re: Board's opinion on Alienware R13 (current prices)?

Ok, brief update so far;
games played are Elden Ring, Deadspace Remastered, War Thunder, Cyberpunk 2077, Crysis Remastered trilogy...
settings to high/ultra, DLSS to Balanced.

Also some YT surfing.

HWInfo and Rainmeter Gadgets installed

Games look prettier than on the 3060 (that will get transplanted into my PC shortly). Framerates never dipped below 100.
CPU core temps sitting in the 30's, none bump up to 40. GPU temp goes up into the 60's, hasn't hit 70 yet that we've seen.

Fan noise... not yet an issue. 95% of the time, this box is dead silent; at one point playing Elden Ring my son called me and said "ok dad I can hear the fans now", I came in, listened, and it was... not bad. He had to mute volume and all I could hear was normal fan noise, similar to the older PC. NOT the jet engine turbine I have seen complained about.

For the record, I HAVE heard that noise, during the above troubleshooting session. When the support team took remote access to correct the sound issue, at one point they ran a diagnostic that caused the fans to cycle to 100%, and at that point, yes it sounds like my air fryer. We have not seen that in real-life usage yet.

I'm guessing I could invoke that, and force it to happen if I tried, we could install some 3D software and start rendering some hi-poly scenes with IBL. I've got some stuff that would push any CPU to do if I cranked up. But my son doesn't mess with that.

I thank y'all for all the helpful feedback. I do understand the concerns about proprietary bits, and limited upgrade paths; not that worried about that to be honest. I hope to get 5 good years or more, and when it's obsolete at this spec level, just build or buy another. Probably about the time Windows pushes to 12 or whatever next.