Customer Ratings & Reviews

I've owned several Alienware machines in the past, but never one of their laptops -- they've always just been a bit too heavy and bulky. This new m17 R2 is finally thin and portable enough that I was very excited to get my hands on it. As expected, it has that futuristic-looking Alienware design and excellent performance, but also some drawbacks that are borderline unacceptable at this price point. It's an awesome gaming laptop -- as long as you know what you're buying into. === DESIGN === - I'm a big fan of Alienware's new Lunar Light color. It's kind of an eggshell white with a very nice matte texture. Even the wrist area and keyboard are covered in this beautiful white finish. It's a refreshing change from the typical black color of most gaming laptops. - When closed, the laptop 15.7" wide by 11.6" deep. At under 6 pounds, it must be one of the lightest 17-inch gaming laptops available. - The RGB keyboard looks excellent contrasted against the Lunar Light finish. The LED strip surrounding the black shroud at the rear of the laptop is a great addition, though you really can't see it while using the laptop. The laptop's power button is an Alienware RGB logo that changes colors based on the laptop's status -- for instance, it glows yellow when you are using battery power. - Unfortunately, Alienware's Command Center software used to customize the RGB lighting is horribly confusing and buggy. It often fails to retain my settings, crashes frequently, and required 3 or 4 different updates upon opening it for the first time. - There are plenty of ports available on the m17. On the right: Two USB 3.1 Type-A ports. On the left: One USB 3.1 Type-A port, a gigabit Ethernet jack, and a headphone jack. On the rear: One Thunderbolt 3 port, HDMI, mini DisplayPort, and Alienware's proprietary port for its Graphics Amplifier. - The power brick is huge and must weigh half as much as the laptop itself, but that's one of the tradeoffs of having a laptop this powerful and thin. - Overall: Make room for the power brick in your backpack. Also, I wish there were an additional USB-C port somewhere on the laptop. Alienware also needs to go back to the drawing board on its Command Center software. Those minor things aside, this is an incredible looking laptop with all of the connectivity options that a gamer could need. === DISPLAY, KEYBOARD, & TRACKPAD === - This model is equipped with a 17.3-inch 1080p display running at 144Hz. The display is excellent and I'm very content with 1080p at this size. Colors are rich and vivid, black levels are very deep, and the matte screen does an excellent job reducing glare. There is the tiniest bit of light bleed in the bottom left corner of my display, but it's hardly a deal breaker. Sure, a 4K OLED option would be great, but you would sacrifice refresh rate and battery life. As such, this 1080p panel at 144Hz is a great option. - The keyboard is very large and comfortable. It has a nice amount of travel (reported to be 1.4mm) and it takes a satisfying amount of force to depress the keys. I wish there was some more tactile feedback from the keys, but overall, it's a great keyboard. - The trackpad uses Windows Precision drivers and is outstanding. It works perfectly with gestures and is extremely responsive. - Also standard on the m17 is Tobii eye tracking, located in the bottom bezel below the screen. It looks to be pretty neat technology, but I only own two games that support it: The Division 2 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider. (Fun fact: if you purchase this laptop by November 30, you'll get a free key for Ghost Recon Breakpoint in the Tobii app). In The Division 2, the camera pans based on where you're looking, and staring at the same place long enough brings up the aiming cross-hairs. It's a cool feature to have, but I wouldn't base any laptop/PC purchase solely on this technology. - Overall: Alienware has nailed the basic aspects of a 17-inch laptop with an outstanding display, keyboard, and trackpad. === PERFORMANCE, COOLING, & UPGRADES === - Let's start with the bad stuff: namely, the glaring lack of upgradability. Most notably, the RAM is integrated onto the motherboard and cannot be upgraded past 16GB. Also, this particular m17 model includes a last-generation Wireless AC card, not a next-gen (Wi-Fi 6) AX card. And just like the RAM, the wireless card cannot be upgraded. - The speakers are acceptable, but nothing more. They work fine, but there is noticeable distortion at higher volumes and they sound tinny and hollow to me. - This laptop has some of the most advanced eye tracking technology available for PCs, but it does not support Windows Hello (facial recognition log-in), which boggles my mind. - Now the good stuff: The laptop performs exceptionally well. It has handled every game I've thrown at it with ease. Shadow of the Tomb Raider (high settings; RTX high; 65 fps); Metro Exodus (high settings; RTX high; 50-55 fps); Gears 5 (Ultra settings; 60 fps). An RTX 2080 would have been nice to squeeze out some better ray tracing performance, but I'm perfectly satisfied with the performance of the 2070 and the i7-9750H. - The laptop gets HOT. There's no getting around it. Luckily, the fans aren't overly loud and the speakers easily drown out any fan noise. Most games push the GPU temp to upwards of 75°C, and the CPU to over 80°C. So no, you probably won't want to game with this on your lap. - Battery life what you would expect for a powerful gaming laptop -- acceptable, but nothing more. Browsing the web with the screen at half brightness resulted in about 3.5 hours of battery life. Obviously, gaming is going to result in even shorter battery life - Overall: If it's upgradability you're looking for, you may want to look elsewhere (like Alienware's new Area 51m laptop). Besides adding more SSD storage, you won't be doing any major upgrades to the m17. Luckily, performance out of the box is outstanding and should satisfy most gamers looking for a portable gaming laptop. === OVERALL === My biggest gripe is the inability to upgrade the RAM on the m17. At the very least, I wish Alienware would have offered the m17 with 32GB of RAM so buyers could futureproof if they wanted to. The clunky Alienware software and lack of Windows Hello support are also head-scratchers that could have (and SHOULD have) easily been addressed. Regardless, I'm very excited to have a laptop this beautiful, this powerful, and this portable. Recommended -- as long as you're aware of the upgrade limitations.

This is by far the best laptop I’ve ever owned. The amount of money it costs it well worth the performance it’s shells out. I do wish it had long battery life but that’s was never a deal breaker. It also helps that the design is very appealing.

