Alienware Area 51m Review (With Pictures/Movie!) - Page 2

I haven't gotten it yet. Check your PMs for my other e-mail. It's got a 20mb limit, but it's alittle faster.

Hammy, sent an email last night requesting movie. Did you receive? Looking forward to seeing it. Thanks!

curse! i hate .wmv files i cant play them on winamp. oh well i can hear the music though

Use windows media player 9, or pretty much any video player.
Here's a link to the movie directly, if anyone missed my thread:
http://www.zelda-system.net/awvid/gtaviceaw.wmv

A side note Audio can be transfered to a TV useing the headphones jack all you need to do is go to radio shack or its equivilent and purchaces a headphones to rca jack then you can hook the rca jacks into your TV and play the music through the TV speakers for better sound. the conversion piece only runs like 5 or 6 $us.

How long does the battery last on a full charge on your Area 51?

Over 2 hours of word processing and internet browsing. About 1 1/4 hour gaming.

-Craig

Hey guys im new to these forums. Just thought id thankyou for the review coz im 99.9% sure that ill be ordering an area 51-m now this friday. The only thing im unsure about is all the bad press i see on random sites saying "alienware dont care" etc. has any1 had this experience? or is it sager fanboys? btw hammy some1s taken one of the photos of your rig and used it as their photo to sell on ebay!!!!! cant beleive it.
im also in the UK and was wondering wether alll DHS deliveries AW make are overnight? any answers would be great.
cheers

My experience with Alienware.

I do agree that they may have a great product, but I believe that they lack in support area. I've ordered twice from them. The first time I was told it would take a week, and then all of the sudden they wanted me to wait for a month and a half. I cancelled that order, and decided to order again when they had the parts in stock. That was in the end of May. On July 4th my desktop had a bios rom problem, so I decided to give alienware a call that monday after calling a few other laptop companies. I asked if they had the parts in stock to fufil my order, and I stated that I needed the laptop to ship within the 7 day timeframe they said it would. The slaes rep assured me that it would and I asked if he could double check because I needed it for work, and the alienware competitors said they would have no problem shipping that soon. He again assured me that it would ship by the 13th of July. I placed the order, and was fairly excited. I called on the 12th of July just to make sure everything was going smoothly. I was suprised to find that my order had a hold on it because of a laptop bag being out of stock. Had I not called to check on the order, I would have never been informed of the hold. I cancelled the order for the bag, and it still was a full 7 days behind on the shipping time. I sent an e-mail to customer support stating that because of this delay I have lost 2 clients and might even lose my job, all because I was assured that they could deliever. This is my reply from them:
Dear Mr. Roux,

I have been following up on your order, and I am glad to inform you that your order has entered the Assembly Phase.
We appreciate your patience very much.
I can assure you that we are working around the clock to have your order finished and ready to ship as soon as possible.
As soon as I have any further updates about your order, I will be sending you an email notification.
We usually allow a time frame of 3 days in order for the order to move from Assembly to Integration.

Again, thank you for your patience and kind understanding.

Best regards,

Order Status Team
Alienware Corp.

----


When ordering from Alienware, just be wary of the delievery dates and what not.. Because of this exchange, I have 2 friends who are going with the dell XPS.

I'm fairly sure the laptop is worth the wait, but it seems to be a gambit in dealing with customer support.

Hammy, amazing review and great pictures. I loved the movie too. Im currently saving up for my alienware m51 and your review is making me wish i started saving earlier, thanks for your time

Port Replicator with Area 51-m

Has anyone used the Targus USB Port Replicator w/ ethernet on their Area 51-m ???

I read one review that said the drivers included by Targus are poorly written.

great review, man I hate you tho, cuz now I want mine even more which is gonna make time go so slow while it's being delivered to me, it should come by tommorow!!! wish me good luck! I'll try and get a review going, i'll take tons of pictures / movies of me pwning in counter-strike haha, well peace out. cant wait!!

how ya doing guys, am already thinking of ordering the area 51m tomorrow, since my parents are giving me this gift.... well let me start off by saying i have heard good stuff about alienware and about the price it carrys , and then i hear other people and sites such as cdnet and ect all over the dell xps... whats the deal why cant they speak about alienware well that has be type shady and wondering whats going on... on the other hand the configures i have made gave me a grand total of about 4,100 or so estimating with 3 year warranty...and i just want some type of insurance of what am getting you know its not always a person can say they just wasted 4,000 dollars on a laptop... so please i would like to know if am getting what am paying for here are the specs of the laptop i may order tomorrow:

Warranty: 3-Year AlienCare Toll-Free 24/7 Phone Support with Onsite Service
Operating System: Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional with Service Pack 2
Desktop Enhancements: Exclusive AlienGUIse Theme Manager
AlienRespawn: Alienware® Respawn Recovery Kit
Case: Area-51m Case with 15.4" WideSXGA+ 1680x1050 LCD Display - Saucer Silver
Processor: Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor w/ HT Technology Extreme Edition 3.2GHz 800MHz FSB 2.5MB Cache
Motherboard: SiS648FX + SiS963L AGP8X Chipset
Memory: 1GB DDR PC-3200 at 400MHz - 2x512 SO-DIMMs
Video Card: Area-51m ATI MOBILITY™ RADEON™ 9700 Module with 128MB DDR and Half-Life 2 Coupon Bundle
Video Optimizer: AlienAdrenaline: Video Performance Optimizer
Sound Card: Sound-Blaster Pro Compatible 3D Audio
Hard Drive: Hitachi 60GB 7200 RPM ATA100 with 8MB Cache
Smart Bay One: 4x2x8x DVD+/-RW / 16x10x24x CD-RW Combo w/Software
Ethernet NIC: Integrated 10/1000Mb Gigabit Ethernet NIC
Wireless Network: External Wireless 802.11a/b/g PCMCIA Card
Modem: 56K Modem with V.92 Technology
Remote Control: Area-51m Multi-function Infrared Remote control
Optional Mouse: Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer 3.0 - USB - Space Black
Alienware Exclusive Offers: Gamespot Complete - Free 90-day Trial (a $20.85 value)
Alienware Exclusive Offers: 10% off your next EB Games online purchase
Benchmark Software: 3DMark®03 Standard Edition
Productivity Software: Microsoft® Works Suite 2004 ($89.99 MSRP)
Free Alienware T-Shirt: Free Alienware® T-Shirt - White (a$10.00 value)
Free Alienware Mousepad: Free Alienware® Mousepad (a $14.99 value)
Automated Support: AlienAutopsy: Automated Technical Support Request System

3 year warrenty is stupid in my opinion. i stuck with the 1 year warrenty. most hardware problems i can fix by myself. i would put the 250$ from that warrenty into a better video card or speakers. i highly recommend the z680's logitech.

Alex,

He's getting a laptop...he's already got the best card they offer.

And the 3-year warranty is worth it in my opinion. When you're talking about a laptop, its a different animal completely. Servicing a desktop is very easy in comparison.

trust me...laptop repairs cost A LOT. stick with the 3 yr warrenty, buy your external wireless card somewhere else...you can get one that supports 108 mb/s G, and go for a nice pair of headphones instead of speakers. i have a pair of sony MDR v700dj that work like a charm.

I don't know much about laptops, so don't take advice from me. but if you are in college, I would highly highly highly recommend good speakers... probably headphones as well.

Id go with 1yr warrenty. Besides saving some cash.(which is hard to do with AW) if laptops go wrong its either from the begging or after a few months. In my experince if a laptop lasts 1year no hardware problems they have lasted 4years+ before it starts to wear down. EG hd noise.