Gateway P-7811 FX Review

I went to BB to check out the notebook, it was blue screened and the right side of the notebook was running really hot.

I’ll wait for the HP HDX18t.

 

That's odd for the right side to be running hot. It's normally the left side that runs fairly warm. After my first laptop purchase (HP dv6408nr), I've learned to never really go by the display models.

 

That's impossible for a stock setup. The primary hard disk is on the left side, the heatsink and fan is also on the left side drawing heat out to the side.

If you think HPs will be better, think again. The HP forum is full of overheating complaints from the low-end to the high end consumer models.

If you want a cool running gaming notebook, try the Toshiba X305.

 

Can you please post a screenshot of the main GPUZ page? I've seen a bunch of posts around the Sager/Clevo forum where they claim that the 9800GTS is only 1-2% slower than the GT. Yet on nVidia's website, the GT has 96 "compute cores" and the GTS has 64, so the GTS ought to be more than 1-2% slower.

 

The 7811 is at my house right now, I will grab a GPUz screenshot after work.

http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=4610

We just reviewed the HDX18 and in almost every category the Gateway smoked it, including price.

 

GPUz shot for those interested

 

Well I wouldn’t mind giving the machine a try and saving some cash if it worked out. But with BB’s return policy I’m not going to get stuck with store credit.

Can you buy this model anywhere else that will give you a full refund?

Question: Is it possible to remap the left control key and function key?

 

I've been running my 7800 pretty heavy the last few weeks with no problems (with the config in my .sig). I've run the Nvidia graphic demo for hours on end and played EQ2 for long sessions (3hrs+) with no problems.

WoW does crash sporadically, but it is the 64-bit issue (Memory cannot be 'read' problem), since dual booting to XP it runs fine.

This is without a laptop cooler or extra ventilation. I use the notebook on a basic lapdesk.

 

I purchased one of these at Best Buy and have had problems with it locking up after only an hour of Crysis. This is with the back propped up with the game box.

I thought that this was only with Crysis, being a very high demand game, but even Sid Meier's Pirates locked up after a little over an hour.

Gateway told me that since this is only happens during game play, there was nothing they could do. Hello, its a gaming laptop. And was advertised as such.

I game all the time, desktop and laptop. I travel quite a bit so I was looking for laptop to play on the road with. This was second after the HP 21 inch failed as well. The disc drive didn't work.

This is getting returned as soon as I get near civilization again. I couldn't even get Battlefield 2 run properly on it.

Any other suggestions? I am thinking of just biting the bullet and buying Alienware.

Help me !

 

Thanks for the GPUZ screenshot. The increased clock speed probably mitigates the effect of having fewer cores.

 

Kevin proved his Gateway provided Laptop could support gaming without locking up. The previous P-7811FX I had wouldn't come close to being able to do what Kevin's unit did. I exhcnaged it yesterday, and the unit I received is NOT the same as the one I returned. This one has a different plastic molding on the bottom of the notebook that appears to allow better cooling, and the GPU fan is blowing air out at a much greater rate. The DVD drive is also different than the other one - this one doesn't pop out at the drop of a pin.

It does appear that the version of the P-7811FX is sufficiently different that the one I originally purchased to allow it to play games or do other graphic intensive tasks without locking up. I believe this is why some people have been able to 'fix' this issue by exchanging their unit, while others haven't. If they received the save version of the P-7811FX that they were trading in, I would expect them to have the same issue. There is a raised circle on the 'windows' key on the new unit I received - also the keyboard as a whole is different than my original unit. Hopefully this might allow people to determine if they have a 'good' unit or one that might be prone to the overheating lock-up issue.

 

Amazing deal. Just amazing.

 

You got any screen shots of the differences I just want to take a look.

My 7811 was manufactured in August and have had no real problems. What I thought were lockups just was some annoying game glitch. The only thing the paint on the back rubs offs so easily. I travel with it a fair bit.

 

I noticed Kevin's photo of the 7811fx has the raised circle as you mentioned.