This is both my first Alienware computer and my first gaming focused laptop. My last laptop had similar specs to this one (17", core i7, 12 GB RAM, 1 Tb HDD) but that is where the similarities between them end. The Alienware M17 is so many lightyears ahead of my old laptop that I have trouble believing that their specs are even remotely the same. First impressions: The Alienware M17 shows up in a decent looking white cardboard box with an exploded view of the laptop ghosted in the background (picture attached). Besides the prominent Alienware text and a few choice specs on the side, the box gives you very little information about the powerhouse contained within. The simplistic design style continues when you open the box to find a completely foam lined interior with 2 cutouts: one for the laptop and the other for the box containing the power supply. Speaking of which, the M17's power supply is enormous compared to the only my old laptop used. I've included a picture of them both side by side. After reading the spec stickers, I discovered the reason for the size disparity. My old laptop only used a 45w power supply compared to the 180w monster required by the M17. Personally, I like how this iteration of the M17 looks. It's a gaming laptop that does scream "Look at me! I'm a gamer!" and I appreciate that. The customizable RGB accents and the number of cooling vents are the only indications that this isn't your average laptop. The Lunar Light color looks better in person than it does in photographs and pairs nicely with the default blue backlighting of the RGB keyboard. However, I am a bit concerned about being able to keep the light color clean looking good in the long term. Initial Setup: This may be the only possible gripe I have with the M17. Like with any computer, one of the first things you do after unboxing it and setting up Windows is performing updates. Considering how new this model is, there were A LOT of initial updates. Between all the Windows updates, the Alienware updates (including a BIOS update), and the updates for all the preloaded software, it took a few hours before it was completely up to date. I will mention that the Alienware updater handled most of the legwork in determining what needed to be updated and acquiring said updates. It even handled the BIOS update which was a welcome surprise. Gaming: Being a gaming laptop, this is where the Alienware M17 should truly shine and it performs well beyond my expectations. It tackled every game I threw at it with ease and asked for seconds. Since this laptop is equipped with a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Max-Q and a 144Hz display, I made sure to max out every graphics setting possible with every game I played. I wanted to see if I could give the M17 a workout or at least make it break a sweat. Well, I failed in that mission but I was rewarded with some of the best looking gameplay I have ever experienced. Even with a graphics-intensive game like Subnautica, I didn't experience framerates lower than 60 fps. The water was so well rendered that I thought it might just be a video of the actual ocean. My old laptop could barely even run Subnautica with the graphics at their lowest setting. Even then, I was lucky to get 20 fps and the game was essentially unplayable. It was a similar story when I played League of Legends. My average framerate was well north of 100 and I never saw it drop below 80 fps even during 5v5 battles. The only downside is that I can no longer blame my hardware for my poor performance during a match. It is definitely not the computer's fault in any way, shape or form. Something that I didn't discover immediately is that within the Tobii Experience app there is a redeemable code for a free copy of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Breakpoint. To redeem, all you have to do is create a free account with Tobii, download the Epic Game Launcher, and paste the code. It is even one of the games that can incorporate eye-tracking into its gameplay though that's probably why they want you to play it. I don't know how long this promotion lasts but I didn't see it mentioned in any of the paperwork or during any of the setup process. I wanted to make sure I shared this info for others to find. Standard use, features, and downsides: Between the 9th-gen Intel Core i7-9750H processor, the 16 GB of RAM, and the SSDs, this is hands down the fastest computer I have ever used. From being completely shutdown to fully booted and at the desktop ready to go takes less than 5 seconds. Chrome opens instantly and you can easily have a multitude of tabs open without any performance degradation. I have not yet encountered a situation where the M17 wasn't overkill for any task I asked of it. Overclocking, fan settings, and lighting effects are easily adjustable in the Alienware Command Center. The keyboard feels fantastic to type on and I like that the RGB lighting for each individual key is customizable. There are even a handful of preprogrammed lighting effects. My personal favorite is the Knight Rider scanner setting (you can have it in any color but in reality red is the only acceptable choice). The touchpad is unlike any I have used before; it feels good to the touch, it is easy to use, and it is super precise. The laptop is very light, considering the level of hardware it is packing, yet it doesn't come off as flimsy in any way. It does feel like a premium product like Alienware claims. The Tobii eye tracking is neat but I haven't had a chance to thoroughly see how it can make my computer experience better. However, I do like how the laptop will automatically dim the screen when it notices that I'm not looking at it (this can be disabled if you prefer). The speakers sound really good for being the factory speakers. They're much better than the ones in my old laptop even with them having Beats Audio. This is a plus since you'll have to turn them up a bit to drown out the cooling fans, especially while gaming. It's not that the fans are deafeningly loud or anything but they are very noticeable if you are trying to use the built-in speakers. This is one of the few downsides of this laptop. I'm not sure it can be helped when you cram as much performance into such a thin package like Alienware has. Honestly, I'd much rather hear the fans than have the performance suffer due to thermal throttling. Besides, this is a nonissue since the majority of users will be using headsets which will negate the noise anyways. While I am talking about downsides, I have to address the M17's upgradability or lack thereof. From what I have read, the RAM cannot be easily upgraded as it is soldered to the motherboard. For most users, this means you're locked at 16 GB unless you are adept at soldering and willing to risk damaging the laptop. Also, 512 GB sounds like a lot of storage space until you start downloading games onto it. The free Tom Clancy game I mentioned earlier takes up over 40 GB of space on its own. Other large games like World of Warcraft, Fortnite, Destiny 2, etc. will use up 50 GB or more per game. Now this can be alleviated by adding an external hard drive as they are relatively inexpensive nowadays. But it is still a hard pill to swallow after already ponying up so much money for this laptop. Overall, the Alienware M17 is a fantastic laptop with amazing graphics that should be able to easily handle anything you throw at it. Games play beautifully and multitasking isn't an issue due to the robust hardware packed inside. Yes, it is an expensive laptop but you do get what you pay for. I highly doubt that you will be disappointed with this laptop if you decide to get one for yourself.

After using the laptop for like almost 2 months to only play Apex Legends, when I turn it on it doesn’t star normally, it stay on the Alienware logo, i am going to take this back to the store for a refund or a replacement. I pay almost 2400$ for this trash of laptop.

Purchased this laptop while thinking between this and their MSI GS75 Stealth-243. MSI definitely makes high quality stuff but then so does Dell. One aspect I personally love about Dell is customer support. Can't be the remote visit when something breaks and you really don't want to ship it out waiting for it to come back a couple months later to play a game. I went home with it thinking "It's ok it's comparable and just as good" but nah this thing is blowing me away. Let me just say that I already had a laptop with comparable specs except the processor was 8th gen and it was from CyberPower PC. Running games on that laptop was good but I had to tone settings down a lot to maintain the heat and get decent frame rate from the get go. THIS LAPTOP THOUGH! I haven't had to compensate at all! My CPU maintains 4GHz clock while gaming for hours and temps for CPU and GPU have never exceeded 70 degrees! I haven't repasted, haven't undervolted, haven't placed it on a cooler... Imagine the performance! I've been playing Apex Legends with everything maxed and maintaining at a minimum 144 fps (counter keeps displaying 175-180 while in a match). I am relating all this to the cooling job done by Dell Alienware. My hands feel comfortable resting them on the keyboard often it's pretty cool to the touch. I am going to buy a couple new nvme drives to extend the storage space because 512gb just isn't going to cut it. That's my only bad thing to say about the laptop. I don't even mind that the RAM is soldered on because 16gb is more than any gamer would need and it's dual channel confirmed! Excellent job Dell. And thank you Best Buy for dealing with my million questions and back and forth until I was convinced to make the plunge on this. I'm on happy gamer right now even though it's just a week after purchase haha. I'll update this later on as I keep on gaming hardcore.

