Gateway P-6831FX User Review

What the.. theres flicker for you at 60hz on a LCD??? CRTs definitely but LCD??? LCDs don't flicker like a CRT does.. pixels are either on or off... and ive never seen an LCD with higher than 60 refresh rate.

 

Well it flickers whenever I play Portal or any game on Steam. It also flickers when I play Crysis. World of Warcraft doesn't flicker though. My old laptop is only 60hz too, but I think that it doesn't bother my eyes as much because it's a much smaller screen. Any suggEstions on how to reduce the flicker in games with this video card?

 

Maybe your FX is defective?

 

LCDs (at least working ones) don't flicker at all. It is not how the technology works.


Speaking of LCD's though - anyone experience dead pixels? Given that my laptop is getting shipped to me, an exchange is not really an option for me (my local BB hasn't had any for a few days, and are still waiting on backorder)..

 

Well, I was wondering if this laptop would go back up after the sale and boy did it! In case you haven't seen the Best Buy site as of midnight, the price is now $1699.00! Haha, it looks like Gateway wanted to get the buzz going about their new FX line and now we see that the price just jumped to a more realistic range in today's laptop market. Hopefully this is a typo on Best Buy's site and it will be fixed. Either way, I am glad I got a raincheck since my local Best Buy was out of stock when I went in.

 

FYI, the P-6831FX at Bestbuy.com is now listed at $1699.00. Seems the 1349 and 1249 were teaser prices. I'm happy at 1250!

 

LOOOOOL!
New BB price is $1,699.99 ?!
I was planning to buy 1 tommorow ....but not now
I'm so angry now because of this, they ruined my day .... AHHH ...

 

ah man..damm that BB ....

 

any1 know that will BB lower the price again to $1350 ?!
Or this high price is final ?

 

Hey guys. I just purchased one today, luckily before the price hike. Where can I find updated drivers at? I've read on here about 169.09 drivers, but aren't they for Linux? The version I have installed that came with the laptop is 7.15.11.6746

That's the same as on Gateway's site. I want to make sure I'm able to use DirectX 10 for games. Does anyone have a link to install the drivers I need or am I already good to go?

 

Yes, I personally negotiate to the $1599 price for the P-181X FX Edition. Now I am just waiting for it to be built and shipped.

 

any1 know where can I still get this for a normal price? ($1250-$1350)

 

DRevan - i believe that price was a BB only special. Unless you got a raincheck this past week, or BB changes the price, it won't be at that price this week..

 

For what it worth, I upgraded to Vista 64 and it found all the drivers I needed. I have yet to find a program I can't run. I have not been a Vista fan, but Vista 64 may change that.

 

According to BB.ca it's now 1399, on sale for 1349. about half an hour ago it was 1699, though.

 

I have been playing Portal on Steam with my FX with no problems. Looks great !

 

damm I hope they change back the US BB price too

 

Stumpie, wheredid you find the updated drivers? I really want to make sure I'm able to use DirectX 10.

 

When most BB stores sell out of the model someone at Corporate realized that this was a winner and could afford a premium on the price...

 

169.09 is located at

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16152


Directx 10 installed jsut fine for me

 

Whell I hope less peaople will buy it because this new price and they change it back to $1350 ...

 

I found in order to use those you need to completely uninstall the other drivers, or you'll just end up with the old ones installed again. And DX10 is installed alright, but games don't use it with the Gateway drivers.

 

Shoot. I just followed the instructions on that site and installed over the old ones.

I did restart and the new drivers are still on there.

 

Did you do a clean install of Vista after you bought it?

I did a clean install, used the GRC disk for drivers and when I got to the video drivers I downloaded the 169.09 and they worked just fine....I agree with the previous post about completely purging them from the system, otherwise they may cause some pain.

 

the party is over, gateway has changed the price to $1700...

 

On Gateway official site:
"Suggested Retail Price: $1,349.99 "
So WTF? The $1700 price is not because Gateway raised the price, its because Best Buy wants more money..screw Best Buy ...

 

On the Canadian site this notebook is still $1350...any chance to get 1 of these shiped from Canada to the US? If yes, how ?

 

Crysis: What does everyone have their settings at? I clicked auto optimize and it put me at medium across the board. anyone got the sweet spot on this machine? i'm running DX10 w/ 169.09

Thx

 

No, I did not do a clean install based off of everyone having problems finding drivers. But I ran Counter-Strike last night at max settings with no issues. I need to go to Best Buy today and pick up my free game, so I'll try it out with UT3 or Crysis.

Shouldn't be a big issue with the drivers though, and if it is I'll just uninstall them and reinstall fresh.

