Gateway M-152XL Review

by Kevin O'Brien

The Gateway M-152XL is a compact multimedia powerhouse aimed directly at the Toshiba A305, HP Pavillion dv6700, or Dell M1530. Each of these notebooks offer the same basic features, including high glossy chassis, fast processor, dedicated graphics, HDMI outputs, and their own brand specific styling elements. So how well does the Gateway stack up to the rest? Read on to find out.

Our Gateway M-152XL ($1,299.99) had the following specifications:

• Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.4GHz)
• Windows Vista Home Premium 32-Bit w/ Service Pack 1
• 15.4" WXGA Ultrabright TFT Active Matrix (1280x800)
• ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600 w/ 512MB GDDR3 Memory
• 3072MB 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM
• 160GB Seagate 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
• 8x Multi-Format Dual Layer Slot Load DVDRW w/ DVD-RAM
• 5-in-1 Digital Media Manager
• Integrated Intel 802.11a/b/g/Draft-N Wireless Networking
• Bluetooth 2.0+EDR
• 1.3 Megapixel Webcam
• HDMI Connector v1.2
• 6-Cell Lithium Ion Battery (5200 mAH)
• 1-Year Warranty (Tech Support / Parts / Factory Labor)
• Retail Price: $1,299.99

Build and Design

The Gateway M-152XL has a very stylish design with glossy metallic blue paint contrasting the brushed aluminum trim around the frame of the notebook as well as the keyboard. This silver theme also continues onto keyboard which is painted with a matte silver metallic finish. One thing to note is while other manufacturers are going with glossy finish for even the keyboard, Gateway is staying with their matte finish for now.

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The optical drive, following the sleek and stylish theme is slot loading, just like the Dell M1530 or Apple notebook line. While it does remove the CD tray from the equation for a streamlined design, I still can't get over the "optical drive is consuming my disc" noises that all slot loading drives make.

Build quality is above average with a durable chassis that feels pretty solid in your hand. The plastic is tough, flexing little under stress and producing no squeaks when tossed around. The chassis as a whole feels like it would hold up well, even in the hands of less than friendly students.

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The glossy paint quality is one aspect of this notebook that falls short, leaving much to be desired. Our review sample had some paint application quirks such as paint not being applied all the way to the edges of the plastic and as well as discoloration that gave off a wavy gasoline on water effect. If you were looking at the glossy surface at an object like an overhead light being reflected from it, the reflection would be obscured by purple and green fringe. This by no means impacts the performance of the notebook or changes the texture of the painted surface, but is almost impossible not to see once you notice it.

Glossy finish on M-152XL. (view large image)

Glossy finish on T-6828. (view large image)

Screen

Display quality is average, with a very narrow viewing angle which can make enjoying a movie or game difficult until you find a sweet spot. Vertical viewing has about a 10 degree +/- range before the screen either gets dark or washed out. Horizontal viewing angles are much better, keeping colors accurate even at extreme viewing angles. No screen defects were found on our review model, which includes dead/stuck pixels or backlight leakage.
When inside the viewing sweet spot, the color and brightness of the screen is very nice. My preferred brightness setting was 70 percent, or a bit darker if I was at home without as much overhead light.

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Keyboard, Touchpad, and Media Keys

The keyboard on the Gateway M-152XL notebook was very nice, with a very solid feel when typing. The structure underneath the keyboard provided a great deal of support, preventing any unwanted sag during use. The key action felt great, with a decent throw height, and very little key wobble. Key spacing was fine, and the key size itself was normal for a 15" notebook.

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This notebook offers a Synaptics style touchpad, which I absolutely love to find on a notebook. Sensitivity is excellent, tracking is near perfect, and above all the configuration software offers a ton of adjustments to get the touchpad working to your exact specifications. The touchpad buttons were of decent size and provided a shallow throw with an audible click.

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The Gateway M-152XL offers a mixture of soft touch and touch sensitive keys for the media functions. The volume control is a touch sensitive strip that detects tapping as well as sliding action to adjust the volume. The rest of the keys are soft touch, that provide a small click when pressed. With the media keys, you can control volume, mute, play/pause, stop, skip, DVD, Music, and TV.

