Recent updates
Updated October 7, 2024 because Dell's only gone and slashed another $200 off the already discounted price of the Aurora R16.
It was already the cheapest RTX 4070 Ti Super machine we'd seen when this Alienware gaming PC deal was sitting at $1,700, but now Dell has knocked the price down from its original $2,100 listing price by fully $600, we can probably now upgrade this deal to a bona fide bargain.
When it was just $50 cheaper than a system with standard, easily upgradeable PC parts, there was still an argument to be made for paying the extra to make your life easier down the line. Alienware gaming PCs use a lot of proprietary parts, which make future upgrades awkward and often more expensive than they need to be.
But now it's $100 cheaper than the next cheapest RTX 4070 Ti Super gaming PC, those arguments are blown out the window. This is an a great price for a really powerful gaming PC.
Though that alternative RTX 4070 Ti Super machine is also damned impressive. It's a Lenovo Legion Tower 5, with a last-gen AMD CPU inside it, and twice the DDR5 memory, for $1,600 at Newegg.
There aren't a ton of specs for this machine, but we're familiar with Lenovo towers, and they're great little gaming PCs, with standard off-the-shelf parts.
Original deal October 4, 2024: I've spent my morning searching the web to try to find a gaming PC fitted with an RTX 4070 Ti Super inside it that is cheaper than this Alienware. I've come up short so far. If you're in the market for a ready-made machine, it's worth considering.
You'll find the deal direct at Dell's own website: the Alienware Aurora R16 Gaming Desktop for $1,700—$400 off the usual asking price.
That price includes a performant RTX 4070 Ti Super graphics card—probably the most sensible high-end Nvidia GPU—alongside a Core i7 14700F. That's a high-end combo capable of bountiful frames at 1440p or appreciable 4K gaming.
It also includes 16 GB of DDR5-5600—though I'd have preferred 32 GB at this price—a 1TB SSD, and a 1000-watt power supply. This machine is also liquid cooled, apparently, despite one image of the innards suggesting otherwise.
We tend to stand by the advice that you shouldn't buy an Alienware unless it is significantly discounted. Proprietary parts make upgrades a hassle or more or less impossible (even the memory would require buying a whole new kit, as there are only two DIMM slots) and you can buy entirely regular gaming PCs for roughly the same price. Because, while this Alienware is the cheapest around, I did spot another worthy contender for those in the market.
The ABS Tempest Aqua is going for $1,750 over at Newegg. It comes equipped with an RTX 4070 Ti Super, Intel Core i7 14700F, 32 GB of DDR5-6000, and a 1 TB SSD.
I'd put up the extra $50 for the ABS machine, quite frankly, but if you're already stretching your budget, the Alienware still gets you all the important parts and should net similar frame rates.
If neither option appeals, we're only a week away from a major sales event that will surely see some heavy discounts. Amazon's 'Big Deal Days', or is it 'Big Deals Day', except it's two days... I don't know. Check out our page dedicated to all the early deals or deals on the day here: best October Prime Day gaming PC deals.
October Prime Day... that wasn't so hard was it, Amazon?
