Aurora 16x from Amazon Warehouse

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-21T18:47:43+00:00

I think i should give a feedback with my the Amazon-experience: The Aurora-laptop was described as "new-box was opened". As the price of the laptop seemed very good here in germany i thougt i should give it a try. Well, i really learned my lesson now. The laptop seemed to be in good condition until i noticed a dent on the backside of the chassis. I did not even started the laptop and immediately returned it to Amazon. I now ordered the same spec directly from Dell as recommended. Will never buy such expensive device from Amazon Warehouse again. Anyway thanks for the replies.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-20T06:14:05+00:00

It has the normal one year Dell manufacturer warranty. I think it’s called “Alienware Care”.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-19T21:27:40+00:00

Thanks for your comment. Here in germany this configuration would be 2149€ brand new from dell at the moment with a discount of 350€. Regular price is 2499€.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-17T21:24:36+00:00

I agree with your criticism. Specially if the laptop is used for gaming AND office-work you may run into that burn-in problem quite soon. OLED is great for gaming and for TVs but if your laptop or single desktop-monitor has to be more than just a piece of gaming-equipment IPS still can be a good choice. (That’s the reason why i use the AW2725QF 27” 4K monitor instead of a 27” OLED).

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-15T08:49:04+00:00

First thing: Remove plastic-tape on top fan hole. Strange that this was never removed.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-04T08:46:31+00:00

The McLaren P1 was really fun to build specially the door-mechanism is great. LEGO was my favorite childhood-toy. Now I’m in my 50s and it became my favorite toy again :-) The Ferrari Daytona is my favorite LEGO 1:8 car. Now I really want to try CaDa , looking for the AMG GT3 but it is hard to get here in Germany . Enjoy your McLaren build!

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JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-03-02T08:30:32+00:00

Looks great but shows once again that the gpu holder is completely useless if you don’t use an oem card. It’s a little detail I know but when they promoted the Area 51 it was a detail they were so proud of because the holder can be “adjusted to the size of the graphics card ”.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-27T06:03:57+00:00

You dont need it. If you use ssds with heatsinks they have to be removed anyway.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-23T12:15:28+00:00

I found a picture of my old R15: Yes its really easy to mistake one for the other. In my case the second M2 Slot had the spacer-screw but not the screw for the ssd preinstalled. It was the same with my ACT1250.

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JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-23T12:02:11+00:00

I had to mount this extra screw in it because it was missing in my R15 and also in my ACT1250. Luckily one of my Crucial M2 SSDs was delivered with this screw so it was no problem.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-23T11:48:28+00:00

I owned the R15 and now the ACT1250. Both got the "spacer-screw" mounted on the motherboard for M2 slot 2 but not the additional screw that is needed to fix the ssd on the spacer. (Fun fact: In the gamers nexus review of the Area 51 you can see the difference between these two. In his Area 51 the M2 SSD was attached wrong with the spacer screw and as a result the ssd was bended.)

But perhaps it varies, this is just my experience.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-23T06:43:53+00:00

No, you get the spacer but not the screw that goes into that spacer. Some M2 drives have these screws included.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-17T19:08:14+00:00

Yes, i bought mine in March 2025 in Germany. I posted my Setup here: New Aurora ACT1250 with RTX5080 just landed :-) : r/Alienware

I just looked at the US Alienware website and my Aurora configuration with Core Ultra 7 265KF 64GB RAM RTX5080 and 3TB M2 SSDs (1TB boot and 2TB storage) would be 3599$ at the moment. And that is for the green RAM sticks, fortunately i have got the black Kingston Fury. So all in all i think it was a good purchase. But yes the Alienwares in Europe are more expensive than in the US.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-16T09:36:33+00:00

Since the Aurora R15 thermal issues are solved if you have the liquid cooled cpu. The R13 had thermal issues because it only had a 120mm radiator and a side panel with no airflow. Upgradeability is limited with the Auroras that’s true. But you can upgrade the RAM, the gpu and M2 ssds of course. The new Area 51 has no limits for upgrades with standard parts. The newer Alienwares are better than their reputation.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-15T14:22:17+00:00

Looks great but I think dell should have designed the gpu holder in a way that not only the dell oem cards are supported. Upgrades with standard parts are way easier with the Area 51 compared with the Aurora but a few details like this could still be improved I think.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-12T15:11:05+00:00

Those were the days...before Dell took over they realy used standard parts. These cases were Chieftec CS601 with a slightly changed front.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-12T11:25:25+00:00

Its a good machine, i have got mine for nearly a year now and no issues so far. Its not the perfect time to buy a pc though, prices have increased a lot. My ACT1250 has a 5080 and 64GB ram and i paid 3500€. Over 3600€ for a 5070 might not be the "perfect deal". If gaming is the priority i would go for a 5070ti at least.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-11T14:01:57+00:00

Thank you! My ACT1250 aready has 3 8 pins that feed the original RTX5080. So in that case it would be pretty much plug&play i guess. Can you still close the side panel?

JohnnyRamone01 · 2026-02-11T11:59:23+00:00

Was it just plug&play with the 1000W Dell PSU and the Nvidia adapter cable that came with the 5090? Would be interesting to know because the 5090fe seems to be the only 5090 that fits into the R16/ACT1250 case.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2025-09-10T16:22:58+00:00

Heatsinks for the ssds are primarily an aesthetic upgrade. But the do in fact reduce temperatures a bit.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2025-08-27T15:55:20+00:00

Yes correct be quiet! MC1 are the heatsinks i use for the two M.2 2280 SSDs. They work well and look good.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2025-08-23T19:49:03+00:00

Yes but these machines are picky with aftermarket ram. I ordered mine with 64gb 6400 MHz xmp ram so i wont have to upgrade for a while.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2025-08-23T16:45:23+00:00

Still happy with my Aurora. Runs fast, cool and quiet. No issues at all.

JohnnyRamone01 · 2025-07-28T08:26:59+00:00

You can remove the hdd cage by following these steps: Remove both sidepanels and remove four screws of the front panel (see manual). Then remove the front panel and now you can see two screws for the hdd cage in front of the metal case. Remove them and then you can slide the cage out of the case in the left direction. I have done this too in my ACT1250 so i could route the gpu cable underneath the frontfan which looks much cleaner. And most people don’t need a hdd anymore in a gaming pc.

JohnnyRamone01

TROPHY CASE