Performance and Benchmarks

The overall system performance of the Gateway M-152XL notebook is excellent, with its Intel Penryn T8300 processor and ATI Mobility HD2600 graphics card. This combination gives you plenty performance to play most modern games on average settings, and more than enough power for day to day tasks. The 7200rpm Seagate hard drive helped load media applications such as Windows Media Center without lag, and gave the notebook a very snappy feel when just tooling around. Compared to the other notebooks in this price segment, the Gateway M-152XL clearly leads the pack in overall system performance from what we have seen in our testing.

wPrime is a program that forces the processor to do recursive mathematical calculations, the advantage of this program is that it is multi-threaded and can use both processor cores at once, thereby giving more accurate benchmarking measurements than Super Pi. (Lower numbers mean better performance.)

Notebook / CPU	wPrime 32M time
Gateway M-152XL (Core 2 Duo T8300 @ 2.4GHz)	31.792s
Gateway T-6828 (Core 2 Duo T5550 @ 1.83GHz)	45.457s
Toshiba Satellite M305 (Core 2 Duo T8100 @ 2.1GHz)	38.532s
Toshiba Satellite A305 (Core 2 Duo T8100 @ 2.1GHz)	36.442s
Asus M51S (Core 2 Duo T5550 @ 1.83GHz)	46.293s
Lenovo IdeaPad Y510 (Core 2 Duo T5450 @ 1.66GHz)	50.184s
HP Pavilion dv6700t (Core 2 Duo T5450 @ 1.66GHz)	50.480s
Dell Inspiron 1525 (Core 2 Duo T7250 @ 2.0GHz)	43.569s
Dell XPS M1530 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.485s
Portable One SXS37 (Core 2 Duo T7250 @ 2.0GHz)	41.908s
Sony VAIO NR (Core 2 Duo T5250 @ 1.5GHz)	58.233s
Toshiba Tecra A9 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	38.343s
Toshiba Tecra M9 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.299s
HP Compaq 6910p (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2GHz)	40.965s
Sony VAIO TZ (Core 2 Duo U7600 @ 1.20GHz)	76.240s
Zepto 6024W (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2GHz)	42.385s
Lenovo T61 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.705s
Alienware M5750 (Core 2 Duo T7600 @ 2.33GHz)	38.327s
Hewlett Packard DV6000z (Turion X2 TL-60 @ 2.0GHz)	38.720s
Samsung Q70 (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2.0GHz)	42.218s

PCMark05 overall performance comparison results (higher scores mean better performance):

Notebook	PCMark05 Score
Gateway M-152XL (2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T8300, ATI Mobility HD2600)	6,256 PCMarks
Gateway T-6828 (1.83GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5550, Intel X3100)	3,656 PCMarks
Gateway M-6816 (1.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5250, Intel X3100)	3,480 PCMarks
LG R500 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS 256MB)	4,702 PCMarks
HP dv2500t (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS 128MB)	4,522 PCMarks
Dell Inspiron 1420 (2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7500, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS)	4,925 PCMarks
Sony VAIO FZ (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	3,377 PCMarks
Dell XPS M1330 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS)	4,591 PCMarks
Lenovo ThinkPad X61 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	4,153 PCMarks
Lenovo 3000 V200 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	3,987 PCMarks
Lenovo T60 Widescreen (2.0GHz Intel T7200, ATI X1400 128MB)	4,189 PCMarks
HP dv6000t (2.16GHz Intel T7400, NVIDA GeForce Go 7400)	4,234 PCMarks
Fujitsu N6410 (1.66GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400)	3,487 PCMarks
Alienware M7700 (AMD Athlon FX-60, Nvidia Go 7800GTX)	5,597 PCMarks
Sony VAIO SZ-110B in Speed Mode (Using Nvidia GeForce Go 7400)	3,637 PCMarks

3DMark06 gaming performance comparison results (higher scores mean better performance):

