Gateway P-6831FX User Review

I didn't get one yet and I'm still deciding. I started a thread here

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=215832

It be nice if everyone throw in their 2 cents and let us know

 

Yea, and thats the whole problem...manufacturer recommended price is $1350, but Best Buy sells the notebook for $1700...

 

I got 3950 in 3dmark06 on 'power saver' on battery.

 

I had external power with poower saving setting set. But thought it would be much higher then 3725.

Also, can a hard drive with the 3.0 gb work on this notebook? or just the 1.5gb drives?

thx

 

Just wondering how you got the 171.16 drivers. The Nvidia site doesn't have the mobile drivers updated yet for 8800gts. I can't get dx10 rendering to work on this notebook. I think my drivers are 149 or something close to that.
In World in Conflict it won't even let me check the dx10 rendering box.

Please help...

 

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/drivers/vista

 

this thing gets hot whats the best cooler for it?

 

The stock gateway drivers don't support DX10, you need to download the modded drivers.

 

Hi Just wondering Had anyone try Playing Final Fantasy XII?
having lag problem...

 

How much hot?

So far, there are no temperature issues from users since FX released.

You should be getting around idle CPU 40-45C and GPU 45-50C on high performance on AC plug. On load CPU 55C and GPU 65~70C.

FX has an amazing cooling system. Does a nice job cooling my FX.

If you want to try a cooling pad, check out Zalman NX2000. 2000 series has tad bigger footprint then 1000 series.

 

This is my first notebook, and I want it to last, so if it can cool itself and be reliable, then I should be fine, thanks for the help Petey!

 

I get about an hour playing games, and over 2 hours surfing. That is very good for something this big and powerful. Initially I though the small battery was a joke, but I am eating my words. It isn't bad.

That is 60% of what you should be getting out of the box. Try to remember what you messed around with and undo those things.

This week. The price is $1350 in Canada. Just be patient. Haven't you guys ever seen a sale before? They need to mark it up before they can 'put it on sale.' Consumer laws in Canada make that sort of thing illegal so they can't do it up here.

See the link for laptopvideo2go - detailed instructions over there. Expect to have to read some instructions and do a little bit of work if you want the modded drivers. It isn't too hard, but it isn't fool proof.

Are you sure? Mine ran Crysis in DX10 out of the box.

 

I've tried the Crysis demo on this notebook and there is no evidence of DX10. And all the very high options are greyed out (not sure if that's a demo thing or if it's related to dx10).
Maybe I got an older model with the stock driver.
Thanks for the help looks like I will have to dl the modded drivers. Pretty sure I read somehere it's 169.09.

P.S. While I'm on this subject, has anyone tried World in Conflict on both DX10 and DX9? Is there a big difference? I have my 6831fx hooked up to a 24" so I like to play in 1920X1200. Is DX10 possible on this resolution without much of a slowdown?
I'm sure the 1080 resolution in DX10 on Crysis would have a very slow fps.

 

I had mentioned 169.09 but it looks like there is a later version out there. I'm going to DL it tonight and see how it works.

 

can anyone tell me if there are any drivers for XP available for this laptop? if so then links plz? thanks in advance

 

http://cgi.ebay.ca/New-Intel-Core-2...ryZ99251QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

First Penryn I have seen for sale.

 

Hi..I want to upgrade my processor and have a question. Will an INTEL CORE 2 DUO MOBILE T9300 2.50GHz 6MB L2 CACHE work in the P-6831fx. I can get one for 315.00. Is that a good deal??

 

Yes and yes.

 

And this one :

http://cgi.ebay.ca/INTEL-CORE-2-DUO...yZ141323QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

I've had a T9300 in mine for 2weeks now, very easy install, kicked my 3DMark06 score to 8578.

 

lol, BB price is still $1699

 

I suspect that demand outstripped supply and this is meant to cool off the market for a little while until they can build up stock. Gateway could have also adjusted their wholesale price to BB due to some other type of issue.

We might see a sale but not necessarily down to the $1200-1300 range we saw it in for awhile.

Keep the Faith....

 

Ok..I bought a T7500. I unscrewed the bottom of the laptop and I see 4 tiny screws around the CPU and one large screw at the end of the heat sink. Do I just remove those and lift the hink sink off of the CPU....Thanks in advance

 

Did anyone try to put 800Mhz RAM in this?
If so - how does it work?
At 667 or 800?