My big question is, what bloatware did you guys remove when you first got your laptop? What do I need to uninstall that came prepackaged with this PC?

 

Wow, I didn't see this move coming! I'm glad I'm holding out for a 171X and didn't get impatient for the 6831 because it seems like some people have been having luck getting them down to $1600, $100 less than what BB wants for a lesser equipped machine!

 

The sale ends on Thursday. I'll get the PM - but I am sure there will be a $1250 sale in Canada too.

Not sure what the $1699 price is about. Probably a price increase so they can say '$400 off' next week when its $1299. BB does that all the time.

Or they are trying to cool demand as they get more in stock.

 

Yeah, medium at 1440*900 works well for me.

UT3 would be a better choice IMO. It runs well with everything maxed out.

 

i wouldnt say buying the FX from gateway would be the best choice. It is now, of course. But if u bought it when it was 1249 with a free game. Its actually 1199 and then u wont be charge with shipping fee. so i would consider that but now they got gay and charge u 1699. I rather get a alienwware m15x if im u. But i got it luckily.

 

I highly recommend everyone consider Call of Duty 4, The Orange Box and Bioshock as games to get, they're all amazing, especially the orange box, if you haven't play HL2, for some reason.
Team Fortress 2 looks gorgeous on the FX

 

I got COD4 for my freebie. I have everything set to max and the res at 1440x900 and it runs smooth as butter on the FX. I have Orange box for the 360 or I would have gotten that. You can't go wrong with any of the three you suggested, though.

 

No suggestions on what unneccesary programs I can take off the laptop?

 

May be better to create a backup recovery disk and rebuild. Thats what I did.

 

Pretty much everything. If you don't know, best suggestion is just use it as it is. Don't fix it if it aint broken. But I had to do a clean install because I don't like bloatwares. Make sure you make a driver DVD if you do attempt to do a clean install.

 

Google: fakefactory cinematic mod - it replaces the textures and models in HL2 games with much higher resolution versions. It makes the game even better.

Everything except drivers, antivrius and mediaplayer. That is what I did.

The performance increase from removing software is minimal. See my benchmarks.

 

I had NO complications with a fresh install of vista. I believe that was because I heeded the advice in earlier posts.

Namely: Make a DVD of the Gateway Recovery Console. that puts all my drivers on a disk and I get to pick and choose what to reinstall.

The disk that comes with the laptop is an OEM version of Vista, no bloatware at all. I also followed Black Vipers advice on tweaking Vista to run faster.

Took me a couple of hours end to end but I'm not the sharpest pencil in the drawer either.

 

So my power supply makes a tiny noise when the PC's on, you can only hear it if you put your ear on the AC adapter, but Gateway was sending me a new one. It arrived today. It was another battery. After talking with people I think the power supply noise is well within acceptable limits, and I got a free battery, YAY! (it's the large form factor one)

 

Despite the enormous driver headaches (I'm talking about simple driver installation for things like my mouse, flash drive, etc. Damn thing keeps installing things when I plug them in) my wi-fi doesn't seem to want to work. Yes, the wireless switch is set to on, lol. I'm using my girlfriend's Verizon dongle for now, but where I'm at there is free wi-fi. I can connect to it, but the internet, instant messenger, etc. won't work. My home network connects just fine though.

I do know Verizon's portable modem had Vista issues and I adjusted some thngs, but it shouldn't effect wi-fi should it?? What and where should I check?

Any ideas?

*Edit* I did update to the latest 11.5.0.32 drivers from Intel.

 

http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/getFile.asp?id=21354&uid=186156076

http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/getFile.asp?id=21300&uid=186156168

http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/getFile.asp?id=21358&uid=186156197

 

I did get this laptop for 1250 from BB, but i think you could get it online from gateway.com
here is a link http://gateway.links.channelintelligence.com/pages/prices.asp?sSKU=P6831FX&nRGID=1559
Just a quick question, how long does you battery last?, i heard this dude saying it lasted like 3 hours, thats imposible right?

 

Another thing, what backpack should i get for this laptop? what do you guys got?

 

Isnt this notebook a Best Buy exclusive,so only Best Buy can sell it ? I think not even the manufacturer sells this ...

 

Just ran 3Dmark and only getting 3725 score. Wow, thought it would be higher. Did a clean install with the 171 drivers installed. Shouldn't the score be better for this system?

 

For those of you who never used Vista: DO NOT install an older version of AOL Instant Messenger. It will f your network settings panel up. Only use the new version for Vista. I learned that last night. lol

 

Does this notebook support the 3G hard drives. Looking at the 320 WD drive that has 3G.

Thx

 

If you click the buy button it takes you to the BB page with the 1699 price tag.