Alienware m15 R3 Review: A thin and light gaming powerhouse that runs hot under pressure

Alienware is synonymous with PC gaming, but apart from powerful desktops, the company also offers more portable machines. Although Dell has several gaming laptops in its product portfolio, Alienware machines sit at the very top of Dell's gaming laptop portfolio. While the Alienware Area 51-m is the most powerful laptop in the company's gaming arsenal, it is too large and heavy.

The Alienware m15, on the other hand, is more of a portable gaming machine, in line with most flagship gaming laptops. Today, our focus is on the latest addition to the Alienware notebook family, the m15 R3. The 2020 Alienware m15 offers the latest 10th Gen Intel hardware coupled with Nvidia's RTX graphics. So, without any further delays, let's take an in-depth look at the new Dell Alienware m15 R3.

Design and Build

While the design is a big step-up from the original Alienware m15, not a lot has changed from last year's m15 R2. The Alienware m15 R3 features the same distinctively sci-fi aesthetic as its predecessor. The Alienware m15 R3 may not have a metal chassis, but build quality is quite solid, while the softer keyboard deck plastic is pleasant to touch. The R3 arrives in white "Lunar Light" and grey "Dark Side of the Moon" colour options, with ours arriving in the former.

The white Lunar Light colour goes well with the RGB lighting. Moreover, the ringed LED on the rear, combined with accents like honeycombed ventilation definitely adds flair to the overall design. Weighing in at just under five pounds and measuring about 0.9 inches thick, the Alienware m15 R3 is much lighter than the desktop replacement that is the Area 51-m. The Alienware m15 R3 doesn't look like a traditional gaming laptop, and that definitely works in its favour. You know what they say, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' and as you are soon going to realise, this is pretty much the theme of the m15 R3.

Keyboard and Trackpad

The Alienware m15 R3 has one of the best keyboards I've seen on a gaming laptop. The spacing between the keys makes the keyboard feel nice and roomy, while the keys have an ideal travel distance. The R3 features per-key RGB lighting, which can be customised through the AlienFX app. The glass trackpad on the m15 is smooth to the touch and easy to use. It performed well with Windows 10 multitouch gestures and precision drivers, making it quite responsive. If there was one downside here, it is the fact that the trackpad is on the smaller side.

Ports

There's a pretty strong assortment of I/O here. You have two USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A ports and a microSD card slot on the right. On the left, you get a USB 3.1 port, an Ethernet port, and a headphone jack. Additionally, the m15 R2 also features a USB Type-C port with Thunderbolt 3, a Mini DisplayPort and an HDMI 2.b port along with a power connector on the back. Lastly, there's a proprietary Alienware Graphics Amplifier port on the back for an E-GPU.

Webcam and Tobii Eye-Tracking

The webcam is nothing to write home about, although it does a fairly decent job for video calls. However, it is nowhere near good enough for streaming, but I've yet to see a gaming laptop that has an integrated webcam good enough for streaming. Additionally, the Dell Alienware m15 R3 also comes with Tobii eye-tracking, which sits just above the keyboard and scans your eyes to automatically dim the display when you're looking away.

But beyond this, Tobii eye-tracking can also control your computer. It is supported in over 150 titles and has a few uses in games and game streaming; however, the changes don't dramatically affect gameplay. But I found it particularly useful while firing from cover. Tobii eye-tracking can also be used to instantly wake your machine or as a mouse of sorts to launch an app.

Display

When it comes to the display, Dell simply does not compromise, offering a 15.6-inch Full HD (1080p) panel with a 300Hz refresh rate for hardcore gamers or a 15.6-inch 4K OLED screen for creators. However, the OLED panel is limited to 60Hz refresh rate, which means you won't be able to take advantage of the powerful specs unless you game in 4K that is. Watching content on the 4K OLED display was an absolute delight.

Picture quality was top-notch, delivering excellent hues with crisp detail. Additionally, colour reproduction was absolutely stunning, while viewing angles impressed. The 4K display features a 1ms response time, a 100,000:1 contrast ratio, and 400 nits of brightness, which is much higher than the category average. The OLED panel features a new True Black HDR 500 with a wide DCI-P3 colour gamut. While the OLED display may not be the best for gaming, it is ideal for content creation and well above average for 4K gaming.

