Gateway P-7811FX

Gateway has impressed with their gaming laptops as they offer excellent price to performance ratio which is hard to find in this category. Slowly gaming laptops are approaching the bar where they can be termed as true desktop replacements. Gateway recently introduced their P-7811FX gaming laptop that closes the margin further. It is an excellent offering from the manufacturer at an amazing price.

Gateway P-7811FX specifications :

• Dimensions : 15.7″ x 11.7″ x 1.7″
• Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo P8400 / 2.26 GHz
• Chipset : Mobile Intel PM45 Express
• Display : 17″ TFT active matrix 1920×200
• RAM : 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1066 MHz
• Graphics card : Nvidia GeForce 9800 GTS
• Hard Disk : 200GB SATA-300 7200 rpm
• Optical drive : DVD Burner
• Webcam : 1.3 megapixel
• Battery : 9-cell lithium ion
• OS : Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit
• Approx. price : $1500

The Gateway P-7811FX laptop is based on the latest Centrino 2 platform. It has a bumped up processor, graphics card compared to the older gaming laptops produced by Gateway. The price for the configuration is a steal and probably the best you can expect right now in the market.

The chassis of the laptop is made of glossy black plastic and also has brushed aluminum detailing and copper accents. Looks are very subtle on Gateway laptops and so is the case with this one. The body is a magnet to fingerprints though which can get annoying at times. It features a full blown keyboard which includes a numeric keypad. Media control buttons can be found on top of the keyboard but sadly they are not touch sensitive apart from the volume slider.

The display is a 17″ beauty and has a full HD resolution of 1920 x 1200. This is great for viewing HD movies at full resolution and multi-tasking becomes a breeze. The display quality is great and offers crisp picture quality. Ports are selective and it has only 3 USB ports to go along with an eSATA port.

The laptop has a high-end graphics card in the form of Nvidia GeForce 9800 GTS which offers strong gaming performance. A 7200 rpm hard disk ensures faster performance along with the P8400 processor. It comes with 64-bit OS as the laptop has 4GB of RAM. Missing Blu-ray drive is probably the only downside.

The performance of the laptop as expected is top notch and manages to pull impressive frame rates in Unreal Tournament 3. It scores 117 fps at 1280 x 800 and 58fps at 1920 x 1200 resolutions. This is by far the highest scores you can expect on gaming laptops in this price range. The battery life is also good at close to 3 hours when viewing a DVD movie.

Pros :

• Great specifications
• Highly aggressive pricing
• Full HD display
• Excellent gaming performance
• Fast hard drive

Cons :

• No Blu-ray drive
• Fewer ports

Final Thoughts

The Gateway P-7811FX is an excellent laptop and probably the best one to invest your money in right now. It has everything perfect about it and the price makes it a killer deal. You can hardly go wrong with this one.

My Rating : 4.5/5

Gateway P-172X FX

Gateway has a gaming laptops in various budget levels, which makes them attractive buy for gamers. Gateway P-172X FX is a medium budget gaming laptop. It features the Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTS which offers rich gaming performance. It offers all the features required by gamers along with a huge 17″ screen.

Gateway P-172X FX specifications :

• 
• Dimensions : 15.7″ x 11.7″ x 1.7″
• Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 2.4 GHz
• Chipset : Mobile Intel PM965 Express
• RAM : 2×2 GB DDR II SDRAM 667 MHz
• Display : 17″ TFT active matrix
• Display Resolution : 1920 x 200
• Hard Drive : 160×2 GB SATA-150 7200 rpm
• Graphics : Nvidia GeForce 8800M GTS 512MB
• Optical Drive : DVD Writer
• Webcam : 1.3 Megapixel
• Battery : 9-cell Lithium ion
• Weight : 4.2 Kg
• OS : Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
• Warranty : 1 year warranty
• Approx. price : $1999

The Gateway P-172X FX offers excellent value for money and it offers high-end components at a highly affordable price. Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTS is bound to attract a lot of gamera at this price along with a strong processor, 4 gigs of RAM and a 17″ screen.

The look is almost same as other Gateway laptops, making it hard to distinguish it from the lot. It has a glossy black finish with a huge FX logo on the lid. The keyboard has a numeric keypad and the keys are spread out nicely. The control and function keys have swapped places creating a mess. It will take time to get used to the new layout, which is frustrating. Media control keys can be found above the keyboard but do not offer enough tactile feedback. The volume slider is touch sensitive though.