I enjoy video games and the only way I have ever played them is on a game system like the PS3, Nintendo Gamecube and Xbox. I wasn’t sure about the experience of playing games on an actual gaming computer. Would it be fast enough, will have the right hardware and work it run games without bugs? Here is the answer I was seeking: the Alienware M17 R2 laptop! It is absolutely packed with power! Amazing graphics, a very fast processor and lots of memory give this Alienware M17 R2 laptop the ability to run game after incredible game. The laptop also does things just like it would on a regular computer. Browsing the web, Email, gathering information and playing music are just some of the many things that this gaming laptop can do that is not all about gaming. • Alienware Command Center is available to let you dial in the settings you want for how you want the gaming laptop settings. This is very helpful when you get to know the Alienware strengths and areas that need tweaking. You can take a look at the speed, heat, and other categories to keep you up to date on the performance of the Alienware gaming laptop. • The weight of the Alienware M17 R2 is only 5.7 lbs overall and has a slim design for a 17 inch gaming laptop. The frame is built of magnesium alloy that is makes the gaming laptop very sturdy and light. The colors of the Alienware M17 R2 are “darkside of the moon” and “Lunar light.” The Lunar Light color is the one I have and it is stunning to look at and comfortable to the touch. • You need a fast hard drive to keep up the games downloaded, daily internet use and other media (pictures, music) and the SSD PCI-e at 512 GB is all about those things. With no moving parts the SSD PCI-e is quick to bring up programs, games and has plenty of storage. The SSD PCI-e is incredibly faster than a just a hard drive. • At the heart of the Alienware gaming laptop is its processor. An Intel Core i7 (9750H Processor) 9th generation (2.6 gigahertz speed) really gets this laptop moving with its incredibly to power games, daily usage on the web and more games! I downloaded a few games from Steam and had a rich powerful experience with the games. They were extremely smooth and the Intel processor had no trouble running the complex games. • The Alienware has an exceptional NVIDIA Geoforce RTX 2070 Max-Q graphics card along with 16 GB of RAM. This is some powerful processing that moves the gaming laptop in a fast superior speed. The games I played were very fluid and did not lag or stall at all. • A Cryo-Tech 3.0 designed cooling system keeps the Alienware gaming laptop temperatures down. I experienced no problems with over heating. The cooling system is a honeycombed shape on the surface on the keyboard, bottom and rear. The intense heat is blown out of the rear honeycombed cooling system. I gave the gaming laptop space behind it, which I also think help to keep the heat down. • A unique and cool feature this laptop has a Tobii eye. This tech can actually follow your eyes to move the screen while playing games. Your gaming laptop will go where you eyes go. That is impressive. • There is no optical drive or touch screen, but there is an RGB keyboard. It looks really cool and you can adjust the colors. The contrast with the Lunar Light color goes great with the RGB keys to complete the look of this gaming laptop. Along with the looks of the keyboard, the keys have a great feel to them. It is very comfortable to type with and use in game special keys. The webcam is okay. It is not as clear and colorful as I expected. When you look at yourself or someone else when using the webcam, the overall look is just alright. I don’t expect I will be using the webcam that often so I don’t think it is a sticking point. • Battery life is about 4hrs (Li-on batteries) from heaving game playing. That is pretty good considering the power that is being used by the processors and memory. It is really no trouble to plug in the charger. It is really long and the brick is outside of the gaming laptop. • The display is really something to look at! At 17.3 inches and a 144Hz refresh rate, the screen gives me the immersive feel when playing games. The screen is in full HD with Eyesafe technology that reduces blue light emissions for your eyes. This protects your eyes and still allows beautiful and colorful full HD. I had a great time gaming with this amazing display and avoided eye fatigue (reasons above). The screen also has a matte finish and anti-glare coating. Along with everything going into the screen features, the benefits are really nice for an amazing view. • The Alienware gaming laptop runs Windows 10. That should be pretty familiar to most people. It is easy to navigate and use because most computers have Windows 10 on them anyway. • Connections are important and Alienware does a great job with these. There are 3 USB 3.1 Type A ports, a Gigabit Ethernet Jack and a headset jack. Also included are a Thunderbolt 3 port, a HDMI 2.0 port and a mini displayport (1.4). The power jack is located on the rear along with an Alienware Graphics Amplifier connection. I plugged in my mouse to the USB Type A port and my headphones into 3.5 mm jack. Everything worked fine and sounded better than I was used to. My initial experience on the Alienware gaming laptop was a superb experience. Playing games were never better in sight, sound and entertainment. Gaming computers/laptops have the power to run games without hesitation and are structured differently than regular computers/laptops. I really enjoyed this Alienware M17 R2 gaming laptop and would recommend to anyone who wants to step up their video gaming!

OK...so here's the skinny. The M17 R2 is a beast...plain and simple. Here's the run down... Packaging is excellent. Things like this often get overlooked, but I always look at packaging as a way to tell just how proud a manufacturer is of their product offering. The custom fit box was not only aesthetically pleasing, but the laptop fits like a glove and is very secure and well protected during shipping. My son won't even let me throw it away. Alright...down to the nuts and bolts. It fired right up out of the box with about 50% battery life. After walking through the standard windows setup and about 7 million windows updates I was ready to roll. I decided to run the Alienware updater first. It quickly scanned my hardware and recommended appropriate updates. I let it run them all, and after a couple of reboots I was good to go. I love the look and feel of this laptop. The design is sleek and modern. The LED lighting of the alien head and keyboard are vibrant and fun. The Tron rim lighting around the back of the laptop is killer. Using the Alienware Command Center app, you can customize the colors of each section to the Nth degree. I especially enjoy being able to set specific colors for each individual key. I know it sounds nerdy, but it makes it easier to find specific keys in the middle of a fight. Green for motion, Red for Combat, Yellow for healing...it works. You can save profiles, so it's easy to set up different schemes for each game you play. Love it. The keyboard itself is large with plenty of space between the chiclet keys. It is comfortable and responsive. While I generally use a gaming mouse, the native touch pad seems to work just fine and has a nice feel. Power wise, this thing is a monster. It boots up from a cold to login screen in 12.7 seconds, and shuts down in 7.4 seconds. The SSD is crazy fast. The RAM screams. The video card is off the hook. I was able to play World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XV on max settings without breaking a sweat. The screen is amazing. I was surprised at how vivid and crisp things were given that it is a matte screen. I personally like matte screens because of better glare control from ambient lighting, but it is rare that I find one that stands up to glossy screens in overall look of images in optimal conditions. Heat control is always the trick on a souped up gaming laptop. I think the M17 R2 has made great strides in this area. During normal surfing/video streaming,etc, the laptop sits comfortably on my lap without me really even noticing the heat. The fans can be set to different cooling profiles, but I found that letting it run in auto mode worked well. It remained very quiet during normal every day use. When you crank up a demanding game like Final Fantasy XV, it definitely wakes up and the temperature goes up significantly. The fans get a bit loud, but I'm generally so involved with the game that I don't notice them unless I purposefully stop to listen. I found it a little too warm to sit on my lap while wearing shorts. It would probably be fine in the winter when wearing jeans. I'll likely use it sitting on a chill pad moving forward simply for comfort and some extra cooling capacity. Overall I was pleased with the temps and cooling system. Audio seemed pretty nice to me. It's a laptop, so there is only so much room for speakers. I generally use a headset anyway, so I don't usually care too much about the built in speakers. I did crank them all the way to max and watched the WoW trailer. It was crisp and clear and acceptably loud from my perspective. Did it blow me away? Not really, but it didn't disappoint either. The bottom line is that this is one beast of a gaming laptop. Weighing in at at little over 5.5lbs, it packs huge power and performance under a relatively small hood. Is it a little on the expensive side? Ya...probably...but it outperforms most gaming laptops in its class hands down. I don't always associate expensive with better, but in this case, I do think you are getting what you pay for. It is backed by great support and a warranty that will get your through any break in period. If you can afford it, I don't think you will be disappointed with the Alienware M17 R2. I hope you found this review helpful Matthew

Nice laptop, fast as all get out. However mine appears to be defective. I am getting a lot of light bleed along the bottom. Not the normal IPS bloom, but actual hotspots that are clearly visible on a darkened screen. Another note, if you intend to add another SSD to this, think it over carefully. This requires a heatshield that you can only get from Dell. The manual makes this very clear and after opening and trying to install another SSD, short of jerry rigging, it's definitely true. However, Dell's support has no idea what the part number is or how to order it. Might be because it's brand new, but it's ridiculous that the shield isn't already in the unit. When looking at the attached picture, the glow in the upper left and right isn't really noticeable. But those bleed through spots on the bottom are very distracting.

