New Alienware m15 - 2018 with 8th Gen Intel core i7

Those shiny bezels are absolutely stupid looking.
I really hope AW does something about them when they eventually update them with the 2xxx series cards.
Those 2 reasons are holding me back from ordering, I just can’t picture myself ordering without a next gen GPU now matter how impressive the 1xxx series has been. I already have a pretty good GTX 1070 laptop so I’m in no rush.

 

get the matte black 3m wrap and take your time and wrap it. Its easy to do.

https://www.amazon.com/3M-M12-MATTE...qid=1540738624&s=Automotive&sr=1-6&ref=sr_1_6

 

I emailed dbrand about the AW m15 and they said they might do skins for it so it'll be easy to hide them hopefully.

 

Yes I did also and they replied they have not had enough request at this time, so I suggest anyone buying to email them and ask for them to add support for m15.

 

Problems as I see them:

They Half committed to the slim bezel thing. I mean go all out and reduce the top and bottom as well (just narrow enough for webcam is fine). Max out at a full power GTX 1060 if you need to. This would have further reduced profile and weight. As of now it looks like a cheap knockoff of a premium product.

Still no vapor chambers on Alienware. Only thing that sets it apart from competition is the AGA port in the back.

They should have gone HDR or something special for the Panel if this is replacing AW 13 (given that they say OLED is not available)

From videos, it looks like the keyboard is a big downgrade... Also why the heck did they feel the need for numpad when that space could be used for better keys.

 

Well said 100% could not agree more!

 

Man you make some solid points! Could you imagine it with vapor chamber and an oled panel oh man that would be sweet!

Sent from my SM-N960U1 using Tapatalk

 

You make some great points and for me in particular the keyboard! I would have much preferred a decent keyboard centered with a centered trackpad and then a pair of decent up firing speakers rather than the anemic looking speakers they crammed in the bottom.

I know it is a gaming machine but I am waiting for someone to make a great all round package that I can game on, work on and play media on. Sick of running a gaming notebook and a MacBook for work/media

 

Look at razer blade, same form factor, high powered, can get with vapor chamber + gtx 1070 but it is pricey

 

If the Alienware m15 doesnt work out I will probably try it next. Still using my blade pro with raidriar modified bios which is serving me well but I would love to shave some size and weight from it

 

For screen they are limited what manufacturers offers them. There are no 15inch oled panels and HDR panels available.

The chassis looks very good though, the magnesium top and bottom. Kinda wanna try it out as a second laptop because of that.

 

The Lenovo X1 Extreme has a 15" HDR Dolby Vision panel.

Also, saying a panel isn't "available" isn't much of an excuse for a company as big as Dell/Alienware. They are supposed to be making technologies available by innovating (or moving forward) and investing in having these things developed and made.

A 13" OLED panel was not available until Dell paid for one to be developed for example.

I feel now Dellienware is simply following the pack instead of offering anything new with their last few refreshes of hardware.

 

The Oled 13inch panel was made for tablets and Dell picked one up.....Thats also the main reason why it was only available in the AW13. It was made for Samsung tablets originally.

The costs/benefits are not there for a compute rmanufacturer for getting into the screen business with. Its extremely expensive.

The Lenovo doesnt offer true HDR, it doesnt have the screen brightness for it which sucks. You kinda need a screen that can go all the way near to 1000nits to create that contrast between bright and dark scenes. With a screen in the Lenovo it pretty much only has a wider color gamut.

 

The Samsung Galaxy Book came/comes in 10" and 12" variants. Was there another 13" tablet available? I am almost positive there wasn't... also the 14" OLED Lenovo was a one off too.

The OLED HP Spectre never made it to the market as far as I am aware.

I could be wrong

 

Wow, not much love for the m15 here!

I'm looking for a new thin and light gaming\content creation laptop now. I narrowed it down to the blade 15 with 144hz screen and 1070 max q or the m15. You can get the same set up with the m15 but for £150 cheaper than the blade.

Main difference is the blade is much smaller (like 4cm height, almost 1cm wide and 4mm thinner!) for travelling, and I'd have to replace the SSD with a 1tb stick. But the m15 has 2 m.2 slots, and an ethernet socket!

I know classic alienwarA fans are annoyed they've brought out a thin and light model. But if you remove that passion would you still get an Alienware over a razer?

 

Personally I can't see why anyone would choose an m15 over the razer unless Money is an issue,or you want a full keyboard with numpad, or you need a few extra hours of battery life (which is nice)
But I have an m15 coming and I have a blade 15 but I have the spare cash and I like to play with new systems, I get bored and my 17% off coupon with the extra discounts they had made it an easy order to cure my boredom for a few weeks lol.
and who knows I may fall in love with the m15 and toss my blade over to a family member or employee in need of a system? But I really doubt that will happen as I love my blade, its solid and sure it had heat issues but after tweaking and repad, repaste, It runs below 90cpu and in the lower 70's gpu and that's overclocked 220/600 on GPU. If I can get the M15 to perform better than that than I will keep it.

