I think the term "best bang for the buck" will change dramatically as time goes by.  But for now, you're getting a very nice setup.

I ordered mine the day the new M17x was released on June 2 (6/2) and it has a Estimated Delivery date of July 1st (7/1).

I called Customer Care and they said that they are out of "Black Cases". I ordered mine within 4 hours of the launch.

That seems ridiculous - how many black cases were available? 25?

Anyway, they said they'll get the cases on the 20th.. This is really bad -- almost embarrassing. I have some friends that ask whether they should get an Alienware or not, and I tell them I have no clue -- depends on if they want to wait a month to get their new laptop.

Seriously, this is a deal-breaker. I understand Sager doesn't have this problem..

wow!! no cases until the 20th?! This is why Dell is on the down sloop..If i see a better deal before then I'm going to look at changing my order..Thanks for the heads up!!

I ordered one June 11.  Delivery is July 16.  That is ridiculous!  Yes I upgraded some things but come on......this better be worth it.

Hey Guys, since Dell cant get there act together on having the parts in stock ...what about this machine Cyber Power

http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Xplorer_X7-Xtreme_S1_Notebook/

I hate to agree with you but you are absolutly right..thats the only reason i'm not going for the cyberware. All i've ever bought has been XPS's but i've heard so many bad things about Alienware and now its already starting to come to fruition...Hopefully the Dell guys read this and sense the aggravation..

I actually did look at CyberPowerPC. That's a decent system, but it doesn't have some of the things that I wanted.

2 x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280M , SSD, Blu-Ray.

A laptop that is more comparable to the M17x is this by Sager.

 http://www.sagernotebook.com/product_customed.php?pid=188463&action=customize

I just chose Alienware because I used to own the XPS series and I liked it. I just wasn't prepared for the long wait.

Unfortunately, since I've wait so long already, it'll be a sunk cost if I was to drop this and get the Sager.

It does look like it, I must admit.  I was only going from my past experience with ordering from Dell. 

I agree as well. I ordered mine on the 3rd of the 6th and it cleared processing on the 5th of the 6th, now I find after waiting for two and a half weeks that my order has been cancelled and "re-ordered" under a new number and is back in the processing stage!!!

That often happens if there a number of items ordered simultaneously.  They do that to facilitate getting the items that are available out to you straight away.  The others will follow.

The delivery date they give is always the outside limit.  Usually things get delivered much earlier.  Of course I have no idea if Alienware's M17x is made to order in each case or mass produced.

In pre-Dell-ownership days, it would have been put together by hand for each order.   Now I have no idea if the Alienware products are still made in Florida or what.

But surely since my order was about to go into production, which is the third stage, and is now back in the processing stage, which is the first stage, that will mean that my order will be pushed back?