'Quite frankly it was missing one thing': Alienware has fixed one of the biggest issues with its Area-51 gaming PC

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The new Ryzen 7 9850X3D is part of the Alienware's CES 2026 party.

Alienware Area-51 desktop now with AMD 3D V-Cache options.
(Image credit: Dell | Alienware)

Dell has acknowledge an inalienable truth about its Area-51 gaming desktop, it was sorely missing an AMD Ryzen option from its config choices. At CES it has revealed the new Area-51 now comes with AMD Ryzen X3D processors, including the brand-new Ryzen 7 9850X3D.

I was as surprised as anyone at just how good Alienware's Area-51 gaming PC actually turned out to be. Its promise of an endlessly upgradeable Area-51 machine might be predicated on a supplemental $35 upgrade kit to allow you to use non-Dell parts in the future, but it had built a speedy, cool, and quiet gaming desktop.

CES 2026

The CES logo on display at the show.

(Image credit: Future)

Catch up with CES 2026: We're on the ground in sunny Las Vegas covering all the latest announcements from some of the biggest names in tech, including Nvidia, AMD, Intel, Asus, Razer, MSI and more.

Now, I just need Alienware to package that $35 upgrade kit in the box gratis. It's really only needed to facilitate a motherboard's connection with the front panel and RGB illumination of the massive Area-51 chassis, so it'd be a neat thing to include from the off. Though I would guess precious few Area-51 machines will be upgraded down the line anyways…

Anyways, Matt McGowan, head of product at Alienware, introduced the new config at Dell's CES 2026 pre-briefing in December. Referring to the Area-51 itself, he calls it, "the king of performance in our portfolio… designed for enthusiasts who demand unwavering performance and the ability to make serious upgrades for years to come with ATX compatibility."

"But quite frankly it was missing one thing: it was missing AMD X3D processors."

AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D specs

(Image credit: AMD)

The new configuration features an industry standard ATX Alienware X870E motherboard, with the option for either a Ryzen 7 9700X, Ryzen 7 9800X3D, or Ryzen 9 9950X3D chip. There will also be the option for the new Ryzen 7 9850X3D when that properly launches, with its 5.6 GHz boost clock and… er, not much change from the OG chip.

Otherwise, it's all still the same Area-51 goodness, with Nvidia GPUs from RTX 5070 to RTX 5090 options, and a determination that positive pressure airflow (where all the fans point inwards) is where it's at. Hey, it works on the Area-51, so maybe Dell knows a thing or two about PC building.

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Dave James
Dave James
Editor-in-Chief, Hardware

Dave has been gaming since the days of Zaxxon and Lady Bug on the Colecovision, and code books for the Commodore Vic 20 (Death Race 2000!). He built his first gaming PC at the tender age of 16, and finally finished bug-fixing the Cyrix-based system around a year later. When he dropped it out of the window. He first started writing for Official PlayStation Magazine and Xbox World many decades ago, then moved onto PC Format full-time, then PC Gamer, TechRadar, and T3 among others. Now he's back, writing about the nightmarish graphics card market, CPUs with more cores than sense, gaming laptops hotter than the sun, and SSDs more capacious than a Cybertruck.

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