Alienware Skylake

Any clue on future Alienware laptops with DDR4 and Skylake processors and when they will be coming?
Also any idea when the next nvidia laptop gpu will be coming out?

 

when both Intel and Nvidia release them at a guess?

 

Hoping drives will be PCI e 3.0 and they will bring raid back.

 

I am also hoping that they switch from SATA 3 to PCIe 3.0 on the M.2 slots. Its stupid on Alienware's part to stick to SATA for them. I am also hoping that they will switch to USB 3.1.

 

I'll share your suggestions with the developers. Thanks!

 

It's usless to depend on Aw for Skylake after what they have done with this HQ crippled lineup.
There are much better options out there, MSI / Clevo (the best money can buy ).

 

Sure if you like cheaply made and tacky cases.............

 

Is it better with massive throttling?

 

Spoiler: Truth

As an AW17 user coming from an M15x or comparing with an M17x R4 / M18x R2. I've noticed a ton of changes to the machine,
It's not like I hate my AW17, I like this machine but there are some serious trade offs & people need to know the truth that's in front of them, If people ignore the AW's greed things will get irrepairable damage (It's already in progress..Thnx to Privatised Dell Inc.)

- No sleep wake up with keypress in Haswell 2014 machines (joke of the decade)
- BIOS CMOS reset never works (CPU, RAM OC are bit hard, hard reset is a massive pain in the arse) & NVRAM BIOS with secure flash, Things are way nasty...
- Build quality ?, my old M15x was stronger outside and bottom (Full body anodized AL not just a fancy lid) than this new chassis.
- EC fan tables messed up / crippled (I'm happy that atleast the Ranger /Viking (too bad they killed the flagship and the representative machine of the brand...) machines got a BIOS updates to fix the huuuge flaws before) unlike the older legacy machines have full HWinfo control (clevos also miss that control from start, It's a niche feature for AW consumers and they ruined the user experience).
All this is on the 2013-14 PFGA / MXM machines. The list is infinite when it comes to the newer BGA crippled machines.

Believe me, Once you go with an P377SM-A / P570WM (The Devil ) / P7xxZM there will be no coming back (Prema BIOS mods, very good upgradable features over this UEFI infected Maxwell GOP requirements, throttle fested machine with maxwell unless a custom vBIOS mod and the Sandy gen machines are dead-end regarding updates on hardware and BIOS updates..with AMA feats and lame excuses.

And that's it

 

I have an m17x R3 at the moment and the reviews of the Alienware 17 R2 and my own experience of my current machine is pushing me back towards Clevo for my next laptop.

The things that personally concern me is Alienware has the worst temperature regulation of the top end laptops. They need to change their thermal design and give user controlled profiles of fan speed (like HWinfo does).

If I buy the 17 R2 I have to then think about the additional cost of changing over to M.2 SSD as you can only fit 1 normal SSD.

The constant problems I've had trying to update AMD graphic drivers because Dell decides that it needs its own special graphics driver for some reason which it can never be bothered to update frequently. Over time I have spent hours trying to upgrade to the latest AMD drivers, forcing the machine through BSoDs. In end I just had to remove dell driver completely and replace with a Leshcatlab driver, which means I lose laptop brightness control except through AMD software (a small price to pay).

The ridiculous situation of shipping the 17 R2 with a power supply that is inadequate to run both CPU and GPU. They should really do a recall of these power supplies rather than letting customer trying to figure this out themselves, if they realise at all.

I'm sure I've missed some things out, but these are the main issues of the top of my head. I feel that the competition is catching up and in some areas surpassing Alienware now.

 

not sure why you guys rag on AW? laptops are going bga and AW cant do anything about it. Intel's using its monopoly to dictate what the market should do. They have been flogging quads since 2007 for gods sake

 

Are you fully aware that there is Dellienware who is responsible for delivering a bios with a proper fan profile and power settings? Dell does not even follow Intel's own specifications when it comes to these Bga processors. Quite ingenious; Create handicapped power settings in the new "modern" hybrid bios because Dell delivered the new Aw laptop with a too weak 180w psu and shared pipes, heatsink for the cpu and gpu. Dell to blame on this... Sorry but so it is. Why can't we rag on Dell when they create a crippled product?

 

Well not sure what your actually comparing to but the new sager cases are extremely professional looking and well made. Can't comment on the msi but I prefer sager cases to anything out there right now.

 

They are made of very thin plastic and metal. The one I had was inferior to consumer level HP laptops, and rattled every time that i touched it. The screen lid bent pretty easily and the entire case exhibited nothing that gave me a Premium experience/look. They are the equivalent of putting a V8 engine inside of a Toyota Corolla...........

 

I didn't get that impression from the ones I've seen. The screen had more flex than the Alienware but I can't stand the hokey look of an Alienware, just can't get over having an alien head that is all lit up on my laptop cover.

 

Bring back dual GPU laptops or it'll be a Sager/Clevo for me late 2016

 

I wouldn't recommend Clevo, parts like batteries are of less good quality but spare parts are also more difficult to get after a few years due to the lack of popularity. The styling itself is horrible in my eyes but thats just depending on the eyes of the beholder.

Some Clevo's allso exhibit throttling by the way. But the good part is that it is easier to open.

 

Well again I disagree. Batteries are easy to find but honestly this is the first time I've heard of a complaint on their batteries. Can you site a source showing low quality battery usage in Clevo models? Parts are fairly easy to find for Clevo, but they may be expensive to replace the older they get; however, that brings up another point in favor of the clevos, you can upgrade or continue to replace parts in certain models. This is why a lot of the forum members rail against the new alienware lineup simply because you can't upgrade or replace parts like you could in their older models.

 

You hit the nail on the head . You might as well buy an MSI, Asus, Gigabyte or Lenovo instead for a Aw laptop. Everyone is the likewise but MSI has at least MMX GPU.

 

and there are people that are ok with that too....the mind is boggled!

 

Apart from some models that let you replace the cpu for example its mostly the same as with any notebook manufacturer. The batteries in Clevo machines come from a smaller Taiwanese battery manufacturer which rates its batteries for around 300 cycles. Most bigger laptop manufacturers are surpassing around the 1000 with Samsung batteries going up to 2000 cycles. Still a lot of Clevo models use the typical Li-ion cylinder style cells by the way. The more recent Li-polymer variants often have a bit better lifespan.

But me personally I rather have a bit more slim laptop that has high performance parts which I replace after 2 or 3 years than a big bulky laptop like the bigger Clevo's which do have replaceable parts.

 

Well considering many of the newer clevos are thinner, more powerful, and upgradeable I find them pretty hard to dismiss these days. However, with alienware becoming more reasonably priced and their top notch tech support alienware is still the one to beat, but that lead is starting to slip imo.

 

Still no news on Skylake laptops from any company

 

I bet we will see the first models in october, Dell already announced the XPS 15 with infinity display and skylake processors...