Pros: I had to toss my hat in the ring seeing the comments from those 2 who do not own the product..... BTW yes I think pretty much everyone knows you can build a desktop for cheaper than you can buy one built already. However for those who meet the following scenarios, this makes a great gaming rig: Not technically versed or simply do not want to build their own. You simply would rather not bother and spend all that time building and configuring, and just want to enjoy. You like the fact that it comes with a warranty and if part X goes bad that's their problem, not your job to trouble shoot it out. Love them or hate them Dell has their arms around the world and no matter where you are, they can get you technical support of some level of assistance, which if you built yourself is simply via friends and the internet. These rigs use the intel x79 chipset which is 4 channels which means plenty of bandwidth, the 3820 is the lowest of the intel extreme chips but no slouch!

Cons: power supply is only 875 which is ok, but when you are buying a premiere brand you expect more than just enough. I would not venture into upgrades later without making 1 a power supply. lack of amd cpu's in the aurora r4 lineup, they are cutting off a customer base by only doing intel cpus. integration of uefi instead of bios has made the alien respawn/recovery broken and created a breakfix solution in the interm that can be confusing i am told.

Overall Review: overall its an alienware, you get the global support/warranty that is missing if you build it yourself and is a pain in the neck to get with some other major gaming rig co's who's name's I will not mention (research customer service/warranty issues on a gaming pc co. before you buy anything!).