 

For anyone who wants to buy it - I bought mine a week ago and I was able to lower the price to 1349!
Just negotiations!
I was leaving Best Buy twice and the manager called me back .
Final price (tax etc.) was something about 1460.
You can try negotiations for yourself - for me it was easy...........

 

I just recently purchased the FX, and found a couple of weird things I haven't seen covered yet. Being inexperienced with computers (to put it nicely), I really have no clue to what these mean.

1. Almost everywhere in Vista, it says that I have a Nvidia GeForce 8800M GT, including under the Video options of Oblivion. However, in the Nvidia control panel, under one of the Help options, it says Nvidia GeForce 8800M GTS. Is this usual?

2. I tried installing the latest drivers for the GPU, being 8800M GTS 512, and it told me that setup detected that the OS was not Windows Vista 32-bit. Any other driver pack told me it couldn't find hardware compatible for these drivers, so I'm fairly confident it's the right one (see above). Also, since my FX is still in out-of-the-box condition, Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit is obviously the OS I'm running. Anyone able to offer any assistance/advice?

Thanks in advance!

 

I saw a great new info on 2 different sites...according of that new info, a person who is working at BB sad that on Februar 17, BB is going to lower the price of this laptop to $1199 I hope this is true

 

This is a good description http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=206261&page=59

 

Just upgraded the HD to a Hitachi 7200rpm 200gb drive. Reinstalled the system and things were much more quicker.
Then put the original WD back in as secondary for storage, now booting and loading of system seems sluggish.

Is this common when you have mixed HD with different speeds installed?

Thx

 

Check the BIOs and disable RAID. I think it may be loading RAID setting on boot and drivers are causing some conflict.

 

Hey guys how does this laptop perform compared to a laptop with the 8800GTX? Is it close? How well does it safely overclock?

 

hey guys i bought this laptop last month when it was 1349 at BB and i got the price match to 1249 when the time came. so far this laptop runs pretty solid except the typical windows issues.

i guess the only question i have is im sure everyone else has the same windows rating of 4.6 if you didn't put new hardware in, i noticed the lowest rating is the memory operations, its dual channel memory at 667mhz...im just wondering if there is anything i can do to make the memory run any better without buying any new sticks? sorry if this is a dumb question...

 

Did you have to update your BIOS for this?

 

Any tried to OC this notebook's VGA? What are the maximum, stable GPU and memory clocks? How much were the 3dmark06 scores increased? And how much was the CPU and GPU temperature ?

 

No Over clock attempts here...I have been playing WoW and Crysis and haven't had any problems. My biggest gripe is vista but that is the price you pay for progress I guess.

As for the sale, I'll be interested in what happens there....

I bought mine on the BB card and got 6 mo/ no finance and yesterday I walked in to a store and saw 18 mo/ no finance....anyone familiar with trying to get that 'matched' in-store??

 

Greetings,
I thought I'd write my saga for triple booting the P-6831FX. I'm a Linux fan but have to use Windows for a couple of applications for my business. I've been looking for a laptop with 17 inch screen, dedicated Nvidia graphics, with enough storage to hold my MP3 collection, 3 OS's and all my necessary applications. I couldn't believe the price I was getting on this machine from BB.

I spent about an hour with www.blackviper.com and “tweaked” my services as he directed. I also spent an hour or so removing the bloatware. I tried running pcdecrapifier as I had read that this would take this stuff out but it didn't work for me. This did result in a noticeable improvement in response though I had also gotten rid of the visual effects and selected performance so I'm not sure which lead to the improvement.

From zipzoomfly I ordered a Seagate Momentus 7200.2 ST9160823AS Sata mobile hard drive rated at 3 Gb/s and after fumbling around for 30 minutes installed it. This would take a normal person about 15 minutes following the manual but first I used screws with too large heads, had a heck of a time finding 4 fine threaded screws with the flat heads, had immense help from my cat who decided these 4 screws were just what he needed to play hockey with, etc. Actually very easy install.

