Alienware, I Thought You Offered Quality, Premium Gaming Laptops. I was wrong.
This is obviously not a gadget blog. However, in my 15 years of work in public relations, I’ve worked with a wide range of companies at the intersection of technology, media, and digital marketing. As a technology and digital PR person, I certainly consider myself an early adopter and an above-average technology user.
Here’s a current list of gadgets and technology between my wife and I: two MacBook Pro laptops, an Alienware laptop, a MacMini that we use in conjunction with an external hard drive for storing photos and music, Xbox, Xbox Kinect, iPhone, Samsung Captivate (Android phone), Playstation 2, Wii, iPad, Kindle, iPod classic, and iPod touch. I bought a TiVo in its first year on the market. But, when our TiVo died, I ended up getting a basic DirecTV DVR, because there wasn’t a DirecTV/TiVo integrated set-top box available.
Four years ago, I switched from Windows and bought a MacBook, and I’ve never looked back. Over the years, I occasionally longed for a state-of-the-art gaming PC, because I love videogames, and there are still plenty of PC games that aren’t available for Mac. Yeah, yeah, I know that I can use bootcamp, and use Windows on my MacBook Pro. I fight for storage space on my MacBook Pro on a daily basis – without a Windows partition. Plus, I worried that with video games that tested the limits of Windows if I would have problems running Windows on my MacBook Pro without weird errors.
Recently, I decided to take the plunge, head back to the dark side for the sake of playing PC games, and I ordered an Alienware M17X laptop. Here are my thoughts/observations.
Tacky, plastic keyboard – You’re selling a premium product Alienware. I would venture to say that the laptop I bought is in the top 5% of premium-priced PC laptops. Why would you sell a laptop with a tacky, plastic keyboard? That’s not premium. After years of using a MacBook Pro, it’s painfully obvious every time I use the Alienware. A plastic keyboard and keys is tacky and cheap. Not a good decisions for a premium laptop.
Screen design – I was shocked when I opened up the Alienware, started loading some games, took a look at the screen and tried to push the screen all the way open, and the screen budged. The laptop won’t open beyond a straight 90% angle. I glanced in back, and the screen is designed in such a way that if you try to force the screen open beyond a 90% angle, you will break the laptop’s screen. What an abysmal design flaw. I often find myself bobbing and weaving my head in odd angles to look at the screen. Michael Dell you should horse whip the engineer who designed the screen for the Alienware M17X.
“Tech support” – Within 24 hours of opening up my Alienware, I was thrown back into the world of endless driver updates and arcane error messages. Again, a premium laptop in the top 5% of premium-priced PC laptops, and I immediately had to begin installing drivers. Awful. When I connected the Alienware to an external monitor (also purchased from Alienware/Dell), the audio from the laptop wouldn’t come through the external monitor. I hopped on Alienware’s tech support line, ready to try out Alienware’s stellar customer support, and I was promptly routed to an international boiler room, um, tech support center. Within five minutes, I heard something that completely stunned me. “We’re having a problem with this driver. We may need to reinstall Windows completely.” I think Michael Dell heard me screaming all the way from Massachusetts.
So, do I regret buying a state-of-the-art (with a tacky, plastic keyboard) Alienware? Unfortunately, I do. Years down the road, when I’m ready to buy another gaming machine, I’ll buy a MacBook Pro and run Windows from Bootcamp.
I really, really, really wanted to buy an Alienware and love the experience. However, I was reminded again that there’s only one computer company that understands how to build premium products.
