Alienware M15x gaming laptop and Area-51 desktop officially land

The Core i7-powered M15x and Area-51 gaming desktop have left the Alienware mothership and made a beeline for your wallet

 

After numerous sightings in the blogosphere, Alienware has finally announced what unidentified laptop hunters had spotted in their telescopes – a brand new M15x gaming laptop, along with Area-51 and Aurora desktops.

 

The big news with the Alienware M15x – a more portable 15in version of its m17x gaming monster – is that it’s powered by Intel’s new Core i7 processor, which has now made the leap from desktops.

 

The trademark muscular, aggressive styling is all present and correct, and it also has a backlit keyboard that can be programmed to glow different colours for different functions (red for work emails, for example).

 

Prices start at £1200 for the M15x, but some optional spec upgrades will push that up further – you can swap the 500GB hard-drive for a 256GB solid-state number, and a Blu-ray can also be added.

 

Alienware has also beefed up its desktop army, with new Aurora and Area-51 models. The ‘entry-level’ Aurora starts at £1200 and rocks a 2TB hard-drive, an overclocked 3.6Ghz Core i7 processor and dual 1GB ATI Radeon HD5870 graphics cards.

 

Pro gamers with doorstep wallets, though, will want to plump for the Area-51 – a brutally powerful (and expensive) beast with dual 1.8GB nVidia GeForce GTX295 cards and a feature called ‘active venting’, which makes the roof of the case fan upon booting to keep the innards cool.

 

Prices will start from £1800, and it’ll be available from October – time to start saving your earth pounds. And while you’re waiting, weigh up your options with our Laptops Top 10.