Gateway M505XL Review

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The Review

I went to my local Gateway Country store yesterday and spent some time examining and playing with the M505XL laptop that they have on display. What follows are my impressions and conclusions with a focus on information that is not stated in the M505XL information at Gateway’s website. The M505XL was connected to the internet but had only basic Windows and Gateway software installed. During my visit, I did not attempt to load and run any benchmarks.

The M505XL is smaller and lighter than I expected. The M675 next to it looked like a monster by comparison. The M505XL is made of silver-grey plastic with a nubby texture that is easy to grip. The laptop seems very sturdy with no detectable flexing of the case or creaking of hinges when hefted, twisted, opened or closed.

To the left of the keyboard are CD/DVD control keys, a small LCD display like on a portable CD player, and volume control keys. To the right of the keyboard is the power button and five hot keys, including two user-programmable hot keys. The keys on the keyboard are made of a dark blue, transparent plastic like the cases of some Game Boys and calculators. The feel of the keyboard was about average, neither exceptionally good nor bad. I did notice some flexing of the keyboard when the central keys were pushed down hard, but no more than other laptops the same size. After I cranked up the sensitivity in the Control Panel, the trackpad was quite responsive. The mouse buttons on the trackpad were somewhat stiff, but not nearly as stiff as the button on an Apple Powerbook (for example). According to the Device Manager, the trackpad is made by Synaptics. I could not determine the manufacturer of the keyboard.

The main LCD display was very clear and bright with vivid colors. The viewing angle was also quite good, with at least +/- 45 degrees of viewing possible in the horizontal direction. I did not find the 1280 x 800 resolution of the display to be either coarse or grainy. During DVD playback, I did notice slight ghosting during rapid scene changes which makes me wonder about the response time of the LCD display. I was not able to determine the make and model of the display from the Device Manager.

The M505XL seemed to be virtually silent. I held my ear right against it and could only hear the fans whirring in the M675 next door. The sound produced by the two speakers on either side of the palm rest and by the subwoofer was better than I expected. The sound was clear and full with something of a “surround sound” effect. The speakers were able to be played at room filling (though not floor shaking) volume.

The slot loading DVD-RW drive in the front of the M505XL is quite slick. I learned from the Device Manager that it is a Mat****a UJ-815A. By coincidence, it is the same 2X Panasonic DVD drive that Apple uses in their high end G4 Powerbooks. Apple calls it their “Superdrive”. DVD playback produced good quality images.

No specifications on the hard drive used in the M505XL are available on the Gateway website or from Gateway sales reps. According to the Device Manager, the hard drive is an “IC25N060ATMR04-0″. I have determined that this is a 60GB model of the Hitachi Travelstar 80GN series. It offers 12 ms average seek time, 4200 rpm and an 8MB cache. It is a good quality drive, just not a terribly fast one.

The Device Manager reports that the computer is a “Wistron DG8LXLG”. From this, I conclude that Gateway does not buy the M505 from Gigabyte as I originally thought. Instead, both Gateway and Gigabyte buy the DG8LXLG from Wistron. Gateway calls it the M505 and Gigabyte calls it the N601. It should still be possible, however, to get drivers and FAQs from Gigabyte’s website if need be. Wistron is a Taiwan-based manufacturer of ODM PCs that was spun off from Acer. According to this article HP has selected Wistron to manufacture the bulk of its consumer desktops.

The M505 is the current bargain among laptops that offer both a Pentium M CPU and ATI 9600 graphics. My chief complaint with the current model is the relatively slow hard drive. Nonetheless, I could live with this laptop if nothing better comes along before I make my purchase (probably 1Q2004).