Hey all,

I used to build my own gaming PCs way back in the 90s/early 2000s but I fell out of the habit when I realised I’d rather kick back on the sofa with something that “just works” than constantly chasing framerates etc, and I switched to exclusively console based gaming. Now that I own a Steam Deck, and with Xbox going down the shitter, and my kids becoming of the age where having a static family PC makes a lot of sense, I’ve decided to move back into PC gaming.

I started looking at self builds again but everything’s moved on so much since I last dipped my toes into that space that I struggle to know where to start. Then I saw an Alienware A51 in the refurb store with a decent early Black Friday discount code and very-nearly top-end specs so I pulled the trigger yesterday:

£2525

• Core Ultra 9 285K
• Geforce RTX 5080
• 64GB RAM
• 2TB Gen5 SSD
• 1500W platinum PSU

Retail, this spec is currently going for £3600 so it’s a sizeable saving, but now I’m getting cold feet on the basis of the Intel chip not being the best choice for gaming (and will possibly never see the BIOS fix that Intel rolled out to address this), the odd PSU that’ll likely need swapping out at some point in the future, and the sheer size and weight of the thing.

On the plus side, the reviews I’ve seen say that it’s very cool and quiet, which is pretty important to me, and I do like the case design itself - it’s very understated compared to most of the off-the-shelf options out there. On the downside what looks like a huge discount on the surface is mostly just wiping out the Dell premium, and similarly specced AMD options are available elsewhere for similar prices - albeit with the aforementioned off-the-shelf cases and a big question mark over noise levels.

All of which is to say: Help this former DIY builder feel a bit better about dropping this much money on a Dell of all things! Odd CPU choice aside, this is still a decent system at a decent price, right?