Notebook	3DMark06 Score
Gateway M-152XL (2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T8300, ATI Mobility HD2600)	3,754 3DMarks
Gateway T-6828 (1.83GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5550, Intel X3100)	469 3DMarks
Gateway M-6816 (1.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5250, Intel X3100)	529 3DMarks
LG R500 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS 256MB)	2,776 3DMarks
HP dv2500t (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS 128MB)	1,055 3DMarks
Dell Inspiron 1420 (2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7500, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS 128MB)	1,329 3DMarks
Sony VAIO FZ (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	532 3DMarks
Dell XPS M1330 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS 128MB)	1,408 3DMarks
Samsung Q70 (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo T7300 and nVidia 8400M G GPU)	1,069 3DMarks
Asus F3sv-A1 (Core 2 Duo T7300 2.0GHz, Nvidia 8600M GS 256MB)	2,344 3DMarks
Alienware Area 51 m5550 (2.33GHz Core 2 Duo, nVidia GeForce Go 7600 256MB	2,183 3DMarks
Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Xi 1526 (1.66 Core Duo, nVidia 7600Go 256 MB)	2,144 3DMarks
Samsung X60plus (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo T7200, ATI X1700 256MB)	1,831 3DMarks
Asus A6J (1.83GHz Core Duo, ATI X1600 128MB)	1,819 3DMarks
HP dv6000t (2.16 GHz Intel T7400, NVIDA GeForce Go 7400)	827 3DMarks

HDTune results:

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3dmark 3754
Pcmark 6256
Wprime 31.792

Ports and Features

Port selection on the Gateway M-152XL was decent, but I felt it was missing Firewire and an additional USB port. It was nice to see VGA still included, even though HDMI is taking the lead.

Front: Headphone/Mic Jacks

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Rear: Modem, VGA, AC Power

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Left: HDMI, LAN, two USB ports, 5-in-1 Media Card Reader, ExpressCard/54, Wireless On/Off

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Right: Slot Loading Optical Drive, one USB port

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Webcam

The webcam performed quite well, working just as I would have hoped. Clarity of the image was decent, but you can't really expect a great deal of performance from a image sensor so small.

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Audio

The integrated speakers on the M-152XL were below average, sounding very tinny and lacking all bass and most midrange. For listening to the occasional YouTube clip they would be fine, but I would really suggest a pair of headphones for longer use.

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Heat and Noise

Thermal performance of this notebook was excellent, operating at stealth noise levels during most activities, and mildly ramping up in speed under benchmarks. Temperature levels of the notebook a bit higher than average, but it did have the high performance excuse. When compared to other notebooks in its class, it might have been a couple of degrees warmer overall.

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Battery

For having a standard, non-extended battery, the Gateway M-152XL brought in good off the grid battery time of 2 hours and 35 minutes on the Windows Vista "Balanced" profile, with screen backlight set to 50 percent and wireless on. With the extended 9-cell battery I think it would be possible to break the 4 hour mark using these same settings.

Conclusion

The Gateway M-152XL offers a great deal of performance and very good build quality for a very attractive price. While the standard retail price of this notebook is $1,299, at the time of this writing Gateway is currently selling it on their website with a $250 discount, bringing the final price down to $1,050. The only big complaint I had with our review model was the paint defect that gave off the shimmery discoloration, which didn't directly affect the performance or durability of the notebook and is not a common problem.

Pros

• Excellent performance
• Cool brushed aluminum trim
• Responsive touchpad

Cons

• Odd paint discoloration with the blue paint on our test unit

 

Good review, didnt knew the 2600XT was so far behind the 8600GT ddr3

 

"Odd paint discoloration"..
not to mention odd color combination as well...

 

It all depends on clock speeds and drivers. The 2600XT should have default speeds of 700/750 and somehow I don't think they managed to pull that off in a 15.4" laptop...considering the same graphics card in the HP HDX scored 4200 at a higher resolution.

 

$1,050 seems like a very good price for this laptop.

I'm surprised at the performance of the XT. Is it possible for you to run a check on the GPU and its clocks, Kevin?

