I’m guessing that most hardcore gamers don’t actually read the WSJ - but there’s nothing like a little link love to connect us to stories that impact us. Here is the real scoop on what we are up to.
Dell XPS and Alienware are both great brands – arguably the greatest brands in PC gaming – and both will live on. But we are going to expand our focus on Alienware. We are going to invest like crazy in product development, design and engineering to propel Alienware as the premier gaming brand in the future. We are integrating the best gaming product development, engineering and design teams in the industry — Alienware and XPS — and this all-star lineup will be supported by a worldwide sales and marketing organization.
Alienware products are built by gamers for gamers and the brand has an impressive heritage of delivering a number of industry firsts in gaming. Alienware was first in the industry to introduce colors and a unique design for its PCs. Alienware also was the first to place a desktop processor in a gaming notebook. More recently – Alienware was first with dual GPUs (SLI) in notebooks and remains at the forefront of the industry with desktop offerings such as quad GPUs, overclocked processors and the fastest hard drive options available.
Today, Alienware gaming products have been recognized by customers and the industry as the best of the best. In fact, the Area-51 m15x has won multiple editors’ choice awards from prestigious publications such as Laptop, PC Magazine and Maximum PC, and the Area-51 desktop has won the Editors’ Choice Award from PC Gamer and the Shoppers’ Choice Award from Computer Shopper.
XPS remains an important Dell brand with its heritage of premium performance. While closely associated with gaming, in the last year XPS has expanded well beyond a gaming brand – look at the XPS One, our first entry into the all-in-one market, the XPS M1330, an industry leading ultraportable or the XPS 420 desktop, designed for multi-media activities. How the WSJ missed all this is a little beyond us.
And XPS gaming systems will remain an important part of our gaming product portfolio. We don’t plan an early phase-out of these systems as the WSJ incorrectly stated, and in fact will continue to refresh them to keep them on the front edge of gaming:
The XPS M1730 gaming laptop
- Nicknamed “the Beast,” this laptop is packed with powerful technology that boosts its performance above many gaming desktops available today.
- Editor’s Choice awards from PC Magazine, CNET, Laptop Magazine and Game Informer
The XPS 630 gaming desktop
- Received a remarkable FOUR Editor’s Choice awards within the first five days of launching
The XPS 730/730 H2C
- Supports bleeding-edge technology and features, includes re-designed H2C cooling system
We love gamers. We love gaming. And much like we want to win every game we play, we want to lead in this market. Simple really. So that’s why we’re investing so much in the gaming systems of the future – we want those on an Alienware or XPS to reign supreme.
May 13th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
Will you be updating the XPS 1730 with Intel’s Montevina platform?
Will you phase out the XPS line in early 2009?
May 13th, 2008 at 10:33 pm
What about rumors that a new line of hardware changes will effect the 1330 and 1530 xps’s?
May 13th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
Wow. Kinda interesting how the WSJ messed up bigtime with that article! I read the article first thing this morning - and the only thing I got out of it was the XPS Gaming Systems were going to be phased out - almost immediately - and AlienWare was going to be Dell’s “Gaming Platform”.
I do admit though - It is a little confusing to have two brands by the same company, that almost sell the same product.. I understand you can compare it to Toyota & Lexus (both sell high quality cars and are owned by the same company) but it almost seems as though its as though BMW & Lexus were the same company - whats the difference between the two??
May 14th, 2008 at 4:07 am
Glad to see such a quick response to the article.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:05 am
[…] brand names on the Dell umbrella diluted the Alienware product line. Dell, however, says that it must have missed the memo concerning any changes to its own XPS range. "XPS remains an important Dell brand with its […]
May 14th, 2008 at 10:58 am
I bought my Alienware laptop a year or so before Dell bought them. They took over a month to make and ship my machine to me. It has run flawlessly all these years and I see no reason to upgrade to any other machine.
For whenever I do upgrade I would look at Alienware first but the fact that Dell bought them makes me not so sure because I have a very poor impression of Dell cause it seems like they are in a hurry to ship out products and do things cheap and they basically end up shipping products with faulty parts.
May 14th, 2008 at 11:07 am
[…] [via Dell blog] […]
May 14th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
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May 14th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Whats interesting is they don’t shed any light on the issue of redesigns coming to alienware. From the article:
“The resulting group is now working on a line of new products that go beyond the colorful alienware boxes-Which Mr. lewis calls “passe”- by using new materials for their exteriors”. (Mr. Lewis is head of Dell’s PC Gaming Division)
Are they making a new line or replacing the existing alien ware with this new line? Is the only difference going to be the case?
May 14th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
“Alienware products are built by gamers for gamers and the brand has an impressive heritage of delivering a number of industry firsts in gaming.”
I like this sentiment, but I highly doubt that there is any truth to it. If they were built “by gamers for gamers” then they wouldn’t charge such exorbitant prices for hardware. Gamers are a counter-culture that usually live their lives on a strict (or slightly stricter, I suppose) budget.
