What's your reaction when people recommend alienware?

[Dabombinable]

No, mobo and PSU are crap. They use WD Greens in their Area 51 desktops, and their PSUs are crappy multi-rail units 

WTF? They use WD Greens in their desktops? F***ing con artists.

[asim1999]

WTF? They use WD Greens in their desktops? F***ing con artists.

True dat, check out some reviews and videos of the Area 51 and u will see what i mean 

[Dabombinable]

True dat, check out some reviews and videos of the Area 51 and u will see what i mean 

I'll check some out, but how can they get away with crap like this? Because if they actually use components that are supposed to be for those on an extremely tight budget in a computer that is "worth" several thousand dollars, the pricks should be investigated for fraud (I think that is the applicable term for what they are doing).

Edit: this guy had a problem with the motherboard not supplying enough power through the PCIe slot, I thought all manufacturers had to follow the standard?

[BurgerBum]

most of their current desktops are pretty bad in terms of being over priced and all. but thier older stuff and their laptops are insane. and they're really cool people too. 

yes, i joke about hating alien ware alot. but they are a nice company, good customer service (in my experience) and makesome nice products. i just dont like their cases anymore.

[Ptopman]

*walks away*

[asim1999]

I'll check some out, but how can they get away with crap like this? Because if they actually use components that are supposed to be for those on an extremely tight budget in a computer that is "worth" several thousand dollars, the pricks should be investigated for fraud (I think that is the applicable term for what they are doing).

Edit: this guy had a problem with the motherboard not supplying enough power through the PCIe slot, I thought all manufacturers had to follow the standard?

IKR, proof that you should always build your own gaming PC

[BurgerBum]

ALIENWARE!?!?!?!? All of there systems are way overpriced for what you get. And in my opinion they are UGLY. There are way better options. Like build one yourself. you get more for your money and most often a better looking system.

 

IT JUST BLOWS MY MIND HOW LIKED THEY ARE.

.......... 

alrighty then.

[TheMidnightNarwhal]

No, mobo and PSU are crap. They use WD Greens in their Area 51 desktops, and their PSUs are crappy multi-rail units

WD green is not that bad tho...

[Dabombinable]

WD green is not that bad tho...

They are only good for storage, any other situation will see them die quickly.

[Mush Brain]

I get slightly jealous about the chassis, other than that im kool.

[DosBlade]

Its nice.. like others and so many know its way "Overpriced".

[carguy86]

Bad recomendation!

WARNING THE WORDS SHIT AND SHITTY MAY APEAR BELOW

(They give you shitty shit when you buy their shitty shitputers)

[Timmy-P]

I try not to kill them.

 

Really though, I point out that for what they are, they are relatively overpriced, then the conversation will go from there.

[gnarly0531]

yeah there is always someone in gen ed classes who thinks they are beast with an alienware laptop. i think it is more of a money show case than anything. Like oh everyone knows this is expensive.

[GoodBytes]

At my university, we have game developer rooms (for class related to game development), and they are on desktop Alienware computers.

Why?

1- Pre-build solution is looked for.

2- Support. A mentioned, in my previous post: ASUS, MSI, Origin PC, etc.. all don't have what Dell offer: Next business day on-site service. In all cases with the others, you need to ship your system to them, wait 1-2 weeks, and get it back with the slowest shipping option which you wonder if they took "walking".

3- While I do agree that sometimes the specs of a system don't make sense, but usually Alienware does a reasonable decent job.

4- System builder like Puget Systems but they charge you a HUGE premium. Yes you get the premium full package service, but still. Yet their business seams to be growing as people are willing to pay for this. Those that don't care, well Alienware now look not half bad.

That's for school and even business perspective.

In addition, they are many people who like to game on their PC, but they don't have the time or knowledge or simply willing to build their own system. They just want a box were everything is done for them, and ready to go. Kinda like a console experience, and once more are willing to pay the premium price. And if there is anything wrong with the system within their warranty period (which many picks 3 years as it's not that more expensive and even the on-site service), they have 1 phone call to do, and the system will be taken care of. No need to spend hours on forum, searching and diagnostic. Sure it is fun for us, but not for them.

Also, when you order your Dell system, you can negotiate the price, and you'll be surprised how they go lower.

