Gateway P-7811FX NICE!

[mrtr33]

nice pickup.

I'm still using a Gateway 450ROG, it's reliable, although it putters along kinda slowly.

I was checking out the specs - does it have a wireless card? I've never used 64-bit Windows OS's. How could you compare the difference?

[Silencei2]

Nice laptop. I work on these all the time and they got best bang for your buck on some review websites. 17" is a little big imho but if it's going to be sitting still for the most part, no need to worry. I had the older Gateway MP78__ series. Great laptop and doesn't come with a bunch of useless junk. I recently gave it to my parents and got myself a 15" Lenovo.

I was checking out the specs - does it have a wireless card?

This laptop does have wireless, even comes with the next gen wireless, "N".

64bit Windows is not really different than 32bit except the limitation of 32bit being 3.5 gb of RAM. Microsoft minimized the compatibility issues between the 2 operating systems by making the 64bit OS virtualize or simulate the 32bit operating system for certain programs. Only problem I ever ran into is older games. If you just word process, go on the internet and check email then its no problem at all. As long as you don't try using extremely old programs or games for that matter, you'll be fine.

[BigMacFU]

Sorry, just can't get on the winblows train.

[Kenyth]

There are a lot of older apps that won't run on 64 bit vista. Many of them won't be getting patched either.

[Kenyth]

Sorry, just can't get on the winblows train.

Regardless of OS bias, you have to appreciate the hardware on this thing dude. I've only met one person with a need for more hardware, and his needs were specialized. He's an instructor and needs a laptop with 8GB of RAM because he uses multiple virtual machines. 4GB of RAM just doesn't do it in that scenario.

[Silencei2]

Regardless of OS bias, you have to appreciate the hardware on this thing dude. I've only met one person with a need for more hardware, and his needs were specialized. He's an instructor and needs a laptop with 8GB of RAM because he uses multiple virtual machines. 4GB of RAM just doesn't do it in that scenario.

Agreed.

Ram is so cheap nowadays you'll find desktops with 6-8gb of RAM. More RAM the merrier, you can multitask more, do some photo editing, some video editing, etc. You also can disable your paging file and free up a little space on your hard drive and also prevent Windows from trashing your hard drive by moving files back and forth.

[MarineOne]

I've never bought a factory desktop computer as I'm an avid gamer and require performance, and found its cheaper to build (and manage warranties) than it is to buy one outright. Not only that, but my systems last longer due to the custom hardware. My last system lasted 5 years and was handed down to my kids when I upgraded after using it for just over 2 years myself.

The last computer I built is the one I have here with me in Iraq, and while I could afford more expensive components I chose what I knew would work versus top end hardware that might just end up being destroyed by the large amounts of fine dust we have over here.

Running Win XP64 on top of 4GB of RAM, a single 1GB video card, and an AMD 3.2GHz dual core will handle all the apps and games I need.


The added plus is I get to stay away from the abomination known as Vista.




Kris