Alienware, a maker of high-performance personal computers, announced it had extended its lineup of so-called ultra high-end desktops with Intel Pentium 4-based machines. The PCs come with overclocked microprocessors, delivering performance not attainable by computers from other makers.

Area-51 ALX systems from Alienware not only bring high-speed desktop processors, but also enable PCI Express interconnection on ALX-series PCs, as previous flavour of ALX did not sport the new bus. The ALX-series is luxurious family of personal computers aimed at enthusiasts and hardcore gamers.

To make installation of yet-not-announced Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.80GHz and Intel Pentium 4 4.0GHz possible, Alienware had to overclock existing 3.40GHz and 3.60GHz chips to new rates. Excess heat generated by processor with elevated clock-speeds is controlled by Alienware’s exclusive ultra-quiet Liquid Cooling technology, which cools components with specially formulated liquid and gold-plated, pure copper coolers.

Intel Corp. is expected to start supplying the Pentium 4 chips at 4.00GHz only in Q1 2005.

Default configuration of Area-51 ALX includes Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition processor at 3.80GHz, 1GB of dual-channel DDR2 533MHz memory, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra graphics card, 148GB WD Raptor HDDs in RAID 0 configuration, Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS audio card, Microsoft Window XP Professional and so on. The default pricing is $5458.

“Area-51 ALX systems combine state-of-the-art innovations with an elite level of customized service, support, and style,” said Frank Azor, senior vice president, Alienware Worldwide Product Group.

Later this year Alienware will offer ALX PCs with two graphics cards for extreme performance in 3D games.