Gateway LT3101u 11.6" netbook impressions/thoughts/reviews

I find it very odd that setFSB works on a bloody netbook tha gateway released but not on their gaming laptops... they crack me up

Good to see you all are getting the 1.4ish needed to offer smooth runs on net videos now

 

HQ full screen video is still not perfect on fox.com, but I'd say a 50% improvemnet, shorter hiccups with much more time in between of perfect fluid video, its "watchable" IMO now.

Shame real temp and core temp wont work with these CPU's....Whats a good temp moitoring program compatible with these?

My Vista EXP CPU rating went from a 2.8 to a 3.2, so its definatly doing something.

The free CPUID temp program sems off to me, I get a generic 43-48C reading depending on clock speed....dunno if thats the cpu or not.

 

Pretty much ...

One thing is after doing the OC to 1434 MHz, I seem to be able to load Portal better, and can play it with reasonable frame rate. Haven't tried other games.

As always, ymmv™!

sg

 

I use is SensorView Pro3.2 to watch the temp. It has some good options for setting warnings and apperance. just right click on the icon in the lower right on the startup bar.

http://download.cnet.com/SensorsView-Pro/3000-2242_4-10457011.html?tag=mncol

However sensorview is not a free program - just free to try.

 

Half life 2 original no mods works very well for me high settings no AA and trilin over AF , it was steady and fluid throughout the short time I spent with it at stock cpu speed, Lost coast is a slideshow, and I doubt the mild OC will change that.

Havent tried VPin/pimame with the OC, it ran complex table like star trek TNG and tommy pretty well with a few hiccups and slowdowns, plus a lot of static in the voices I never got on other notebooks or desktops at stock clocks, that program is very cpu dependan tbut ran fine on my ols AXP 1.1 fhz tbird so....I dunno. may need to try compatiability mode with it, though it runs fine as is on my desktop.

I'll checkout sensoe view, thanks.

It doesnt feel any warmer, and it is a very mild OC so I doubt there will be a big temp jump, those experiencing lockups going over 1.6 most like are simply voltage starved and not due to overheating, plus in the DT world, its the voltage increases that really jack up the temps, not the clocks. I cant count how many posts I've read where kids went back to stock clocks but their temps barely dropped, because they didnt lower the Vcore.

Are there any programs like I8kfangui that work with these?

 

I just installed the Omega drivers for the ATI 1270 and the system is MUCH smoother. The problem is that the temps have gone up by a couple of degrees Celsius.

It used to be 50 C to 51 C degrees at idle, now it is 52 C (125 F) gaming it could go up to 58 C. Did a burnout test and went to 62 C after 15 minutes (i think the max the CPU can take is 70 C). All of this with the Omega drivers and the OC hack up to 1434. I think this combo with XP really outperforms EVERYTHING (in this category) out there!

I can easily see this neybook as being the only system for a LOT of people!

Anyway, I really hope I don't burn the CPU anytime soon since this setting is going to be my standard load setting (I can't go back!)

 

How is this system with a 7200 HDD? Anyone? will the temp go up?

 

So did you test out any games with the Omega drivers vs. stock ones?

 

Supposedly the Omega drivers are more "optimized" versions not necessarily faster. In games, the performance is pretty much the same but in everyday windows (I am using translucent taskbars-windows), there is a REAL difference. There used to be a small delay when I pressed the start menu but now there is no delay. And the windows render much more smoothly.
Anyway I think that for these systems it is better to have a nicer everyday experience since these systems are not gaming machines...

 

On a netbook I automaticcally turn off OS effects, let the machine use its limited resources to useful tasks instead of looking a little more pretty.....shadows, areo etc dont really do anythingbut slow a machine such as the one were discussing way down. I disable all interface "eye candy" and the visuall differenceis minimal at best, plus I diable superfetch, indexing, and auto defrag, that frees up a lot of CPU cycles and memory, the freed up CPU cycles are very important in a cpu bound machine like a netbook, you'll notice (at least I did) a huge performance jump in actual tasks, be it gaming, video etc, all those background processes are constant. I've seen posts about folks thinking they have a bad machine because the CPU is always around 50-70% when they are doing nothing....indexing, superfetch,defrag,aero/effects, defender,AV etc on a stock setup are always running or sponteaneously running in the background bogging the machine down, on a dual or quad core machine with gobs of ram and efficent video card....these dont pose real problems, on netbooks....thats why folks love XP or other OS'es....

 

for those interested you can disable the touchpad when mouse plugged in with the synaptics driver. This is one of my pet peeves too...............

 

TANWare, that's a common problem with new drivers of Synaptics... it's not just related to this computer... and I find it annoying as well.

 

My p-7805u is setup to disable, I just exported the synaptics registry from there and imported it on the LT and bingo, mouse now disables the touchpad.............

