Alienware Aurora R5 Review: Small Stature, Big Performance
Aurora R5 Review Summary And Conclusion
The Alienware Aurora R5 is a surprisingly difficult desktop PC to nail down with a simple description. Let's get the easy observations out of the way first. It's a fantastic performer at a reasonable price. It looks great on the outside and is intelligently constructed on the inside.
As much as we like the new Aurora, it is still a mass market product that lacks the some of finer touches of some boutique systems. There's no side panel to show off the internals and the plastic shell doesn't have the most inspiring feel to it. The single fan radiator should get overclockers pretty far, but it can get a little loud to compensate if forced to ramp-up. Then again, it is equipped with a solid liquid cooling solution and the system, despite its relatively small size, is capable of handling a powerful configuration like the one we tested, complete with NVIDIA's latest GeForce GTX 1080 and the fastest Skylake chip out there.
Nevertheless, Dell's Alienware Aurora R5 is an excellent machine for anyone who wants to jump into gaming and have a powerful desktop PC for heavier duty productivity and content creation workloads. It provides a first rate experience without sacrificing upgradeability or requiring significant experience to get the system humming along just right. With a wide array of configuration options starting at $799, the Alienware Aurora R5 earns an easy HotHardware recommendation.
As much as we like the new Aurora, it is still a mass market product that lacks the some of finer touches of some boutique systems. There's no side panel to show off the internals and the plastic shell doesn't have the most inspiring feel to it. The single fan radiator should get overclockers pretty far, but it can get a little loud to compensate if forced to ramp-up. Then again, it is equipped with a solid liquid cooling solution and the system, despite its relatively small size, is capable of handling a powerful configuration like the one we tested, complete with NVIDIA's latest GeForce GTX 1080 and the fastest Skylake chip out there.
Nevertheless, Dell's Alienware Aurora R5 is an excellent machine for anyone who wants to jump into gaming and have a powerful desktop PC for heavier duty productivity and content creation workloads. It provides a first rate experience without sacrificing upgradeability or requiring significant experience to get the system humming along just right. With a wide array of configuration options starting at $799, the Alienware Aurora R5 earns an easy HotHardware recommendation.
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