Alienware’s new Aurora desktop gaming PC is cooler and quieter

October 15th marks the 25th anniversary of Dell’s Alienware brand, one of the most iconic brands of gaming PCs we know today. To celebrate the occasion, Dell is announcing a new version of the Alienware Aurora, its flagship gaming desktop. This new version boasts an all-new design with improved thermal performance.

The new Alienware Aurora is the first to use the company’s updated Legend 2.0 industrial design, so it looks significantly different from previous versions, but it’s also significantly different on the inside. Alienware says it redesigned the computer from the inside out and rearranged the internal components and cables, resulting in a 50% increase on the inside of the chassis, even though the external dimensions are about the same. This was done to prevent cables from blocking any necessary airflow inside the machine, so all the components run as cool as possible.

To help with this, Alienware is using a new custom motherboard design that has most of its power connections towards the edges of the board, freeing up space in the center of the board so air can flow more easily. Cables are routed along the right side of the chassis to keep them out of sight, but servicing and upgrades are still possible.

The cooling system has also been improved, and the Alienware Aurora now comes with up to four 120mm fans (the base configuration includes two) to move air through the inside as fast as possible. The base configuration includes one air intake fan at the front and an exhaust fan at the back, but more powerful configurations will add a second intake fan and another exhaust fan at the top.

Despite the additional cooling chops, Alienware says the new Aurora is even quieter than its predecessor. When idle, and using the liquid CPU cooling option,  the new Aurora is anywhere between 13% and 16% quieter, and during CPU-heavy workloads, it’s up to 9% quieter.  At the same time, the CPU is up to 3% cooler compared to the current Alienware Aurora models. The improved cooling also means better performance, with Alienware claiming up to 5% faster graphics performance with the same GeForce RTX 3090 GPU as the current model.

There are other design changes, too. For the first time, the Alienware Aurora will be available with an optional clear side panel on the left, so you can gawk at the internals at your leisure. Plus, the new model comes with up to eight lighting zones, counting both internal and external lighting, compared to the four zones of the previous generation.

Dell’s announcement focused exclusively on the new design, so we don’t know specs, pricing, or availability yet. It’s fair to expect the same NVIDIA GeForce RTX GPUs as last year’s model since there are no new models yet. What might be new is the CPU, seeing as Intel is expected to introduce its 12th-generation Alder Lake processors sometime soon.

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