Dell, Lenovo and HP. The prices they put their product is like if it was sold in stores. So you have the retailer profit inside which already they can cut out, and cut some more as you deal directly with the manufacture not through a distribute which stores goes through. AND, they can give a lot of upgrades for free. If they are stuck with RAM they need to finish as no one picks it, well give it for free. It make you happy, and probably stick with them, and it is cheaper for them to give it to you for free, than the cost involved in keeping too much RAM in a warehouse, where if there is a new model coming out and can't use the RAM, they need to bin it all. So might as well give it away.

Example:

When I ordered my Dell Latitude E6400 back in 2008. A nice system, was considered "thin" back in the days (now normal), LED back light screen (fairly new back then), back it keyboard, DisplayPort, had the slim optical drive too, Nvidia GPU, 14inch, really good cooling solution, and a feature that I miss today in newer models: Easier to dissemble that laptop than our desktops (the engineering was superb to make that possible, while keeping the system a tank).

Anyway, I called to order. The laptop configuration I initially picked was ended up being ~1800$ (with 3 year warranty and 3 year on site service). You know what I got just by asking nicely for free?

-> Larger battery, RAM upgrade, HDD capacity upgrade, higher screen resolution upgrade, and wireless card upgrade (from Dell Wireless single band G card, to Intel wireless 5100N)

AND, 350$ off.

This is nothing new to Dell, Lenovo, HP, and so on. That is the beauty of ordering directly from the manufacture. And many times they drop you some offers just by contacting them to place your order.

So that Alienware is not that expensive at the end of the day if you contact the manufacture to place your order.

And my experience is not this only time.

[Dabombinable]

At my university, we have game developer rooms (for class related to game development), and they are on desktop Alienware computers.

Why?

1- Pre-build solution is looked for.

2- Support. A mentioned, in my previous post: ASUS, MSI, Origin PC, etc.. all don't have what Dell offer: Next business day on-site service. In all cases with the others, you need to ship your system to them, wait 1-2 weeks, and get it back with the slowest shipping option which you wonder if they took "walking".

3- While I do agree that sometimes the specs of a system don't make sense, but usually Alienware does a reasonable decent job.

4- System builder like Puget Systems but they charge you a HUGE premium. Yes you get the premium full package service, but still. Yet their business seams to be growing as people are willing to pay for this. Those that don't care, well Alienware now look not half bad.

That's for school and even business perspective.

In addition, they are many people who like to game on their PC, but they don't have the time or knowledge or simply willing to build their own system. They just want a box were everything is done for them, and ready to go. Kinda like a console experience, and once more are willing to pay the premium price. And if there is anything wrong with the system within their warranty period (which many picks 3 years as it's not that more expensive and even the on-site service), they have 1 phone call to do, and the system will be taken care of. No need to spend hours on forum, searching and diagnostic. Sure it is fun for us, but not for them.

Also, when you order your Dell system, you can negotiate the price, and you'll be surprised how they go lower.

Dell, Lenovo and HP. The prices they put their product is like if it was sold in stores. So you have the retailer profit inside which already they can cut out, and cut some more as you deal directly with the manufacture not through a distribute which stores goes through. AND, they can give a lot of upgrades for free. If they are stuck with RAM they need to finish as no one picks it, well give it for free. It make you happy, and probably stick with them, and it is cheaper for them to give it to you for free, than the cost involved in keeping too much RAM in a warehouse, where if there is a new model coming out and can't use the RAM, they need to bin it all. So might as well give it away.

Example:

When I ordered my Dell Latitude E6400 back in 2008. A nice system, was considered "thin" back in the days (now normal), LED back light screen (fairly new back then), back it keyboard, DisplayPort, had the slim optical drive too, Nvidia GPU, 14inch, really good cooling solution, and a feature that I miss today in newer models: Easier to dissemble that laptop than our desktops (the engineering was superb to make that possible, while keeping the system a tank).

Anyway, I called to order. The laptop configuration I initially picked was ended up being ~1800$ (with 3 year warranty and 3 year on site service). You know what I got just by asking nicely for free?

-> Larger battery, RAM upgrade, HDD capacity upgrade, higher screen resolution upgrade, and wireless card upgrade (from Dell Wireless single band G card, to Intel wireless 5100N)

AND, 350$ off.

This is nothing new to Dell, Lenovo, HP, and so on. That is the beauty of ordering directly from the manufacture. And many times they drop you some offers just by contacting them to place your order.