Performance 

The m15 R3 model Dell sent us came with a 10th Gen Intel Core i7-10750H processor paired with an Nvidia RTX 2070 DDR6 8GB GPU. The notebook can also be configured with up to 32GB of RAM and up to a 1TB PCIe M.2 SSD. However, you can go all out with an Intel Core i9-10980HK and an Nvidia RTX 2080 Super Max-Q GPU with 8GB of VRAM. So, how did the laptop do in real-world tests, well, let's find out.

How to #PlayOfTheGame like a noobz#NoobGamer #Overwatch #ALIENWARE pic.twitter.com/14FoL1CFMC

— Carlsen Martin (@Carlsen0491) December 2, 2020

I tested a few games in 4K resolution, just to see how well this machine stands up to pressure. GTA V on high settings saw the laptop deliver an average of 76 fps, while Far Cry 5 struggled to surpass the 40fps mark on high settings in 4K resolution. Battlefield V managed to deliver just under 50fps on average in Campaign mode. Another title tested on 4K resolution was Overwatch, which consistently hit the 70fps mark. In 1080p resolution, Overwatch delivered an average of 160fps, while Call of Duty: Modern Warfare consistently surpassed the 100-fps mark.

Call of Duty on #Alienware

It's the laptop, not the player#CallofDuty #NoobGoingPro #Dell pic.twitter.com/ceTA3hFeLT

— Carlsen Martin (@Carlsen0491) December 2, 2020

While the m15 R3 did quite well, pushing games to the limit, it is not going to be capable of delivering 300 fps in games to match the 300Hz IPS panel. In Cinebench R20, the m15 R3 achieved 3,065 and 460 points in the multi-core and single-core tests respectively. In 3D Mark's Time Spy Graphics test, we got a score of 7899 points. Overall, performance on the Alienware m15 R3 is up to the mark.

Cooling

Cooling was definitely an issue with the original m15 and the m15 R2, so Dell has tweaked the cooling system on the m15 R3 to ensure those powerful specs can be utilised to their full potential. The cooling system is redesigned with more blades added to the fans with an increase in the amount of copper in the system to better dissipate heat. But while this new cooling system does feel like an improvement from last year, it is unable to cool down the CPU and GPU for extended periods, providing inconsistent performance.

Considering Alienware designs their hardware to run pretty fast, this wasn't much of a surprise; you are working with a highly portable form factor here and undervolting the CPU would help. But I still think the cooling system requires some work as it falls just shy of perfect. And while the bottom and back of the laptop get pretty toasty, I didn't experience any discomfort when using the keyboard.

Battery

Battery life on the Alienware m15 R3 was pretty underwhelming, and I tend to set the bar pretty low for gaming laptops because of their over-the-top specifications. You shouldn't expect more than three hours of battery life for regular productivity tasks, with the power-saving measures, including using Nvidia's Optimus technology. While gaming, the battery won't survive a single hour. While battery life should be one of the least important considerations when picking a gaming laptop, the m15 R3 falls well below the category average here.

Audio

The Alienware m15 R3 features front-firing speakers that are capable of delivering excellent audio output, putting the machine in a long list of laptops that don't require external speakers. While the fans do run quite loud at times, they aren't capable of drowning out the sound from the speakers. The speakers have good bass and mid response but do tend to struggle on the high frequencies. You are definitely not going to get Alienware Area 51m or Asus ROG Mothership sound quality here, but it's definitely impressive given its size.

Verdict

It goes without saying that the Alienware m15 R3 is quite an impressive gaming laptop, but it is still far from perfect. With the m15 R2, Alienware addressed most of the issues of the original m15 and the m15 R3 tends to follow that trend, addressing most of the shortcomings of the m15 R2, but not all of them and not to the extent that I can say 'third times a charm'.

There's a lot to love here, like the sci-esque aesthetic, smooth keyboard, vibrant display, powerful hardware, fluent audio, and overclocking support out-of-the-box. Even, Tobii eye-tracking seems like a gimmicky, but cool feature to have at your disposal. That being said, there are still a few areas where the m15 R3 did worst than expected, which was a real shame considering that this is definitely one of my favourite gaming laptops.

Despite being a powerful gaming laptop, the Alienware m15 R3 keeps pace with most of the competition but fails to surpass them for an albeit higher price. I have to admit; it'll be pretty interesting to see Dell incorporate an AMD CPU here, especially considering the new Ryzen chips would be able to help with some of those temperature woes.