 

2 reasons, Razer laptops are notoriously unreliable. Granted any brand out their has their lemons. But Razer laptops had design flaws which werent fixable for even the most experience tinkerers out there. VGA bioses that got too hot because they where located under the heatsink etc, hell even jumper wires soldered on a motherboard to rectify board issues and they didnt want to throw away fauly boards.

Last but not least, their worst in industry support, 1 year warranty etc. Again horror stories surround any brand. But Razer is a step more in the wrong direction.

Granted I like how the Razer Blade looks, it still runs hot and its not known yet if they finally really fixed all their previous issues.

 

Maybe it will change with the coming m17 ?

 

LOL never would have thought below 90C was actually a good thing.

I remember when we used to say below 70C years ago.

 

It's not a good thing...target is always below 80 to be safe, below 70 to be optimal. 80+ is insane and anybody telling you differently is kidding themselves. I would not use a laptop that routinely hits 80s-90s or tjunction. I did that with Alienware 17 R2, I nearly burned myself more than once from how HOT that thing ran. Entire laptop industry is moving in the wrong direction on several fronts.

Razer has its share of problems. End user support is junk, warranty claims are a hassle, machines throttle out of the box and run way too hot. But they are probably the best BGA book for enthusiasts, mainly because Razer is so kind as to not sign their BIOS files, makes it very, very easy to mod. Heatsinks (for RBP, and for new RB 15) are excellent fit and finish, paired with liquid metal and an undervolt, can achieve below 80C full load. The build quality of the case, blows anything Alienware can offer out of the water. Solid CNC milled aluminum has no replacement, especially not with el-cheapo glossy swiss-cheese-hole plastic.All they need to do is up their nearly non-existent quality control.

 

The reason why over 80c now is okay because of the change in chip production. They dont degrade and burn up like the older chips used to do. Also different solder. Solder was a bit issue after the EU forced lead free solder and the chips where designed for it yet. That doesnt mean all components ofcourse are allowed to get that hot.

The AW17R2 became hot after a while because of the motherboard VRM's and the location (at least on my models) even though the CPU was around 80c which I do think is perfectly fine, the system was heating up at the spots where the DC-in cable was located and the whole powercircuitry around it.

 

Oh of course. I have a 2013 15" Macbook Pro that hits 99C all the time even with a IC Diamond repaste. I use my M18xR2 for most of my stuff. I personally don't like above 70C.

I made sure my P870DM3 ran everything in the low 70s with 7700K @ 5.0Ghz and 2x 1080s. Took a lot of work. Today's laptops run too hot. I just find it funny the industry is all okay with 90C temps.

I don't agree with this. I don't think newer chips are better. I think everyone just raised the bar to what's acceptable. I've hit 105C on accident on my 3840QM and it just thermal shut down. Still runs 3.9Ghz on all cores fine.

I've had a C2Q chip hit 110C for a few seconds once..still ran fine after LOL

 

Its not a factor of what you think its acceptable. It was a factor that the flipchip designs of 5 to 10 years ago had issues with the solder and thus chip dying from hto temps. That doesnt happen now anymore unless it goes over 100c. The 8800GTX chip whoes are a perfect example of this. The solder would crack from the repeated thermal cycles after they switched to lead fee solder. The chip design did not incorporate fix for this yet such as underfills, margins for thermal expansion, chip internals shifting due to heat etc. This killed the chips. Now they did fix this and now it isnt nearly as big of an issue anymore. Did you come across an actual CPU dying? I to be honest never saw a CPU dying the past 5 years? They do run hotter than ever simply because the smaller die size is harder to cool. Current CPU's are a quarter of the size of what the Sandy Bridge generation was for example.YOu do see PCH's controllers die from time to time because they are made on older production nodes.

 

I don't see CPUs die, never. I do see many supporting components die, that heat generated moves by convection and starts destroying other things that are not as stout at the CPU. ROHS has not been a problem for nvidia since 7000 series, and not for AMD since 6000 series.

 

The 8800GTX was notorious for solder issues....

But yeah you are right like I also stated not all components can survive the heat. But in general manufacturers do tend to think about this nowadays luckily.

 

Haha! Thanks for the replies guys! I guess theres no right or wrong answer here then. Razer if you want smaller and better build quality. But you have to be wary of a rubbish warranty and likely breaks. Whereas Alienware if you want the bigger battery, and a better warranty support.

Hoping to buy on black friday so I've got a week to decide! And at this point i could pretty much flip a coin!

 

I wouldnt say the razer has a better build.... They use fairly soft aluminum.

 

This’s true, Blade 15 has super thin bottom cover lid which I think I can bend it easily unlike stealth late 2016 that i have, its speaker also worse than that smaller size ultrabook, i believe they reduce those aspects to gain lighter and smaller body, especially since there’s a huge new vapor chamber there, Base model Blade 15 without it weight less even though it’s thicker.

 

I wonder if thats the piece they held up on the Alienware m15 ama? They were waving a bottom plate around saying how flimsy aluminium is and that's why they were using magbesmag alloy.