I created the back up disks. (I'm not totally stupid!). Then I installed Ubuntu 7.10 or Gutsy Gibbon if you prefer. I had some trouble with this as the only resolution that it would take is safe mode or 800x600. This put the back, cancel and install buttons out of sight. I had to tab and use the enter key to get it installed. Specifically I hit enter for the English, US querty, enter for the time zone, from there I hit the tab button 3 times to get to next. I used the total disk sdb or the Seagate in this case for my Linux OS. It installed without difficulty. I had the ethernet port plugged into my network. It uses DHCP and I had a connection after the install. The restricted drivers from Ubuntu didn't work as it claimed I didn't have a supported Nvidia device. Of course I still had 800 x 600 resolution so I installed Envy from:
http://albertomilone.com/nvidia_scripts1.html
and it handily installed the Nvidia driver for me. This chip is too leading edge I'm afraid. I've never tried to use a wireless device with Linux and I had read many horror stories. But I saw a blog about Wi-Fi Radar and installed that. I had to fuss with it a little to get my TKIP security password in the right spot and I had to assign the wireless access device an IP address though my LAN is set up for DHCP. My Smoothwall firewall accepts this without a hiccup and I had a nice wireless connection in under 15 minutes.

Okay let's turn to Windows. First I used Gparted to set up partitions on sda or the Western Digital 250 Gb hard drive. I wanted 25 for XP, 50 for Vista and the rest I was going to set up as an ext3 partition, install an ext driver in the Windows and use it as storage for all three OS's. I was planning on leaving the recovery partition intact. So much for plans. I managed to muck it up (I always tell myself that is the way I learn). Gparted is relatively easy so it takes a real idiot to f#$k the whole thing and I did it with ease. But I learned from my mistakes and after 30 minutes had my 3 partitions and started the install of XP having heard it was easier to start with XP, then Vista. I used nLite from:
ttp://www.nliteos.com/ to slipstream in XPSRP2, all the security patches, the wireless and the SATA drivers. I got the SATA driver and the driver for the wireless ethernet from the Gateway site for this machine. I couldn't find any other drivers except for the wired Ethernet and this is only because the XP and Vista drivers are the same. More on that later. I installed XP. I managed to get the wireless connection to my LAN, futzed briefly with other drivers and got very frustrated. I could never get the wired Ethernet port to work. Although the Gateway site says they are XP compatible it wouldn't install. I tried it in safe mode and as administrator and I got an error message saying the administrator had prohibited this activity. I don't remember doing that. Since this is an Intel chipset and it is used on an ASUS laptop that can be used with XP I figured I wouldn't have too much trouble getting a chipset driver. Wrong. I did get audio working, I can plug in a thumb drive or external hard drive and read/write it but device manager says there is something not right about it. And I tried www.laptopvideo2go.com but was unable to get a video driver installed for XP. Very discouraging.

But on to Vista. Vista installed from the recovery disk with no issues. I had downloaded all the drivers from Gateway's website and applied all of them except the video drivers. I was hoping to use laptopvideo2go's but despite inserting the modded .inf file it was no go. I used the one from Gateway's site. Wireless gave me a little trouble as it needs to be “repaired” after each boot and that is a 3 or 4 click process. I had to do that sometimes in XP and it was a two click thing. Progress. I spent another half hour with www.blackviper.com getting the services pruned. Then I tried rebooting into Ubuntu to find I had messed up Grub. I attempted to fix it using the Ubuntu liveCD and Knoppix to no avail. So I reinstalled Ubuntu and had to work out while the 186 security patches downloaded....again. Reinstalled Envy and got the Nvidia driver to work. You have to hand edit (at least I did) the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file with the line: Modes “1440x900” to get that resolution. Looks great though. And Ubuntu is very fast on the 7200 RPM Seagate rated at 3 Gb/s.

I still have to get XP working to a reasonable level as there is a program I need that won't work on Vista. I may never log into Vista but it is there if I need it. Ubuntu works great so far though I haven't attempted to set up NFS server and client as well as Samba.

It is a great machine. I was lucky to order it at the $1249 price level but shipping and taxes got it about $1350. Another $150 for the SATA hard drive.....T9300 when I can! I hope you enjoy your Gateway machine.

Tom

 

I am going to buy this on Sunday.

Here are my questions. Since I want XP and not Vista and am also in need of an external Harddrive.

Is it possible to remove the current HD, turn it into an external HardDrive, install a new faster Harddrive and configure that with XP??

Is it that easy?

Once i turn the Laptop harddrive into an external harddrive, will i need to reformat it or something?