 

Gosh, these notebooks are getting cheaper and cheaper.

 

"# 5-in-1 Digital Media Manager "

Is this what we call card readers, now? Oh, you crazy Gateway marketing cats, you.

 

I thought people already proved this laptop only had a 2600(not the advertised 2600xt at bestbuy)
I was trying to convince my brother to get this one over a tx2000, but he said hed rather have a tablet(which he has yet to actually use) instead of a good video card(which he constantly complains about the tx2000's lack of)

 

I'm surprised you didn't list the lack of a firewire port on the cons list. I personally find that the incorrect placement of the function <fn> and the left control <ctrl> should be listed in the cons list, too.

The black, silver and blue color scheme is questionable, too.

Other than those issues, I've always found that Gateway was a highly underrated brand, and it's good that they are able to offer a good level of performance in a well-built 15.4" notebook.

 

How much does it weigh?

 

One thing dont like about Gateways is that FN key is where the CTRL key usually is. Don't know why they make it this way

 

it is a good value PC but it is not avialable world wide, I think Acer sells it only in the US, canada, Korea and Japan, I may be wrong though.

and , seems like Acer's improved it alot with interesting new design and more realistic marketing, it is not for me since no high resolution screen options but it is a good buy IMO.

it seems at least better than the old HPDV6700T and I prefer Acer-Gateway over Gateway-Gateway..

Still, Dells are much better deals with more customizable options.

 

So, does gateway ship outside the US from their website? Or will I have to find a dealer from somewhere here in Australia? This seems like a great alternative to the 1530, and the 2600XT seems more than adequate for the occasional COD4 game.

 

I think the review would have been a bit more effective if you had benchmarks compared with the notebooks its actually competing against (like the XPS M1530 instead of the XPS M1330) It seems like a good value laptop but I'm not too sure about the paint finishes. I'm sure at first it looks neat but it seems like something one would get sick of seeing after awhile

 

Now if Gateway would put atleast the ATI HD 2400 XT in their C-142XL Tablet, I'd be a happy camper. The x2300 just ain't cuttin' it.

 

Nice review. If that's really a 2600XT though, it's painfully underclocked. My regular 2600 gets 38-3900 in 3dmark06 @ 1280x800.

 

nice review

but are u sure its actually an XT? looks more like an HD or it got underclocked

 

Gateway's site says that the GPU is an Ati HD 2600 with 512mb DDR3 (not a HD 2600 XT).

 

Yes, you are wrong.
Acer computers are being sold everywhere in EU. Though it's kinda looked down as a 'low class' brand quite often.

 

Confirmed on the notebook that it was in fact the 2600, and not the XT. We were going off the spec sheet that gateway gave us for the notebook, perhaps a change between design and production?

 

wow the ati 2600 is on par with the nvidia 8600? i like this laptop although i thought i saw this laptop earlier selling at 799$ at gateway.

gateway has been bought by acer and are highly underrated sad to say. most of their products are quality and acer is a global brand. easy to get parts and stuff for it.

 

Yes indeed it is. A little known secret we confirmed months ago with the HP 8510p's release, although it never seemed to catch on

 

Glad to see the chassis is a bit fore firm, because I have come into contact with one Gateway notebook, and it was just one big SQUEAK!!!

 

I ordered this laptop on Wednesday, and I am so excited about its arrival. It is expected on Monday, and I am extremely excited!

 

I hope this laptop holds up for 2-3 years =) mine should be in at the very latest next friday.

 

I think I am going to do some OCing of the Graphics Card in this laptop to keep in on par with the 8600M GT. The gaming performance isn't too far away from the 8600M GT.

 

You know, the author showed that picture of the "gasoline" like color on the cover of the laptop and that reminded me of thin-film interference from the AP I took earlier this month. lol...I can't wait until my laptop arrives (now only less than 16 miles away!) XD...

 

Did you get your laptop ^^? And is there a dvd burner in this or just dvd player?

 

It's a burner.

