Today's review features the new Alienware M11x Gaming laptop, which was featured at CES 2010. The M11x is available at Alienware starting at $799...more...
The M11x is just 11.6 inches which is only a little bigger than a netbook and a bit heavier weighing about 5 pounds. The M11x features switchable hybrid graphics. You can use the integrated graphics and get several hours out of the battery, or by holding down the function key and pressing F6, you can switch to the 1GB GeForce GT335M. The card can easily handle games like Modern Warfare 2, Left 4 Dead 2 and Resident Evil 5, with a whopping 30fps.
Price as reviewed $1399.
Specs (As reviewed):
11.6 Inch screen (16:9, 1366x768 pixel)
1.3GHz Core 2 Duo SU7300 (OC's to 1.7GHz)
8GB DDR3
750GB 5400rpm hard drive (I added it. 500GB is the largest available from Alienware)
Intel GMA 4500MHD & GeForce GT335M 1GB (Switchable Hybrid)
Integrated battery
Windows 7 Home Premium
4.5lbs total
Unraveling
It arrived in a plain box
With a Alienware box inside
Opening it reveals an interesting looking box inside for all of your accessories. This is exactly what I was expecting from Alienware.
The laptop is wrapped in a soft cloth bag, This is one accessory I will definitely reuse.
Review
At first, the casing is not all that impressive. It's a mix of matte and shiny. It's not reflective, but does attract fingerprints.
When you open it up, you quickly realize that the screen is awfully reflective. After just owning an Asus Netbook with a matte screen, this is kind of annoying.
The bottom has the usual layout of features with one noticeable difference: No battery. The M11x features an integrated battery that can be removed by opening the bottom plate where the RAM and Hard drive are also located.
Here are the profile shots. As you can see the right side is half empty where you would expect a DVD drive. I would've at least liked having a slot loading drive, especially since most people will need one for the gaming that this machine is supposed to deliver.
The power cord is a straight cable. I like having a right angle plug, but everyone is different. The good thing about having a laptop for a while before finally finishing the review is to see its wear and tear time. I had my Power cord go bad. After a pretty short time the converter box on the cord gets really, really hot and then shuts off. I called Alienware and was on hold for about 2 minutes. The bottom of the laptop has an Express Service Code that gives me "priority service" and it does. I called at about 9 in the morning and the next day it was delivered!! Go figure, the new cord has the same problem. I think I might just buy a third party cord that doesn't have this overheating problem.
Here is the F6 key that you'll need to switch between the integrated and discrete graphics.
The Caps Lock and wifi lights are at the top.
The touchpad has a honeycomb feel to it which isn't as abrasive as the Toshiba L555, nor as soft as my old Asus EeePC. After a couple of hours my finger tip does get annoyed by the feeling, but I imagine that most people will probably use a gaming mouse instead.
When you fire it up you are welcomed by the Alien-themed wallpaper. There are actually eleven different Alienware wallpapers provided to you.
The two front vent-looking ports are just that: "looking". But who wants hot air being blown at them anyway?
My favorite feature has got to be this back-lit keyboard! It is amazing.
What makes it even better is that you can change the color on the fly by opening the Alienware Command Center. Press FN and the UFO key (To the right of F12) to start it.
From here you can change the colors of the keyboard, vent lights, logo, power button and even the Caps lock!
The back of the screen has the usual glowing alien head that Alienware has always been known for. It's lit by the glow of the LCD, but since the screen isn't as bright as the sun, it doesn't appear to be on at all in the daytime.
Even in my profile picture is an alien head. Yes I'm TheGreatSatan at home too.
Gaming
Let's move on to the real reason this laptop is such a hit, the graphics! The M11x has hybrid switchable graphics. It's not the same as the Nvidia Optimus, which switches graphics on it's own. By pressing FN + F6 you can switch from one to the other.
To get a little bit more performance out of the laptop you can also Overclock the processor from 1.3GHz to 1.7GHz!
It's the easiest overclocking you'll ever do too.
Just press F2 on boot up to enter the enter the BIOS, then go into the Advanced tab. You can enable the overclocking at the bottom.
The Windows Experience Index is a decent, but not perfect measure of what the performance differences are.
With the processor overclocked to 1.7GHz and the Geforce 1GB GT335M the score is:
At 1.3GHz and with integrated graphics enabled the score drops to:
It's pretty sad that 8 gigs of DDR3 only scores a measly 5.4??
Battery Testing:
At exactly 2 p.m. I unplugged the power cord.
