Dell Alienware m18 R2 (2024)  Laptop Review

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 is only available in the Dark Metallic Moon color. See the bottom of the laptop here.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's build quality is outstanding. The construction is a mix of aluminum and plastic. It feels very sturdy and hefty, exhibiting only a small amount of flex on the lid but almost none on the keyboard deck. The finish is fairly scratch- and smudge-resistant, and the feet feel solid and stick firmly to the bottom.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's hinge is outstanding. It feels smooth when opening and closing the lid and is stable, exhibiting only a little wobble when touching the screen or typing heavily. There's a fair amount of resistance, but you can still open the lid with one hand because the laptop's base is heavy enough to keep it in place.

Check out the Dell Alienware m16 R2 (2024) if you want a smaller, more compact laptop for on-the-go use.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's serviceability is outstanding. Accessing the internals is straightforward; you only need to remove a few Philips screws and undo the bottom panel's clips with a prying tool. The two corners are captive, meaning they remain attached to the panel. The four storage slots comprise two M.2 2230 and two M.2 2280/2230 slots. Models with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 or 4070 GPU only have two M.2 2280/2230 slots.

See the owner's manual here.

• 360W power adapter and cord
• Documentation

Note: Models with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 and 4070 GPU come with a 280W power adapter

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 is available with the following displays:

• 18" IPS 2560 x 1600 165Hz
• 18" IPS 1920 x 1200 480Hz

The choice of the display depends on your usage. The sharper QHD+ (2560 x 1600) is a better option if you play a lot of games in which you have the time to appreciate the graphics, like atmospheric games and RPGs. Its increased sharpness (167 PPI) also makes it a better option for productivity and media consumption. The lower-resolution FHD+ (1920 x 1200) display is better suited for fast-moving games like FPS and racing games because its high refresh rate provides better responsiveness when gaming. Check out the Razer Blade 18 (2024) if you want a laptop available with a sharper 4k display.

The 480Hz FHD+ display has a fast response time, resulting in a clear image with minimal ghosting in fast-moving scenes. The 165Hz QHD+ display has the same advertised response time and will likely perform similarly. Both displays support variable refresh rate to minimize screen tearing.

The FHD+ display's contrast ratio is decent and within the typical range of most IPS panels. However, it's still relatively low compared to other display technologies like VA and OLED. This contrast level makes blacks look gray in dim settings. The QHD+ display has the same contrast ratio.

The FHD+ display gets reasonably bright, though it falls short of the advertised 300 cd/m². This brightness level is fine for most indoor environments, but you'll likely have trouble seeing dark-color content in bright ambient lighting. The display gets pretty dim at the lowest brightness setting, which helps reduce eye strain when viewing content in the dark. The QHD+ display has the same advertised brightness.

The display's reflection handling is good. Its matte anti-reflective coating works well against direct reflections like a lamp or open window during the day. For the most part, reflections aren't an issue when viewing bright-color content with the screen at maximum brightness; however, they make dark-color scenes much harder to see.

The display's accuracy is bad out of the box. Most colors look oversaturated because the default color profile targets a wider color space, and the white balance is also off, as there's far too much red. The gamma doesn't follow the sRGB curve all that well; most scenes look too bright, while dark scenes are a tad too dark.

The FHD+ display's color gamut is outstanding. It has full coverage of the commonly used sRGB color space. It also has full DCI P3 coverage, making it suitable for viewing and producing HDR content. Its Adobe RGB coverage is outstanding, though it might still be too low for professional print photography, as it can't reproduce the highly saturated greens that define Adobe RGB. The QHD+ display has the same advertised color gamut.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has an outstanding keyboard. Our unit's keyboard has CherryMX ultra-low-profile mechanical switches. You can also get the laptop with a scissor-switch keyboard, which we expect to be similar to the one on the Dell Alienware m18 (2023). The layout feels spacious and is easy to adapt to, and it's the same regardless of which key switch you get. The keys are stable, have a good amount of travel, and require very little force to actuate. They provide distinct tactile and audio feedback; you can hear how it sounds here. Both keyboards (scissor switch and mechanical) have per-key RGB backlighting, which you can customize via the Alienware Command Center app. The brightness is adjustable using the F7 shortcut.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has a great touchpad. Its glass surface feels very smooth, allowing the fingers to glide easily, and it tracks all movements and gestures well. There's no issue with palm rejection or accidental triggers. As for the size, it's reasonably large but could be bigger, considering the amount of space available on the deck. You can only click in the bottom half of the touchpad, and the buttons are decently tactile.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's speakers get reasonably loud with minimal compression at higher volume levels. They sound clear but boxy and tinny, with very little bass. It's worth noting that the grills above the keyboard are air vents; the speakers are on the bottom near the front.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has a decent webcam. The image looks a tad soft, noisy, and overexposed, though the colors are reasonably accurate and natural. Voices sound clear over the microphone with very little background noise.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's port selection is outstanding. All three USB-A ports support USB 3.2 Gen 1 data transfer speed of up to 5Gbps. The USB-A next to the Ethernet port supports PowerShare, a feature that lets you set how much of the battery's charge a connected device can draw when charging. For example, if you set it to 25%, charging will stop when you've used 25% of the laptop battery's total charge. You can also turn off charging completely. Both USB-Cs on the back support Thunderbolt 4 (up to 40Gbps data transfer speed and two external 4k displays at 60Hz) and DisplayPort 1.4, while the one on the laptop's right side supports USB 3.2 Gen 1 data transfer speed. The HDMI is a true HDMI 2.1 port that can output a 4k @ 120Hz signal. The Ethernet controller is an Intel Killer E5000 5G.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's wireless adapter is an Intel Killer 1750 2x2.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 is available with the following CPUs:

