ASUS G50V-A1 vs. Gateway P-7811FX

I've been looking at both these systems and wondering which would be better off.

I'm no expert by any means but what I've noticed is the Asus has a stronger cpu with larger hdd but the Gateway has the stronger gpu, ram, and faster hdd.

For mostly gaming, surfing, multimedia, which would last longer without needing an upgrade?

 

Its not quite a seamless comparison. Its more like apples to oranges than it is green vs red apples.

The Asus is a 15" while the Gateway is a 17" that already puts them worlds apart.

So just going by a specs page your pretty much right.

G50 vs Gatway

9700gt vs 9800GTS the gateway wins here
4gb 800mhz DDR2 vs 4gb DDR3 gatway probably wins here but this is debatable as DDR3 performance is varied so depending on its latency it may not be much better, plus in a laptop enviroment i doubt it will make much a difference anyways.
2x 250gb 5400rpm vs 1x 200gb 7200rpm Well in terms of speed... the gateway wins I suppose, but your comparing 200gb of space against 500gb of space, also there is a G50V-B1 that has 2x 200gb 7200rpm drives.

The speed difference wont be too significant, and you have the option for Raid 1/0 on the G50 since it has 2 hard drives. In benchmarks the raid 0 setup will blow the gateway out of the water.

So thats the specs down and dirty. However what you cant see is the quality and asthetics of each unit.

I have been hands on with the G50V-X1 and the Gateway model just before that one with the same body and I can say the gateway does not look as good in my opinion, the screen quality was only standard and the keyboard flat out sucked. Plus the gateway was hot, just idling in best buy no games, no hot room it was blowing HOT air out the side.

If you look deeper you only get a 1 year warranty on the gateway (from best buy) while Asus has a 2 year warranty.

I would have to get the Asus without a second thought about it. However if your goals are very centered around gaming and lots of it and wanting to keep the laptop for a long time the 9800GTS will play games better and last slightly longer, if your willing to sacrifice many of the other things I just mentioned to achieve that, then the gateway is still a valid option.

 

That is the first solid answer I have received off these forums.... thank you very much. I just want to make sure I make the correct decision when I pull the trigger and buy a laptop.

I won't disagree that the Asus is better looking, and probably a better build quality. It's just the gateway is only 1450 and can be financed for up to 2 yrs which makes it an easy purchase.

Food for thought I guess.

 

^ i agree with ViciousXUSMC asus also usually have better build qualities than gateways and better build materials. so in term the asus would probably last longer than the gateway but would not be as future proof. will the asus is a solid configured system. the only thing better in the gateway is the powerful graphics card. so i would also recommend the asus

 

i'm also looking at the gateway, but after reading these comments i've checked out the Asus G50V. I love the sleek design of the asus, the gateway looked too flashy and i didn't care for that color either.

only thing that comes to my mind is upgradability. i've seen it stated here that the gateway is better for gaming. i don't game but i want a laptop that will do me for 3 years since this is a large investment.

All the laptops I've owned, and currently own have integrated GFX. hdds, mem, etc are easily upgraded. chipset is not, tho. on laptops with dedicated gfx, that is also upgradable, right? so in two years i could throw the (what is NOW, obviously not in the future tho) latest and greatest in there as long as it's the same socket and rock it out for another year or two?

i do not game, but vista is so hungry that i haven't upgraded from xp, and i'd be far more inclined to do so with a dedicated gfx solution. as long as the gfx can be upgraded, the asus is my decision all the way.

I may even go with the Asus M70Vm-C1 Centrino 2 17" WUXGA/T9400/GeForce 9600M GS 512MB/4GB/500GB/WiFi-N/Blu-Ray/ATSC Tuner as i'd prefer a 17", but like i said when shelling out so much $$$ (for me as computing is a hobby) i want to know i can upgrade the gfx for two or three hundred one day and still stay competitive... i

i don't care for the colors of the M70 as much, but the WUXGA 17" is awesome! any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

 

No, for all practical purposes, the GPUs in the ASUS laptops are not user upgradeable, with one exception: C90S, and all the GPUs available for it are outdated now. I am not sure how the situation is with Gateway.

 

Check the Gateway boards pretty closely and you'll see that the Gateway is also rife with issues. Most notably, the screen quality fades or "fuzzes up" fairly quickly, making everything blurry. Also, there are discussions of problems with build quality being affected by shipping, such as the computer coming with all the glue failed... meaning the laptops are simply falling apart. Having played with both the G50 and the Gateway, I think the Gateway felt more flimsy. But, yes, the Gateway's specs in RAM and video card are better out of the box.

Your call, I'd go for the more solid computer, personally.

 

yes, the prerequisite for a laptop that lasts 3+ years is definitely durability. gpu comes second.

i suppose since i'm not a gamer, i won't notice the difference anyway? bottom line is i'm using an acer 3680 w/ intel 945gm and 14.1" wxga 1gb ddr2@533mhz 5400rpm 80gb drive and a 1.86ghz celeron m 440 1mb cache...

this asus is going to beat the crap out of this thing isn't it? and it will last me a long time.. considering i could use this one, except for archiving files and it's media playback can lag when multitasking..

if anybody can suggest to me a better notebook than the asus g50v-a2 for the money then i'll check it out.. i should go with the a2 over the a1 correct? seems like a cheap trade off for the advantages

 

Thats what I did, I mean to add 7200 rpm drives to the A1 would cost more than the A2 + you get a "free" blu-ray player

 

Well if one wants space more than speed (I don't know how those 7200RPMs improve on the 5400RPMs, the latter may be close in performance) and doesn't care about BluRay... It's still possible the A1 is the better choice.

 

I was just at best buy yesterday during their Labor Day sale with my friend who ended up buying this laptop, and being a G50 owner I was initially jealous because of the better GPU. Here is my initial thoughts after about one hour of use:

Pros over the G50:
- As stated above, better GPU and ddr3 ram. Installed the Crysis demo and I was able to crank the settings slightly higher and still maintain a higher fps.
- Small frame around screen.

Cons:
- Heavy, but not necessarily heavy for a 17" notebook.
- Within 20 minutes of use there was 1 gpu lockup.
- Screen quality and heavy light bleeding on the left side of the screen (there is a thread on the gateway forums dedicated to this, apparently there is a lot of people with this issue.)
- Battery sticks out the back side.

You draw your own conclusion; I am sticking with my Asus.

 

I was also torn between these two as well.

When this Gateway went on sale for 1249.99 I was sold, bang for buck. I must have been one of the lucky ones. I play games for hrs and no lockups.

I will agree with the back light bleed, mine is on the bottom though. Acceptable

And from what I here, Gateways are very upgradeable. There is also an option for raid on the Gateway, it has room for a second hard drive. And I bought a 3 yr international accidental cover warranty that will replace if any of these prior Gateway issues do become a problem.

Another thing is, even though Asus may come with a Blu ray, it does not even support the resolution. At least with the Gateway once Blu ray cheapens I can get one and enjoy it in all its glory. You also paying another 550 plus.