The first testing phase is what I consider normal use. The processor is set to 1.3GHz, the integrated graphics are on, the keyboard back-lit is on and the screen brightness is set to second from the bottom.
I surfed the net, ran some system cleaners and played light games like Hoyle Puzzle & Board Games. For some of the time I watched TV and let the photo slide show screen saver play.
I used the headphones on and off too. I don't know if it's because this is a gaming laptop, but when you plug and unplug the headphones you get a message saying that you did. I'm sure that would be handy to know in the middle of a game if you didn't know that it was unplugged.
The battery went to critical just after 7 p.m. and I was forced to plug it in before it shut down.
So five hours for a normal day. I've read reviews where they just let it sit and it goes for seven, but that's not how I test.
Next, we test the battery under gaming conditions.
For this test I enabled the 1.7GHz overclock and set turned on the 1GB GeForce GT330M graphics. I set the screen brightness to two from the bottom. During these tests, I will also have an external DVD drive plugged in too. It will be entirely powered by two USB ports as there are no external power plug options for this device.
I wish I can get my games to run without a drive, but that continues to elude me. That is one annoyance to note. I don't have a huge array of high end games to run this assessment as I've seen in other reviews. I know this video card can handle games like Resident Evil 5 and WoW. I will start testing with C&C Yuri's Revenge.
I play in skirmish mode and the battery is dead in 3 hours and 14 minutes! That alone is far better than most laptops, especially gaming ones.
When I installed Oblivion it scanned my system and didn't recognize my card then set itself to medium settings. I assume this is because my system is so new and the game was written long before this technology was out. The game plays for just 2 hours and 49 minutes before shutting off.
Obviously this shows that higher end games will drain it faster. So I installed Fallout 3 and discovered the battery sweet spot. I set the OC to the 1.3GHz default and left the 1GB Geforce on before playing and it helped more than I thought. The game still played fine and I went 3 hours and 6 minutes. Anything over 3 hours on a gaming laptop is very good, especially with a 1st person shooter.
The Annoying Things:
For all it's speed it's actually annoyingly slow with simple tasks. A prime example is when I plugged in my optical mouse and the computer started to install the drivers. It took at least 3 minutes to install a freaking mouse!
Another example is when I open an Internet screen or let's say MS Word, it takes up to 30 seconds. My old Asus Netbook with a single core Atom was lightening fast with Word and the internet compared to this Dual core memory monster.
Even in game mode there are lags. There are points where the games seem to gag on the graphics. I would be in game in Oblivion and try to turn my character around and he would just slowly shutter around. Maybe there's some setting tweaks I need to make, but with these specs I shouldn't have to.
The Alienware Control Center that controls the keyboard back-lighting has a keyboard shortcut, but it sometimes takes a few minutes to open up as well. Another example, as I showed above with the message of plugging and unplugging your headphones. I've had times where I'll plug in my headphones and listen to at least 10 minutes of music before the message finally pops up. What's with the delay?
Remember it's dual core with 8 Gigs of DDR3 RAM. I wonder if it has something to do with the "SU". The Intel SU7300 does not have hyper threading and that may not seem like much, but my old Atom did. It was obviously faster with the small tasks like Word or IE. Usually I expect double the threads for the number of cores, but Intel's site just says 2 cores, 2 threads. I think, in this case hyperthreading would make a huge difference.
In Closing:
This is no doubt the fastest laptop I've ever owned. It also has an incredible battery for the games it plays. The battery is built in, but can be replaced if necessary. I love having the option of playing easy games without ever having to turn on the hybrid graphics. And the keyboard is really what does it for me. Every few days I change the keyboard back-light color just to see something new. I've spoken with several people and that's the only thing they ever notice.
The laptop does not have a DVD drive, although you can tell where they wanted to put it because of half of a blank side. It would have been so nice if they could at least put another USB port or some kind of port there, but alas there's nothing.
I bought it with lower specs, but upgraded the hard drive and RAM because it was cheaper for me to do it and not get it from Dell that way. Plus Dell didn't have the 750GB or 1TB option. I didn't go with a 1TB drive because it's a little thicker and may not comfortably fit in the bottom of the casing.
Pros:
Way cool customizable back-lit keyboard
Massive RAM allowable
1GB hybrid graphics
Easy overclock from 1.3GHz to 1.7GHz
Battery is not removable
Great battery even when playing games
Only 11 inches for max portability
Cons:
Major lags when doing easy stuff
Half of one side is blank
No DVD drive
Excessively glossy screen
SD cards stick out when their inserted
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