Alienware I do enjoy me some PC gaming, and I also like a computer that can handle business. I work in IT and have PC gamed most of my life, so I usually have high, but reasonable, standards for my box. So this review might be a little lengthy but hopefully informative. I’ll be using my prior gaming laptop (not nearly as nice as the Alienware, it ran about half the price) and my gaming desktop benchmarks to compare. The specs for these are: ASUS Republic of Gamers Laptop (about 3 years old) • Intel i7 6700HQ 2.6GHz • 16GB Memory • Nvidia Geforce GTX 960m Custom Desktop (4-5 years old) • Intel i7 5930k (6 core) @ 3.5GHz • 32GB Memory • Nvidia GTX 970 (old but still good for my needs) Alienware M17 (This product: Specs for comparison) • Intel i7-9750H (6 core) @ 2.6GHz • 16 GB Memory • Nvidia Geforce RTX 2070 Max-Q Looks and first impression Before I get into the benchmarks, the laptop is beautiful. The packaging was simple, but didn’t really include any documentation. I think I was expecting more of a Wow factor, they only include tiny documents….a warranty, a how to plug your laptop into the wall, and some sort of card with their web address. I thought it would have been nice getting something, even cheesy like a welcome letter to the Alienware family, but nevertheless it was a nice basic setup that include just the laptop and charger. Starting out as I do with any new PC, I run all the updates. Windows, Alienware, Nvidia drivers, and anything that needs it. Then installed Steam for to begin installing games and programs. The laptop looks fantastic! Dell definitely put some work into the beauty of this thing. Plenty of ports for my needs and then some. Not to mention this is a super light gaming laptop, really just a super light laptop in general. Aside from my Macbook air, it’s the thinnest one I’ve ever used. Some things I noticed right off the bat: - Beautiful and rich screen color - Small bezels - The glass-based touchpad is really smooth - The eye-tracking is very interesting, I’m starting to like it. The screen dims after several seconds of looking away and un-dims when you look back. I was surprised this was active while plugged in as I don’t see much benefit for it other than letting you know it works. Apparently there is a lot more to this technology. - I like the Alienware Command Center. Messing with it at first didn’t seem very intuitive especially with the keyboard lighting but I was more interested in the games. I’ve played 3 games on it so far including Wolfenstein Youngblood, Doom, and Call of Duty WWII, and all of them have been impressively smooth. I used Nvidia Experience to optimize the settings based on the hardware and it went well beyond the defaults. The monitor is gorgeous, just stunning picture for the games. Other things I really liked once I got to start really using it: - Fast bootup time, real fast - Very powerful and quiet - Stereo speakers sound pretty good for a laptop, I could def notice range and position of sounds when playing Doom - Very lightweight (had to say it again) - Integrated TPM chip for Bitlocker Ok time for some numbers. Below I ran Graphics test, CPU/multitasking tests, and Hard Drive tests between 3 of my computers: PC Mark – Benchmark with profiles for measuring common activities. I chose the Work and Creative (Media) profiles: Work Accelerated Profile Desktop - 4748 ASUS ROG Laptop-4627 Alienware (current)- 5659 Creative Accelerated Profile Desktop - 6418 ASUS ROG Laptop- 4125 Alienware (current)- 4672 3D Mark – Since my Desktop card doesn’t support Directx 12 I ran both 3D Mark tests to compare between the two: Fire Strike w/Directx 11 Desktop - 10494 ASUS ROG Laptop- 3959 Alienware (current)- 13241 Time Spy w/Directx 12 Desktop – N/A ASUS ROG Laptop- 1383 Alienware (current)- 2761 CrystalMark 6.02 – Used to measure read/write speeds on Hard drives: Hard Drive Scores (read and write in MBs- Seq 1) Desktop w/Samsung M2 nvme 512GB - R 2404/W 1484 ASUS ROG Laptop w/SSD- R 478 / W 474 Alienware (current)- R 3120 / W 2810 I’m blown away by performance of this laptop in comparison to my full sized Desktop. It blew it away in most of the tests, and very shocked it scored so much better in the Hard Drive tests. I never have thought a laptop would could perform better than my custom desktop, even if it is a few years old. On top of it, I would have thought the “light-weight” factor of this laptop would have came with some sacrifices, but was I wrong. It exceeded my expectations for such a portable device. Overall I see some negative reviews but don’t get them at all. I honestly can’t really think of anything reasonably wrong with this laptop even though I’ve been trying using it for hours a day. It doesn’t get hotter than you expect when gaming, its actual not bad for the quality its putting out. Performance is great along with movie quality, and the gaming is all there…I’ve had no lagging or problems whatsoever with any of the games I’ve played. I love using this laptop and now I think I’m ruined from buying any other laptop from here on out that isn’t Alienware. Aside from gaming, I think its serves as a great workstation or a general home computer if you get a docking station and add some monitors. If you’re on the fence, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed in it. This is truly a gaming laptop that can replace most desktops and still be used as a laptop.

This laptop is awesome. The colors with the display are very accurate and it is a very bright panel. The 2070 max q is very powerful for gaming.

I bought an Alienware laptop a long time ago, and although it had some issues, it was a nice gaming machine, so when I had the chance to test this new M17, I just had to see how much things had changed. As was the case with my first Alienware, unboxing this new one was like opening a box containing some unknown treasure; even the box is impressive. Upon opening the box, the first thing that struck me about this laptop was how thin and light it is. All of the gaming laptops I've had previously were 'wedge' shaped (for airflow and additional components) and quite a bit heavier, so the weight and slim profile of the M17 really surprised me. Opening the laptop reveals a truly well designed keyboard layout that is both incredible to both your sense of sight and touch; the keys appear to be made of the same metal alloy that constitutes a majority of the case, and they all have a very crisp feel when pressed and released. I have to admit that watching the kaleidoscope of colors flashing over every key and the corresponding LED ring around the rear exhaust, when I first pressed the power button was a bit exhilarating. The wrist pad/rest also gives ample room when using the keyboard, which is important for me because I have slightly larger than normal hands; my hands sometimes feel cramped on laptops, but not so on this one. The laptop of course is equipped with a webcam, and a microphone array (one on each side of the webcam)for recording, and this model has another device below the display that I couldn't find in the manual. It turns out this is the Tobii eye tracker. It's a cool concept, that allows you some control in certain software/games by using your eyes. Again, a cool concept, but also a bit creepy, especially when you read the Tobii agreement. There are enough USB ports to handle about anything you'd need, especially if you get a USB hub or a Thunderboltt port, so the M17's functionality isn't hampered by its slim profile. The only component this laptop is missing that I would've like to have had was a DVD bay, but to be honest, I don't even remember the last time I used the one on my current laptop, so that's not a big deal. After powering up the laptop and connecting it to my router, I updated windows and then used the Alienware update utility to check for updates specific to this machine. After installing all updates as well as connecting some peripherals, I installed World of Tanks for a quick test of what the machine could do. With all of the graphics settings set to Ultra I was getting about 105-120 fps. Add that to the absolute stunning clarity of the M17's display, and it's easy to forget that this thing only weighs about 6lbs. I also hooked the laptop up to a larger monitor since I often use a laptop at my house, and I found gameplay equally stunning, even though the refresh rate on the external monitor was only 75Hz compared to the 144Hz on the laptop display. However, one thing I did notice right away, is this thing runs hot. Just starting World of Tanks and sitting in the garage causes an audible change in the fan speed and similar increase in the amount of heat being pushed out the sides and rear. The top of the case near the display, which is covered with hexagonal vents, and I assume is for air intake along with the vents on the bottom, also gets quite warm. During gameplay, this area gets even hotter. I actually called Alienware about the heat and these upper vents, because I usually close the lid of my laptop when I have it connected to an external monitor, since I have the laptop sitting infront of the monitor. I was told that this laptop has had enough 'complaints' about heat that they pushed out a bios update (the one I had already installed). I was also advised not to close the lid, which kind of sucks. This isn't a show stopper, but I have limited space at some locations where I use external monitors, so placing the laptop to one side is not so easy. I've only had the laptop for about a week, but unfortunately, I've already started to have some issues with the internet connection dropping via a cat5 cable. I haven't had any issue with the wireless connectivity, but when I game, I like to play with a hardwired connection. The M17's RJ45 port is a bit odd (at least to me) in that it's almost half-height (again to accommodate the slim profile). The bottom of the port is hinged, so connecting isn't completely straight forward. The problem occurs after a powerup, and then at some point, the connection drops and the port acts as if there's no cable connected. If I restart, everything is fine again and the problem won't reoccur until the next cold start. It's probably a driver issue, but again, the machine is a week old. Is it an Alienware issue or MS, who knows? I've contacted Alienware and hope to hear back soon. I've also started getting random bluescreens, although MS has changed the color to a nice shade of purple... it's much more calming. It's always the same stopcode and usually when restarting after the ethernet port gives up the ghost (coincidence? probably not). Again, the machine is only a week old, there's not much I've installed on it, and what I have installed has worked flawlessly on another machine for years. I've also noticed that one functionality of the Tobii eyetracker has stopped working; the screen is supposed to dim when you're not looking at it and brighten when you turn back to the laptop (cool and creepy), but this is no longer working. Lastly, I discovered that the screensaver functionality doesn't work (I'm not sure if this is a new problem since I just tried it), but I also found around the same time that the power settings that allow you to control when the screen turns off or when the laptop turns off/sleeps are no longer working. Now is that a problem with the laptop, Windows, or one of the 3 things I installed? I'm not sure, but everything I have installed is still working on another machine and causing no trouble... so we'll see what Alienware has to say about it. In a nutshell, this M17 laptop is gorgeous; it looks incredible and just feels solid. It's stylish, slim, weighs almost nothing, and it's got some pretty neat features, some of which border on creepy. Although my gaming was limited, the gameplay is stunning. The laptop does seem to run hot, although I haven't had any trouble with that affecting gameplay, so I'm hoping Alienware has fixed the 'heat' issues from my previous model. My biggest concern right now is that within a week, I've already started to see cracks in the functionality of hardware and in the OS.... it could be all OS related. I haven't had time to have these addressed by Alienware, so hopefully they can shed some light on the issues. If I hadn't had the issues I've had over the past 2-3 days with OS functionality failing and the internet connectivity, I would've given this laptop 5 stars, but as it is, I'm giving it 4. I would still recommend this laptop for anyone wanting a very capable, light weight gaming machine, but I would also suggest you wait and make sure all of the kinks get worked... since this is a new model.

