My m15x Review

I ordered my m15x from the Alienware UK Website on 5th March 2008. The system spec I ordered is as follows:

15.4" WideXGA+ 1440 x 900 LCD (720p) with Clearview Technology Alienware® AlienFX® System Lighting - Aqua
Genuine Windows® Vista Home Premium - English
512MB NVidia® GeForce™ Go 8800M GTX
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9300 2.5GHz (6MB Cache 800MHz FSB) 2GB Dual Channel DDR2 SO-DIMM at 667MHz - 2 x 1024MB
Intel Turbo Cache Memory 1GB
Single Drive Configuration - 200GB 7200 RPM SATA Smart Bay: 200GB 7200RPM (16MB Cache) Smart Bay
8x Dual Layer Writer (DVD±RW, CD-RW)
Intel® High-Definition Audio (24-bit, 192Khz) with surround sound
Alienware® Area-51 m15x AlienFX® Keyboard
Internal Intel® Wireless 4965 a/b/g/Draft-N Mini-Card
AlienRespawn v2.0 Recovery DVD – Windows Vista Edition


At the time I ordered my new m15x I was at sea and wasn't due home until May, so any delays didn't really bother me. As it happened payment was taken on 7th March, and my order shipped on 1st April. Whilst I was at sea I would read this forum quite closely and after reading the reports of problems with build quality, overheating and underclocking I was left wondering if I had spent my money on a lemon. I arrived home from the Persian Gulf on 26th May and it was with some trepidation I opened the box that had been waiting for me since 2nd April...

Inside the courier's outer box I found a simple black box with the Alienware logo on the side. Inside I found my new m15x very sturdily packed in a soft cloth cover with exanded polystyrene end pieces holding in securely in the box. There was also another cardboard box containing the battery, mains power adapter, additional 200GB Smart Bay HDD, my invoice, Alien Respawn DVD and a soft leather binder with some basic documentation, some system restore discs and a card with my Alienware account number should I need to contact their Tech Support.

I very carefully removed the laptop itself from the packaging and took a quick look around. There were no cracks or damage to the chassis, I checked the movement of the screen lid and it was very smooth with no creaking. The BIOS supplied was x30 and I flashed it to x32 and checked I was using all the latest drivers from the Hive Support site. Over the next week I set the system up as I like it, installed the software I use and ran some benchmarks to see if the m15x lives up to my expectations (and the price tag!).

A few caveats before we start the review:

I haven't checked the battery life of the m15x as I don't ever run my laptops on batter power.

I didn't check for any anomolies with standby and hibernation modes. I don't use these, my laptop is either on or it is off.

Finally, I didn't go looking for faults in my laptop and nor did I try to break it in order to find out if it did have any faults! This review is simply from the perspective of a fairly experienced computer user and gaming enthusiast.


AESTHETICS & ERGONOMICS

Some have criticised the m15x for its colour and "clunky" design. I agree silver wouldn't have been my first colour choice. I would have preferred black or maybe gun metal, but the silver finish looks perfectly acceptable. The design itself is very modest going by previous Alienware designs. Granted it's not as elegant as some of the latest Sony Vaio or HP Pavilion laptops, but it is very smart.

The "AlienFX" lighting system is probably a little gimicky for my liking, but it can be fully configured via the included software. You can select the colours for the various lighting elements or disable it completely if you wish. One thing I will say though is the back lit keyboard can be VERY useful when you are sitting in a dark room. The keyboard itself is perfectly useable. The keys themself feel a little fragile, but then so do the keys on most laptops I have used. I have noticed no flex in the keyboard that has been noted by others.

The power button is centrally located above the keyboard and is in the shape of the now famous alien head logo. The outline lighting changes colour depending on if the system is running on mains power or battery power, and it will slowly pulsate when the battery is charging. The alien's eyes are also used as the HDD activity light. To the left of the power button is the volume control, and to the right are buttons for Bluetooth, wireless network, "Alien Command Centre" and "Stealth Mode". These buttons are all touch sensitive. Much has been made of the lack of sensitivity of these buttons. I found they do not respond to a light touch, and you need to positively press them for the function to be activated. It's a purely subjective matter, but after using laptops where these buttons were hyper sensitive I actually like having touch sensitive buttons that require a positive press to activate them. All these functions can also be accessed via the Windows Taskbar. The touchpad has also been a point of conversation. The touchpad sits perfectly flush with the rest of the chassis and is outlined with a light. There is no real tactile boundary for the touchpad, just a very small bump where the lighting is.

