Graphics Performance

Now for the fun stuff: graphics performance.

Looking at 3DMark to begin with, the Alienware 15 R3 doesn't perform particularly well. The GS34VR, another GTX 1060 laptop, is 30 percentage faster in Sky Diver and nine percent faster in Fire Strike, which is no small feat from a laptop with largely the same hardware. This isn't good news for the Alienware 15, but this is but a synthetic benchmark; let's have a look at bodily gaming performance.

Looking at the good news first, the Alienware fifteen R3 is twoscore-50 percent faster in games compared to previous-generation gaming laptops that used the GTX 970M. If you lot're upgrading from terminal year'south Alienware xv, for example, this is the sort of huge performance gains yous can look. Often this is the difference between striking 40 FPS and threescore FPS at a given quality level, and that's a large deal.

The bad news is this Alienware 15 was routinely beaten past MSI's GS43VR 6RE Phantom Pro. MSI's GTX 1060-equipped 14-inch laptop was only slightly faster in most tests – typically under 8 percentage faster – nonetheless this is a larger margin that I'd like to see from two laptops that are near identical from a hardware perspective. In raw FPS numbers, the GS43VR held a 3-5 FPS reward in most cases, and that'southward zip to sneeze at.

I am not 100% sure why the Alienware 15 is slower than the GS43VR 6RE, however information technology'due south possible that MSI's offering has a better power direction and thermal solution that allows its GTX 1060 to hit higher heave clock speeds on a more consistent basis.

Throughout my testing of the Alienware 15, the GPU consistently sat well below the card's rated heave clock speed, sometimes reaching merely 1430 MHz depending on the game. This isn't a huge surprise considering the GPU is regularly power limited (the GTX 1060's TDP is just 85W), and temperatures typically striking 90°C during sustained gaming sessions. As such, at that place is essentially no room for overclocking the GPU.

Thermal performance is disappointing from the Alienware xv considering its large cooling solution; the GPU still runs quite hot, although typical CPU temperatures of 77°C nether heavy load are respectable. The laptop is very loud while either the CPU or GPU (or both) are beingness stressed, every bit its fans spin up to produce a tone similar to a small jet engine. The in-built speakers can overpower the fan dissonance in games, nonetheless you'll want a good pair of headphones to fully block out the dissonance.

The benefit to the Alienware 15'due south loud and beefy cooling solution is keeping the key areas of the laptop's surface absurd during gaming. The WASD keys reach just under 33°C during an extended gaming session, and its surrounding keys are under 30°C. The hottest part of the keyboard is around the nine primal, which reaches over 44°C under heavy load, however this area is seldom used for gaming applications.