The power and the glory

By Paisal Chuenprasaeng

The Nation

Published on January 7, 2010

Dell Alienware M15x

The Alienware M15x is a very powerful notebook computer for hardcore game players.

It has a very unique design and it is not for road warriors without their own vehicle because the M15x has a huge chassis and is quite heavy, weighing about 4 kilograms. It is 48.7mm thick, 37.79cm wide and 30.85cm deep.

Alienware designed the M15x with a huge chassis to dissipate heat rapidly, because the notebook uses a very powerful CPU chip and a very fast graphics processor.

The M15x is available in 3 colours - black, red and silver. I liked the red anodized aluminum cover because of its attractive contrast with the black body around the keyboard.

As part of its unique design, the keyboard is illuminated and the light can be adjusted. Different coloured lights can be assigned to four parts of the keyboard.

There is an illuminated alien head on to top cover and an illuminated "Alienware" title below the screen. Media buttons on top of the keyboard and stereo speakers in front, below the keyboard, are also illuminated and the lights can be changed.

There was a time when Thai game players watched in envy as their counterparts in the United States shopped for famed Alienware desktop and notebook computers. Their long wait is over because they are now available here. After Dell took over Alienware, Dell Thailand began importing and distributing the Alienware M15x.

The big notebook has everything for extensive graphics games. It is powered by an Intel Core i7 720 QM running at 1.6GHz with 4GB of working memory and 500GB of storage space.

Its graphics horsepower comes from an NVIDIA GeForce GTX260M with 1GB dedicated to video memory.

Its 15.6-inch glossy and bright LED-backlit LCD screen is really great with high-definition details at 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution.

Alienware also provides two "game joy" pads.

I tested the M15x with Residential Evil 5 and found the game flew on the machine with no performance hiccups. I tested the machine with built-in benchmarks provided by several games and found that the notebook reproduced the games at high frame rates of more than 30 frames per second. For example, the built-in benchmark from CAPCOM's Street Fighter IV gave the machine a B grade.

Assessed with the built-in assessment tools of Windows 7, the M15x also achieved high scores.

On a scale of 1 to 7.9, the M15x got 7 points for the processor's calculation speed, 7.4 for memory speed, and 6.8 for both 3D business and gaming graphics performance and desktop performance for Windows Aero transitional effects. The hard disk speed got 5.9 points.

Unfortunately, the notebook does not come with a Blu-ray drive or HDMI port.

The Alienware M15x costs Bt82,990.

Key specs: Alienware M15x

Operating system: Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit

CPU: Intel Core i7 1.60 GHz

Memory: 4GB DDR3 SDRAM

Storage: 500GB SATA hard disk

Display: 15.6-inch WideFHD 1920 x 1080 WLED

Graphics adapter: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260M with 1GB memory

Webcam: 2 MP

Dimensions: 48.70mm x 37.79cm x 30.85cm

Weight: 4.08kg

-- The Nation 2010-01-14

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There was a time when Thai game players watched in envy as their counterparts in the United States shopped for famed Alienware desktop and notebook computers. Their long wait is over because they are now available here.

Dream on. At Bt82,990 I suspect their sales figures now confirm Thai game players are still watching with envy as their counter parts in the United States are able to pick up this system or an even badder M17x at a much lower price.

What kind of weirdo would want a notebook as a games machine? Especially at that price :-)