**Official Alienware M11x Owner's Lounge**

I totally and 100% agree.

Damn it all if we carry the "unpopular" opinion, I know the value of my dollar and Alienware has not convinced me the m11x is worth mine.

Whether it bothers you or not, you're still settling for an inferior processor by purchasing this. While that may sit easy with a lot of you, it doesn't for me. Things like the CES press release of this "innovative" and "groundbreaking" product put me off when I found out the processor they slapped in this thing.

Again, I own an SU7300. My UL30VT contains one, and it's a decent processor for everyday tasks, but it's definitely not good for gaming. It's passable yes, but I expect more from an AW that will cost more than my Asus did.

What would have been innovative and groundbreaking, is designing a higher capacity battery to fit into the slim chassis and stick a bigger and badder (or just simply newer) CPU in there.

I hate to use Apple as an example (because I hate their products), but you can't argue their battery technology. Full fledged processors pulling 6+ hours of battery life. The m11x has an integrated battery as well. I just expected more. My Asus will last for 11 hours, and 4+ hours gaming. It's got a slightly bigger screen, but it's much thinner. (To be clear, my issue isn't the battery life, rather why they couldn't find a way to pull the same or similar battery life with a better processor. A battery upgrade, would've been one way of accomplishing this. Again, if this product were truly innovative, it would contain a better processor and pull similar battery life. It seems more like AW took the easy way out in designing this.)

I'm allowed, along with everyone else, their own opinions. I'm simply voicing mine because I know I'm not alone, and initially I was utterly thrilled at the idea of purchasing one of these. At the present time I can't seem to marry the idea with the cash in my pocket because it doesn't fully seem worth it.

Perhaps I'll better be satisfied after their first refresh of it down the road, because an 11 inch gaming "powerhouse" is a no brainer for me, but I need it to be a true mini powerhouse across all fronts, not just in GPU.

But here's hoping I will join the ranks of m11x owner if Alienware refreshes this product. I do want one, and probably would've bought this over the Asus had I known this was in the works. Perhaps that's the real issue for me, that I already made an ultraportable purchase with gaming in mind, I just feel like I'd be all over Ebay right now if the m11x did more to impress me initially.

Time will tell. But I'm sticking with this topic and hoping to be swung to the other side once people get theirs and start testing, maybe I'll reverse my opinion.

 

Do remember the MBP's are running MacOSX so maybe thats why it runs longeron batteries compared to other notebooks running Windows? Hmm..

 

I too am dissapointed at the lack of core i tech. however, why are people comparing this product with 13" laptops as if they are the same? Its like complaining that the m15x doesnt come with Dual GPUs like the 17 incher.

I think alot of people are missing the fact of how small this machine is. this shouldn't be compared to the asus ul30jt, or the sony z. a better comparison would be tha asus 1202/ul20a, the HP DV2z or the sony x which are similar form factors... plain and simple, the m11x KILLS anything in the 12" or less realm even with the C2D

 

I would like to buck the trend here and say 'I will be buying this machine'. Sure it doesn't have the latest and greatest I(x) processor but considering my uses, its perfect. It can play Oblivion, Fallout 3, Half life 2, STALKER etc. on med - high and play CIV 4 on integrated. The processor is low heat so it won't boil when I use it for gaming and a 6 hour battery life to chop those pesky trans-atlantic flights down to size and a laptop which may actually fit on those piddley tray tables.

Outstanding effort Alienware, I feel like you have made a custom laptop just for me.

 

I'm actually not sure what I'll do now. How long after a model's initial release does Alienware typically offer an updated/revised version?

 

@jannas = Actually you're just taking my side. Hehehehe

You guys can wait all you want for iX and its truly justifiable. robamp has a point too but heck if you keep insisting on comparing it with the asus, then buy the asus? right? :laugh: Just chill out y'all. Leave the 1st gen to me and grab the 2nd gen one. Beeeesides, think the m15x and m17x didn't take up the i7's the moment they were released too either.

