Gateway P-7811 FX: We've Got Upgrades
by Jarred Walton on August 15, 2008 5:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
False Start or Judging Error?
We've had a lot of good things to say about the P-7811, and on paper there's plenty to like. Clearly performance is also good, and for the price there simply aren't any other laptops that can seriously compete right now. What the previous pages haven't told you is that we did have some difficulty with our test laptop, specifically in regards to stability and graphics drivers.
Two of our gaming tests could not be run on the driver that initially shipped with the laptop because of display corruption. Company of Heroes DX10 and the Devil May Cry 4 benchmark (again DX10 mode only) both had completely corrupted colors. Performance in some other titles wasn't quite where we would expect it to be. Even now, we're still not entirely sure about performance in some of the games - are the games GPU bandwidth limited, or is it simply a case of the drivers not being fully optimized yet? Unfortunately, driver difficulties are something you have to deal with on pretty much every gaming laptop out there, and the Gateway P-7811 certainly isn't any worse than the competition.
Complaints about graphics drivers are nothing new, but the stability problems are much more troubling. We continued to have sporadic lockups throughout testing, but tracing down the cause of the lockups is difficult. You see, Gateway provided us with a beta graphics driver to fix our display corruption issues, but beta drivers could also create stability problems. We had the system crash during a gaming test, during the DVD playback battery life test, and once or twice while it was just sitting idle in between testing. (Note that the lockups were not a frequent occurrence; we encountered perhaps five or six during several weeks of testing.)
Besides the beta graphics drivers, there's another potential cause for the lockups. We are testing prerelease hardware, and despite similarities to previous P-series FX notebooks we are dealing with a new motherboard, chipset, and processor. We definitely got the impression that Centrino 2 wasn't entirely ready for prime time at the official launch last month, so the instability we experienced might be related to that. It's entirely possible - even likely - that Gateway just needs to finish a bit of BIOS tuning. We also noticed that the exhaust port for the GPU tended to get hotter than on other FX notebooks, and the fans never seemed to run at maximum speed. Higher temperatures certainly could have contributed to the lockups during gaming, and a minor tweak to address cooling concerns could easily fix the problems.
Given the above concerns, we are not ready to declare the P-7811 an unequivocal success, but we are still very optimistic. We only encountered a few problems during our couple weeks of testing, and for early hardware we're willing to give Gateway the benefit of the doubt. If you're not willing to take a chance - even a small one - you might want to hold off a bit. Then again, if you hold off too long you may find that the P-7811 is no longer in stock, or even in production. All of the upgrades that Gateway provides compared to the earlier P-6831 provide an exceptional value for users looking for a new gaming notebook. Our only other request for Gateway is that the next time they look to revise their gaming laptop lineup, they need to rework the chassis slightly and get rid of the protruding battery. We would be a lot happier with a slightly thicker notebook that can fit in standard 17" laptop bags.
We can't say with a straight face that anyone actually needs a gaming notebook, but if you're in the market and you don't want to break the bank the P-7811 is our current pick for best overall value. If you can't find it in stock, check the Gateway website and TigerDirect for some other options. You might need to spend a bit more money, or a bit less money as well in some cases, but either way Gateway's P-series FX notebooks have a lot of very attractively priced options for mobile gamers.
We are still at work on our laptop roundups, which should hopefully be posted within the next week. In addition to providing the additional testing and results from Gateway's P-7811, we will also provide any updated information about stability and/or BIOS updates.
Update: As mentioned in our Gaming Laptop Roundup, updating the graphics drivers to the hacked 177.92 Vista 64-bit drivers at LaptopVideo2Go.com seems to have cleared up the stability concerns with the P-7811. While the P-6831 FX received a Gold Editors' Choice upon release, the bar has since been raised. The P-7811 makes a lot of meaningful upgrades to the P-6831, but given it uses the Centrino 2 platform, the lack of Hybrid Power as a feature (and the bulky chassis) is no longer something we can wholeheartedly recommend. The price/performance offered is way ahead of the competition, however, so if you don't mind the design or missing features we have no other remaining reservations.
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JarredWalton - Monday, August 18, 2008 - link
You know, I used to feel the same way, and I still prefer non-glossy desktop displays. On laptops, though, the glossy LCDs frequently look better in terms of color and contrast. I've had the P-171XL and P-7811 sitting next to each other, and the glossy 7811 looks better in pretty much every way. The reflections are annoying at times, but in the right environment I definitely prefer it over a dimmer matte display.rjc - Friday, August 15, 2008 - link
Sorry if i missed it - but was there any temperature info about the different components in the review?Personally own a 8600gt based laptop and the gpu temperatures are terrible, quickly into the 90's celcius as soon as i try to play a game. According to other users(at the notebook-review forums) i can expect this to worsen over time exceeding 100C, the more i play games the quicker the part degrades till it fails.
I didnt pay enough attention to the thermal perf of the laptop when buying, instead distracted way too much the performance graphs like the ones present in the above review. Certainly not going to make that mistake again.
Would the stability issues mentioned in the last page possibly be temperature related rather than a driver issue?