 

Yes,the 2600 is ~=with the DDR2 8600M GT or a little better.
This laptop packs quite a punch for such a low price!

 

might wish to correct the links for this notebook. the retailer links are showing 850, which is the price for the one with a 2400xt, and generally much different specs.

 

I haven't received my laptop yet because I think UPS doesn't deliver on a Saturday. But there is a DVD Burner in this Gateway, though.

8x multi-format dual-layer slot-load DVD-RW w/ DVD-RAM

 

I saw a laptop that looked just liked this for $799 if that is what you are talking about. but that laptop had a much weaker processor, something like T5550 or something, but it also had 4 gigs of ram and 64 bit vista.

 

if its at a UPS station go pick it up IMO!!!
Who wants to wait till monday? boooo
btw did you get the blue or the red one? i got the blue one.

 

Yea ^ ^ , if I saw this bad boy for 850 I would not even hesitate.

 

how about 950? cause thats how much i got mine for =D

 

That's a cheaper model of the M-series. I'm not sure if it's the same chassis, but I suspect so.

 

I got the blue one, too!

 

Almost the same chassis. The only difference is that it is missing the fingerprint scanner in the middle of the push buttons for the touchpad.

 

I have a few questions right now since I still don't have my laptop.

What are the default GPU processor and memory clock speed?
How does this card compare to the 8600M GT GDDR3?
How much do I overclock to get to this level of performance?
Can I overclock to match the level of performance of the 8600M GT GDDR3?

Thanks for any help. When I get my laptop on Monday, I will just figure all this out myself. Someone in another thread tells me that this laptop sucks and is no match for the M1530. I just want to "bend the rules" a little bit to make it appear that this laptop is just as fast as his.

 

I ordered this M-152XL Pacific Blue, arrival is set for Monday, I'm most excited about the slot loading DVD Drive and what looks to be like a solid chasis, my last Gateway Laptop had the old plastic flexing type chasis, and after two solid years of use, the hinges just snapped off. You can see from the picture it looks like they added some very solid hinge support.... overall a very good deal for the price, got mine for just over $1,000, and its benchmarks top its class for the price range. Use code AFF08Q2 for an extra $75 off...

 

That's exactly what I did! This laptop is really underrated compared to the XPS M1530. I think it is on par with that laptop's performance.

 

The HD 2600 GDDR3's very slightly behind the 8600M GT GDDR3. The last I heard, overclocking on the HD 2600's was rather difficult, plus drivers get less support from ATI. I'm not sure if that's still ongoing.

 

I thought that RivaTuner and ATITools can do it. I am sure that both works because I installed both on my computers that I have and tested them out. They work perfectly and I don't need ATI's drivers to overclock anyway.

 

I mentioned the drivers since you were talking about gaming performance.

And my bad, I was thinking about the HD 2600 in the HP 8510P. That used to be locked in the BIOS. The ones in the Gateway should be overclockable, if they are anything like the P series.

 

My bad too. Didn't know what I was thinking! You're right about the gaming performance thing. Yah, that has to do a lot with the drivers.

 

I have been gaming on (I'm embarrassed to say) an ATI Radeon X300SE (Crippled Edition). Will this HD 2600 offer better performance than my X300SE? This is not a joke.

 

OK, so I finally received my laptop. I am extremely impressed with the amount of effort Gateway put into making the laptop. It runs pretty warm after a while, but that is expected of every laptop. After I tried to run Crysis on my desktop, I am glad to say that this laptop can run Crysis with everything except shaders on high. Crysis is SO beautiful when those small things are enabled. Sad to say that I think I will be using my Dell desktop less and less. I think I might want to consider a chilling mat, because it does run a little warm for my liking, as the reviewer said.

 

idq, I'm trying to figure out what color i want. Either the red or blue obviously. Does the blue look sharp?

 

Thanks for asking, but I am not especially sure what "sharp" means in the question. Does it look nice? Absolutely. It does seem dark, and you might see that it is a little bit dull, so if you need a sharp color, I would probably recommend the red. I hope I answered your question? Please feel free to ask more!