Hilariously overdone, like most of tourist Dubai. Don't go there if you want in anyway an authentic, gritty experience. But if you want to sit around like a first world raj-baron by the side of the pool and smoke hookahs, get into it.
Minus points for fat English and Russians sitting around with their pudgy families, but maybe that's just me looking in an ugly mirror!

We have a young family and really like to stay in luxury and we found the AQ to be a prefect family resort.
For a supplement, you can have use of the executive club where the chlidren can play and you can eat in peace!
Food and service are great (and free!) and you can take afternoon tea there as well (free). The bus centre within the club is great (free internet) plus lounge area, bar and play station room.
Best of all, there is an adults only club area on the 5th floor and you can have any drink on the balcony looking out to sea and between 6pm and 8pm its, you guessed it, free! Any drink! Or a cockail or glass of Moet. Plus some nibbles (these were slightly hit and miss to be fair). Overall though: of the drinks are free it is def fabulous!
The suite was spacious and the bed was like sleeping in a nest as they have so many wonderful pillows. Really, a great nights rest and we had 2 interlinking suites for 2 adults and three children.
If you have not been before, the Jumeria resort is great as it has so many restaurants and bars and things to see and do (there are 4 hotels there after all).
The kids club right by the pool was just the licket and our little people loved it. And it too was free.
The staff were very kind and attentive and Maren in particular was excellent.
It was a particularly enjoyable, relaxed family holiday and we will be back!

We stayed at the Al Qasr (AQ) for 5 nights in the middle phase of a honeymoon trip that commenced with 10 nights in the magnificent but peaceful Reethi Rah in the Maldives.

The AQ is a first rate 5 star property. It is well located on the beach with great views of the Burj Al Arab and it has facilities that are probably unmatched by most hotels in the world.

We stayed there in the build up to the really hot summer period. Rarely did the day time temp drop below 40 and the humidlty hit 100% a number of times. It is energy sapping stuff. But the hotel copes well with this - great aircon everywhere, ice towels, ice creams by the pools, evian sprays - its all available.

We stayed in a premium level arabian superior room - large and very comfortable with access to the business lounge ( which serves an assortment of food and drinks for free during the day ). Our room was pool facing with fantastic views of the sea. The bathroom was nice, decorated in an arabian style, with a lovely walk in shower and double vanity sinks. It had a seperate toilet - which is a feature I am beginning to enjoy in 5 star hotels. The products were a madinat generic brand but were plentiful and seemed to be of high quality. The mini bar is very well stocked and wasnt too expensive. Each night the hotel turn the room down for bed we were left with little towel animals on the bed. It really is a fantastic touch and one that we looked forward to nightly.

We made good use of the airconned gym - its a brilliant gym. Better than most private health clubs in my opinion. The only negative is that its a bit of a travel to get to as its in the Mina Al Saalam - which is a sister hotel next door.

I suppose thats my only real negative about this hotel - you do walk a long way to get anywhere! Its huge - and in the heat of July thats not the nicest!

One other thing - we had dinner at the Al Mahara in the Burj. Not worth it at all. Food was nice - but service was so awful. The submarine trip is shamefully tacky. The restaurant is nice - the fish tank is interesting but the staff really make this place a flop. It is expensive to boot - but this is to be expected in a hotel that prides itself as the worlds most luxurious - but the restaurant service really pokes fun at this self imposed title!!

All in all I will probably return to dubai and would have no issue staying at the madinat AQ.

My husband and I arrived at Al Qasr on 7th June and were to check-out and depart on 9 June from Al Qasr at Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai on an Emirates flight to Paris scheduled for 08:20hrs. In order to save time in the early morning before our scheduled departure from the hotel, we completed check-out formalities and settled our hotel bill just before midnight on 8 June 2008. We also requested a wake-up call at 05:00am the following morning as we had an Emirates limousine scheduled to pick us up from Al Qasr at 06:00am for our 08:20am flight (as we had already completed the online check-in procedure, we were required to arrive at the airport 90 mins before departure).

We promptly received our wake-up call from the hotel staff at 05:00am as requested and waited patiently in our room till 06:15am for a call from the hotel staff to announce the arrival of our pick-up and finally called Emirates to find out why the car had not yet arrived. We waited another 5 mins on the phone till the Emirates representative made inquiries about our scheduled pick-up and came back on the line to inform us that the limousine had in fact arrived at the hotel as scheduled at 06:00am and that the driver had also requested the concierge on duty to inform us of the arrival of our Emirates pick-up. Unfortunately, the concierge a gentleman by the name of Mr. Rauf refused to inform us about the arrival of the car and told the driver that he was not allowed to disturb his guests at that hour and therefore sent the driver away! The driver left the premises and reported the incident to Emirates airline, making sure to mention the name of Mr. Rauf for the record.

We immediately called Service One from our room to inform them of the incident and asked for Mr. Rauf to ask him why he had done such a ridiculous thing! As we were already late for our flight, I told Mr. Rauf to meet me downstairs. Upon meeting Mr. Rauf at the entrance of the hotel and demanding an explanation for his actions, we were treated with complete indifference and not even given an apology! We also asked how he could do such a thing when we had asked for a wake-up call from the hotel at 05:00am, to which he shrugged and mumbled something about not being able to trace the wake-up call. To make things worse, he did not even have the courtesy to arrange for a complementary airport transfer for us considering it was clearly his fault that the limousine had left without us. He asked the doorman to get us a taxi for the airport for which we ended up paying Dhs 95 upon reaching the airport.

Needless to say, the experience has been shocking and pathetic coming from a hotel of it's repute and will prevent us from ever returning at any of the Jumeirah properties. The unprofessional behavior of Mr. Rauf indicates a serious deficiency in the training of the hotel personnel and even a lack of common-sense amongst it's employees. I believe that if a prestigious hotel like Al Qasr is unable to meet such basic expectations of it's guests (that even a 3-star property would definitely see to) it is simply not worthy of it's reputation and definitely not worth paying big buck for!