Alienware 18 Pro Reviews

More so than the Alienware 17 and Origin EON17-S, or any gaming laptop in existence, users should think long and hard before picking up an Alienware 18. There are just far too many more affordable and sensible options out there. For roughly the same price, you can build a desktop around an Nvidia Titan part (or two even) and still have enough leftover to build a beastly gaming machine. At half the price, both of these listed competitors serve up more than enough graphical horsepower to play most games out today. You might have to spend your first moments in-game toning down the settings for the optimal experience, but a more affordable option will leave you with more money in the bank to spend on monitors, peripherals, Doritos or whatever else tickles your fancy. But those still dead set on getting the most amped up Alienware 18 configuration won't be disappointed. Save for a few easily fixable issues, this 18-inch gaming rig can plow through just about any game you can throw at it. The Alienware 18 remains one of the world's most powerful gaming laptops, but at a prohibitive price.

It's big, heavy and outrageously expensive – and at this price the display could offer better-than-HD resolution. However, the dual GPUs of the Alienware 18 really do provide the strongest performance we've yet seen from a gaming laptop. The only question now is whether the forthcoming GeForce 800M series can outdo that performance, in either single or dual-GPU configurations.

Fully tricked out, as our review model was, it's hard not to like the Alienware 18 as a game-playing monster, but it's so big it's likely to eat all your desk space, and gamers this serious are just as likely to go with a build-it-yourself (or at least configure-it-yourself) gaming desktop. Aside from a few ergonomic tics, however, using the system was just plain fun, especially when it easily ate through the latest PC games. The Alienware 18 is big, ambitious, and an overwrought example of conspicuous consumption, at least when it comes to gaming laptops. It's also the least ugly an Alienware has managed to be in some time, even if that's a fairly low bar.

The $4,499 price tag is a bit dizzying (there are cheaper build-outs, obviously), but if you’re looking for a solid gaming machine at a bargain price, there are other Dell Alienware configurations (as well as good options from other manufacturers) that you can value shop for. The Alienware 18 is the one that you buy when money is no object and you refuse to accept anything less than everything.

Alienware once again lives up to its reputation as a manufacturer of high-end notebooks. The successor of the M18x R2, simply called 18, not only impresses with its noble design but also with the excellent performance. Nothing comes close to the performance of an SLI system with two GeForce GTX 780M GPUs at the moment. Combined with a quad-core processor and a Solid State Drive the notebook even manages the most demanding applications. The retail price is accordingly very high. The integrated Super-PLS panel is quite unusual: Saturation, viewing angles and contrast ratio are even superior to some IPS competitors. Other highlights are the adjustable illumination, the generously-sized palm rest and the excellent build quality. This is combined with good upgradeability and maintainability as well as an extensive port variety. However, we did not really like the WLAN performance, the size of the power supply unit and the fact that the battery is fixed with screws. The limited mobility is a general problem of a desktop replacement, but the notebook is even very big and heavy for an 18-inch device. The limited Turbo Boost during multi-core applications and throttling under maximum load might also scare off some potential buyers. The Alienware 18 would have gotten a very good rating if it had a matte display. It just misses the 88 % in this configuration.

Big, bulky, and ostentatious as heck, the Alienware 18 is the ginormous gaming laptop you want to use to show off your riches on the game grid.

We've been pleased with the battery-stretching results brought by Intel's fourth-generation Core processors, but "Haswell" can only do so much when teamed with a gigantic hi-res display and colossal array of hardware. The Alienware 18 came up short on our video-playback torture test, lasting only a couple of hours between charges.If you're shelling out $4,500 for a gaming laptop, you have every right to expect a system that looks and performs like no other, and the Alienware 18 delivers on both counts. Its metal accents and sleek exterior lighting are only a sample of what you get once you pop open the lid and are exposed to its myriad lighting zones and awesome 18.4-inch display, and its gaming performance is unparalleled.As a bonus, Alienware offers configurations to fit, well, any budget as long as it's a big one (though we'd skip the quad-SSD RAID array, since it deprives you of an optical drive). Yes, the 18 is huge and heavy, but there's an awful lot of firepower packed into this behemoth, more than enough to blow the competition out of the water and earn it our Editors' Choice for cost-no-object gaming notebooks.