 

Actually, it should be good that they're comparing this to those outside it's class. It just proves it by nature owns everything in its own class then proceeds to give the higher class notebooks a run for their money (to some extent). And people don't buy gaming notebooks for photoshopping or facebooking. You buy em to frag hapless opponents. And if it can let me frag em nice and toasty, I ain't complaining mate

 

@saosin = Unless the world ends soon, there will be a refresh. Unless well nobody buys it... Which won't be my fault

 

I do have to agree that no one is arguing against the M11x when it is put into the category where it belongs, Ultra portables 12" and below. It destroys anything in that realm. Now bringing it up to 13"+ is kind of useless. Like a poster mentioned above, that's like comparing 15" to 17" computers. This will be a day one purchase for me. TOO EXCITED!!

 

people compare m11x with 13" lappys because 13" is imo ideal for portable gaming, kill your eyes gaming on sub 12"

 

yeah well 17" can fit dual video cards and can/should have better cooling than 15" or less so what, it's more ideal for "hardcore" gaming? Unfair argument still.


Anyway, for those of you that own a netbook or a notebook w/o an optical drive, how is the OS recovery and disc provided? Is it on a bootable USB drive or what? I'm curious b/c I tend to reformat often for whatever reasons and never owned a computer w/o an optical drive to boot from for OS installs etc. Especially if I opt to go the SSD route and firmware upgrade is necessary, a reformat would be needed too right? Thanks ahead.

 

the ulv core i3 and i5 that were pegged for this were delayed

april/may for the refresh

i don't care. i will order the second this is on sale...

i want bt though - bit not a deal breaker

and i'll get the core iX too

 

in all honesty i understand why those that are upset are upset, but correct me if i'm wrong, all these new ultraportables coming out with th ix series that your all talking about are larger than 11' right, so maybe that could be a reason y, size not heat. could be wrong though

plus if you really need a ix proc then get the 15 inch, oh wait u want something light and portable that can handle new titles really well, then u have the m11x, there are only like 1 or 2 other slightly larger laptops that come close and it's still a pretty big gap in performance, and those other ones are bigger. i mean this thing is smaller than everything else close to it's size and performs better. if thats not good enough for you than i don't know what is. i'm sure there is a valid reason for putting the c2duo culv in there

/rant

 

Are you saying this as this is what is going to happen or this is what you're hoping? Also a previous poster showed Bluetooth will be available. So I'm unsure if you're posting for just hopefuls or if you heard from a source.

 

Well let's compare the M11x's CPU to the 10.4" Panasonic CF-R9 then. It's base processor is the i7-620UM with the option of choosing the higher clocked i7-640UM. Hmmm... smaller netbook, yet faster processor/newer tech than the "All Powerful" (supposedly) AW...

Dell must have made an agreement with Intel to get rid of their "soon to be phased out" Pentium and C2D ULV processors, because to me, that's the only logical reason why they'd put them in the M11x.

Wow, thanks for the reliable information. There's no such thing as a ULV Core i3. The ULV Core i5's and i7's have been out for nearly a month now, and many manufacturers have been supplied and built machines with them.

 

It's going to be very interesting to see how succesful this machine is going to be. I believe there is a great hope for a 13" AW if the M11X works well.

On the other hand if it fails then all hope is lost...

 

I don't see AW having 4 different laptops.

Unfortunately, this will be it....

 

You don't think we will ever see an 18.4" and a 13" laptop from AW?

 

"Help me AW m11x, your my only hope"

and on a side note, yeah, its a bit odd that if they could develop the m15/17x refresh with the core ix architecture in there own current time frame, that they should have been able to develop the m11x core ix within the same... something must not have gone well somewhere during R&D

 

I would agree with the above. 17, 15, and 11. I doubt we will see anything else. Maybe an iAW Tablet. (or not).

 

Thanks for the vid! First time we get an actual idea of the size, i'm guessing about 9"x12" which would make it 1/2" shorter than a 13" and about the same depth.

Still on the fence...LOL for an extra 1/2" in size you can get an extra inch and a half or so of screen real estate on something like ul30jt and get an i7 to boot. Wish there was some place to go see one of these in person.

 

I'm in the same boat. It's like a mini struggle between the ul30jt and the m11x. Both have their own pros and cons. I'll just have to wait until the reviews of both come out. If I had the money I'd throw the updated Sony Vaio Z in there too but I don't have 2/3 grand to spend on a laptop.

 

Damn just ordered a MBP for around 1k which was cost for my retailer as he did me a favor. Thinking of selling it on craigslist for the same price I bought it and buying this. This is what I have been dreaming all about for years. Long battery life and an awesome graphics card. Well unless the MBP hooks me with the OS or something since it's my first mac.