 

It must be an old driver. I've noticed that a specific older version you can download if you search for will let you disable the touchpad... but downloading the newest drivers doesn't allow it. Who knows why they removed that option... it's a good option to have...

 

Easy there. Multiple people have opened up this baby and confirmed that there is only one physical slot. You can buy a 4GB DIMM if you're feeling flush

 

Latest from the synaptics site..............

 

Mark, Yes You are right LT3101u has one slot, not two.. but why it said LT31 have two slot after scanned my netbook. Mm..

anyway I planning to get 4GB RAM in few weeks.

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to connect a external hard drive and burn the recovery disk's to that instead of a DVD drive? I have an external hard drive and I don't have a external DVD drive.

I have to say after owning many laptops I am so far loving this little baby. The screen is one of the best I have seen and after comparing the screen side by side to other netbooks ....well there was no comparison!

 

Has 4Gb memory modules come down in price for this Netbook? The last time I checked they were very expensive. Mine seems to be doing fine with the 2Gb and I only overclock it when I'm doing some installs or when I plan to watch an HD video.
This Netbook worked out perfectly while on vaction. Allowing me to use it for Internet Access and also downloading my pictures and viewing my 720P HD video from my Sony camera.

 

Does 4gb even work in this laptop?

 

Hi all,
Newbie here.. just finished reading 31 pages.. and ordered the LT3114u last night, just waiting for pickup.

But today, just found out that another local electronics store is selling the EC series with core2solo, hdmi, vista premium, 5400mah for $60 more.. and so which one is better buy? is core2solo having same problem to play youtubeHD? how about 1080p? 720p?

hope this is the right place to ask or start a new thread?

E

 

Yeah, you gotta run 64 though...

http://gatewaynetbooks.com/index.php/forums/9-internal-hardware/57-ram-upgrade-pics

 

Kind of a trade off there. While he has four gigs he is now also at CAS6 where we are at CAS5. Still only 239.4 on the memory MHz too. I am hoping Cas3 at that stock speed, what I use most of the time, will give the desktop a better feel to it.

I've noticed the Wireless drivers for Atheros are better using thier version over the M$ version, not by much but better. Using http://www.speedtest.net/ gets better throughput but that site also taxs the cpu too.

 

I don't think you'll notice any difference in latency on the desktop, especially a tiny change like 6 to 5.

 

Just got the new stick, CAS3 and 1T, yippie. only in for a few minutes but yes there is a noticable difference and it OC's to 287 easily..........

 

Can you give us a link to the specific Omega drivers? I'm currently running Rainmeter and whatnot and some other random themes.

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a311/asif2290/desktop-1.jpg

Personally, I would spend the $60 more. You get A LOT better battery life, and you can upgrade to Windows 7 in the future.

 

http://www.omegadrivers.net/

 

Just be sure to do a clean install for the drivers. On my first try I overwrote the stock ones and It didn't worked. Not to worry, I solved the issue without hassle by uninstalling everything and by clean installing the Omega.

 

Windows 7 and Vista are larger memory footprints than XP. Naturally then dual channel 800 MHz memory is superior for those enviorments. Don't get me wron the LT-31xxu is a great unit but it can not compete with that memory bandwidth.

4500 chipset will have better native 720p and 1080p capabilities. Online HD and other video usually requires flash and cpu horsepower. The cpu having 3 meg L2 is bound to help especially with wireless encryption and the like.

figure 60 more but you have to purchase Windows 7 with the LT's and a free upgrade with the other, so a no brainer there too. Again do not get me wrong, I love the LT but if they were side by side when I made the purchase I'd have gone with the EC.............

 

My $0.02 = Get the EC. You would be nuts to get the LT31 over the EC.

The LT31 I had was so bad I could not bring myself to review it. I had the model with 1 GB RAM.

 

A 1 gig version of this machine with Vista would be BAD. The video takes up 384 megs right off the top. This would force Vista into heavy page file use. In order to be even slightly usable you would have to run XP and like NO bloatware.

I can tell you the 2 Gig version, especially with Windows 7 and the low latency stick added, is really nice. I'll agree though at 1 gig this machine would not have even been a consideration.............

 

Hello,

I own a LT3114, it is a very cool notebook for the price.

but for u get the best from this machine isugest u use linux.

it with linux have a performance near a much more powerfull notebook under vista.

if you have problem whatiching movie with windows, yoou can see 4 movies playing ate same time on linux.

I hope you enjoy the mp4

http://www.gsv8.com/img/filme.mp4

sorry for my terrible English

Best regards,

 

That was very cool. Agreed linux for the most part is a more powerful OS on the same CPU. What disrto was that BTW?

