Hey Guys, Help me out

Hey guys, I've been looking into buying an Alienware Laptop for a long time now. Let me outline my needs for you:

1) Need it for college
2) I wanna play games on high if not max atleast higher than medium
3) Good battery life atleast 2-3 hours of no gaming, just surfing the web.
4) I wanna be able to play games like World of Warcraft, Crysis and Flight Simulator.

I am looking into buying either the M15x (with the i7 and 1080p screen) or the M11x (upgraded processer, 8gb ram, 500gb hardrive) money isnt really a problem, I can afford both. Please post your opinions.

And anyone know when the potential refresh might be I can wait another 3-4 monnths

And two questions:

1) how long does the m15x battery (9-cell) last on stealth mode, some people are saying 30 mins and some say 2 and a half hours

2) Why is there no custom engraving in Canada

Ohh, and is 8gb ram just overkill?

 

you can't use stealth mode on battery. but you can get about 2+ hours battery just surfing net with the right power saving options. on battery mode the M15x down clocks itself already thats ways stealth mode doesn't work.

for number 2 know one know. but its not really engraved anyways just printed. just go to engravers and get in custom made, may even look better.


if money isn't a problem then the M15x all the way, 8gb is overkill just for gaming and reg apps. if you doing video coding than 8gb is good for tha and also running mutiple vm's. 4gb should be fine for gaming and apps.

 

Ahh thanks for the reply, What does stealth mode do then? I thought it powers down to conserve battery

 

Stealth mode is just another fancy term for turning off independent graphic card and using the integrated one.

 

^^^^there is no intergrated cards in these new models

you can only use stealth mode when plugged in, it just down clocks your system to use less energy, when full power isn't nessary. like web browsing and lite apps. while on battery it automatically does the same thing.

you can also set power options to save battery power also. stealth mode is just a gimmick pretty much, or also known as the face palm button. when people get crappy fps, most of the time they just press the stealth mode on by accident. most people like myself never use it at all.

 

Ahh I see thanks for clearing that up, And one more question I was reading on the M17x owners forum and some dude claimed laser engraving is available in the UK and AUS? and i dont think it wud look that great coz the m15x engraving comes with the default thing written on it

 

You might be able to order a blank plate and have some other place laser etch the plate.

 

About laser engraving, it feels and looks less exciting than in photos. It's pretty small and besides, it's on the bottom side which is facing the table 99.9% of the time. Maybe just "feels" better knowning it's there -- I couldn't really care less. I guess it helps if you loose the laptop and need to confirm you're the owner... but then again you can do that with Service code too.

I thought I ordered mine without my nickname engraved but just couldn't be bothered to call again and deal with their customer support. Surprisinly, it came engraved. I wouldn't worry about it, it's just a microscopic detail... as long as you get bugless and working unit all is good!

 

You might consider a sager np 8960. Sager has superior build quality. I bought the previous revision of m15x and got shafted big time by AW (crap build quality with broken hignes, broken graphics). Now my graphics doesn't work either . If you're in USA this is a great site to buy it from: http://www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8690-built-clevo-w860cu-custom-gaming-laptop-order-p-2659.html
This is the corresponding sub-forum for any other questions: http://forum.notebookreview.com/forumdisplay.php?f=1017 . Plus it has a much better gfx card (mobility 5870 )

 

But your's is the Area 51 version, I remember reading somewhere that everyone had complaints about that model?

 

One more question guys, is there gonna be a potential restock in 3-4 months? Coz if so Ill wait, Im in no rush to buy!

what have previous trends been with AW in relation to restocks? or revamps?

 

Yes, at the very least a new gpu option....at least for the M17x. We'll see if anything happens with the M15x but it's due.

 

Ahh, Ill just wait then, for another month or so. Oh and can you run Crysis on high and Flight Simulater on the m15x?