So that Alienware is not that expensive at the end of the day if you contact the manufacture to place your order.

And my experience is not this only time.

I agree with what you say about their support, though I've found that the build quality of their computers can be questionable (1 month, had to get one replaced 3 times, on the 4th it was a refund), which is why I went with ASUS. 1 thing that was amazing about the one I bought (the A3H) was that all you needed to do was take out 3 screws and you had instant access to the CPU socket and heatsink. Which allowed for user maintenance and CPU upgrades (to a certain extent-65W wasn't much to work with back in 2006). To date I haven't seen a single laptop that is designed to be maintained that easily.

[GoodBytes]

I agree with what you say about their support, though I've found that the build quality of their computers can be questionable (1 month, had to get one replaced 3 times, on the 4th it was a refund), which is why I went with ASUS. 1 thing that was amazing about the one I bought (the A3H) was that all you needed to do was take out 3 screws and you had instant access to the CPU socket and heatsink. Which allowed for user maintenance and CPU upgrades (to a certain extent-65W wasn't much to work with back in 2006). To date I haven't seen a single laptop that is designed to be maintained that easily.

My laptop.

1x screw (which holds with the panel) slide out this panel of pretty much the size of the laptop bottom (like like a remote battery cover), and you have FULL internal access. wireless, Bluetooth, fan, heatsink, etc. 4 screws the heatsink and fan is out of the system, you can upgrade the CPU. Optical drive is a button press and pull to get it out. You don't need to remove any screws for that. HDD/SDD, 2 screws, no need to remove that main panel, they are accessible through the outside (the panel has holes as by-pass), and you can slide the HDD (or SSD) out.

6 or 8 screws, the motherboard is out.

This is how it looks like once you remove that panel:

As you can see, even the BIOS battery can be replaced with immense ease. The body is in magnesium, and Dell still painted large part of the base (the base and panel (magnesium alloy as well), is used as heatsink as well, that is why you have areas not painted, and look gray/beige. It does contact to the panel to transfer heat better. This allowed the system cooler operating and have the fan only spin under heavy load after a while, plugged in.

Picture above shows the model without the Nvidia GPU. The Nvidia GPU model has a larger heat pipe.

Top right where you barely see that blue cable with a sleeve, that is where you can put (or have) Bluetooth card. And to the left of the wireless card, that is for a cellphone network card (SIM slot is under the battery)

Seriously Dell did a superb job with it. And that dates back to 2008! Shame that other models don't carry this design.

[The Crazed Child]

I launch one of these.

Lesson learnt.

[cesrai]

My laptop.

1x screw (which holds with the panel) slide out this panel of pretty much the size of the laptop bottom (like like a remote battery cover), and you have FULL internal access. wireless, Bluetooth, fan, heatsink, etc. 4 screws the heatsink and fan is out of the system, you can upgrade the CPU. Optical drive is a button press and pull to get it out. You don't need to remove any screws for that. HDD/SDD, 2 screws, no need to remove that main panel, they are accessible through the outside (the panel has holes as by-pass), and you can slide the HDD (or SSD) out.

6 or 8 screws, the motherboard is out.

This is how it looks like once you remove that panel:

As you can see, even the BIOS battery can be replaced with immense ease.

Top right where you barely see that blue cable with a sleeve, that is where you can put (or have) Bluetooth card. And to the left of the wireless card, that is for a cellphone network card (SIM slot is under the battery)

Seriously Dell did a superb job with it. And that dates back to 2008! Shame that other models don't carry this design.

My G580, two screws and back panel is out, access to HDD, RAM, BIOS battery, Wifi card, ODD, with with few more 5-15 screws keyboard and MB are out.

[GoodBytes]

My G580, two screws and back panel is out, access to HDD, RAM, BIOS battery, Wifi card, ODD, with with few more 5-15 screws keyboard and MB are out.

Cool! It's good to see that this kind of smart engineering is still applied today. I wish it was more standard in laptops.

[cesrai]

Cool! It's good to see that this kind of smart engineering is still applied today. I wish it was more standard in laptops.

Yep me too, I really like the G580 chassis it's one of the best chassis of a laptop I have ever used.

[Fgtfv567]

Oh god. Why am I on this thread?

[IhazHedont]

"And I just say NO, NO, NO"

[NeatSquidYT]

 

While searching for that, I came across..... this.

[KayTees]

Even budget builds look better than this shit.