Alienware Area-51M R3 Wait or no?

Hey guys, so I am on the verge of pulling the trigger for the Alienware m17 R4 but I REALLY want to get the 51m R3 IF its coming out.. So the previous R2 was released on May 13th, and the R1 was released in April 2019 (I believe). So it could be fair to POSSIBLY expect an R3 come April - May.. The question is, will it come? What do you think? Would you recommend waiting?

 

If you're looking for an awesome DTR machine, wait until the Clevo X170KM-G releases in April and get that instead.

It's possible that Alienware may release a third revision of the Area 51M, but I've been done with Alienware since they screwed up hard and started selling BGA machines. I simply don't trust them to do things right anymore. They need to go back to being the old them.

The X170KM-G will cost less than a hypothetical Area 51M R3 (guessing by Alienware's pricing) for the same config, and perform the same or even slightly better. Yeah I know people think Clevos are ugly, but I view that as an advantage. Nobody will want to steal your awesome laptop.

In short, if you want an awesome DTR, I'd recomend a brand change.

 

Appreciate the input bro. Yeah the new m17 R4 being a BGA machine is what has kept me from buying it thus far. That's the main reason why I like the idea of the 51m and its customization that can be done on it. I like the sound of the X170KM-G and will wait and see how it turns out. I am not big on what the machine looks like, but more so what it can do heh.

 

Honestly, I'm a huge Alienware fan, have followed them since inception in the late 90s. I have an Area 51m R2 right now. This one I've had about 10 days. Two previous brand new ones had dead pixels and I returned them. This one is a 10900k and is thermal throttling badly.

I believe I am returning this one and changing brands. For 4k this is what you get? Hell no. I would have told you to jump on the R2 a few days ago, but not anymore.

 

Damn that's rough man... I was actually thinking about the R2 as well, when I was comparing the 2080 super vs (laptop) GTX 3080 the gains were better (even if marginal, not including the CPU of course which blows the R4 out of the water though). But The thought of a looming R3 made me resist..

Sorry to hear about the dead pixels.. Its unacceptable on a machine that costs so much, to go through so little check prior to sale.. Sigh, you'd think they would have fixed the thermal issues by now as well. I really wish alienware was not a subsidiary of Dell... I miss the old glory...

 

I am looking to buy a new gaming laptop after 5 years with an MSI and after a zillion hours of research settled on the Alienware 51m r3 whenever it comes out because I need a laptop not a desktop and I want the most power so I don't care if it weighs 10 lbs.

So this thread is super helpful to me, thank you. And now with the bad review shared above with the AW r2, I want to look closer at the Clevo model but I can't find it. Do you have any links?

I think I found the model on xoticpc but it had Intel 10th gen and only 1080p or 4k screens. Is the one coming out in April that you mentioned switching to AMD CPU or at least getting Intel 11th gen? And will it have a 1440p screen option?

Thanks!!

 

The revision coming out in April, the X170KM-G, will have 11th gen Rocket Lake CPUs and RTX 30XX GPUs. Anyone who has it listed is taking preorders, and some have wrong specs listed for it as well.

The current revision available is the X170SM-G with 10th gen Comet Lake CPUs and RTX 20XX GPUs. You can get this laptop from XoticPC, Origin PC, HIDEvolution, Elukronics, Sager, Falcon Northwest, and zTecpc. There may be more vendors in the US, but those are the ones I'm familiar with. I'd recommend the zTecpc offering since it's be best out of the bunch, and it seems the best price/performance ratio as well. The other vendors overprice the crap out of their base configs.

These same vendors will have the X170KM-G when it is released. If you get one, I'd recommend going for the base config, and then building up the system with the parts you want, then sell off the original parts. That method will be much cheaper than speccing it out at a shop.

 

Thanks for this. Just checked out zTecpc and HIDEvolution and at least ztecpc has the model number but yeah it's still 10th gen intel and only a 3060 that has a preorder. I do not see any 11th gen intel and 3080 for preorder with those specs anywhere in the interwebz. But now that you gave me the model I will check back in a month and if it goes up on websites I will see how it compares to other desktop replacements. Probably wait for this one and the Alienware 51m R4 and get whichever one is better Thanks!

 

Currently debating on getting a new Alienware at the moment. I saw that the M15's new version just came out and has Ryzen with a 3080 GPU so maybe I'll wait for an M17 Ryzen with a 3080 GPU since that's more my style. Pretty sure it will still cost around $2.5k for a 4K screen, 16gb ram, and 500gb storage (if those are even available options). I'm kinda upset at how few configurations can include a 4K screen at 17". Oh well. Lets see what happens in the next couple of weeks.

 

The Ryzen model max out with 3070. And from what I have seen the 3070 in m15 R5 come with lower TGP.

 

I think we all wish they would get spun off at this point. They were foundering lately under Frank Azor (not blaming him) and with him gone I have little faith in Dell not just abusing the brand now. The only benefit they bring is in-home service, but I am not ever sure that is happening with Covid. I think no matter what you get these days, you can expect some form of disappointment on the laptop front.

 

For this exact reason I am hoping the M17 R5 is going to be worthwhile. It has been very frustrating deciding what gaming laptop to buy. I am ready to buy right now, but with all of the overheating issues and throttling and quality issues it just feels like nothing is worth it yet like my old Alienware M17x-R2....however, I do recall hearing similar talk when I bought that one back in the day. Everyone saying it's not that good of a laptop and there's a better brand elsewhere and the quality has gone down the drain, but now it seems nothing has changed in here. I am starting to wonder what people are expecting in a laptop because every new version of the laptop I hear how it's an abomination and worthless and you should look elsewhere because Alienware isn't what it was.....and it never was....yet people are FIGHTING to buy Alienware M17x-R2 parts or entire laptops. Why? I dunno. It was considered garbage by the masses back then, now it's more than gold.....so frustrating....

Regardless, only thing stopping me from getting an M17-R4 right now is because I need to plug in two AC adapters to get the best performance out of a 3070, but Dell's own 3070 lets me run one power supply and STILL game at high performance.....it's crazy..../rant

 

Just to throw in my 10 cents worth. I've had this lappie for just over 2 years now and I am very happy with it. It didn't want to play nice when first out of the box and I had quite a few misgivings when I first started using it mainly because of the overheating and throttling but it doesn't take a lot to tame it. The first thing was to install Throttlestop and apply a 100 mV undervolt and the second was when I am playing anything that I know will stress the laptop I set the fans to full speed. That is it. In Division 2 in Ultra I am getting 111 fps in the benchmark. Not too shabby for an old computer.

 

I ended up leaving Alienware this time around for the Dell G17 7700 because I only needed one power supply and was able to upgrade ram if I wanted to. Not two months later, Alienware announces they will be releasing a 17" laptop with upgradeable ram that is NOT the Area51m, but they're too late. I'm extremely happy with my current purchase and Alienware will have to wait several years before I need to upgrade and look at their lineup again.