Gateway-Laptop MD2614u Review: Powerful But Far From Perfect

Gateway MD 2614u $549 Best Buy

Features

The Gateway-Laptop (MD2614u) with AMD Turion X2 Dual Core is a  Laptop for people with a small budget: $549 at Best Buy. It has some features that not every Entry-Level laptop can offer: 15.6 “True 16:9″ (1366×768) format, which lets you watch movies without the black bars on the top/bottom of the screen. If you are planning on using this laptop as an entertainment device you will love this format, however since your screen is now wider but shorter, web-browsing will consist of more scrolling. But Gateway has a solution for this: Vertical Scroll, which is on the right side of your Touchpad. Just move your finger up to scroll up, and down to scroll down.

Other features are the HDMI port, which lets you connect your laptop to your HDTV or newer monitors, the built in Webcam (1.3 megapixel), or the ATI graphics card which has 256MB of dedicated RAM.

Windows Vista 64bit

The AMD Turion X2 Dual Core 64 processor (compare to the Intel Core 2 Duo) is fast but doesn’t drain your battery too fast. An interesting fact is that the MD2614u runs Vista 64 but only has 3G of RAM  (upgradable to 4G). Windows Vista 32bit only supports up to 3G of RAM, but the 64bit version supports 3G and more.

Also, the sales guy told me that MS Office 2003 does not work on Vista 64, which is incorrect. Office 2003 (x11) is supported. Please Best Buy, train your sales people – or go back to the commissions- based sales system. Check the Microsoft Vista Compatibility Website to check if your applications are supported.

Drawbacks

Here are some things that are not that great: It’s the keyboard, stupid. I just can’t get used to the keyboard; in order to give  the laptop a modern and hip look, Gateway organized the keyboard, so that it fits exacltly into a rectangle shape. But the designers forgot to think about ergonomics. I have a hard time hitting  the correct letter in the row  where the letters QWERTY are located. Misspelled words are the norm. And the clicking sound of the keys is annoying.

The finish around the keyboard is glossy and you will see every finger print. The illuminated media buttons are confusing, I haven’t figured out how to use the volume button. With 7.1lbs this laptop is not really a laptop anymore, rather a desktop replacement.

Conclusion

Just by looking at the price and the specs (see below), the MD2614u seems to be a winner. But the unusual keyboard is a factor that should not be overlooked. It’s like buying a nice looking car with a powerful engine that constantly steers to the right.

After owning this laptop for about two  weeks, I  returned it to Best Buy, spend $200 more and own now an amazing laptop with a great keyboard. See my review for the HP DV5-1235dx

Related Links:

CNET Laptop Buying Guide

Gateway MD2614u

Laptop Model	Gateway® MD2614u
Operating System	Genuine Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium (64-bit) with SP11
Processor	AMD Turion X2 Mobile Dual-Core Processor RM-72 (2.1GHz, 512KB x 2 L2 Cache, HyperTransport� technology @ up to 1600MHz)
Hard Drive	250GB 5400RPM SATA hard drive4
Memory	3072MB 667MHz DDR2 Memory
Wireless Network	802.11b/g/Draft-N Wireless LAN
Application Software	Microsoft Works 9.0, Microsoft Money Essentials & Microsoft� Office Home and Student 2007 (60-day complimentary trial period)3
Chassis	Chassis with ATI Radeon HD 3200 Graphics with up to 1919MB of HyperMemory� and AMD M780G Chipset
Digital Media Software	Microsoft Windows Media Player 11, Cyberlink Power2 Go�, & Cyberlink� LabelPrint�
Dimensions (Box)	13" (H) x 17" (W) x 6" (D) or 330mm (H) x 431.8mm (W) x 152mm (D)
Dimensions (System)	1.3"-1.70" (H) x 15.2" (W) x 10.4" (D) or 32.9-44.3mm (H) x 387.2mm (W) x 264.6mm (D)
Display	15.6" High-Definition Widescreen WXGA Ultrabright Display (1366 x 768)
Expansion Slots	ExpressCard Type 54
External Ports	(4) USB 2.0, VGA Connector, v1.3 HDMI Connector
Keyboard and Mouse	Full-Size Keyboard, Synaptics Touchpad with Vertical Scroll
Media Card Reader	5-in-1 Digital Media Card Reader (Memory Stick, Memory Stick� Pro, Multi Media Card, Secure Digital, xD-Picture Card)
Modem	56K ITU V.92 ready Fax/Modem (RJ-11 port)
Multimedia Buttons	Illuminated Multimedia Touch Controls
Network	10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet LAN (RJ-45 port)
Optical Drive	8x Multi-Format Dual Layer DVDRW and DVD-RAM featuring Labelflash� Technology6
Security Software	Symantec Norton 360 2008 (60-day trial)5
Weights	7.1 lbs. (3.2 kg) system unit only

German TV on your PC – SHIFT.TV

The Website shift.tv allows you to download German TV shows for a yearly subscription fee of € 59.99 or € 9.99 per month if you sign up for 3 months.

The following channels are available: ARD, ZDF, Pro7, Sat.1, Das Vierte, mdr, NDR, Tele5, Kabel eins, WDR, N24, arte, Phoenix, BR, HR, 3sat and Eurosport.

Shift.tv works like a remote DVR, and lets you pick programming of up to 20 hours. You can either watch your show on your computer as a live stream, or you can just download the show and watch it later.

TV shows come in the common WMV format (512 x 384, 689kbps); it is possible to burn a show on DVD, however the quality suffers immensely and doesn’t satisfy HDTV junkies

If you are thinking about saving shows on your PC, be aware of the large file size; a 30 minute clip can use up to 200MB.
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Dish offers 4 German Channels

DISH Network has a German-Language Package which offers 4 German channels:

• Deutsche Welle (DW-TV)
• German Kino Plus
• EuroNews
• PROSIEBENSAT.1 WELT
  • One Bundesliga game live on Fridays, Saturday and Sunday Live-Konferenzschaltungen
  • Movies, comedy, N24 News

The package costs $24.99 a month

Or you can get the channels individually -> A la carte

• Deutsche Welle (DW-TV) $9.99/month
• German Kino Plus $14.99/month
• PROSIEBENSAT.1 WELT $14.99/month

Watch European Movies on any DVD Player

In contrast to what the big movie studios want us to believe, it is possible to play European DVDs on DVD players sold in the US. Many US DVD players can handle the American NTSC format (Region Code 1), as well as the European PAL Format
(Region Code 2), even if the box claims to be only NTSC compatible.

All you have to do is take your remote and apply some magical code. First, check the site videohelp.com and see if your DVD player/recorder can be “hacked”. Then apply the “hack” and you can watch European Movies

For example these 2 DVD players can be hacked:

Insignia IS-PDVD10

This 10.2″ portable DVD player can be set to Region 0 with the following code:

• Turn on DVD player
• Open Disc cover. (don’t insert disc)
• On Remote press “SETUP”Select PREFERENCES
• Enter 2 5 3 1 3 5
• Press Left Arrow
• Press Down Arrow
• Region Code 1 will appear
• Press 10/0 button. This will set your Region Code to 0
• Press Setup
• You are done

Lite-On LVW-5115GHC+

To make this DVD Recorder Region free:

• Press “setup” screen, scroll down to EXIT
• Enter numbers 2960; Region Menu screen appears
• Select “0″ or Region Free, press Setup Screen to exit
• Machine is now Region free