Alienware takes aim at consoles with mini PC
Desktop 360
Alienware joined the mini PC biz this week, revealing a powerful games machine roughly the same size as an Xbox.
The Alienware X51 desktop squeezes high-performance components into a compact chassis, the Dell subsidiary said, in a bid to be the brains of a your home entertainment hub.
As such, the X51 veers away from the exclusive hardcore games machines the firm is famed for, keeping costs low and extending the olive branch to those who dabble occasionally. Yet while the X51 is the smallest gaming desktop Alienware has yet produced, it still packs enough of a punch to keep the hardcore community happy, the company promised.
Under the hood you'll find Intel Core i processors and either Nvidia GeForce GT or GTX graphics with dedicated GDDR 5 memory. There's also Wi-Fi for t'interweb access, a couple of USB 3.0 ports and an HDMI 1.4 slot for hooking up HD tellies. Oh, and a 7200RPM 1TB hard drive. Not bad for a machine less than 10cm thick.
The X51 boasts its hub credentials with a DVD burner or Blu-Ray drive as well as the ability to sit in both vertical and horizontal positions, slotting neatly under or alongside your gogglebox.
As with other Alienware products, the chassis gives users the option to get modding through three customisable lighting zones. Blingtastic.
The Alienware X51 is available from Dell starting at £700. To boost specs beyond the standard Core i3 chip and 4GB memory, though, you'll have to fork out a tad more. Check out the Dell blog for further information. ®
COMMENTS
Note to designers (not just Alienware's)
While you may have the urge to create sculpture suitable for gracing the 70s-vintage offices of a pharmaceutical company in Basingstoke, it's unlikely that we will place your new product on a pedestal in the centre of the living room. Recognise that we have more than one piece of kit under the TV. Be nice and make it so we can stack your new item on top or alongside the rest. That way, you might even sell some, instead of just having to send the trucks straight from the factory door to the landfill site.
Did I miss something?
You can buy a PS3 and an XBox 360 and still have a heck of a lot of change. This won't sway anyone over to PC gaming - half the fun is picking your components and building it yourself anyway!
HTPC? Ohhh the price...
Considered it for a µsecond,
Bu the a raspberry pi might just do all I need under the telly.
£700...
Would get me a 360, a wheel, a couple of extra pads and at least 6 games... and it'd be the same spec as all the other 360s...
Hardly targetting console gamers... more going for PC gamers who whilst they may have a decent spec PC are looking for something better and also think that it might well be useful to cream an extra 20cm space for storing that really important thing that never really found a home on the desk but could definitely probably fit in the gap that'd be made by getting this box.
It's a big market.
Never quite understood alienware
They use fairly high spec components to make (to me ugly - but clearly some peeps like it) very expensive kit. Surely anyone who cares enough about gaming to spend this sort of cash on kit is going to look at what goes into it and realise that they can make their own, better, machine for half the money and have cash left over for a decent ssd too. I always assume anyone actually buying their kit has (parents with) more money than sense. The PC I built myself 3 years ago (at a hundred quid more than this admittedly) shows this one the door without even trying. That's a relative dinosaur in gaming terms.
