - Part 4
Bad Company 2 on low gives me 30-40 fps online. Really happy.


weird

 

With regards to Battlefield BC2 benchmarks.

The RC3 patch from the beta definitely improved performance for dual core processors for many of my clan members.

I would be interested to know if someone can edit the settings.ini file to force the game to use DX 9 and not DX 10 and turn shadows way down.

Suspect good frame rates ~30 on medium settings will be possible.

/could someone test that?

 

i guess ill try it again but once i launched the game and you were in that boat i was getting around 20 fps. i cant imagine what will happen once the action starts so i just shut it off lol. I rather play the game on my desktop tho since the game has such amazingly eye candy

 

Hey
in order for winamp to use those commands:
rt click on winamp(any free space on it):
options-> pref
go to global hot keys in the left
->select "enable default multimedia key support"
bam! it ll wok now

 

Thank you very much for this awsome review.

 

What color does the head light up then? Are you sure it can not be changed?

 

It's white, and no it can't be changed because it's lit by the LEDs of the display. So, if the display goes off, then the Alien head goes off.

 

Thanks for the confirmation... Although that is very disapointing...

 

yea it really sucks that it cant change colors. you can prove this by lowering the brightness on the lcd. you will notice the head gets dimmer.

it would of been a cool feature but i dont really miss it since i dont look at the lcd panel of the notebook that much anyways. i rather they added lights to the touch pad.

 

Hmm I thought they'd have room to put in a full sized keyboard. In the next iteration of this notebook (which I hope will appear after this summer), I'd love to see these:

latest ultra low voltage processors
an even more power gpu (96-128 cores)
a full sized keyboard
usb 3.0 ports
a rgbled screen option

That would really make this a unique laptop. But somehow I don't think all of these will ever materialize...