unless you really need a laptop for something, I highly recommend building a desktop.

For the price point you want to stay in, its not really possible. You'll need a desktop.

Basically you need to ask yourself which is more important, playing latest games or portability.

If your primary issue is playing latest games, then let us help you build a really nice gaming desktop for that price.

If your primary issue is portability, then simply ask what the best laptop you could buy for under $1,000 is? Alienware won't be in that lineup as they are overpriced.

Probably be a Dell, Asus, HP, etc.

Here is what I'd say. Check out ASUS. they make some great gaming laptops at really great prices( under $1000)... and although the CPU isnt as important as the GPU.. go for an I core 5.. its about 25% better performance than C2D per Mhz.

And lastly. Go with an ATI GPU. Theyr so much better than Nvidia for mobos its not even funny!

I recommend Asus as well. The single most important part in a gaming laptop is the GPU, and Asus generally puts greater importance on it.

Use $700 to build a nice gaming desktop and spend the remaining $300 on a netbook. You'll get a nice gaming machine and a small, light notebook to use for word processing/note-taking/web-surfing/whatever. You won't be able to play modern games "on the go," but who really does that anyway?

Here is a decent Dell laptop for under $1,000 that might work out for you.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/home/notebooks/laptop-studio-1555/pd.aspx?refid=laptop-studio-1555&s=dhs&cs=19&~oid=us~en~29~laptop-studio-new-15_anav4~~

It is a quad core Intel i7 series with 4GB ram and a dedicated ATi HD5470 1GB Video card. Not too shabby.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834115732

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220696

Also, just go to newegg.com and go to 'laptops' then filter by 'asus' and focus on either the i5 or i7 series.

The Dell I linked to above is still the better deal, but Asus is a really good brand.

EDIT: the ones squiliam listed was the ones I was looking at as well on newegg. Again, I feel the Dell is still the better deal.

The one you listed has barely any GPU performance. The one I listed has over 5* the GPU performance which is the main point of difference for a gaming laptop.

Alienware, make sure you get a big one, video cards require a lot of power, and create a lot of heat. That's the reason they're so inefficient at gaming, also a laptop video card will perform significantly lower than a PC of the same model.