• Intel Core i7-14650HX (16 cores/24 threads, up to 5.2GHz, 30MB cache)
• Intel Core i7-14700HX (20 cores/28 threads, up to 5.5GHz, 33MB cache)
• Intel Core i9-14900HX (24 cores/32 threads, up to 5.8GHz, 36MB cache)

All three CPUs are high-performance processors typically found in gaming laptops and mobile workstations. These CPUs are a refresh of Intel's 13th Gen CPUs and a separate line of processors from Intel's Meteor Lake family with no low-power E-cores or Neural Processing Unit (for A.I.-based tasks). They can handle general productivity tasks as well as more demanding workloads like video editing, gaming, and programming. The choice of the CPU depends on the GPU, as there are limitations regarding CPU and GPU pairing: you can only pair the Core i7-14650HX with an RTX 4060, the Core i7-14700HX with an RTX 4070, and the top-end Core i9-4900HX with an RTX 4080 or 4090. Since most games are GPU-limited, it’s best to choose the GPU first.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 is available with the following CPUs:

• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU 8GB GDDR6 (140W TGP /w Dynamic Boost)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU 8GB GDDR6 (140W TGP /w Dynamic Boost)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU 12GB GDDR6 (175W TGP /w Dynamic Boost)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU 16GB GDDR6 (175W TGP /w Dynamic Boost)

All four available GPUs can handle demanding AAA games at 1080p and 1440p. However, if you plan on gaming at 1440p, getting an RTX 4080 or 4090 is best, as the RTX 4060 and 4070's 8GB VRAM is very limiting at the QHD resolution. You can even experience performance issues like stutters and graphical pop-ins with 8GB of VRAM at 1080p, depending on the game. This isn't to say that you should avoid the RTX 4060 and 4070; just know that you'll run into issues sooner as newer games become increasingly demanding. All four have the same features, meaning they all support DLSS 3 (including frame generation), ray tracing, NVIDIA Reflex, and Resizable BAR. See more details about NVIDA's 40-series laptop GPUs here.

This laptop has a MUX (multiplexer) switch, a feature that allows the GPU to send information directly to the display without going through the integrated GPU. This means you'll see better performance than laptops without this feature. The performance difference can be anywhere from 10% to 25%, or more in some cases.

You can configure this laptop with 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB of memory. The 16GB and 32GB configurations use DDR5 5600MHz RAM, while the 64GB configuration uses DDR5 5200MHz RAM. The speed difference doesn't significantly impact performance. You can replace the memory modules; the laptop uses standard SO-DIMM memory.

You can configure this laptop with 1TB, 2TB, 4TB, or 8TB of storage. Configurations with 2TB of storage or more are available in a RAID 0 array, which significantly boosts drive speeds by splitting the data evenly across multiple drives; however, the failure of one drive can cause data loss across all drives. The SSDs are user-replaceable; models with an RTX 4060 or 4070 GPU have two M.2 2280/2230 slots, while models with an RTX 4080/ or 4090 GPU have two M.2 2230 and two M.2 2280/2230 slots (four total).

The Dell Alienware m18 R2's overall score in Geekbench 5 is outstanding. The Intel Core i9-14900HX can easily handle general productivity tasks and other highly demanding workloads. The Core i7-14650HX and Core i7-14700HX are slower, with the former being the slowest, but they can still handle intensive workloads with ease. All four available GPUs are suitable for heavy GPU computing; the higher-end options will simply complete tasks faster and provide a smoother experience.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has an exceptional overall score in the Cinebench R23 benchmarks. The Core i9-14900HX has no problems handling demanding multi-threaded applications and general heavy multitasking.