Also I should note MP4 is not the issue. I played your video and even full screen only saw 20% cpu usage and windowed 10-15%. The problem is Flash video content........

 

Yeah, just received the ACER 1410 from staples.ca.. so far so good!

 

I am using the mandriva spring free 2009 64bits.

it is a very good linux for use with the LT31.

BR

 

I saw that from your other post. Windows 7 is more than ample for this system. Now if all of a sudden some Linux or other OS can transform this into a Flash Video Format monster I may consider at least a dual boot but I don't see that happening..............

 

how does the acer 1410 at $449 compare to the gateway 3103U at $379? I know the acer does a free upgrade to windows 7 and the gateway is vista basic so no upgrade. they use a different processor and GPU so I don't know which one is faster.

 

The 1410T is bound to handle HD and the OS better with the Video and then CPU & dual channel memory better. The increased L2 and higher bandwidth memory should help out with multitasking as well. AMD even at 1.2 should have slightly more horsepower than the Intel at 1.4 GHz. Neither will do flash video well.

We will see flash video play well once the new Core2duo's start showing up in netbooks. Probably around the same time we see Ion finally showing up in strength. That is when I'll be looking to upgrade from my present LT-3103u.

 

TANWare i beleive you are one of the ppl who have upgraded to the cas 3 2 gig stick of faster memory for this gateway LT could you explain what the difference is between the stock memory and the cas 3 memory, and how much of a increase in performance i should expect to see ( i would and will not be overclocking the cpu) how much of a gain would one see in gaming situations would it be reasonable to see increased fps in old games like warcraft 3 ?
Thanks alot

 

I just ran 3Dmark 2001 SE, old and new stick. So you know we have verry slow memory as part of the AMD design. Since we are forced to run at the slower 240 MHz then we may as well take advantage of a low latency (lower bandwidth but faster access) memory...........

Windows 7, 3DMark 2001SE, Set FSB 240 to run CPU @ 1.4 GHz, memory @ 280 Mhz
Both benchmarks right after boot once the system settled down..........

Cas3

RESULTS
3DMark Score 3703
Game 1 - Car Chase - Low Detail 37.0 fps
Game 1 - Car Chase - High Detail 17.6 fps
Game 2 - Dragothic - Low Detail 60.8 fps
Game 2 - Dragothic - High Detail 29.9 fps
Game 3 - Lobby - Low Detail 61.4 fps
Game 3 - Lobby - High Detail 31.4 fps
Game 4 - Nature 26.6 fps
Fill Rate (Single-Texturing) 467.4 MTexels/s
Fill Rate (Multi-Texturing) 968.5 MTexels/s
High Polygon Count (1 Light) 9.5 MTriangles/s
High Polygon Count (8 Lights) 1.8 MTriangles/s
Environment Bump Mapping 108.9 fps
DOT3 Bump Mapping 54.5 fps
Vertex Shader 47.0 fps
Pixel Shader 96.9 fps
Advanced Pixel Shader 34.2 fps
Point Sprites 7.4 MSprites/s


Cas 5

RESULTS
3DMark Score 3301
Game 1 - Car Chase - Low Detail 34.0 fps
Game 1 - Car Chase - High Detail 16.2 fps
Game 2 - Dragothic - Low Detail 54.1 fps
Game 2 - Dragothic - High Detail 26.7 fps
Game 3 - Lobby - Low Detail 53.6 fps
Game 3 - Lobby - High Detail 27.9 fps
Game 4 - Nature 23.4 fps
Fill Rate (Single-Texturing) 436.5 MTexels/s
Fill Rate (Multi-Texturing) 985.0 MTexels/s
High Polygon Count (1 Light) 9.1 MTriangles/s
High Polygon Count (8 Lights) 1.7 MTriangles/s
Environment Bump Mapping 94.8 fps
DOT3 Bump Mapping 49.3 fps
Vertex Shader 45.4 fps
Pixel Shader 88.9 fps
Advanced Pixel Shader 32.0 fps
Point Sprites 6.6 MSprites/s

So how is that for under $30.....................

 

I recently bought this computer a week ago and I decided to install Windows 7 on it. It worked beautifully. For about 3 days. All of a sudden the track pad driver stopped working and the trackpad was rendered useless. I booted up a new install disc, and the trackpad worked through the install, after the install Windows would assign it a driver and again it would stop working. I tried everything from formatting the drive and doing a clean install (of every Windows OS since XP), and assigning the drivers listed on Gateway's website. No Luck.

I recently put in BartPE tools and loaded up Vista Recovery. Vista Recovery would boot up and the mouse would work. But every time I go into an installation of Windows the mouse will stop working. The mouse will only work if I uninstall the drivers, and it will work until Windows assigns ANY driver to the trackpad.