JarredWalton - Saturday, August 16, 2008 - link
When the fan speeds kick up, temperatures are fine, but the P-7811 BIOS appears to need adjustment right now because the fan spins at lower RPMs most of the time. (The 171XL and 6831 didn't have this issue - it could just be a faulty unit as well, as this is prerelease hardware.)Exhaust temps are hitting the 50C range at load on the GPU, and the core is hitting even higher temps. Instability could be heat related, as I mentioned on the concluding page. I'm hoping Gateway can provide a BIOS update so that I can include more details on the final roundup next week. (If you have an 8600M GT hitting 90C, there's definitely a problem with the design or BIOS.)
The roundup will also cover temps in more detail, as well as LCD quality, noise levels, and tests from other competing notebooks. Stay tuned.
rjc - Sunday, August 17, 2008 - link
If the fan speed is upped make sure you redo your battery tests. Both dell and hp have provided fan speed fixes that upped the fan to almost full all the time and users are complaining about the noise and adverse effect on battery life. Also running the fan at full was not the original design and may overheat the fan motor itself causing the fan to prematurely die, likely followed quickly by the whole notebook.The current rumor is something is wrong in the power plane design on the G84/G86 and possibly G92/G94 which causes excessive heating and eventually cracks the surrounding die. Honestly if you somehow can i really recommend investigating this a little, your readers will appreciate it.
There are clues - the nvidia $200m charge, the halving of their share price, the dell and hp announcements. Dell discontinuing their xps line of gaming laptops, and except for quadros dont appear to be selling nvidia gpus at all in notebooks.
Re exhaust temps. I have been measuring core temps with riva tuner. Have upped the fan but it doesnt make much difference 5C tops. The thermal performance is consistent with most other users i can see. Some people have faulty units which run at 10C higher ie over 100C during gaming.
Sorry for going on so much...am just trying to give you the experience of a current "gaming" laptop owner. At the moment i honestly would advise other people to steer clear of these products entirely.
JarredWalton - Monday, August 18, 2008 - link
"The current rumor is something is wrong in the power plane design on the G84/G86 and possibly G92/G94 which causes excessive heating and eventually cracks the surrounding die. Honestly if you somehow can i really recommend investigating this a little, your readers will appreciate it."As far as I can tell, the *rumors* being circulated by some very anti-NVIDIA groups are blowing things way out of proportion. NVIDIA couldn't provide any specific details (because of OEM relations and such), but failing mobile GPUs does not seem to be a rampant problem. I know that personally I have not had a single NVIDIA mobile GPU fail on me or anyone in my family during the past several years, and believe me the stress testing I put laptops through is quite intense.
Yes, there have been failures, but what percent are we talking about? NVIDIA can't say, the OEMs won't say, and you've got a few crazies out there pretending that 90% of mobile NVIDIA GPUs are failing. The actual cause of failures appears to be rapid heating and cooling of the GPU substrate (according to NVIDIA). So a modified fan algorithm is really all that's needed so that temps don't flip back and forth between say 70C and 90C... a constant 80C would be better. (Just guessing on the numbers, though - I didn't get details on temps, again because of OEM concerns.)
Anyway, from what I've heard, the $200M should be way more than is actually needed to address the failed GPUs... and it is only mobile GPUs. Don't put too much in stock prices, as a rumor can cause stock panic whether it is true or just malicious claims from a competitor.
My personal advice is: don't expect desktop performance from a gaming laptop, but if you're willing to spend more for the mobility option there are some decent laptops out there. Right now, I'd take the P-173XL over the P-7811, just because of the stability problems I've experienced, but I think they can fix it easily enough.
rjc - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - link
"As far as I can tell, the *rumors* being circulated by some very anti-NVIDIA groups are blowing things way out of proportion. NVIDIA couldn't provide any specific details (because of OEM relations and such), but failing mobile GPUs does not seem to be a rampant problem. I know that personally I have not had a single NVIDIA mobile GPU fail on me or anyone in my family during the past several years, and believe me the stress testing I put laptops through is quite intense. "There is an article in the WSJ today:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121910081640451139...">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121910081640451139...
As the article mentions HP and Dell have both extended their warranties specially to cover this. The analyst says that $200m might not be enough to cover it.
Roughly doing the maths at $400 per repair $200m will cover 500k repairs...As nvidia sold around 30m units last year thats 1 in 60 replaced. Of course if the OEM is covering part of the cost the failure rate is likely higher.
I realise when doing reviews the fun bit is all the performance figures, how many frames you get for your $....some time spent on less attractive things like how good the warranty is, ease of rma process and whether the system can run in a stable state for long periods would better help customers make a decision they are later happy with.
As long as your sure you are not selling them a lemon ;-)
disorder - Friday, August 15, 2008 - link
For people that are interested in a bargain, I've seen the P-6831 at a little over $1000 at some Chicago area BBs. It has been discontinued because the P-7811 has shipped.Rekonn - Friday, August 15, 2008 - link
Thanks for an excellent review!rvikul - Friday, August 15, 2008 - link
Any comment on the overall build quality of these Gateway laptops? I am considering getting one of the gaming laptops and durability/build quality is my primary concern.I own an eMachines (later acquired by Gateway) laptop and it developed a crack within a few months on the back just under the screen.
Thanks
JarredWalton - Friday, August 15, 2008 - link
Overall build quality seems good but not great. It's still a plastic chassis, so if you drop it or something it could break. I do know some people with a 6831 that have used it for the past ~6 months with no problems.