Thanks to the NVIDIA GPUs' Optix support, the Dell Alienware m18 R2 is well suited for 3D rendering in Blender.

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU scores exceptionally well in the Basemark GPU benchmark. As mentioned in the GPU section, all four GPUs can handle gaming at 1080p and 1440p, though you'll have to dial down the graphical settings a bit when playing at 1440p on the RTX 4060 and 4070 models to get high, consistent frame rates.

The larger capacity SSDs will likely perform better. You can get this laptop with two SSDs in a RAID 0 array, further improving performance.

Borderlands 3 runs well on the Dell Alienware m18 R2 with an Intel Core i9-14900HX CPU and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU. Except for a few occasional stutters, the gameplay is very smooth. This configuration can even handle the game at 4k with high settings, pushing an average frame rate of 74 fps. Switching to the Performance mode increases the average frame rate (at 1080p) to 213 fps with high settings and 307 fps with low settings, a 3% and 6% performance increase, respectively. The Overdrive mode further boosts performance, albeit only slightly, pushing the average frame rate to 214 fps (+4%) with high settings and 311 fps (+8%) with low settings.

Here are some additional benchmarks in Red Dead Redemption 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 to give you a better idea of the performance on a Core i9-14900HX model paired with an RTX 4080:

Red Dead Redemption 2

• Average fps in Balanced mode:
• 1080p, DLSS (Quality): 127 fps
• 1080p, DLSS( Performance): 136 fps
• 4k, DLSS (Quality): 60 fps
• 4k, DLSS (Balanced): 86 fps
• Average fps in Overdrive mode:
• 1080p, DLSS (Quality): 133 fps
• 1080p, DLSS (Performance): 141 fps
• 4k, DLSS (Quality): 67 fps
• 4k, DLSS (Balanced): 91 fps

Cyberpunk 2077

• Average fps in Balanced mode:
• 1080p, Ultra: 127 fps
• 1080p, Lowest: 144 fps
• 1080p, Ultra, ray tracing: 62 fps
• 4k, Ultra: 41 fps
• 4k, Ultra, DLSS (Balanced): 58 fps
• 4k, Ultra, DLSS (Balanced), Frame Generation: 95 fps
• Average fps in Overdrive mode:
• 1080p, Ultra: 130 fps
• 1080p, Lowest: 146 fps
• 1080p, Ultra, ray tracing: 64 fps
• 4k, Ultra: 42 fps
• 4k, Ultra, DLSS (Balanced): 59 fps
• 4k, Ultra, DLSS (Balanced), Frame Generation: 96 fps

Civilization VI runs incredibly well. Every configuration can handle this and other similar games with ease.

Counter-Strike 2 runs very smoothly. Every configuration can handle this and other similar games with ease.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider runs very smoothly. Every configuration can easily handle this and other similar games at 1080p, 1440p, and 4k, even without DLSS. Switching to the Overdrive mode increases the average frame rate slightly to 214 fps with high settings (1080p) and 311 fps with low settings. The average frame rate at 4k (Balanced mode) is 73 fps with no DLSS—switching to the Overdrive setting has little to no effect.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 gets hot and loud under load. The fan noise isn't overly bothersome, though, as it's just the sound of heavy airflow, not a high-pitch whine. Switching to the Overdrive mode doesn't increase fan noise; it makes the fans spin at full speed all the time, whereas the default profile ramps down the fan speed when the cooling isn't necessary.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has many pre-installed applications, including:

• Alienware Command Center: Lets you change the power and performance settings, launch games, customize the RGB lighting, and view system statuses like CPU/GPU usage and temperature.
• Alienware Customer Connect: Survey about the system's performance.
• Alienware Digital Delivery: Lets you download digital content purchased from Dell.
• Alienware Update: Keeps the BIOS, drivers, and firmware up to date.
• Dell SupportAssist: Scans your computer for firmware and driver updates.
• Dolby Access: Adds Dolby Atmos and Dolby Vision support. It also lets you change the sound and picture profile or create a custom sound profile through EQ.
• intelliGo Neptune: Noise cancellation software to reduce background noise on video calls.
• My Alienware: Shows your laptop's specifications, warranty, and other info.
• Solitaire and casual games: Solitaire, FreeCell, Spider, Mahjong, Sudoku, and other casual games.
• Spotify: App for the music streaming service.

The Dell Alienware m18 R2 has a facial recognition IR camera. You can use it to log in quickly, authorize purchases in the Windows Store, and auto-fill saved passwords on supported websites. The keyboard's RGB backlighting and the lighting on the lid and back of the laptop are customizable via the Alienware Command Center application.