 

The Sony Z is smaller than it and lighter by a pound and a half, You can't really compare it though because for the price you can buy 2 ul30jt or m11x LOL

 

what are the advantages of an ssd over an hdd..i know they are lighter but what else? guessing they are faster when copying data to and from..? also i dont understand the processor speed...1.3 ghz? my $700 laptop from 2 years ago is 1.8 ghz (but its an AMD Turion 64x2)..is this comparison valid, or am i comparing apples and oranges

 

I know. That's what I'm saying. If I had all kinds of money , I'd probably wait and buy the Sony Z for portability and light gaming and something else much more substantial for at home gaming/playing around/brag about. But for the price nothing else really compares to the ul30jt or m11x.

 

that panasonic is an ugly exception to the rule, and it's japan only and you probably can't run maplestory or some other inane simple game on it. just cuz you can cram an i7 in something that small doesn't mean you should, and in something this small it's either extreme graphics or extreme proc. both would be great but everything has limits if only for a while.

http://i582.photobucket.com/albums/ss269/netbookc/20100125134725_86_.jpg

 

this has 11inch, GeForce mGPU & cost for $800.00 which is very close as ADAMO'S PRICE!

If you wanted alienware M13x, it will cost MORE as equal M15x's price.. I bet you would choose M15x over M13x..

I 100% agree with your post. I dont know why they keep babbling like that.. get over! Dell already have M11x Netbook with beautiful specs for everyone who interested to get and can afford this.

 

I agree. That panasonic is super ugly and clunky looking. Yuck!
And for gaming, I'm sure graphics are way more important.

 

okay and what graphics card does it have? Remember the 335m is pretty damn good AND it is newer tech. Can't really have both in these sizes.. not yet anyway.

The asus has a weak 310m, if it had the 330m, then it would probably be a better choice all-around even though the 335m is still a bit ahead of the 330m from paper specs at least.

 

I don't know that the panasonic has any decent graphics card. I would assume integrated.

But I think the people on the ul30jt thread are hoping that it will magically have a 330m as the discrete graphics card when it does finally come out. Though that dream seems similar to what happened on this thread with the iX core cpu. I think someone even mentioned selling their own mother if the ul30jt came with i7 and the 335m.

 

the 330m is ALOT weaker than the 335m despite the minute number difference

 

I'd be willing to bet the asus will be faster than the 11x. A graphics card can only render frames at the speed which the cpu feeds them. So it doesn't matter if you have the greatest graphics card in the world it's still not going to render frames any faster than the cpu allows. If you watch the L4D2 video you can see the 11x dropping to 12 fps when all the zombies come out, most likely because the processor can't keep up and is bottlenecking the graphics card.

 

48 to 72 shaders is a big jump for an extra "5" thats for sure

 

You're comparing raisins to oranges. Intel is better then AMD on a number of level. An SSD is faster then an HDD, but I have heard that over time they get slower.

 

I'd imagine the nvidia 310 would run the whole game at 11 fps though... games are (with very few exceptions) GPU dependent. anyway, its already been agreed that the difference of speed between the ci5 ulv and c2d ulv isn't as great as the difference between the 330m and 335m. The few games that are more cpu dependent wont gain much performance with the ci5/7 ulv compaired to a full fledged processor.

 

I'm not sure if anyone knows the answer to this or if it just depends on the game but are simulation games more gpu dependent than cpu?

 

Games are only gpu dependent at high res, these lappies are all low res machines where it starts to all become about how fast the cpu can feed the frames. Also the Asus has i7 that is a significant difference. I'm starting to lean toward the Asus given it's about the same size (1/2" longer but thinner than the 11x) and has a 13" screen instead of 11.

Also i'm sure the 310m can run L4D2 at more than 11 fps my 1201n with Atom 330 and 9400m can run it at average 20 fps. It's going to be interesting once all these lappies start coming out, i'm going to sit back for a bit as it's really starting to seem like being an early adopter is gonna hurt here

How does 310m compare to 9400m? that would give a better idea the numbers don't really mean alot anymore lol

 

I agree with you but unfortunately you are arguing with people who are like walls and they arent going to look at it objectively. Going to any review site out there will quickly show you at these ultra low resolutions with aa off and quality set to something lower than ultra or high that the majority of games are cpu bound not gpu bound. As weak as the 310 is compared to the 335 playing at a resolution of 720p or below the 310 will still play most if not all games out there.