 

My unit has been running real well, no lockups in either Assasins Creed or WIC. I have a raised circle as well, might be coincidence, or as DuVader says this is a different build of the model. Would be interesting to see if the units that are failing have the same build.

 

There has been 3 different refreshes of the hardware and the BIOS with the 7811FX. The test model used here likely had BIOS 9c.04.00, possibly .05.00..when the unit was officially released it was being shipped with 9c.05.00. The models manufactured in July of 08, which serial number will begin P2887, will all have the 9c.05.00 BIOS. There have been a few minor issues related to these rigs..and it is speculated that ACPI has a lot to do with it. There have also been a few models with faulty screens. The wonderful thing here is Best Buy will return/exchange in the 14-day window as long as it is defective. Well, a faulty screen definately qualifies. The units now being shipped to, and sold by, Best Buy should have a serial number beginning P2888. It will also have the raised "bumP" on your Windows hotkey. In addition, it is being shipped with BIOS 9c.08.00. The hardware is virtually identical, however they are shipping with a different brand DVD Burner..not a big deal really, but it is a bit louder when it spins up than the previous. The 2 largest gains with the 9c.08 BIOS is that Gateway added RAID..for some reason it hadn't been implemented like all other FX series..and they also tweaked the ACPI BIOS settings.. This new BIOS, to my knowledge, has not had any major issues as compared to the 9c.05.00. There are many who love this new rig.. some who hate it..(that's cause they spent $2500 on a Sager and this smokes 'em) and as far as the budget gaming world is concerned.. This is Hands Down, the BEST Gaming Laptop EVER for $1250.

If you are experienceing problems with your 7811FX, and it has BIOS 9c.05.00, which you can find by tapping the escape button when you first turn on the computer..it will show your BIOS POST screen and tells you which BIOS is installed..or if your serial number begins P2887, found on the bottom of your notebook with.. Upgrade HERE to 9c.08.00. Gateway doesn't offer the new BIOS on their website yet, but I was fortunate enough to get assistance in acquiring it.

Beautiful review to the OP, thank you for glorifying this sexy looking machine. And I highly recommend to anyone considering it.

 

By the way this is not sold anywhere in Canada, afaik.
We get shafted, once again.

 

I was in the same boat and I ordered a Dell precision M6400 w/the Quadro M3700 graphics chip. Check it out...

 

I own this notebook, although I did have some serious problems with the first unit I bought, fortunately they happened around a week after I bought the thing and I could return it, although because of some stupidity on my part, I had to pay a restocking fee. I "fixed" the problem with a clean install, reinstallation of the drivers, realizing the CPU drivers were causing the issue to occur, system restoring to before I installed the drivers, and using it like that until I could return the thing. My ACTUAL mistake was not reinstalling the drivers so I could demonstrate the problem to Geek Squad and/or have the issue registered in the system as proof that it happened. Now of course I could've waited a day or two as they ran diagnostics and such with the possibility that they might be able to repair it, but I'm impatient, so since there was a sale that week I used the difference to pay the restocking fee, and got a free game (I picked Turok) for my trouble at least. Also, they were gracious enough to waive a bit of the restocking fee so that I wouldn't have to pay anything extra. Still, I can't help but feel like the "free game" actually cost me $250 in a weird sense-and if they'd discovered that it actually was a defective and/or broken unit that they could not (or could not easily enough) repair, I could've gotten myself a little bit of money plus the free game, and if they could fix it, heck I'd still get the money and I could maybe BUY the game with that money. Still, I'm Mr. Impatient.

Well, anyway besides that long, complicated thing at the beginning, I'm quite happy with the thing. Well, there are still a couple issues-one the display driver crashes (but recovers) every now and again (I'm using a 32" HDTV most of the time, however-and again I should probably update the video drivers), and secondly when doing heavy downloading I sometimes will get the BSOD possibly due to an issue with the network card driver. Really, I suppose the solution to that is going easy on the big downloads.