excellent laptop is made of quality materials and components

Over the years I’ve tried several laptop brands and configurations for both intense design graphics and gaming purposes. I’ve bought machines configured for architects and found gaming machines do a much better job of processing - particularly when you use both the laptop’s screen AND a external monitor simultaneously. I was stoked when the Alienware M17 (in white- coool!) arrived. It’s big, but pretty thin and light for a laptop with a 17.3” screen. It feels good in your hands. The configurable lighting for power button, EVERY KEY, and what I call “The Exhaust” on the rear, is really cool. I change it to motivate myself, or to chill. My only gripe, minor that it is, the power brick is oldschool Dell. Nothing designed about it at all. More important though- how does it perform? Amazing. It never bogs for me- even when connected to a 34” external monitor and still running the 17.3” integrated screen. No doubt thanks to the NVIDIA GeForce card inside. I multitask like an octopus and have never needed to reboot. Graphics are great, rendering speed great, general performance great. Oh, did I mention the super-cool eye tracking camera and software (Tobii)? I didn’t even realize it was there until I noticed the computer would wake up every time I looked at it. Then I explored and fell in love. There’s an Alienware Academy to hone your skills and over 140 compatible games. I can’t wait to see how this technology evolves and gets integrated into more apps. Just cool.

This gaming laptop packs a lot of power under the hood - 6 core Intel i7 processor (with 12 hyperthreaded cores), 16 Gb RAM, 512Gb NVMe SSD and newest nVidea GeForce RTX 2070 graphics card this system can support up to 90fps frame rate with the highest rendering settings! If you or someone in your family is looking for a gaming laptops - take a close look! Dell packed a lot of "Gaming" features into this machine - RGB lighted keyboard (individual keys or zones could be pre-set to be a certain color), RGB Alien head logo on the lid, RGB "crown" on the back - everything says - this machine is made for Gaming. Very nice 17" display supports 1920x1080 and is powered by either Intel UHD630 GPU (to save energy) or GeForce RTX 2070 when top performance is desired. Full sized keyboard layout has a crisp tactile feedback and large enough to map all the game function buttons comfortably. Touchpad is kinda small for my taste but response is fast and precise. Storage is handled by a single Toshiba NVMe SSD (laptop has 2 NVMe m.2 slots on board). Laptop has plenty of ports for expansion starting with a proprietary Dell "Graphics Amplifier" that is meant for an external eGPU enclosure (sold separately), 3 USB-A 3.1 ports (one of those has PowerShare support), 1 Gbit/s Ethernet port (2x2 MIMO WiFi and Bluetooth 5.0 are there too), 3.5mm headphone jack, 1 USB-C 3.1, HDMI output (2.0b), and a mini-Display Port (1.4). Laptop does have a security cable slot, but not a regular Kennsington one. System comes with a TPM 2.0 chip installed so if you desire to use BitLocker for disk encryption - that is available. Battery capacity is 76Ah (system comes with 180W charger) and it takes about 90 minutes to charge the battery completely. Play time while on battery would vary depending on the applications you running of course. Back cover of the laptop can be easily removed with just a Philips screwdriver, however the only thing you would be able to replace is your NVMe cards (battery is easy to remove too if needed). Main system memory is soldered to the logic board (see pictures). Windows Home 64bit edition is pre-installed from factory and I'm very happy to report that laptop did not come with a ton of "junkware" apps. Just the essentials - Alienware Control Center, Killer Network Utility and Tobii eye tracking software (which is able to track where you looking at, I'm yet to explore this technology). Overall - it's one of the best gaming machines available! I do play flight simulators a lot and was very impressed with how fast and smooth this system performed. The only downside is that memory is soldered on and there are no slots for memory upgrade.

This is a stunning solution for mobile PC gaming. Even the packaging is on point. The fit and finish of the whole thing is very well done. Customizing the RGB keyboard and even the alien head and vent on the back side of the chassis are a few clicks away after starting it up. Getting it right for your needs/desires is something I feel isn’t very well advertised for this line of laptops. It already looks fantastic but this customization just puts it on another level. And if you don’t care at all about RGB aesthetics, it can all be turned off if you want that too. The 144Hz monitor paired with the Nvidia 2070 GPU makes casual use so fluid. And for anyone that works with modeling software such as Revit, AutoCAD, or even Photoshop, and that happens to game too…this is the absolute sweet spot for being able to do any and all of it anywhere you take this laptop. The screen resolution could be something left to be desired by some. The max resolution of 1920x1080 seems a bit low for this hardware. But that does remove the potential complexity of dealing with high DPI settings that force some applications have microscopic and completely unusable GUI’s. However, I believe this furthers the case it makes for itself to be a clean, well built, ready to go right out of the box laptop.