A word should also be said about the lacquer finish of the chassis - it is very glossy and will be a magnet for fingerprints and grease from the user's hands, especially where your wrists and hands rest when typing.

On the left of the chassis there is the mains power connection, an ethernet connection, two USB connections, a line out and a microphone connection. On the right of the chassis is a security lock, a 1394B connection, another USB connection, an HDMI connection, a PCMCIA card slot and the slot for the multimedia card reader (this accepts MMC/SD/MS/PRO cards). I was a little disappointed that there is no VGA-out, and this could be an issue for people who do not have a monitor or HDTV with an HDMI connection.

On the bottom of the laptop are the supply fans for the cooling, and the vents are located on the back of the chassis. One very nice touch is the nameplate on the bottom of the chassis. You can specify what name you want engraved when you order the laptop. It doesn't add anything to the functionality of the laptop but it does add to the feeling that you have a laptop that is a little special.

The LCD display is also very good. It is a glossy screen which provides better contrast and colours at the cost of much higher reflectivity. I opted for the 1440x900 display as I felt the 1920x1200 display was too great for a 15" screen. I have previously used a 17" laptop with a 1920x1200 display and I found text on websites could be hard to read so I can only guess that this problem would be further exacerbated by cramming such large number of pixels on a smaller display. I also felt that 1440x900 provided the best balance between image quality, screen size, and gaming performance (I like to play all my games at the native resolution of the display). The one worry I did have was after using the HP Pavilion HDX9000 for the last eight months with its enormous 20" 1650x1050 display I thought the 15" display would appear tiny to my eyes. This is purely a subjective issue, but I was pleasantly surprised to find the smaller display doesn't bother me at all. There is some light leakage at the top and bottom of the display, but I can only notice this when the screen is black and I am sitting in a dark room. I am also pleased to report that the hinges don't creak or make any painful noises that others have reported. The screen does wobble, but no more so than with any other laptop I have used before. As I type this the screen doesn't wobble and is perfectly steady.

I found the m15x's appearance to be perfectly acceptable. It looks smart and I probably prefer the minimalist styling to the more OTT and garish designs that are available at

the moment. The ergonomics again are perfectly acceptable, I have no major complaints and find keyboard is comfortable to use, the touchpad takes a little getting used to (although 99.9% of the time I will be using a USB mouse), and all the connections are easily accesible and not bunched up together like they are on other laptops. The only real thing I can say is a VGA out would probably have been a better choice than an HDMI out.
















PERFORMANCE

So now we come to what you really want to know about. If you are interested in getting an Alienware system then you will want to know how it fairs in it's raison d'etre - GAMES!

First things first, much has been said about Vista and it's performance (or lack of). I have found that if I disable certain Vista features that I don't want or need such as User Account Control, Windows Desktop Search Service, and Superfetch, Vista becomes much snappier and faster to navigate. Those of us who are confident with shutting down services we don't need and removing unneeded start up programmes will find that Vista performs very much the same as XP. I also try to maintain my system by running regular registry cleans, HDD defrags, and being careful about what software I install. My point is if you don't look after your system properly even the fastest one will eventually start to slow down.

I am very happy to report that the m15x truly shines as a gaming laptop. I have a fairly considerable collection of games I have collected in recent years, and I have many of them installed on my m15x. With one exception I can run each and every one of these games at maximum detail settings and get excellent framerates. The only exception to this is Crysis which only runs at a little over 20fps at maximum detail settings (see below). The combination of the T9300 CPU, 2GB RAM, 7200RPM HDD and the sheer brute force of the 8800GTX means this laptop just powers through just about anything I can throw at it. Suffice to say I am absolutely delighted with the gaming performance of my m15x.

