If you desire a reasonably small and portable gaming laptop, the Alienware 13 is 1 of the leading options on the market. With its 13.3-inch brandish, the footprint of this laptop is smaller than a typical 15-inch laptop, and if you're willing to put up with extra thickness and weight, it'due south possible to utilize it as a portable workstation instead of an ultraportable.

Like many Alienware laptops, the 13 comes in a big range of configurations. Depending on how much you lot want to spend, you lot tin can kit out this laptop with a GTX 1050 / Ti or GTX 1060 detached GPU, also every bit quad-core Kaby Lake CPUs, up to 32 GB of RAM, up to 2 TB of PCIe storage, and either a 1080p LCD or 1440p OLED display. Prices range anywhere from $999 to nearly $3,500.

The Alienware xiii is a relatively unique production as few of the major gaming laptop manufacturers produce 13-inch devices. MSI, Gigabyte, Aorus and Razer just go down to 14-inch systems, leaving Alienware nigh unopposed in this infinite.

It's non an automated win for the Alienware 13 in the size and weight arena, though. At 24mm thick and 2.6 kg heavy (5.seven lbs), it's not attempting to be the slimmest or lightest it could be. In fact many 14-inch laptops are more portable than the Alienware 13, including the Razer Bract (1.9kg heavy and 18mm thick), the MSI GS43VR (i.8kg and 23mm) and Aorus X3 Plus v7 (1.8kg and 23mm).

The Alienware 13 also runs into a footprint consequence. Despite its smaller display, it'due south not physically smaller than any of the aforementioned 14-inch laptops. This means the Alienware xiii's brandish is flanked by large bezels, which could hands accept accommodated a 14-inch panel. I'd be disappointed if Alienware was using the smaller 13-inch display as a marketing bullet indicate, making the organization sound smaller and more portable than information technology is, rather than giving users the largest brandish possible in this course gene.

There are a couple of reasons why the Alienware thirteen is larger than its competitors. The main reason is there's a beefy cooling solution that uses ii massive heatsinks fastened to the rear of the device. Air is drawn in through large vents on the sides and base of the laptop, and exhausted through the rear. There's a lot of metal used here, which adds to the weight of the device.

Alienware has as well opted for a large 76 Wh bombardment within the trunk, which is marginally larger than the 73 Wh and lxx Wh cells used in the Aorus X3 Plus v7 and Razer Blade, respectively. Combined with the smaller brandish, you can expect the Alienware thirteen to last longer than its competitors on battery.

At that place is an excellent selection of ports on the Alienware thirteen. On the rear y'all get a ability connector, HDMI ii.0, mini-DisplayPort ane.2, Thunderbolt iii USB Type-C, Ethernet and the Alienware Graphics Amplifier Port. Having these ports on the rear makes sense if you're primarily using the laptop on a desk, as you can plug in things like a brandish and a wired network without cluttering the sides of the device.

On the sides of the Alienware 13 are ii USB 3.0 Type-A ports, one on each side, plus a USB 3.one Type-C port (not Thunderbolt iii) on the correct. At that place are two 3.5mm audio jacks for headphones and a microphone on the left.

Towards the front of each edge are the large speakers included with the Alienware 13. These speakers can become quite loud, just the quality isn't particularly impressive, specially as at that place are noticeable distortions at high volumes. Don't expect much bass either, although the speakers are less tinny than many ultraportables.

The design of the Alienware 13 is very similar to every other Alienware laptop released in the last few years. On the metallic hat is Alienware's signature Y-shaped pattern with their alien caput logo, which adds a bit of gamer style to the design. The palm rest is fabricated from a soft-touch black plastic, which is make clean and stealthy but attracts fingerprints easily. While I typically adopt more business organization-oriented industrially-designed laptops, the Alienware 13'southward design is good every bit far as gaming laptops are concerned.

Of form, it wouldn't be an Alienware laptop without a ton of LED lighting. The Alienware 13 has 8 RGB lighting zones: four in the keyboard, plus a zone in each of the trackpad, ability button, Alienware text, and alien head logo. This provides a great level of customization, although it's disappointing yous tin't control the color of private keys, which is possible on the Razer Bract.

The keyboard on this laptop is decent. The layout is bully, with large modifier keys, a full-sized set of arrows, and a decent range of functions mapped to the F-keys. Travel distance was impressive, and tactile feedback was very good. This leads to a keen experience while gaming or typing.

The trackpad is too very solid. The trackpad'southward surface is good, which provides a comfortable tracking experience, while the tracking itself is first-class. Y'all won't be using the trackpad for any serious gaming, simply information technology's prissy to see massive physical click buttons included here.

Alienware is one of the few gaming laptop manufacturers that includes Windows Howdy and Tobii centre-tracking support beyond their entire product line-up. The Alienware 13's implementation is the same as the Alienware fifteen's, so information technology'due south very solid and works well for facial recognition log ins and eye tracking. Personally I'grand not a huge fan of centre tracking in games, and there's merely a limited pick of games that implement support, simply it's a cracking characteristic for those that desire to effort it out.

In that location are technically 3 brandish options available for the Alienware xiii, merely I would non recommend the 1366 x 768 option under any circumstances. My review unit of measurement included a 13.three-inch 1080p IPS LCD and there's a 2560 ten 1440 OLED selection bachelor for those that want to spend an extra $250.

There are some disappointing aspects to both the 1080p LCD and 1440p OLED options for gamers. Neither display comes with back up for Yard-Sync, which is a feature available on some competing devices. Neither supports refresh rates above sixty Hz either, and while the fastest GPU available (the GTX 1060) isn't particularly suited to high-refresh gaming in modern titles, it's possible to reach well over 60 FPS in games dating a few years back.

Alienware claims the 1080p LCD option is only skillful for 300 nits of effulgence, just in my testing, it comfortably hit 377 nits at 100%. Contrast was adept, at 1180:one, while color temperature was too common cold, which is a typical trait of well-nigh laptop displays. Colour performance out of the box is decent merely not hugely accurate, although the brandish looks vibrant and decent in general, thanks in office to swell viewing angles.

A quick color calibration using SpectraCal's CALMAN 5 software immune the Alienware 13 to hit very authentic levels. I'm not sure how many creative professionals will actually use a laptop like the Alienware 13, but it is possible to use this laptop for color authentic piece of work when properly calibrated.