I had an Alienware 17 3-4 years ago that was black and grey, heavy, thick, loud, and a bit flashy. It performed well, but it's size and heft made it a challenge for traveling, and it could have doubled as a shield or self-defense weapon. People looked at it often out of confusion instead of admiration. Fast forward to this new machine, and the reactions are completely different. It still packs flash, with it's all white body and RGB lights. But it's sleek, thin, and light for a gaming machine. The packed punch is harder with the RTX 2070 MaxQ and 6-Core I7-9750H. And it's a much better travel companion. This new M17 nails almost everything just right. I say almost everything because it isn't perfect. When the fans run at full speed the laptop sounds like it could take flight. When they spin up beyond a medium speed, they are loud enough to be audible through my headset mic. Thankfully the Alienware Control Center allows you to customize overclock settings and fan control, which helps; the balance mode is a great compromise for most. There is also a good set of audio controls, including a noise filtering option for the mic. I found that option necessary to avoid people complaining about the high-pitch fan noise. The fans may be loud, but they move a ton of air. To enable this the design must permit the intake of all that air, and that leads to the second flaw. The bottom of the shell covering the fans is a large air vent with a long honey-comb design to optimize intake. Because the bottom is plastic this unfortunately leads to a design weakness and makes the bottom of the laptop feel flimsy. With different materials or thicknesses this could have been avoided, though I also have yet to have it break on me. I am more cautious and aware when I am moving the machine, however. Next to the exhaust on each side are a couple of ports, with 2 USB 3.1 on the right, and 1 USB 3.1 on the left which can also provide power when the machine is off. There is a headphone jack and flip-down gigabit ethernet port on the left as well. The back houses a full-size HDMI, Mini DisplayPort, and a Thunderbolt 3, along with the power adapter and an Alienware Graphics Amp port, all surrounded by an RGB strip that looks like it's from Tron. Notably absent is any kind of SD card reader, meaning any photographers need to keep a reader handy; another flaw in my opinion. This machine has a good trackpad and keyboard. The trackpad supports standard 1, 2, 3, and 4 finger gestures, and I found the real-estate provided to be just right. Some people like larger spaces, or glass tops, but I found the space and finish on this to work for my piano fingers without me thinking I needed more. The keyboard is comfortable with good resistance and feedback as you type. I spend my days in front of a keyboard, and while this is no match for a mechanical one it still feels good. Your preference may vary, but I haven't had typing fatigue with it yet. The wrist rest area in front of the keys is also nice since the entire machine has a matte, rubberized-plastic finish over it. It makes it feel soft and smooth, and premium. The keyboard packs extra flash with customizable RGB lighting behind all keys but the space bar. With the Control Center you can set up the lights for various transition and animation effects, and you can change the lighting per key if you wish. It also lets you set gaming profiles with different settings based on the game you run. In my testing it worked great. The speakers get loud and stay clear through the range, but they do fall flat with the deeper bass notes. You can compensate for the sound a bit with the Control Center equalizer, but that can't replace a good mid-range speaker. Expect clear highs and decent mids with these, and loudness to fill a room, but lacking that punch you expect to feel from a high-quality set of external speakers or headphones. That said, they still sound better than the speakers on all but one laptop I have, but that one is 3 times this thickness. The display compliments the good parts of this machine, with a 144hz refresh at 1920x1080 resolution providing a clean picture, and good brightness. I can't speak to the color accuracy of the panel, but compared to my calibrated screens, it might be a little oversaturated, though not horribly so. It still looks good and sharp, but I find it best with the brightness notched down a bit. The 144hz refresh really makes a difference, though, providing smooth motion with no blur. The difference is very noticeable next to my other 3 60hz displays. I don't connect this to my external displays when gaming because this screen is easier to look at, despite only being 17". I play strategy, action adventure, and first-person shooters, and I do better with this laptop standalone than connected to the external displays. Above the panel is a camera with a digital array microphone, which is adequate for the job, but nothing to write home about. More interesting is the Tobii Eye Tracker bar beneath the display. This allows you to enable the Tobii Experience, which tracks eye movements for increased interaction with the machine. You can enable simple features like auto-dimming the display when you look away, or turning the display back on when you stare at it for a moment. But the in-game features are cooler, helping aim where you look, or highlighting key puzzle components when you stare at them. In practice it works very well and is a cool feature that makes the experience a little more fun and interesting. Aside from all this, there are a few more things worth noting about the M17 design. First, the memory is soldered to the board, meaning once you get it with your configuration, you can't really upgrade. The wireless chip is also soldered, meaning no upgrade there as well. This means if you want to swap to a new AX chipset you can't just pop them in and out like I did in my other, much cheaper laptop. This soldering trend is really annoying to me, so I feel it's worth pointing out. Thankfully there are two M.2 slots, with only one occupied meaning you can at least expand your storage options, and both spots support NVMe. Overall, I like this machine way more than my old Alienware. The flaws, aside from the soldered components, are fairly minor, and the rest of the package is spot on. I feel like it's a huge leap of an improvement over the old 17 and I think it should be on the radar for anyone looking for a gaming laptop they actually want to travel with.

My first impressions were with the packaging. One of the best packed laptops Ive opened, pleasant to look at. Over all look: I have never owned an Alienware PC or laptop but I have owned other manufacturers gaming laptops and this is by far IMO the best looking as far as looks go for a laptop. I love the white/light grey color, and glad this wasn't another black slab. Im also rather liking the new design over previous models, the screen has a smaller bezel and doesn't have that geometric/angular shape either which I think looks better. The lighting/RGB makes this a cool laptop to have on your desk, the Alien on the lid lights up along with the power button and the cool LED strip around the back IO. Each of which you can customize to your liking through Alienware's Command Center. Also, the keyboard is per key RGB, not just zones as with some laptops and keyboards. Another cool feature. Ports: The main ports are on the back of the Laptop which I can definitely appreciate because this is being used as my main PC and it helps with cable management. There is a Thunderbolt 3 port, a Mini display port and an HDMI port. Currently I am using the Display port and HDMI port to power two 27" gaming monitors, both 1440P and running at 144hz. This is not problem for the 2070 Max Q. Its like I have a desktop in a small form factor. The rest of the ports are on either side, USB and your LAN port. Screen: Some say 1080P on a 17" laptop is not good enough. I beg to differ, its plenty crisp for me and this screen is plenty bright and 144hz. Sure, everyone wants 4k but on a 17" screen you'd be hard pressed to see all those pixels anyway. There is some slight led glow or bleed on a dark screen but not noticeable in a lit room. Power: Core i7 9th gen, 20 series NVidia card/8gb, 16 gb of ram and a 512 Nvme SSD. A winning package. I haven't had any issues with this setup, runs photoshop rendering high res images no problem, my games and your simple everyday tasks without a hitch. I have not experienced any slow downs, stutters, or lag at all. It simply flies. Games: Games Ive played and their settings. Gears of War 5; 1080P Ultra graphics, no lag, runs like butter. Metro Exodus: 1080P, High graphics, RTX and Ray tracing on high. Runs phenomenal. Ultra causes slowdowns and lag. Im sure you can tweak some things like turning the ray tracing down, but Id rather run high and have ray tracing on. Forza Horizon 4: 1080P, Ultra graphics, runs extremely smooth. Heat: It does heat up when gaming but thats normal and the only time you need to worry about the heat is if your CPU throttles. This does not that I can see, and Im not running any benchmarks to see how hot it is or what my score is...just dont care that much as the laptop is running great. Price: I think this is right in there with a proper priced gaming laptop. You can get cheaper of course, but you get a Quality build with Alienware, good components and you know what they say...you get what you pay for...I believe that to be the case here.

My whole life I have played games on my Xbox console and have never thought about switching over given the cost and time it takes to build a custom computer. My friends recommended buying the Alienware laptop and am so happy I did. Playing on 240 FPS has really improved my skill set. Everything runs and looks so smooth. I can even stream shows, live tv or twitch while gaming and my frames do not skip a beat. Love this thing - very customizable as well.

