Revisiting the Alienware M11X R3 Notebookcheck review 12 years later – NotebookCheck.net News

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2008, 2009 and 2010 have been the years when inexpensive Windows computing actually began taking off. Asus’ EEE-sequence netbooks in addition to low-price laptops from different producers have been promoting like sizzling muffins. They have been light-weight and small, but inexpensive and quick sufficient for many mundane duties. The cost was largely led by Intel’s Atom household processors.

“What else sells like hot cakes”, hummed Dell engineers inside an unknown Dell facility. The reply got here instantly. Gaming laptops do! They all the time do.

Soon after that, an thought flashed in a kind of engineers’ heads. “Why don’t we combine a large, powerful gaming laptop and a netbook into a single device?” The Alienware M11x was about to be born.

Over the course of a few years, three iterations of the product have been launched, often known as the M11x, the M11x R2 and the M11x R3. Now we’re having a look at the final mannequin in that record as a result of it was a lot extra highly effective than the relaxation, and in addition as a result of it was the final 11-inch gaming laptop computer from Dell/Alienware.

The laptop computer we examined featured an i7-2657M, a 32 nm Sandy Bridge half, and NVIDIA’s GeForce GT 540M, together with 4 GB of DDR3 RAM and a Samsung SSD. The DirectX 11-appropriate GPU and its 96 CUDA cores have been of specific curiosity to the target market, as the Alienware M11x R2 and the Alienware M11x solely had GeForce GT 335M to work with, which was a mid-vary DirectX 10.1 GPU with 72 CUDA cores. Performance-wise, the M11x R3 was a multimedia laptop computer somewhat than a gaming one; it was its comparatively small dimension, along with the standard set of Alienware options, that gave this product a legit proper to additionally name itself a gaming laptop computer.

• Alienware M11x R3 dimensions: 286 x 233 x 33 mm

Of course, every M11x R3 got here with the Command Center, an app that allowed the consumer to modify between efficiency profiles, tune the RGB lighting results, and do different issues correct gaming laptops are recognized for.

• Alienware M11x R3 battery capability: 62 Wh

Just like the R2 and the R1 earlier than it, the Alienware M11x R3 had an 11.6-inch TN display screen with a decision of 1366 x 768 pixels and that was in no way shiny at round 200 cd/m².

In our review, Notebookcheck’s gaming laptop computer skilled, Florian Glaser, famous how the case high quality was completely nice. The largely plastic 1.95 kg chassis was beautiful to carry in a single’s palms and straightforward on the eyes certainly, if considerably liable to small scratches resulting from its shiny coating. While the display screen was one in all the few drawbacks of the laptop computer, the case was undoubtedly one in all its sturdy factors.

The mannequin we examined got here with a really quick Samsung SSD that allowed for sequential learn charges of over 200 MB/s – an important worth again then. (As of early 2023, 200 MB/s continues to be ok for tablets, laptops, and telephones of the cheaper selection; these get geared up with eMMC chips somewhat than UFS chips or NVMe SSDs). It additionally had a 2 MP webcam and a gigabit Ethernet port. Windows 7 was pre-put in.

The massive battery allowed for first rate battery life, which was aided by NVIDIA Optimus assist.

The M11x R3’s keyboard was nice to sort on; chicklet-fashion keyboards with poor suggestions have been nowhere to be seen in 2011. The touchpad was simply pretty much as good.

The Alienware was quick sufficient to run Crysis and Crysis 2 at 1366 x 768 (medium settings). That was no small feat for an 11.6-inch laptop computer (even when the laptop computer in query was considerably chunky). A little bit of CPU efficiency throttling wasn’t bothersome sufficient to stop the consumer from having fun with the recreation. The constructed-in Klipsch-branded audio system have been comparatively highly effective, making it potential to recreation with no headphones on.

Last however not least, the laptop computer had a good cooling resolution. We have been in a position to measure a peak of slightly below 40 °C on the backside, and far lower than that on the prime. There was a little bit of an disagreeable hiss to the fan’s sound, although.

It seems that gross sales weren’t spectacular sufficient to justify releasing an Alienware M11x R4. Either means, we hope to in the future see the R3’s successor in our take a look at labs.

Buy the Alienware m15 R7 (Core i7-12700H, GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop) on Amazon

Sergey Tarasov – Senior Tech Writer – 2233 articles revealed on Notebookcheck since 2010

I like studying stuff. I additionally love coping with totally different digital gadgets, be {that a} remotely managed toy or a brand new MacBook. When I’m not at work, you’ll be able to attempt looking for me someplace in the mountains of Altai Republic, Russia.