So as a long time gamer/computer geek I have found myself in a bit of a dilemma lately. I have been using OSX for the last few years, and carry around a MacBook Pro on a daily basis. I use a Mac Pro desktop and have been living in a mostly Mac world. And while Unix is a great system, the games I enjoy are Windows based. And while Apple puts some good machines together, they are not a brand that prides themselves on latest and greatest when it comes to gaming performance.
What I have been waiting for is a great portable that would let me take it with me on a daily basis without weighing in at 12-14lbs and would still be able to handle anything I threw at it.
Welcome the Alienware m15x.
I ordered the machine fully blown out, but apparently missed the option for the 1920x1200 display. When the machine showed up, I called Alienware and went over the build sheet with Customer Service. Basically, they said they would be happy to charge me 300.00 for the upgraded screen (they charged me for the 1440x900 and I didn't catch it) and I would send in my system and they would have it back to me in 2-3 weeks. I told them I would call them back.
Then something bad happened. I got addicted to the damn machine
Most reviews here aren't going to talk about the OS. I am going to include some comments on the OS as I see it as part of the experience. Im running Vista Home Premium on this box. Now few people are Windows haters like me. I like the warm blanket of OSX when it comes to security, spyware, and viruses. But so far I will be the first to admit that Alienware has done an outstanding job of optmizing Vista for their platform, and it runs like a monster. It helps that the machine has 4 gigs of ram, but OSX is no different in that regard. Frankly I was stunned at how responsive the machine is. I do alot of multi-tasking, and this machine regularly runs with Pidgin, iTunes, Google Chrome (WooT!), and Windows Mail at the same time. CPU usage is rarely over 20% on either core with about 1 gig of ram in use under these conditions.
The 7200 rpm hard drive screams as well. The system in general is very snappy. I ordered a few add on's for this machine. One is the secondary battery, as well as the additional 500 gig hard drive for the expansion port. The secondary battery basically doubles the battery life. I am a user of Sprint's mobile broadband card (seen in the picture as one of the USB dongles) and with the dual battery's I regularly find myself at a local coffee house with some friends testing Wrath of the Lich King. With the settings on "balanced" I get about 3 hours of play time on the 3g connection and I don't even want to get started with the frame rates. Some of you out there are waving your arms going "Thrawn! It's just WOW. It doesn't tax your system!" Doom on you mister editor. Lich King pushes your system pretty hard, but it doesn't keep me from getting 350 fps at 1440x900 (I was friggin' slack jawed when I saw that number in fraps.)
I regularly dock this system with a Saitek keyboard and a 24" Samsung display that kicks out 1920x1200 at 6ms. I was still getting over 200fps on those settings, with frames dropping no lower then 130 in Orgrimmar (For The Horde!).
For fun, I installed Warhammer Online and had the settings up at 1920x1200 on the external display. Now Warhammer's client is definitely not as optimized yet and the graphics are bit higher end, but I was still rolling over 100fps steadily at 1920x1200. Hard to complain about that.
I installed Oblivion, and at 1440x900 I was rolling a steady 60fps. I think that Oblivion might cap the fps, because it was just maxed at 60 all the time. I will have to get back there and see if I had some kind of VSync on or something. It felt like there was more fps to be had, and something was limiting it. But no matter what I did, it never went above or below 60.
I have Crysis installed, but haven't launched it yet. I'll be curious to see what she puts up in that one. I also have Space Seige, Stalker: Clear Sky, Mercenaries 2, Lost Planet, Mass Effect, Bioshock and HL2 to install yet. So more numbers from all that testing to come shortly.
So the Blue Ray drive: Heaven. I have been doing some web design for my blog, and regularly throw a movie on in the upper left corner. The first one I rolled was Transporter. It looked killer. The system shipped with Cyberlink Power DVD and it seems to work very well. I'll run Ironman, AVP2, and a few others later to make sure they all work. But so far I've run about 3 blue ray disks with zero issues. I can resize them in real time, move them around, and haven't been able to make anything crash. This is all in addition to the four or five other programs I'll be running while watching the movie and resizing stuff. Pretty stout!
3DMark 2006 put up 10267, which seems pretty strong to me. Im using the 167.55 NVidia drivers, and I see that there may be some newer stuff out there. Anyone have any driver comments? Anything I should upgrade to thats stable and doesn't break the BlueRay?
In all, this machine goes everywhere with me. I use it as a daily driver at work now, have it with me in the messenger bag when I hang out with friends at coffee, and dock it as a desktop at home in the evenings. It seems to do basically everything exceptionally well. I haven't used either of my Macs in over a week...which I would have NEVER thought possible.
