*OFFICIAL* Alienware 17 R2/R3 Owner's Lounge

I gave a mini set of */10 a few posts up. I don't have a good set of software to do a solid review, but I'd be willing to answer what I can.

Right now my thoughts is that this laptop is actually almost exactly what I was looking for. I've basically disliked past models for one reason or another. This one has what I want covered.

As far as desktop replacement, I'm one of those people that think it just isn't possible. Laptops are really great in their capabilities given their portability, but you can't beat a desktop

Yeah it's pretty bad. But it's really on the bottom of my lists as far as priorities. I've never had a laptop where if I was looking for good sound I wouldn't opt for my earphones / headphones or desktop speakers.

 

How long did you guys sit in "in production" status before your laptop was shipped out? Also, anyone get one in (or shipped) yet with the 4980 processor?

 

You may want to check your status. Mine just got pushed to the 20th. It was supposed to be delivered tomorrow. I think yours went from pre production to production about the same time as mine.

 

My first AW17 stay in production only one day cause it was just the base model without any upgrade. The second one stay in production 3 days, cause it was the base model plus TrueLife.

 

just a question regarding the alienware 17 R2 2015
i read there are 4x M2 ssd slots, but can they be put into raid??

 

Can somebody with the true life (glare) Display make a few photos of the viewing angles (in a bright room)? maybe during a game that we can see the colours and the brightness?

 

I sat in production about 6 business days for the base model.

 

I have TrueLife, and i'll make photos for you this evening (hope i remember to take photos )

 

No.

 

Why do you say that, an interested party

 

Ahh, mine has been screwed up from the get go so my est delivery date hasn't told me anything. I'm still showing a 3/6 delivery. That's mainly why I was asking how long everyone has been seeing production last. I'm sure it will be here before 3/6...just no idea when.

 

You still don't have yours? Mine is coming today...

 

Please take a lot of photos from different angulations to let us undestand if it's actually a display or a mirror

@starrk I'm going to order the tier 3 this friday: GTX 980M, i7 4980HQ, 8gb RAM plus TrueLife display.

Do you guys think it will be a problem to explain that I want it to ship directly with the 240W AC?

 

Red, do you like matte or glossy? I like TrueLife cause is not too glossy as many people think

 

I definitely like glossy because I love contrast and usually is better for showing a true and deep black color wich is what I really pretend from a display.

Honestly I'm afraid for the glossy surface of the display, I'm not confident with mirroring myself while the screen is black with my actual monitor, is the surface made by glass?

This is why I'm very curious to see your photos about the TrueLife.

 

Nope still don't have it or a firm delivery date other than 3/6 on the website. Did you order the 4980 or 4710 processor?

 

@Red Pyr4mid I have no idea if it will work or not, but it's definitely worth a try! It would be way better to receive it with the system as opposed to waiting to receive your laptop, and then filing a request for the 240 PSU and waiting another week to receive it.

 

168 hours without laptop for not having an AC? I'm too young to commit suicide right now

 

I ordered the Transcend 256 M.2 SSD (believe the 80mm is the measurement) and so far pretty happy with it's price / storage and performance. I'm suprised to hear the complaints about sound being muffled. I did try to push the "subwoofer" if you want to call it that, but I wouldn't say the sound is muffled. Maybe I need to do some comparisons to what you are listening to and come back with my findings.

 

I did compare sound as well, between my new AW17r2 and my old 17R3 (back from mid 2011) --- and, even though I have an "elephant ear" I must say that I can hear the difference, old alienware have better, more rich (deep) sound when using Spotify...

 

Hi Red, here we are. I've taken your photos.

1. As you can see in first photo i've taken on extremely light, the source is just above the laptop. So it's the worst condition.
2. As you can see, when gaming right front of screen there aren't any glossy issue. I find the game really good looking.
3. All the games are in full HD (1920*1080) resolution.
4. Hope my work will help you

WP_20150211_20_07_35_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:16 PM

WP_20150211_21_35_09_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:17 PM

WP_20150211_20_07_17_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_05_15_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_05_07_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_05_02_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_04_09_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_03_34_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_03_28_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

WP_20150211_20_02_21_Pro by Flaick posted Feb 11, 2015 at 9:13 PM

 

thx for the photos...but...i thought you have the 2015 AW17 with touch true life display... if i see it right u have the 2014 AW17?

 

Would you happen to have a link?

Possibly I'm just being too critical on the sound. I have nice speakers on my desktop, surround for my main TV and another surround set for my projector system. These are the kind of speakers I listen to on a daily basis, almost never laptop sound. That said, even when I take into consideration the speakers are from a laptop, I just don't think they're any good.

I tested a range of songs, ones with heavy bass, ones with not so much bass and another example is a strictly guitar only with vocals. None of it sounded good IMO. I would be weary that I am playing YouTube vids but I've played these exact same songs on other computers so I know it is not the videos.

 

Yes i have the 2014 model. It's the TrueLife 3D 120Hz (no touch).

 

yeah i see but the 120hz is not IPS like the 2015 true life with touch

 

Ok so because I love you guys, I busted out what resources I have (aka laptops) to do a comparison for sound. This is purely subjective so keep that in mind. 3 of these laptops are work related so I don't have a sickness... I don't think

2012 MBA 13" > M14x R2 > Dell Latitude 6530 (15") > Alienware 17 R2 > Dell Latitude E6430 (13") >= Dell Latitude XT3 (13")

 

Really man? He does all that work to show you what Trulife does and you think the results are invalid? It's a photo, even if it was on a CRT you can see the effect it has on reflections.