 

This looks promising. I might get one. I love the size of my Acer 1410, though the Alienware m11x looks a lot thicker. I was watching the L4D2 gameplay video they had, seems pretty nice FPS wise. I saw FRAPs read out like 20-30FPS under normal gameplay (and 50-60 when there was nothing going on).,

 

I think they will both give each other a run for thier money depending on the game, they seem like very comparable laptops to me, Asus has the CPU power, Alienware has the GPU power. Too bad there isn't one with both GPU and CPU power then the decision wouldn't be nearly as hard, that's why I really wish the 11x came with i series

 

there is one with both cpu and gpu... the sony z... unfortunately this will also cost you many body parts (corporeal and otherwise)


on a side note,
the m11x has been estimated to have the dimensions 11.3" x 8.2" x 1.3-1.5"
ul30 series has 12.9" x 9.2" x 1.0-1.2" confirmed

so not quite 1/2" difference

 

If the two of you actually went and worked it out, you'd realise that the combination of the GS45 chipset and SU7300 actually require the laptop to have 3W more TDP than the combination of the ULV i5/i7 CPU and any compatible Intel chipset (24.5W vs 21.5W). So your arguments are flawed.

Alienware could easily have put both a powerful dGPU and a new technology processor in the M11x, but they chose not to. Why? No idea. It's not because of size, cooling or price as it's already been worked out that an i5/i7 configuration is equivalent in every regard.

Look, I'm not trying to convince anyone not to buy it. Do what you want, it's your money and it'll probably play all the games you want, the way you want. But I'm not prepared to invest in old technology, I'm going to wait until they do what they should have done in the first place.

Alienware aren't exactly renowned for producing "pretty" machines now are they...

 

I'm the one who made the 11.3" x 8.2" estimate. In one of these threads the official specs were posted, which list 11.25" x 9.2" x 1.5". I believe my 8.2" estimate was off because I only measured the lid: both the hinge on the back and the front area with the speaker grill protrude out.

Still, 11.3" wide is more than 1/2" less than 12.9".

 

Starcraft 2 requirements below -

http://starcraft.incgamers.com/blog/comments/starcraft-ii-system-requirements-revealed/

Looks like 1st gen m11x can play SC2 very well indeed ! heres to hoping D3 will play well aswell....

As for the whole intel i5 cpu situation this is either a heat issue or the fact they want to keep the cost of manufacturing down. That however does not explain why its not an option to upgrade too.

to the people wondering when rev 2 of the m11x comes out that would probably depend on intel releasing a smaller die size i5 which runs cooler.

 

Look at the video, the 11x is bigger than 8 1/2" x 11" magazine by far more than .2 and .3" lol looks much closer to 9" by 12" or maybe even bigger to me. I put my 1201n up to a magazine to try and get an idea and the magazine dwarfs it on the sides but it is about .3-.4 inch bigger lengthwise. 1201n is 11.6"x8.2" so there is no way it meets your estimated dimensions.

Heres link to the video: http://en.community.dell.com/blogs/...28/a-brief-history-of-the-alienware-m11x.aspx

 

They may not be "pretty" but I do like the backlit keyboard and the leds are kind of pretty-ish... or just distracting from the rest of its looks...

I think the updated sony vaio z would be the system to get except for the huge price. For that amount of money you could get a m11x and a ul30jt.

 

Looks wider than 11.3 to me 1201n is 11.6 and is not as much space showing lengthwise on a magazine as there is on the 11x. Maybe it looks wider because of the square edges. I kinda hope those "official specs" are wrong though because 1.5" thick is a dealbreaker for me

 

yeah, 1.5" is chunky. especially since the m11x doesnt seem to have much taper on it... thats 1.5" all the way back as opposed to the 0.9 tapered to 1.3" on most other "thin and lights" Its understandable though, think of all the cooling pipes ya gotta run though that thing. I wonder if anyone has looked at how loud the m11x is gunna be with such air movement and small fan

 

Yea 1201n is only 1" thick without the battery, the battery acts like a foot for the back of the lappy to tilt it forward so it's like 1.25" including the bump of the battery (measuring best I can with a tape measure) 1.5" thick from front to back is huge by comparison. I hope that's wrong.