Below are some benchmarks I have taken. The benchmarks were done when the system had been running for several hours, and the benchmarks were run several times before recording the result in order to stress the GPU and make sure my m15x wasn't suffering from the downclocking issues that afflicted earlier examples.

The display driver settings used for these benchmarks were set in nHancer as follows:





The first benchmark is 3DMark06 Basic Edition. As you can see the m15x can achieve scores of over 10,000.



I know that 3DMark is a synthetic benchmark, and the ones that really count are the real world benchmarks of actual games. I benchmarked my m15x in both DX9 and DX10 on three contemporary titles that I felt would provide a good example of the m15x's gaming power. The first test was running the performance benchmark in Company Of Heroes. The resolution used was 1440x900 and the in-game graphics settings were all set to maximum.

DX9


DX10


Next up I ran the in-game performance test from World In Conflict. Once again the resolution used was 1440x900 and all in-game graphics settings were set to maximum.

DX9


DX10


Finally I ran the Crysis Benchmark Tool. 1440x900 resolution with all in-game settings at "Very High".

DX9


DX10


These benchmarks are VERY impressive, and when you consider they are from a 15" laptop you realise that the m15x really is something special.

(They also show that DX10 is absolute rubbish and not worth the performance hit for a barely noticeable improvement in graphics, but that is another matter)


CONCLUSION

It was with some trepidation that I first fired up my m15x, not knowing if my system would be the lemon that many in this forum believe it to be, or if it would be the truly portable gaming powerhouse that I hoped it would be. I am happy to report that it is everything I hoped it would be. My experience of the m15x has been totally flawless and performs exactly as advertised.

If you aren't interested in playing the latest games then you shouldn't even be considering an Alienware system. If you just want a laptop to browse the web, or a media centre then there are far better choices available to you that provide much better value for money. If however you want a truly powerful gaming system and mobility and portability are an issue for you then the m15x is the laptop you have been waiting for. If you do decide to get one you should bear in mind the caveat emptor that some customers such as myself have had a flawless and excellent experience, whilst others have had a complete nightmare.

I hope this review will restore some hope for those who are still waiting for their m15x and I hope it will go some way to redressing the balance of comments and feedback about the m15x in this forum.

 

+ rep great review and great pics. nice to finally see something positive in here. things were getting a bit negative in here with the m15x.

 

Wow great review very thorough!

 

Excellent review. Thanks.

Why does the Crysis benchmark tool have a custom res of 1400x960 instead of 1440x900?

 

+ rep, one of the best m15x reviews i've seen

 

Nice review. you should do a cpu temp review. While you stress the Laptop with a game

http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/ or http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php. To give us a idea on heat while in a game.

 

Also, can you again verify that you have absolutely no plastic creaking when you open the screen? I find that very interesting and wonder if they have made an improvement in the cases because I wouldn't have thought a "creak free" case would have been possible under any circumstance given my previous experience with the m15x.

 

Congratulations pielstick on receiving a perfect m15x and also what a great review. a lot of people that had ordered were starting to panic a bit with all the negative feedback and hopefully this will restore their faith.
+1 rep

 

i have creak free hinges.

 

Nice review! would be better if AW make the screen frame more "slim"

 

Great review and great pictures! Enjoy your new system.

 

Great review.

After the recent comments made about the m15x here, this does really well in restoring a good balanced opinion.

 

Great one... I agree with pretty much everything you post here. It's a great looking machine that goes fast. Obviously you state that you don't think people should look underneath the "hood".

I also wanted to say I loved this sentence "...nor did I try to break it in order to find out if it did have any faults!". For instance, I have a hammer by my side right now to check how does it resist physical impact.

I honestly hope you have a wonderful time with it though. You ordered it at the same time as me (and received it even before), so I'm sure that: 1-you were lucky; 2- you don't care about those problems; 3- you didn't look well enough.

Good luck with your machine.

 

great review! Thanks for sharing

 

Nice review man. 1 question though, why is your Crysis screen res set to 1440x960?

 

Groove75 - I noticed the unusual res too, I have no idea why it is 960 and not 900? I can most definitely confirm that my screen lid does not creak or make any other noises when I move it. I am careful to move it from the centre and not the corners as this would flex the entire display and place uneven stress on the hinges, which I imagine would ultimately cause them to fail.