I've never owned a gaming laptop. This is my first one. I've always been a PC and Console gamer. Due to having a kid and multiple animals, I have all of my gaming stuff in my man-cave (queue stereotypes here, lol). It's a small-medium sized room and has my LG C8 OLED TV, Samsung Q90R soundbar, PS4 Pro, Gaming PC, Ultrawide monitor, etc. So, after a while, it can start feeling a little cramped (and hot!). I've always wanted a laptop, but never acted on it. I seen this Alienware as an opportunity to free myself from the game room and if I want to play something, just set it up on the kitchen table or bedroom and still be with the family, vs. being isolated. I've owned two Alienware Desktops in the past. My first one (back around 2005-ish) was an Aurora-style desktop PC (I don't remember the exact model name) and the other was an Area-51 small form factor PC that I'd gotten around 2014. I had issues out of both. The Area-51 just died on me out of the blue after just a few years, so I have my current desktop now that is custom-built by another company and I've had zero issues with it and I love it. I vowed after my Area-51 that I would never own another Alienware product again. So, here I sit, with this new Alienware M17 R2 system...full of regrets. I'm going to go ahead and start this review off by saying - I will absolutely NEVER own another Alienware PC again in my life. Even if it were free. This review is going to be different than most because, not only am I reviewing the PC, I'm also reviewing Alienware and my experiences with them during the short time I've owned this system. I mean, after all, when you buy Alienware, you're buying a "premium" brand, proprietary configuration and their (abysmal) support that goes along with it. Let's talk about the laptop itself. The hardware will be the only positive thing this review has going for it. It has a 9th gen Intel i7 processor, 512GB M.2 Solid State drive, 16 GB RAM and an RTX 2070 video card with 8GB RAM. I do want to add that the RAM is soldered to the motherboard and is NOT up-gradable. The screen is also super nice - 17" with 144hz refresh rate and great viewing angles. It also has a built in web-cam and Tobii eye tracking. The keyboard is without a doubt one of the best I've ever felt on a laptop and I love the full RGB spectrum it has. Around back, the frame has lighting, as well as the alien head. On the inside, the power button is also in the shape of an alien head (nice touch!) and will change colors as you use it, indicating the battery level. Setup after the initial power-on was a breeze and I was able to use voice guided setup about 90% through the process. Once I got to Windows, I immediately started the Windows updates. Also note: there is an "Alienware Updater" program that you will need to run as well. This will take care of all the proprietary Alienware updates, such as their specialized drivers, Command Center and other software and...most importantly, BIOS. Everything ran and updated without a hitch. Now...I got everything else installed that I use, like Steam, Blizzard Launcher, Epic games store, etc. After this (no games installed at this point), I have about 400GB space left. On the math part, depending on what you are playing, that's roughly 4-6 games. Fornite takes 60GB, Destiny 2 takes 81GB, WoW takes 70GB. Those 3 games alone take half of the remaining space. So, before I do anything else, I happily bounce out to my local Best Buy and purchase a $215 Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1TB M.2 SSD, after seeing on YouTube, etc, that others have used it and it was the highest recommended M.2 SSD. And here is where all the problems began... I opened up the back panel of the laptop (which was a pain to wedge off after unscrewing) and there sat the empty M.2 slot, beside the primary 512GB drive that came with the system. Easy enough. Plug it in, meticulously attached the back panel and screws and flip it over to turn it on. Long story short, after removing and re-seating the drive about 3-4 times and more software updates to the system (BIOS being one of them), I finally got Disk Manager to detect it. Got it formatted as a single volume drive will full space allocation and named it "Game". But wait! Now I'm getting messages in the Windows notification center asking me what I want to do with the "removable drive". It's not removable! It's an internal M.2 HDD. So now, AutoPlay is constantly notifying me and asking me this. It's annoying and...why is it doing this? Even right clicking the drive from "This PC" shows an AutoPlay option, which should not be happening. Thus, starts my ordeal between 10/2/2019-10/3/2019 with Alienware that gives me a 2-day (and ongoing) headache - for real. I call Alienware and after some questions, such as what kind of drive I'm using and where I got it, they refused to help me because the system didn't come pre-configured with this drive and where I bought it 3rd Party (not from them), they don't support assisting with this. So, I call Samsung. They advise me to go into the BIOS and change the SATA support from RAID (which there are no Raid profiles set, since it was just a single SSD to begin with) to AHCI. I do that and reboot - Blue Screen saying "un-accessable boot device" (or something to that effect). So, I have to change it back over to RAID to get to get it to boot properly to Windows. Samsung then advises to just do a fresh install of windows and map the drives to AHCI at that time to see if that fixes it. Issue with that is, I lose all of the proprietary Alienware software, C: Drive partitioning, etc, which I don't want to do... So, I call Microsoft. They say that it's an issue with how Alienware has mapped the ports/drives and I will need to call them to get my drives remapped. I told the Microsoft agent that won't happen - the refuse to help me. Then he was like, well, it's their proprietary configuration causing it, right? Yep... So, since then, I've called Alienware 2 more times and get the same response - even an email from them a few days later with the same response. The only thing different that I get is that "Samsung Drives are not compatible with Alienware systems", which completely baffled me. They said they don't know why their customers always get Samsung, then have problems when literally any other brand will work. Anyway, they refuse to do anything for me. So...I'm like...let me call Alienware sales and just order **THEIR** 1TB SSD and I'll just return this Samsung for a refund - that way, they HAVE to help me if I have issues. After telling the sales agent what I wanted, he had me on hold for 10 minutes. He came back and said he can get me a 1TB M.2 SSD for $399.99. I about choked and told him he was crazy! I'm NOT paying $400 for an M.2 SSD when I can get any brand I want elsewhere for $200 or less. I told him I got a Samsung Evo Plus 1TB for $215. He starts arguing with me about "well, our drive will work". NO...ANY drive should work - you're just forcing me to buy yours for double the retail value, I thought to myself. Anyway, after we hung up, he calls me back 10 minutes later and told me he could sell me a Samsung Evo for $169.99. I told him that's the same drive I'm having issues with and they refuse to help me - and tells me it's incompatible. He then says "well, if they told you that, then I would take their word for it"...then goes on to say..."you know this is a GAMING PC, right? Samsung is for professionals, not gaming, so that's why it won't work". I immediately call bull on this one and proceeded then to ask him why he called me to sell me an incompatible drive and that he just contradicted himself. He disconnected the call. So, here I sit, writing this review. Fuming over everything. I ordered an ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 1TB drive from Amazon, which will be here today (yes, Sunday), as the only drives my local Best Buy has are the "professional...not gaming" Samsung Evo drives (*rolls eyes*). My gaming desktop has Samsung Evo SSD's!!! Aaaaargggghhhh. I'm hoping the ADATA works great. If not, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. I'm honestly at my wits end with all this drama and haven't even gotten to test this system to the limits, like I would like to have done. So many games I wanted to try - but so little space. I'm just....over it at this point. So, this review is breaking down into two scores. I'm giving an overall/final score of 2 stars: 4 stars for the PC. Performance is great. Using V-Sync, I hit my max 144FPS refresh rate on the above mentioned games I've tried. Around 170+FPS without V-Sync. Temps are stable and runs pretty cool. Fans can get a bit noisy from time to time when they ramp up, but that's to be expected. Build quality is pretty high but the rear panel is a pain to remove. Also, the Lunar Light color came out-of-the box with some type of scuffs or stains on it, so this specific color/finish WILL get dirty very easily and shows every spec of dust/debris. 1 star for the Alienware brand and unfortunately the support that comes with it (I would give a zero here, if I could). It is abysmal at best and is why I will NEVER own another Alienware - even if it were given to me. I mean face it, you're buying the brand and the (*cough*) support. Invest your money in another brand that wants customer satisfaction and doesn't lock everything down behind a "paywall" of over-priced proprietary hardware with no freedom whatsoever, as a consumer. 2 Stars (I probably really should have just given it a 1, but the beauty and performance of the laptop won out). AVOID.