 

No Black Friday deals on this model? Anyone see anything? Thanks, N123

 

It’s in Germany, -15% from Dell plus some local discount code.
https://www.mydealz.de/deals/dell-a...tx-256-gb-ssd-i8750-statt-197799-euro-1278755

 

A big thanks to @OWNORDISOWN for unboxing and showing thermal performance.

 

AW could probably take a page from Razer's design team

 

No it’s really different design language imo, Alienware just joined finally thin light category gaming laptops like MSI, Gigabyte and Asus did since 2 years ago I believe, since big tank design was Alienware image before. I actually like that Alienware existence and looks though, some users prefer the big laptops form factor, made thin one made me thinking loosing its durability.

 

Alienware joined thin and light early 2015 when they pushed out everything soldered in their Echo models with Hybrid Power design + too weak PSU. They couldn't even add in 4 ram slots due the chassis design.

@VICKYGAMEBOY has the official notebook record regardless brand with +15 motherboard replacements. None above or beyond.

 

Add +3 to the list.

 

Wait...How many laptops he had!? When counted from 2015 when he joined the forum it means 3,75 motherboards per year, almost 1 mobo per Quartal...I think I’m lucky enough having 4 laptops, the newest main ones just passed half year playing games mostly on high 80ish cpu temperature. 50 50 with egpu setting...But my rtx card on the enclosure that often save the cpu temperature through egpu setting just rip , almost 2 weeks on evga hand, damn I need it back!!

 

Wait...How many laptops he had!? When counted from 2015 when he joined the forum it means 3,75 motherboards per year, almost 1 mobo per Quartal...I think I’m lucky enough having 4 laptops, the newest main ones just passed half year playing games mostly on high 80ish cpu temperature. 50 50 with egpu setting...But my rtx card on the enclosure that often save the cpu temperature through egpu setting just rip , almost 2 weeks on evga hand, damn I need it back!!

 

He had odd throttling even with temps under 50C. Still has them. He got ripped off when Dell cancelled his extended warranty midway after he asked for too many mobos in a span of 4 months.

 

Thermal or power limit? Power limit throttling is known on Blade 15 and I think from ownordisown later video about m15, it use similar tdp lock setting (on Blade 15 it’s on balanced mode, idk on m15) that lock tdp to around 25 watt to keep cpu temperatures lower, but I think it’s on 8750H only, on my previous 7700HQ I didn’t see one, it’s shows also on cpu load in lower temperatures like 70ish or lower, noticed sometimes when I check xtu.

 

I don't know. He had AW 15 r1 and r2

 

Dell engineers never fixed the flaws. As long 100% wasn't affected by the issue they just gave you the middle finger!

From @Lord Zog

 

i still have them, with bunch of old 14 and 11x as well, ive gone too far, it now history, future is forsaken.. dell XPS team helps design alienware model.. so no thanks.. i rather buy a custom built laptop and take care of it myself..

 

I already left gaming on a laptop on newer tech hardwares. I will be getting a desktop and a BGA like Walmart's notebook for 600$ and 2yr US warranty. No AW,Asus,MSI or even Razer blade.

 

cannot believe how expensive laptops have become these days for the junk performance, while on mobile side they are improving in a different way.. i saw a walmart gaming laptop beat a alienware m15 in scores for almost 75% of the price.. rofl.. even im gonna build a new desktop, after i join new job lol..

 

And same 6 core i7-8750H perform better in the cheaper and slimmer Dell XPS models than in the more expencive and bigger Alienware 17R5.

 

https://wccftech.com/nvidia-geforce-rtx-2080-2070-2060-mxm-mobility-specs-leaked/

 

I just bought the m15 and I'm already having doubts. Can anyone help?

I sometimes spend long periods off-grid, and use one of those readily available DC-DC converters to power my past (mostly Asus) laptops from a 12 volts DC supply. It's always worked great, once you find a converter with a plug/tip that matches the DC plug that connects to the laptop's power socket. (Usually DC-DC converters come with a selection of tips to match the plugs of a variety of laptop manufacturers.)

So I'm now looking for a similar solution for my new m15, but there are a couple of snags:

1. The included m15 AC power supply is rated at 9.23 amps DC output which is quite a bit more than my past laptops, and more than the max output current of all of the DC-DC converters I can find. I don't think this will be a problem as I will probably just be using it to charge the m15 or using it for very light work, so I guess the current draw will be fairly low.

2. Does anyone know if the m15 DC power plug/tip is a standard Dell type? It is quite a bit bigger than my existing laptops, so I'm worried that it might be a new plug specifically for the m15 that I will not be able to find a match for in any DC-DC converter.

3. I've found mention that some/all Dell laptops have some sort of digital interface in their AC power supplies, so the laptop will refuse to work with non-Dell power supplies. This would obviously prevent me from using a DC-DC converter, Does anyone know if the m15 has this abomination, or should I be OK to use a "generic" power supply with it ?

Thanks for any helpful comments.

 

There are some disassembly pictures in this Alienware M15 review http://gadgetmix.com/alienware-m15-review-disassembly-benchmark/1527/