fast and sleek
Written: Feb 04 '09 (Updated Feb 09 '09)
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Pros: Nice quality appeal. Brushed metal palm rest. Fast.
Cons: Uncomfortably shallow keyboard. Awkward touchpad placement. No bluetooth. Poor speakers quality.
The Bottom Line: Asthetically pleasing and performance to go with it. Poor layout and design of the keyboard & touchpad.
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| hankshay's Full Review: Gateway MD7820U PC Notebook |
I bought the Gateway MD7820U Notebook as a replacment for a Dell Inspiron 9300.
BRIEF SPECS:
# Intel Core2 Duo Processor T6400 (2.0GHz, 800fsb,2MB L2 cache)
# Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit edition with Service Pack 1
# 4GB DDR2 system memory
# 320GB (5400rpm) SATA hard drive
# 15.6" WXGA widescreen display (1366 x 768)
# 802.11a/b/g/n WLAN, 10/100/1000 Ethernet
# Integrated Webcam and microphone
# 1-year limited Warranty
4 USB 2.0, 1 HDMI (HDCP capable), 2 headphone out, 1 microphone in, 1 VGA, 1 RJ-11, 1 RJ-45, 1 FireWire (IEEE 1324), 1 consumer IR, 1 Modem Jack, 1 Ethernet Jack, 1 Expresscard Type 54 slot
LOOKS
Have you seen some laptops in ads only to be disappointed in-person? The Gateway MD7820U is not one of those. It’s beautiful in simplicity. I had the choice of several colors, but I chose burgundy. Overall, the edges are round and the areas that aren’t usually touched are smooth and shiny. The palm rest is brushed metal.
Gateway paid attention to small details. For example, the plastic filler for the express slot matches the side panel even to the extent that it has different upper/lower border just to match the case. Yes, that detailed!
SCREEN
The MD7820U is a midsized laptop that sports the new 16:9 HD widescreen format (1366x768 resolution). The 16:9 appears wider than the previously popular 16:10 widescreens. HD Videos which commonly formatted for 16:9 will fit the entire screen vs leaving a small vertical black bar on a 16:10 screen. Although this good for multimedia, some might find 16:9 too wide vs vertical (e.g. requires more scrolling in documents).
At first, reading documents was slightly awkard at the 16:9 stretch, but getting accustomed was less so than switching from the standard screen to 16:10 widescreen (i.e. vga to wvga).
My unit didn't have any dead or stuck pixels and the light seemed uniform even at the edges.
INSTALLATION/USE
Just plugged the laptop in the wall and turned the power on. Windows vista premium 64bit SP1 is pre-installed and didn't give me any issues. I was up and running in 10 minutes.
Once powered on, Windows Vista required several setup screen before I was up and running. Vista detected my wireless-N network, and I was able to connect to the internet after entering my passcode.
FEATURES
The keyboard is a weak point on this laptop. The shallow depth of the keys feels awkward during strikes and sometimes doesn't register. It could be that I'm more accustomed to softer keys, but currently this feels uncomfortable.
On the right of the keyboard are touch sensitive buttons for media. The volume control is convenient: you can drag your finger tip to adjust the volume up/down.
The MD7820U includes a large touchpad, which is very wide to match the width of the screen. It was responsive and includes a scroll bar section. However, the centering of the touchpad with relation to the keyboard is awkward. It is too far to the left of the keyboard which puts my left thumb too far into the touchpad area and my right thumb too far.
The brushed metal palm wrest feels very good, though can feel cold at first touch.
The MD7820U includes HDMI w/HDCP to connect to monitors or tv's. I was able to connect it to my 1080p TV and it looked great.
The laptop includes few software applications, which is a good thing because I don't like the bloatware. I was able to uninstall all the software I didn't want. One of the better applications is gateway's camera software which pops up when you move the cursor to one edge of the screen. You can then access it's options and/or take images. At 1.3Megapixels, it's not going to give digital camera quality, but it was very sharp for video conferencing and snapshots.
Gateway includes small speakers on the front edge of the laptop. I don't think this is the optimal place to have speakers as your hands typically partially cover them. Sound was not very load and lacked clarity.
The MD7820U includes 2 headphone plugs which is good for two headphones and a mic input jack. There is also a built-in mic.
A 5-in-1 Media Card Reader on the left side works with Memory Stick®, MemoryStick Pro®, MultiMediaCard™, Secure Digital™ and xD-Picture Card. I tested a 16GB SecureDigital (SDHC) card in the slot without any issues.
PERFORMANCE
I was surprised that this laptop felt faster than my HP DV9700 laptop, which was more expensive and has higher grade components. I'm not sure if this was because the MD7820U has the 64BIT version of MS Vista, but it felt more responsive.
Battery life was a bit less than 3 hours (one test).
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 600
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Other
Processor speed: over 1000
Screen Size: 15 inches
RAM: More than 256
Internal Storage: CD-RW and DVD
Hard Drive (GB): Over 50
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Epinions.com ID:
hankshay
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Location: San Francisco, CA
Reviews written: 50
Trusted by: 2 members
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