The display offers a native resolution of 1920 x 1200, allowing you to view HD movies in full resolution. Text size does seem small at higher resolution, but movies are a pleasure to watch. The display quality as expected is top class and the finishing was between glossy and matte, making it perfect.

Laptop offers a full range of ports including HDMI and eSATA ports. It has the standard DVD Writer as the optical drive, not a Blu-ray one which is slowly making its way into laptops.

The gaming performance is good with 60fps frame rate in Unreal Tournament III at 1440 x 900 resolution. The processor and graphics card along with 4GB RAM ensure smooth gaming performance. The battery life of the laptop is a little above two hours on full throttle. This is disappointing as it features a 9-cell battery which holds a lot more juice.

Pros :

• 
• Good specifications
• Attractive price
• Great display
• Good performance
• HDMI, eSATA ports

Cons :

• Low battery life
• Not configurable
• Swapped keys

Final Thoughts

The Gateway P-172X FX offers excellent price to performance ratio. It is a dream laptop for gamers on a medium budget looking for everything that high-end laptops have on offer. Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTS ensures smooth gaming performance. The processor and RAM are enough to supplement it. Overall a great package to put your money in.

Rating : 4.35/5

Gateway P-6860FX

Gaming laptops have started becoming a rage and gamers are ready to spend mega bucks to be able to game on the move. Alienware has always been known for gaming laptops and PCs but now several companies like Gateway and Dell have also jumped into this field. Gateway introduced its latest gaming laptop P-6869FX last month with upgraded components.

Gateway P-6860FX specifications :

• 
• Dimensions : 15.7″ x 11.7″ x 1.7″
• Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo T5550 1.83 Mhz
• Chipset : Mobile Intel PM965 Express
• RAM : 2×2 GB DDR II SDRAM 667 MHz
• Hard Disk : 320 GB SATA-300 5400 rpm
• Graphics : Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTS
• Video Memory : 512MB GDDR3 SDRAM
• Display : 17″ TFT active matrix
• Display resolution : 1440 x 900
• Optical drive : DVD±RW
• OS : Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit Edition
• Webcam : Integrated 1.3 megapixel
• Battery : 9-cell Lithium cell battery
• Warranty : 1-year
• Approx. price : $1350

That surely is a bit list, and promises to deliver good gaming performance. If you look at the specifications closely, then you will realise immediately that the processor is the weakest component of this machine. We will get to the performance aspect later though.

The laptop has a glossy black plastic chassis and aluminium finishing can be seen around the touchpad and the keyboard. Having a 17″ screen does have its benefit apart from the obvious disadvantages, the laptop keyboard has a separate numeric keypad along with the standard keyboard. Media buttons above the keyboard have become the favorite place among manufacturers to place them and same is the case here. The volume control buttons is touch sensitive.

Talking about the display, the 17″ display has a resolution of 1440 x 900. The picture quality was clear and crisp and the glossy screen gives you sharp texts and amazing movie viewing experience. The resolution is good enough to run games as well as watch high definition movies.

Coming to the ports section, this one has quite a large number of ports and some unexpected ones too. HDMI port has be included which is slowly becoming a standard. The surprise is the inclusion of an eSATA port for hooking up external drives, the port has not made its way to newer desktop motherboards also yet! Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capabilities are nothing to boast about, a Blu-ray drive would certainly have been, but that isn’t the case.

Finally, lets come to the performance of the laptop, which is of utmost importance as it being a gaming laptop. The processor as I mentioned earlier, is a weakling, and is a shame that Gateway decided to include this when higher end processors like T8xxx series has been out for quite some time now. 64-bit OS has been bundled to make sure the RAM gets detected as 32-bit OSes can detect only upto 3GB RAM, but that would hardly affect gaming performance. The high-end graphics card ensures that you get good frame rates in games. It notched up impressive scores in Quake III and Crysis. A better processor could have gone a long way in improving the scores but then it would have added few extra hundred dollars.

The battery lasted a cool 2 hours while watching a high-definition movie, which is excellent for 17 incher. Gateway includes a 1-year only warranty with the laptop. Overall the laptop offers excellent value for every penny spent on it.

Pros :

• Excellent performance
• Great display
• Big hard drive
• Inexpensive
• High-end graphics
• Excellent battery life
• eSATA port

Cons :

• Poor processor
• Not configurable

Final Thoughts

The Gateway P-6860FX is an amazing system as if offers high-end configuration as an extremely affordable price. 4GB RAM, 8800GTS, 17″ display and 320GB hard disk are too hard to resist at this price. The low-end processor can be forgotten as it won’t hamper your gaming experience too much.

My Rating : 4.5/5