Alienware M17 R5

Ryzen 6900HX meets Radeon RX 6850M XT

- SHERRI L. SMITH

WE’RE NOW at a place where it’s truly a competition in the laptop space. Instead of Intel and Nvidia ruling the gaming scene, AMD is making some serious noise and OEMs are starting to dance to its beat.

Enter the Alienware m17 R5. Boasting an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX processor and a Radeon RX 6850 XT GPU, the laptop is not to be trifled with. Thanks to AMD Advantage Suite, this system is optimized to ensure that you’re getting the best performance out of it. You also get Cherry MX keys, a stunning 4K display, great speakers, and a slick design to boot.

Our test configuration featured the 3.3GHz AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX processor with 32GB of RAM, 1TB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD, AMD Radeon RX 6850 XT GPU with 12GB of VRAM, and a 3,840 x 2,160 display with a 120Hz refresh rate and 3ms response rate. In other words, it’s a powerful machine.

The laptop also follows Dell’s Legend 2.0 design language, with a grayish black finish, numerous RGB elements around the alien logos, and onyx black vent at the rear. It looks nice, but this isn’t the most portable 17-inch laptop at 15.6 x 11.8 x 0.9-inch and 7.3 pounds. If that’s important for you, look for the thinner and lighter MSI Vector GP76, Razer Blade 17, or Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16.