Alienware has long been one of the leading names in gaming laptops, and with the 2014 version of the Alienware 17, that reputation continues. The new Alienware 17 ($3,399, as tested) boasts an Intel quad-core processor, Nvidia's latest graphics card, and premium features, like a distinctive design, rich display and sound, and spacious storage. But while the Alienware 17 is very good, but it can't beat the performance of the Origin EON17-SLX (2014), the Editors' Choice for high-end gaming laptops, thanks to the latter's dual GPU.
Design
The Alienware 17 isn't shy about what it is: a powerful gaming laptop designed to put premium gaming power into a semi-portable design. While it's mobile, it's clearly not made for carrying around for long in your arms or even stowed in a backpack. It measures 1.9 by 16.3 by 11.7 inches (HWD), and weighs a backache-inducing 9.2 pounds (11.2 pounds if you bring along the power adapter).
The beefy laptop sports a brushed-
aluminum lid, and a magnesium-alloy chassis, but what will probably grab your attention is the lighting. As with the previous iteration, the dark material of the chassis is contrasted with lighting accents on the lid, a Tron-like glowing strip around the edge of the chassis, a glowing touchpad, and a backlit keyboard. The keyboard itself has multiple lighting zones and a rainbow of colors to choose from. Using the included AlienFX lighting control dashboard, you can set different color schemes and assign certain shades of color to specific events.
The 17.3-inch display is also very good, with an anti-glare coating to eliminate reflections, and a 1,920-by-1,080 resolution for enjoying your games in full HD. As with most gaming laptops, the Alienware 17 does not have any sort of touch support, but we'll give it a pass since our system came with Windows 7, and thus doesn't need any of the touch capability that Windows 8 demands. You'll also get great audio from two integrated Klipsch stereo speakers.
Features
The Alienware 17 has a rich selection of ports and features. On the right-hand side of the system, you'll find a slot-loading optical drive (dual-layer Blu-ray/DVD+-RW), along with an integrated card reader (SD, MMC, MS/Pro), Gigabit Ethernet, and two USB 3.0 ports. On the left are two more USB 3.0 ports (one with PowerShare for charging devices), along with an HDMI port and a mini DisplayPort for connecting monitors, a headphone jack, a microphone jack, and a power connector. There's also a case-lock slot, for physically securing the laptop when you take it to a big LAN party or similar event. The laptop is also outfitted with 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0.
Alienware doubles down on storage, with a 256GB solid-state drive (SSD) as the boot drive, and a larger 1TB, 5,400rpm hard drive for storing files. Preinstalled on the system is Windows 7 Home Premium, though customers can also get the laptop with Windows 8.1. It's mostly free of other programs, with only a few Alienware-branded tools, like Alien Autopsy (a branded version of PC Doctor's recovery tools), AlienRespawn (recovery and support software), and Alienware Command Center (customization and settings). Included in that last offering is AlienFX, which gives you extensive control over the custom lighting elements that cover the laptop.
Alienware's parent company, Dell, covers the laptop with a standard one-year warranty on parts and labor. While that's fine for a normal laptop, it's a bit short for this sort of machine, as many boutique gaming PCs offer longer two- and three-year warranties.
Performance
Our review unit was equipped with a quad-core Intel Core i7-4910MQ, a potent 2.9GHz CPU overclocked to 4.1GHz, and 16GB of RAM. The combination helps the system gain solid scores for both gaming and productivity. It garnered a healthy 5,734 points on PCMark 7, though it fell short of the MSI GT70 2PC Dominator, a midrange gaming system, which scored 6,073 points in the same test, and the Origin EON17-SLX (2014), which scored 6,446 points. In multimedia tests, the system finished Handbrake in 31 seconds and Photoshop in 3 minutes 24 seconds, suggesting excellent performance in all sorts of applications beyond gaming.
The Nvidia GeForce GTX 880M is the same discrete GPU you'll find in the Digital Storm Krypton, the Editors' Choice for midrange gaming laptops. This latest graphics card from Nvidia helped the system produce 3DMark 11 scores of 11,999 points (at Entry settings) and 2,888 points (at Extreme settings). The new Nvidia hardware has excellent performance, and it showed in our gaming tests, where the Alienware 17 produced solid playable frame rates, even at full 1080p resolution with detail settings all the way up. In Aliens vs. Predator, it produced 80 frames per second (fps), ahead of the MSI GT70 2PC Dominator (36fps) and the Digital Storm Krypton (46fps); it did the same in Heaven, garnering 48 frames fps, again ahead of both the MSI GT70 2PC Dominator (38fps) and just a hair behind the Digital Storm Krypton (49fps). In both instances, the Alienware 17's new single GPU, though potent, couldn't top the performance of a dual-card system, like the Origin EON17-SLX (2014), which boasts two Nvidia GeForce GTX 780M in an SLI configuration, and produced 96fps in both gaming tests.
Battery life is fairly short, lasting only 3 hours 12 minutes in our rundown test, which is typical of gaming laptops of this size. No regular gaming rig has all-day battery life; the MSI GT70 2PC Dominator lasted a nearly identical 3:19 on the same test, while the Origin EON17-SLX (2014) lasted a mere 1:13. The Digital Storm Krypton provided nearly an hour more (4:07). The 8-cell, 86Wh battery is not removable, which is unusual in this style of gaming rig.
Conclusion
There's no doubt that the Alienware 17 continues the company's reputation for having high-quality, high-performance gaming laptops. A premium price comes with certain expectations, however, and with the less expensive Digital Storm Krypton offering similar performance, there is the question of what the extra money gets you. In the case of the Alienware 17, that means a premium design with high-quality metal construction, top-of-the-line hardware, and more than a terabyte of storage space. The Origin EON17-SLX (2014) holds on to the Editors' Choice for high-end gaming laptops, thanks to the superior graphics performance that its dual GPUs provide, but if you want great performance and all the bells and whistles, the Alienware 17 is a great system to consider.
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