Maybe this will help you with your decision? http://www.screentekinc.com/dell-truelife-lcd-screens.shtml

 

The CES video shows a better view on the glossy screen here. Pretty darn bright and very good color production on the alien logo.

 

@Micky: i think you missunderstood me i am realy thankful for his work. But i asked for a photo from the viewing angles of the true life display... and this is the thread for the 2015 AW17 so i thought its clear that i mean the 2015 true life IPS display. Yeah both are true life... but the 2014 is a TN and the 2015 is an IPS display and there is a huge difference.

 

Only reason I didn't opt for TrueLife is because it has the same brightness (at least based on specs). Since that wasn't a factor, I prefer matte to glossy so it made my choice pretty simple, even if the TrueLife does look a little better.

I really like the matte screen, I personally see no reason to upgrade unless you want touch or you really just want to go for the best available because you can

 

OK but a 'huge difference' (that personally I cannot actually see) in the source or technology is not going to effect whether you see reflections or not with the truelife technology.

If you like to move your machine around in differing lighting conditions go matte. Sedentary, low light gaming only, go glossy. The truelife bit is just an addon to reduce those reflections. Mine does not even have truelife but I can put up with the occasional reflection for the superior gaming experience .

HTH.

Edit: To add some value, If I did the same pictures you'd never buy one! I'm happy but a lot of people would not be...

 

again: look at the last page i asked not for a photo to see the reflections...that was @Red Pyr4mid. I only wanted to see a photo from the side to check the viewing angles

but the posted video helps a lot. The panel looks great. I think i go with the glare panel. I prefere glare because of the better colours and better contrast

 

Yes, based on the brightness specs they are the same. It's the contrast and colour differential that gets lost behind a matte finish. Really a purist thing but I haven't come across a single person that did not say the glossy just looked brighter and crisper than matte.

I think if I travelled with this machine I would have thrown it

If matte is your choice then that's great, you have the technology that works for you

 

Yeah it really is preference. I had the M17x R2 RGB screen and I'd probably opt for the matte just because I prefer it that much.

And honestly this matte finish is a little shiny. It really is well done. No grain at all.

 

Sorry, yes the photos don't help much with a different model in that respect.

Glad to hear you are moving away from the 'dark' side .

 

could anyone make a youtube video with a review of their new AW 17 R2 ?
i'm dying to see it in real life

 

http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-MTS...=1423696711&sr=8-1&keywords=transcend+256+m.2 and wouldn't you know it's 15$ cheaper now than when i bought it... sonofa...
So I compared the sound between my 2009 mbp, M17xR3 and 17r2 and the 17r2 is easily the best of the three. I get that you are used to desktop or actual speakers, but the sound on this system while not amazing, isn't the worst I've seen nor is it the best. Bass response was actually present (no thump don't get me wrong) but it sounds clear, not distorted and I can actually hear the bass track even if it isn't louder than me tapping on the palm wrest lol.

 

Honeslty my concerns about reflections on the TrueLife display have muffled after analyzing the CES video posted by @Fragster, let me show you with the correct timecode:

(4m 40secs - 4m 46secs)

If you look at the video - 6 seconds - in that section the display brightness isn't too high, the laptops are placed on a table in a brightly lit room, you'll see that the reflection level in this problematic situation is totally reasonable in my humble opinion.

 

I will try to do so this weekend. Just been really busy at work. If someone beats me to it that's cool, but I'll just plan on putting something together either way

 

Thanks for the link. Did you have to order screws?

 

Do the online chat with Amazon. They will refund you the difference. After reading your post about the price drop, I contacted them via chat. Received the $15 refund with absolutely no hassle. I ordered a week ago.

 

maybe the display brightness is dimmed because of staying on the table without mouse movement?

 

4710.


So I got my laptop today. It's a pretty neat device. However I heard something rattling around inside it when I took it out of the box. I put my SSD in it and come to the conclusion the rattling must have been something on the motherboard. I still can use it but it BSODs or randomly shuts off. So I guess it has to go back. :'(

 

Maybe, the important is that we can see how the TrueScreen reflects while not at full brightness (brightness overrides reflexes) in a bright location and as I wrote the result is very good = not too many reflexes.

 

I spoke with tech support, looks like my machine may end up going out for repairs or they may replace it with a new one. Sigh, back to the waiting game again I guess maybe unless I just want a flat out refund.

 

That's terrible! I'm so sorry to hear that. Hopefully they will send you a new one, and let you keep the original while you wait on the new replacement.

 

Oh man that stinks =(

 

Wish you good luck dude.

 

Thanks for the heads up on that. I was outside the "7" day order window but they did a one time exception.

 

I have the same drive ordered from 'Zon. So how did you move the OS to the new SSD drive? I've been reading the other sticky using the usb recovery disk but not sure if I have to put both
drives in and then do a clean install on the m.2 SSD ?? Is this correct?

- Power down laptop..remove battery..insert m.2 SSD into bay (leave the stock 1TB as it is)
- Put battery back, power on...stick recovery USB stick and boot off from there.
- Install OS from recovery disk to new m.2 SSD ....
- Change boot order to m.2 SSD drive as primary
- Boot from SSD and then install all drivers, alienware spawn, etc ....

I guess with this, you stock OS is intact on the 1TB drive but you can still use the rest of the drive for data?

Thanks and congrats on your R17