Here's a list of games I've been able to play on it (excluding some older ones):

Silent Hill 2-4 (although 3 seemed to have some framerate issues @ max settings, this may be fixed by updating the video drivers))
The Orange Box
Doom 3 + Resurrection of Evil
Crysis
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
F.E.A.R.
Quake IV
Painkiller Triple Dose
Turok
Condemned: Criminal Origins
The Sims 2
Clive Barker's Jericho
Bioshock
Deus Ex: Invisible War (with CPU affinity set to a single core)
Audiosurf

Games I've got installed but have yet to try out (they'll likely work, though):

Prey
The Witcher Enhanced Edition
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines

I'm also planning on getting Silent Hill: Homecoming whenever the heck it comes out on Steam-the only problem is the Minimum System Requirements say "2.8 GHz (XP); 3.2 GHz (Vista)", although I might take that as a grain of salt because a lot of games seem to SAY they need a fast processor when a slower but perhaps well-built one will suffice. It's interesting that the one in this laptop rated higher than one made by the same company that was 2.8 GHz, not sure if it was a typo or just that there's more to how well a CPU performs than merely the GHz.

 

Hi,

Thanks for the great review. Is there something akin to the P-7811 in a 15.4 screen size? Speaking of in the Gateway series.

Dick

 

There is no 15.4'' notebook sold by Gateway with a high-end graphics card.

The only 2 that are available in the market right now are the Alienware m15x and the Clevo m860tu (aka Sager NP8660). Alienware offers the 8800GTX (huge overheating problems though) and the Clevo/Sager offers the 9800GTS.

 

More heat soaking tests today (reviewing a antec cooling stand with this notebook). At times had it sitting at 93C with the GPU and CPU pegged out. Ran flawless without crashing once.

 

Question for Kevin,

I just bought this laptop myself and ran 3DMark06 and got a score of 8750. You said you received a 9600, I was wondering what you did to get this score. I ran 3dmark06 with my laptop right out of the box, did you tweak yours or update drivers? If so can you walk me through what you did?

 

8750 is normal, average 3d06 score for gateway p7811fx.
9600+ is 20% overclocked. i dont see in game fps gain from 20% oc though.

 

Ok I was wondering if I was doing something wrong because I dont know much about computers, I am currently playing WAR online at full graphics but I get some stuttering at times and was wondering if I could do some tweaks to improve this performance.

 

That is close to water boiling point.
There is no way that with this temp the notebook can last more than a few months.

A 20% OC for me gives me a lot, sometimes more than 20% in fps

 

I've had my GPU hit 101C. No issues

 

101C ?
No issues NOW.
Give it time...

 

Wi-Fi card decided not to work properly after waking it up from "Sleep". Updated drivers... still nothing. Gonna reseat the card.

 

Turned out to be that my primary router (I have regular router(primary) and 2 Wi-Fi routers) had to be reset. The DHCP wasn't working correctly. Wi-Fi on my laptop works fine again

 

Eurasianman, how noisy does it get when gaming ?

 

Um... I'm not sure. Let's put it this way, I never really notice the fan when I'm playing a game and the volume on the notebook is around 25-50%. It's quieter than an XBOX 360 and a little quieter than a PS3 at full load a.k.a. F@H for 8 hours. Does that help? =\

 

What are the lastest drivers I need to download for playing a game like Warhammer online? I have been playing with this laptop but get stuttering fps drop sometimes and was wondering if updating my drivers would help.

 

It might help. Have you been monitoring your temps? HWMonitor works well Just download, and run and leave it running in the back ground and play Warhammer. When you're done, check to see how high the temps were. If you're playing on a flat surface, it might help if you elevate the back of the laptop.

 

I dl'd the program what should I be looking for? What is safe vs not as far as temp?

 

Watch the TSZ (I think that's what it's called) temps and make sure they don't spike up like crazy. If they do, then you have a bad sensor IIRC. As far as the GPU... um, I'm not sure. I've gotten my GPU up to 97C playing Rainbow Six Vegas 2, so I elevated the back of the notebook and it dropped my temps down to 75C. As well as be sure to monitor the HDD temps. Some people are getting idle temps of 50C up to 65C when the HD is being accessed frequently. Hope this helps.

 

How do I overclock?