Is it easy to uninstall and install a harddrive into this baby?
Once i load the new Harddrive into it and load XP onto it, will i need any special Drivers?? drivers I can't get through Microsoft update??

Thanks for any info...

p.s. this sound like a good idea to you?

 

Yes its possible to remove and install XP. XP install is a bit more of a challenge there is thread here on what you need to do.

As you guessed the drivers are the challenge -- read the thread on the XP install and it should give you most of your answers.

 

The post I see is related to installing XP on the Disk with Vista already on it.
This is not my plan. I will REmove the HArd DRive and install a new fresh one, and install XP on that. And turn the Vista HD into an external harddrive.

 

Hendel,

I gave up trying to find all the drivers I needed for xp and made the jump to Vista 64. I am very suprised how much better it runs than Vistax86.

Yes you can turn your main drive into an external, but you can also move it to the second hard drive bay.

 

What drivers were you having trouble finding? ( how long did you spend before you gave up?)
You think I should just go with Vista, and try to optimize it and get rid of all the fluff and bloatware?

Also, does it come with Vista 64? or did you have to pay to upgrade (if so how much?)?

 

HI Hendel,
I've spent about 3 hours trying to get an XP drivers installed for the Nvidia 8800M GTS GPU, chipset and wired ethernet port. I have not been successful. I tried the www.laptopvideo2go.com site but even the modded inf files reported that I didn't have a supported Nvidia GPU. YMMV. I was able to slipstream in the SATA drivers using nLite and Gateway's site had a compatible driver for the wireless ethernet which works well. I need a program that doesn't run on Vista or I would just optimize Vista. XP seems to run faster (entirely subjective) than Vista even crippled by lack of drivers.

But Vista is acceptable to me when tweaked. Ubuntu runs better.

The current hard drive when removed will work excellently as an external hard drive. You will need a SATA capable enclosure, of course, and you will probably want to reformat just to get rid of the restore partition and the Windows directory that you won't need. Or you could just leave it in and use it as additional storage. I'm running Ubuntu off a new Seagate 7200 RPM drive and XP and Vista off the original 250 Gb 5400 RPM drive. Works fine. Good luck.

Tom

 

The price for this baby is $1199! + you can choose a free PC game! (max price: $49.99)

 

Just got in on that deal. Real nice looking laptop.

One question to those who bought one. Did your laptop have that protective plastic film covering the case. Mine didn't and was just paranoid BB might have passed me a display model.

 

I ordered my P-171x fx though a gateway rep "Rico", I paid $1,909.00 total, I saved $585.00. that includes taxs, shipping and a 3 year warrenty, and 3 year accidental damage. Has anyone tried running Everquest 2 in this notebook? If it can handle EQ2 it can handle anything, its a very cpu intense game. Also I have been reading posts on people unistalling their OS to get rid of all the bloatware, use this free program called decrapifier, here is the link. I found out about this program from Leo Leport "The Tech Guy" here is thew link http://www.yorkspace.com/pc-de-crapifier/ I hope this helps.

 

Hi..NO clear cover on these. Just the black mat on the screen/keyboard area.

 

I just saw the Gateway in BestBuy today. The design is nice, and so are the specs you get for the price, but the 17" screen is awful. That's where Gateway cut corners, and it shows. My three and a half year old 17 CRT looks noticably better, which isn't a good thing to say about the Gateway's LCD screen.

 

hmm michael, they might had showed u a defected one or u whatsoever. the viewing angles are bad but the screen is good maybe mess with the screen settings and it'll do fine.

 

Am I looking at a different screen then you guys? I think this thing is amazing. I sold a Dell XPS M1710 and bought this from Bestbuy and im not sorry for one minute. Another thing I cant figure out is why people are buying this and the first thing they do is uninstall vista. Give it a chance and just remove the junk that Gateway installed. All I've done is upgraded to a T2500 2.2 GHz. This thing flys!!.

 

I definately agree with you. Even so on uninstalling vista first thing people brings the FX home.

Play with it, have some fun, cruise the inturdnet, install a game you got for free.

Too many are installing 'clean' vista and having too many problems on day 1.

My first day was, browsing every FX material in this forum. Figuring out what I am going to do next. Making driver DVD. Installing a game or two and checking out this beast. Seeing how 3DMark06 perform at stock level.

Then day two, off went the clean install