Earlier than right now, you’ll have wanted to spend a minimal of roughly $1,700 for considered one of Dell’s Alienware laptops (although, Dell’s revolving reductions imply you’d seemingly pay lower than this determine). With the arrival of the Alienware 15, the worth of entry has dropped to $1,300.
After all, you will want to simply accept just a few tradeoffs to hit this cheaper price, however the Alienware lineup has expanded downward to draw extra players — particularly, those that discover themselves on tighter budgets on this period of provide shortages and rising costs.
Dell has additionally introduced two mainstream laptops right now within the Dell 14S and 16S. Let’s check out the three new fashions.
The brand new entry-level Alienware
The Alienware lineup now contains three tiers, with the brand new Alienware 15 on the backside, the 16/16X Aurora within the center and the flagship 16/18 Space-51 on the high.
The Alienware 15 gives a selection of Intel and AMD processors and present and previous-gen Nvidia RTX GPUs as much as an RTX 5060. It is primarily based on a 15.3-inch IPS show with a decision of 1,920 by 1,200 pixels and a refresh price of 165Hz, which is wrapped in an all-plastic chassis. These are pretty uninspiring show specs, as is the 300-nit ranking for brightness.
The AMD and Intel choices are every a technology or two behind the occasions. You’ve gotten your selection of a pair of AMD Ryzen 200 collection processors (a Ryzen 5 220 or Ryzen 7 260) or a pair of Intel Raptor Lake chips (a Core 5 210H or Core 7 240H). Dell says it is including Ryzen AI 400 collection processors choices quickly.
The GPU choices span three generations: RTX 3050, 4050, 5050 or 5060. The graphics chips are throttled to maintain thermals in test. The RTX 3050 and 4050 are set at 70 watts, and the 50 collection GPUs high out at 85 watts. That is one sacrifice you make in dropping down from the Alienware 16X Aurora, which I examined with an RTX 5060 operating at its full 115-watt capability.
The Alienware 15 additionally lacks the Aurora’s aluminum high panel that provides a splash of fashion and extra rigidity to guard the show. It additionally lacks the Aurora’s RGB keyboard backlight and illuminates its keys in solely primary white.
A few elements I preferred seeing for the Alienware 15 has to do with upgradability and sustainability. The RAM and SSD aren’t soldered to the motherboard and will be changed or expanded.
Okay, let’s discuss pricing. The AMD-based fashions begin at $1,299, and the Intel-based fashions begin at $1,349.
Alienware 15 pricing
| CPU | GPU | RAM | SSD | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 5 220 | RTX 4050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,299 |
| Ryzen 7 260 | RTX 4050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,399 |
| Ryzen 7 260 | RTX 5050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,459 |
| Ryzen 7 260 | RTX 5060 | 16GB | 1TB | $1,849 |
| Core 5 210H | RTX 4050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,349 |
| Core 7 240H | RTX 4050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,449 |
| Core 7 240H | RTX 5050 | 16GB | 512GB | $1,509 |
| Core 7 240H | RTX 5060 | 32GB | 1TB | $2,299 |
The above pricing is the US listing value. I’d anticipate Dell to low cost numerous configurations of the Alienware 15 with some regularity to the place you may be capable of discover a sale value that dips beneath $1,000 for one of many lower-end configurations as a result of the Alienware 15 is much less interesting when you’ll find a 16 Aurora discounted to simply $1,200.
Slim twins: The Dell 14S and 16S
Dell introduced a brand new laptop computer collection that slots in between its entry-level Dell laptops and its Dell Plus line. The brand new Dell 14S and 16S are slimmer variations of the baseline Dell collection and have all-metal chassis. And they seem like very slim: Dell lists the thickness as simply 0.6 inches for each the 14- and 16-inch fashions.
The Dell 14S is available in both frost blue or celestial blue.
These new mainstream laptops function a choice of Intel Panther Lake processors, from the Core Extremely 5 322 to a Core Extremely 9 386H and together with the Core Extremely X7 358H that options the flagship built-in Intel B390 GPU that has 12 Xe cores. I’ve examined laptops with this CPU, and so they provide a compelling combination of a skinny design, quiet operation and lengthy battery life with sufficient 3D efficiency to fulfill informal players.
Show choices abound, with each primary IPS and superior OLED panels provided, with and with out contact help. You’ll be able to outfit both mannequin with as much as 32GB of RAM and 2TB of storage.
The Dell 16S is a slim, 16-inch laptop computer primarily based on Intel’s Panther Lake processors.
Many occasions, a producer gives a sparse port choice when it goes for a super-thin, modern design, however fortunately, that is not the case right here. Each the Dell 14S and 16S function a broad array of ports with two Thunderbolt 4 ports, two USB-A ports, an HDMI connection and a headphone jack.
I am wanting ahead to testing them to see how they stack up towards two of my favourite thin-and-light laptops, the Asus Zenbook A14 and Zenbook A16.
The Dell 14S and 16S can be found now. The Dell 14S begins at $1,270, and the Dell 16S begins at $1,320.