AtolSammeek - I just ran the Crysis benchmark 4 times in a row and CoreTemp was telling me both cores of my CPU were at 50 degrees Celcius each (give or take a couple of degrees either side).

milcs - As I said in my review, my m15x works as advertised and does exactly what it says on the tin. I am very happy with it and I have no intention of going searching for faults just because somebody tells me there *must* be something wrong with my m15x because there is something wrong with theirs.

If I do find something wrong I will come back and report, but at the moment as far as i am concerned this thing is firing on all cylinders and I am a happy customer.

If I were to hazard a guess at the cause of all the problems people have been reporting with the m15x I would say that there maybe a problem at the assembly line, and maybe one or two of the AW employees aren't putting enough care or attention into their work. It would certainly explain how two different customers in the same part of the world can have such different experiences with their m15x.

I noticed that in the html file that comes with the m15x with the system details and test results it contains the initials of the person who assembled and tested the system. Maybe we should do a little survey of people who have problems with their m15x and see of a pattern emerges?

 

That we would be a good idea to mad mine is long gone maybe its in my binder though.

 

o taco I didn't know yours had left -- is this a repair or a return?

edit: RR assembled, AI tested

 

no sorry i ment i deleted the html file

 

Interesting. Maybe they've fixed a few things with the cases because I'm noticing less complaints from the newer people regarding the creaking which was very noticeable with mine. Many of the major reviews even mentioned it so it couldn't have been a few isolated cases on here. I'll know soon enough when my 2nd unit arrives if they ever get in that backorder on the cases so they can build it. Anyway, glad to know you're enjoying the laptop. If you could get around to running some of the stress tests and posting your results on that big thread we have going it would be helpful.

 

I like the review. Thanks for your time, here's some rep.

 

Nice positive review, i really like it!! rock on with your baby!!

 

I have a very good laptop from AW luckily for me i was only upset i didnt get the AlienGUIse shipped with it

Anyone the only draw back with the rag doll hinches on the lid is annoying to me but i am proud of the m15x

I like this review because it made me proud to own one now GOT A REP FROM ME

 

glad your happy with your m15x tyronne im going to pick one up from austin soon mabye ill be able to help u if u have any software issue.
Also tyronne your desktop looks great! happy to see you setting up your m15x to look stella.. that background is inc in the Alienwareguise i asume.. after a year of using Dark black vista im getting sick of it lol ^_^


in regards to DX10 yes alot of people are running DX10 in crysis and asking why it sucks so much... in crysis its def not worth it.. however in newer games DX10 will improve performance over DX9.. for instance Assassins Creed.

Having a HIgh performing PC is really some thing that requires alot of reserach and wasted time googling such things.. Its quite sad that PC gaming has still yet to have a more User Friendly experience for instance crysis detecting DX10 and using for any 8series card is very silly indeed.. crytek need to stop sucking the Nvdiwang.


Thanks for this review alot of the past reviews since chaz one have really annoyed me and its mainly due to them not being reviewed by the "type" of computer user that i am. I play in a big super cold room on a noisy and overclocked pc or at freezing lan parts and linearly use my PC as my heater ^_^ the m15x sounds ideal for me. I would use the m15x in my Studio at uni but ill just switch it to Intergrated for that as its quite hot in there or mabye just running on power savings to stop some heat out of the 8800 (i do 3d modeling and cad 2d drawings).

 

One thing I forgot to mention, all these benchmarks and the CPU temperature test was done with the m15x sat on a flat wooden surface - i.e. the back wasn't propped up to increase airflow and I wasn't using any laptop cooler.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I hope the review will show the m15x in a different light to the mainly negative feedback there has been on here in the last few months. It seems if you get a good one that has been built properly and has no problems then it really is a very powerful gaming beast in a very portable package.

Well I'm off to set up the Acer 5920 I bought for my girlfriend... one thing I do like about Alienware is they don't fill their laptops with bloatware like other manufacturers

 

Thank you for sharing your experience with us. Congratulations on your new system. Enjoy!