Amazing what a kickass machine Alienware has in the m15x. Definitely not the last machine I will buy from them!
What I have been waiting for is a great portable that would let me take it with me on a daily basis without weighing in at 12-14lbs and would still be able to handle anything I threw at it.
Welcome the Alienware m15x.
I ordered the machine fully blown out, but apparently missed the option for the 1920x1200 display. When the machine showed up, I called Alienware and went over the build sheet with Customer Service. Basically, they said they would be happy to charge me 300.00 for the upgraded screen (they charged me for the 1440x900 and I didn't catch it) and I would send in my system and they would have it back to me in 2-3 weeks. I told them I would call them back.
Then something bad happened. I got addicted to the damn machine
Most reviews here aren't going to talk about the OS. I am going to include some comments on the OS as I see it as part of the experience. Im running Vista Home Premium on this box. Now few people are Windows haters like me. I like the warm blanket of OSX when it comes to security, spyware, and viruses. But so far I will be the first to admit that Alienware has done an outstanding job of optmizing Vista for their platform, and it runs like a monster. It helps that the machine has 4 gigs of ram, but OSX is no different in that regard. Frankly I was stunned at how responsive the machine is. I do alot of multi-tasking, and this machine regularly runs with Pidgin, iTunes, Google Chrome (WooT!), and Windows Mail at the same time. CPU usage is rarely over 20% on either core with about 1 gig of ram in use under these conditions.
The 7200 rpm hard drive screams as well. The system in general is very snappy. I ordered a few add on's for this machine. One is the secondary battery, as well as the additional 500 gig hard drive for the expansion port. The secondary battery basically doubles the battery life. I am a user of Sprint's mobile broadband card (seen in the picture as one of the USB dongles) and with the dual battery's I regularly find myself at a local coffee house with some friends testing Wrath of the Lich King. With the settings on "balanced" I get about 3 hours of play time on the 3g connection and I don't even want to get started with the frame rates. Some of you out there are waving your arms going "Thrawn! It's just WOW. It doesn't tax your system!" Doom on you mister editor. Lich King pushes your system pretty hard, but it doesn't keep me from getting 350 fps at 1440x900 (I was friggin' slack jawed when I saw that number in fraps.)
I regularly dock this system with a Saitek keyboard and a 24" Samsung display that kicks out 1920x1200 at 6ms. I was still getting over 200fps on those settings, with frames dropping no lower then 130 in Orgrimmar (For The Horde!).
For fun, I installed Warhammer Online and had the settings up at 1920x1200 on the external display. Now Warhammer's client is definitely not as optimized yet and the graphics are bit higher end, but I was still rolling over 100fps steadily at 1920x1200. Hard to complain about that.
I installed Oblivion, and at 1440x900 I was rolling a steady 60fps. I think that Oblivion might cap the fps, because it was just maxed at 60 all the time. I will have to get back there and see if I had some kind of VSync on or something. It felt like there was more fps to be had, and something was limiting it. But no matter what I did, it never went above or below 60.
I have Crysis installed, but haven't launched it yet. I'll be curious to see what she puts up in that one. I also have Space Seige, Stalker: Clear Sky, Mercenaries 2, Lost Planet, Mass Effect, Bioshock and HL2 to install yet. So more numbers from all that testing to come shortly.
So the Blue Ray drive: Heaven. I have been doing some web design for my blog, and regularly throw a movie on in the upper left corner. The first one I rolled was Transporter. It looked killer. The system shipped with Cyberlink Power DVD and it seems to work very well. I'll run Ironman, AVP2, and a few others later to make sure they all work. But so far I've run about 3 blue ray disks with zero issues. I can resize them in real time, move them around, and haven't been able to make anything crash. This is all in addition to the four or five other programs I'll be running while watching the movie and resizing stuff. Pretty stout!
3DMark 2006 put up 10267, which seems pretty strong to me. Im using the 167.55 NVidia drivers, and I see that there may be some newer stuff out there. Anyone have any driver comments? Anything I should upgrade to thats stable and doesn't break the BlueRay?
In all, this machine goes everywhere with me. I use it as a daily driver at work now, have it with me in the messenger bag when I hang out with friends at coffee, and dock it as a desktop at home in the evenings. It seems to do basically everything exceptionally well. I haven't used either of my Macs in over a week...which I would have NEVER thought possible.
Amazing what a kickass machine Alienware has in the m15x. Definitely not the last machine I will buy from them!