What do you think is going on with this computer? I am completely stumped.

 

Hey TANWare, thanks for the benchmarks. It definitely looks like a nice little upgrade, depending on what you are doing. Could you point me to the specific memory you purchased? I'm thinking about swaping out to CAS3.

Thanx

 

It will only help things along unless you need to use setfsb and go above 290 MHz on the memory.............

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104100

 

So what were your improvements in an actual game TANWare?

 

I do not game, sorry. I can tell you it boots in 15 secionds less time, all programs open faster and are more responsive. I got this NOT TOO GAME with. I wanted the most out of it and this ram is a great inexpensive start.

While Windows 7 was a great improvement it still felt slightly lethargic and I needed to OC just to boost the desktop. I no longer feel that need at stock CPU/FSB speeds. OC'd the desktop and programs are on steroids by comparison.

Remember Vista and Windows 7 use Aero, so having better ram not just helps the CPU but GPU too..............

 

Sorry for being redundant, but i just want to make sure i understand.
you are saying that you DO NOT need to overclock the cpu any in order to see a decent increase with the new cas 3 memory ?
correct?

 

Correct, the memory gives a nice boost. when I first boot, new or old memory, I am not OC'd. I go from 70 seconds to a usable desktop down to 55 seconds. I now only OC for video and not all video. the desktop feels just way better, I can browse the net, back up my megellan and defrag an external usb drive without a hitch. I felt it was just a bit lethargic before but other than the drive, which is more than adaquate, the system just feels sooooo much better. This is why I want to try 7200 RPM but I am not optomistic with the extra heat................

FYI the memory eats no more desernable battery. If anything it will help it a bit. I tried RMClock and using the 800 clock at lower voltage and with the new memory it still felt pretty responsive I boubt the Cas5 would........

Edit I haven't tried 3DMark 2001SE with the stock memory and NO oc but someone else posted apr 2300, I get at all stock over 3000 at Cas3..........

 

Tanware,
Thanks for all you help. Another clarification...

"It will only help things along unless you need to use setfsb and go above 290 MHz on the memory............."

When I over clock to 1.435 or 1.441 using SetFSB my memory speed only goes to 289.5 using CPUIDz. Is that the 290 you are referring too or is there another way to increase memory speed?

I tried this memory, but had many BSOD when I tried to OC to values that ran fine with stock memory. I'm using Windows 7 also. Did you have any such problems?

Thanks for any suggestions/insight you can provide.

 

I prefer a safe 280 or cpu at 1.4 I can run mine at 290 but I think it is too close to the bleeding edge. I am willing to bet that this memory at 280 will trounce even the stock memory in real world at 300. I think for the same results you'd most likely have to get about 320 or above. Also it means using an oc to at least 280 or so for casual use with the stock memory to match stock speeds.

I prefer most of the time running stock and the oc to 280 when I'm in need for video. Even at stock clock most standard youtube plays fine with the new memory. This alows the lowest possible OC's and the least amount of time doing even that. This should prolong system life and the length of time I'll be able to safely reach my needs.

For those that need to bleed the last ounce of blood from their CPU's with set FSB, Cas4 DDR2 333 memory would be a better choice. Not sure how much the one Cas step down would help but it would help some.

Some say they get 285 others aproach and hit 290 safely with this memory, mine clocks 290 easilly,even fine too 295. I have never been happy that close to the bleeding edge though.

 

I've tried every setting in SetFSB (....93) and I can't find any setting that allows overclocking when I use the Kingston CAS CL 3, 1T memory. I get a BSOD on most setting or just a plain, vanilla freeze.

Things run fine at stock FSB with the "Hyper" memory. But I'm one who wants faster, so I'm going with stock memory and overclocking where I get about a 15% benchmark advantage overclocked compared to the faster memory only. This is found on 3DMark2001, Passmark, and PCMark 05.

I've run memory diagnostics with several apps and all found no problems, but still crashes every time I try to overclock.

If anyone has any ideas I'd love to hear them as I'd really like to take advantage of OC and the faster memory.

I am having to use the ...-96 motherboard PLL; anything else either PLL error or big problems. Also with stock memory I can only OC to 1.441.

I am running Windows 7 with the original Windows 7 ATI driver.

I've decided to go with stock memory and OC to 140/280... With this setup here are some benchmarks:

3D2001 3512
PCMark05 1927
PassMark 234.7
CPU 375,9
2D Graphics 176.1
3D Graphics 42.1
Memory 246.6
Disk 478.1

I am also running a 320GB 7200 rpm Seagate drive. I have not noticed any temp increase with this. Using CPU HW Monitor, the idle temp is around 44C while during the benchmarks the highest temp I have seen is 57C. The disk temp always runs between 38 and 40C.