Personally, I liked Dell back in the day, and I think if they start concentrating on service again (rather than outsourcing on-the-cheap and failing miserably to market themselves), they can become an industry leader once again. I think a step in the right direction, however, would be to draw the line between the company’s two “sects:” let Alienware concentrate on gaming and entertainment hardware, and let Dell’s core brand concentrate on workstations and education. Don’t blur the line by having Dell continue to push for XPS gaming systems or forcing Alienware to come up with office computers (even though having a 512 MB video card at word would be pretty bad-@$$).
May 14th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
[…] Dell Blog Further Related Reading on TFTS […]
May 14th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
[…] You might remember yesterday that we reported on the Wall Street Journal’s report on the canceling of the Dell XPS line, which includes the World of Warcraft laptop. It seems that the Wall Street Journal got it wrong, according to Dell spokeswoman Anne B. Camden, speaking via Dell’s official blog. […]
May 14th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
[…] You might remember yesterday that we reported on the Wall Street Journal’s report on the canceling of the Dell XPS line, which includes the World of Warcraft laptop. It seems that the Wall Street Journal got it wrong, according to Dell spokeswoman Anne B. Camden, speaking via Dell’s official blog. […]
May 14th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
[…] In response to a major news story yesterday that Dell would be phasing out its XPS line of gaming systems, the company has refuted the claims in the story, which originated at the Wall Street Journal, stating, “Dell XPS and Alienware are both great brands – arguably the greatest brands in PC gaming – and both will live on.” Dell’s Consumer Product PR representative Anne Camden posted the blog on Dell’s community blog, “Your Blog”. […]
May 14th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Badger Says:
May 14th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
“Alienware products are built by gamers for gamers and the brand has an impressive heritage of delivering a number of industry firsts in gaming.”
I like this sentiment, but I highly doubt that there is any truth to it. If they were built “by gamers for gamers” then they wouldn’t charge such exorbitant prices for hardware. Gamers are a counter-culture that usually live their lives on a strict (or slightly stricter, I suppose) budget.
“Personally, I liked Dell back in the day, and I think if they start concentrating on service again (rather than outsourcing on-the-cheap and failing miserably to market themselves), they can become an industry leader once again. I think a step in the right direction, however, would be to draw the line between the company’s two “sects:” let Alienware concentrate on gaming and entertainment hardware, and let Dell’s core brand concentrate on workstations and education. Don’t blur the line by having Dell continue to push for XPS gaming systems or forcing Alienware to come up with office computers (even though having a 512 MB video card at word would be pretty bad-@$$).”
When was the last time you build a gaming pc with the same specs as one of the Alienware Gaming PC’s or XPS Gaming PC’s? Did you add up the cost and save a whole lot? Considering the warranty, support, OS etc.
IMHO both brands need to coexist as they cater to two different markets. I might buy a XPS laptop or two if I feel like but not an Alienware laptop unless I have some more to spare after buying the XPS’s. I have my reasons so do 1000’s of the people I know
May 14th, 2008 at 5:22 pm
Happy to see that the XPS line will not be cancel. I’ve ordered recently a XPS M1530 hope to see it soon. It’s been ordered since may 2nd.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
Yay, dell isn’t phasing out XPS! It is still Inspiron’s best buddy and companion! I love this news! Phew, what a relief! Yay, :)!
May 15th, 2008 at 4:13 am
[…] Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments […]
May 15th, 2008 at 5:12 am
Please make XPS M1730 available at Dell Taiwan. Many people here in Taiwan are eager to buy this high performance gaming laptop. Thanks!
May 16th, 2008 at 2:58 am
[…] You strength advert yesterday that we reportable on the Wall Street Journal’s inform on the canceling of the Dell XPS line, which includes the World of Warcraft laptop. It seems that the Wall Street Journal got it wrong, according to Dell spokeswoman Anne B. Camden, speech via Dell’s authorised blog. […]
May 16th, 2008 at 11:01 am
[…] son post, Anne B. Camden, une des représentantes du service de presse de Dell, joue la carte de l’enthousiasme. […]
May 16th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
[…] Fuente: Direct2Dell […]
May 17th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Personally I don’t like the design and look of the alienware laptops even though they are great products and prefer the more subtle look of the XPS laptops dont forget the 1730 is the first with a Gamer LCD and even though people debate weather its worth it it is also the first with a Physx card so if Dell was going to Drop XPS why put so much into dveloping their 1730 laptop??? This is great new as I have a 1730 and would be disappointed if dell dropped XPS!!!!
May 22nd, 2008 at 7:50 pm
Yea, I too am glad to see that the xps line will not be phased out. Friday is my final day of high school and I am going into a video production degree and was looking at the m1730 and have been for a year now. This laptop seems to be my best bet for production and for the last few days I have been scrabling to find a suitable replacement, but now I am happy again.
May 31st, 2008 at 4:37 pm
[…] line of computers, CEO Michael Dell and company have refuted these claims. According to spokeswoman Anne Camden’s blog, “Dell XPS and Alienware are both great brands…and both will live on. But we are going […]