I've never owned a gaming laptop. This is my first one. I've always been a PC and Console gamer. Due to having a kid and multiple animals, I have all of my gaming stuff in my man-cave (queue stereotypes here, lol). It's a small-medium sized room and has my LG C8 OLED TV, Samsung Q90R soundbar, PS4 Pro, Gaming PC, Ultrawide monitor, etc. So, after a while, it can start feeling a little cramped (and hot!). I've always wanted a laptop, but never acted on it. I seen this Alienware as an opportunity to free myself from the game room and if I want to play something, just set it up on the kitchen table or bedroom and still be with the family, vs. being isolated. I've owned two Alienware Desktops in the past. My first one (back around 2005-ish) was an Aurora-style desktop PC (I don't remember the exact model name) and the other was an Area-51 small form factor PC that I'd gotten around 2014. I had issues out of both. The Area-51 just died on me out of the blue after just a few years, so I have my current desktop now that is custom-built by another company and I've had zero issues with it and I love it. I vowed after my Area-51 that I would never own another Alienware product again. So, here I sit, with this new Alienware M17 R2 system...full of regrets. I'm going to go ahead and start this review off by saying - I will absolutely NEVER own another Alienware PC again in my life. Even if it were free. This review is going to be different than most because, not only am I reviewing the PC, I'm also reviewing Alienware and my experiences with them during the short time I've owned this system. I mean, after all, when you buy Alienware, you're buying a "premium" brand, proprietary configuration and their (abysmal) support that goes along with it. Let's talk about the laptop itself. The hardware will be the only positive thing this review has going for it. It has a 9th gen Intel i7 processor, 512GB M.2 Solid State drive, 16 GB RAM and an RTX 2070 video card with 8GB RAM. I do want to add that the RAM is soldered to the motherboard and is NOT up-gradable. The screen is also super nice - 17" with 144hz refresh rate and great viewing angles. It also has a built in web-cam and Tobii eye tracking. The keyboard is without a doubt one of the best I've ever felt on a laptop and I love the full RGB spectrum it has. Around back, the frame has lighting, as well as the alien head. On the inside, the power button is also in the shape of an alien head (nice touch!) and will change colors as you use it, indicating the battery level. Setup after the initial power-on was a breeze and I was able to use voice guided setup about 90% through the process. Once I got to Windows, I immediately started the Windows updates. Also note: there is an "Alienware Updater" program that you will need to run as well. This will take care of all the proprietary Alienware updates, such as their specialized drivers, Command Center and other software and...most importantly, BIOS. Everything ran and updated without a hitch. Now...I got everything else installed that I use, like Steam, Blizzard Launcher, Epic games store, etc. After this (no games installed at this point), I have about 400GB space left. On the math part, depending on what you are playing, that's roughly 4-6 games. Fornite takes 60GB, Destiny 2 takes 81GB, WoW takes 70GB. Those 3 games alone take half of the remaining space. So, before I do anything else, I happily bounce out to my local Best Buy and purchase a $215 Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1TB M.2 SSD, after seeing on YouTube, etc, that others have used it and it was the highest recommended M.2 SSD. And here is where all the problems began... I opened up the back panel of the laptop (which was a pain to wedge off after unscrewing) and there sat the empty M.2 slot, beside the primary 512GB drive that came with the system. Easy enough. Plug it in, meticulously attached the back panel and screws and flip it over to turn it on. Long story short, after removing and re-seating the drive about 3-4 times and more software updates to the system (BIOS being one of them), I finally got Disk Manager to detect it. Got it formatted as a single volume drive will full space allocation and named it "Game". But wait! Now I'm getting messages in the Windows notification center asking me what I want to do with the "removable drive". It's not removable! It's an internal M.2 HDD. So now, AutoPlay is constantly notifying me and asking me this. It's annoying and...why is it doing this? Even right clicking the drive from "This PC" shows an AutoPlay option, which should not be happening. Thus, starts my ordeal between 10/2/2019-10/3/2019 with Alienware that gives me a 2-day (and ongoing) headache - for real. I call Alienware and after some questions, such as what kind of drive I'm using and where I got it, they refused to help me because the system didn't come pre-configured with this drive and where I bought it 3rd Party (not from them), they don't support assisting with this. So, I call Samsung. They advise me to go into the BIOS and change the SATA support from RAID (which there are no Raid profiles set, since it was just a single SSD to begin with) to AHCI. I do that and reboot - Blue Screen saying "un-accessable boot device" (or something to that effect). So, I have to change it back over to RAID to get to get it to boot properly to Windows. Samsung then advises to just do a fresh install of windows and map the drives to AHCI at that time to see if that fixes it. Issue with that is, I lose all of the proprietary Alienware software, C: Drive partitioning, etc, which I don't want to do... So, I call Microsoft. They say that it's an issue with how Alienware has mapped the ports/drives and I will need to call them to get my drives remapped. I told the Microsoft agent that won't happen - the refuse to help me. Then he was like, well, it's their proprietary configuration causing it, right? Yep... So, since then, I've called Alienware 2 more times and get the same response - even an email from them a few days later with the same response. The only thing different that I get is that "Samsung Drives are not compatible with Alienware systems", which completely baffled me. They said they don't know why their customers always get Samsung, then have problems when literally any other brand will work. Anyway, they refuse to do anything for me. So...I'm like...let me call Alienware sales and just order **THEIR** 1TB SSD and I'll just return this Samsung for a refund - that way, they HAVE to help me if I have issues. After telling the sales agent what I wanted, he had me on hold for 10 minutes. He came back and said he can get me a 1TB M.2 SSD for $399.99. I about choked and told him he was crazy! I'm NOT paying $400 for an M.2 SSD when I can get any brand I want elsewhere for $200 or less. I told him I got a Samsung Evo Plus 1TB for $215. He starts arguing with me about "well, our drive will work". NO...ANY drive should work - you're just forcing me to buy yours for double the retail value, I thought to myself. Anyway, after we hung up, he calls me back 10 minutes later and told me he could sell me a Samsung Evo for $169.99. I told him that's the same drive I'm having issues with and they refuse to help me - and tells me it's incompatible. He then says "well, if they told you that, then I would take their word for it"...then goes on to say..."you know this is a GAMING PC, right? Samsung is for professionals, not gaming, so that's why it won't work". I immediately call bull on this one and proceeded then to ask him why he called me to sell me an incompatible drive and that he just contradicted himself. He disconnected the call. So, here I sit, writing this review. Fuming over everything. I ordered an ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 1TB drive from Amazon, which will be here today (yes, Sunday), as the only drives my local Best Buy has are the "professional...not gaming" Samsung Evo drives (*rolls eyes*). My gaming desktop has Samsung Evo SSD's!!! Aaaaargggghhhh. I'm hoping the ADATA works great. If not, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. I'm honestly at my wits end with all this drama and haven't even gotten to test this system to the limits, like I would like to have done. So many games I wanted to try - but so little space. I'm just....over it at this point. So, this review is breaking down into two scores. I'm giving an overall/final score of 2 stars: 4 stars for the PC. Performance is great. Using V-Sync, I hit my max 144FPS refresh rate on most of the games I've tried. Around 170+FPS without V-Sync. For Destiny 2 at High, I get an average of 70-75 FPS and Fortnite gets about 90-ish FPS. Temps are stable and runs pretty cool. Fans can get a bit noisy from time to time when they ramp up, but that's to be expected. Build quality is pretty high but the rear panel is a pain to remove. Also, the Lunar Light color came out-of-the box with some type of scuffs or stains on it, so this specific color/finish WILL get dirty very easily and shows every spec of dust/debris. 1 star for the Alienware brand and unfortunately the support that comes with it (I would give a zero here, if I could). It is abysmal at best and is why I will NEVER own another Alienware. I mean face it, you're buying the brand and the (*cough*) support. Invest your money in another brand that wants customer satisfaction and doesn't lock everything down behind a "paywall" of over-priced proprietary hardware with no freedom whatsoever, as a consumer. 2 Stars (I probably really should have just given it a 1, but the beauty and performance of the laptop won out). AVOID.