Just got it 3 days ago and runs fairly well. Not sure how to post the scores officially and am kinda busy so not hunting it down (I am trying to get to level 20 on Age of Conan! Why yes, I am a freak), so will just write out the overall score. Also my T9300 cpu came in today and I wanted to bench the FX as it is out of the box from Bestbuy, then change out the CPU to the T9300 and bench it again for comparison.

Anyway, no upgrades or overclocks, just as it came out the box with a few bloatware removed, 3DMark06-Basic Edition (all default settings..1280x800...) I get a score of 7313.


Hardest part about changing out the CPU was finding my small phillips screwdriver. Was a bigger increase then I thought it would be. Upgraded the CPU from a T5550 1.83GHz 667FSB 2MB L2 Cache to a T9300 2.50GHz 800FSB 6MB L2 Cache. Everything else was the same. 3DMark06 score was 8623.

$1300 for the laptop + $300 for the CPU. I didn't really look, but pretty sure there are extremely few laptops that will hit 8k+ in 3DMark06 that cost @$1600

I also have 2x2GB sticks of Crucial PC6400 ram. Unfortunately, I didn't really look too hard..because it was Crucial and I was like..'can't go wrong with Crucial...', so I ordered it without even realizing it was cas 6. Probably would be better off going with DDR2 667 Cas 4 ram. Anyway, I will figure out how to do official scores and do so, then I will put the PC6400 Cas 6 ram in and bench and by then the DDR2 667 Cas 4 ram I ordered may be in and I will try that as well. And will go to the latest nvidia drivers, reguardless of what Gateway uses as GPU drivers officially. Who knows, maybe I will even break 9k with no overclocks. Also, will start running it in 1440x900 res if I can do so without actually purchasing the 3DMarks software.

i'm trying to decide if i should get the t9300 or the x7900 around the same price.

the t9300 would run much cooler and faster imo.

Good Scores,

Thought the laptop came with 4 GB ram already ?
What was the make and specs on the stock Ram?

Also was Vista 64 Bit installed or 32 Bit ?

Yes, it comes with 4gb of samsung DDR2 667 Cas 5 ram, which is actually pretty nice. Vista 64 comes installed and the OS disk allows you to install Vista 32 or 64.

I just picked this up at Best Buy for $1,099.... When they went to ring it up, it shows $1499. I complained that the tag on the display clearly shows it for $1,099... she said that the sale was over a few days ago, and that the new price is in effect now. I asked to speak with a manager. He apologized for the error, and told the clerk to sell it at the advertised price that was displayed.

Awesome laptop to say the least. I will upgrade the CPU sometime, but I doubt it'll even be this year. I would have liked to have a 1680 x 1050 res on the LCD, but for the price, I guess I really can't complain too much.

Update

3d Mark 06 scores
7070 @ 1440 x 900
7382 @ 1280 x 800

The OS is Vista x64 Home Premium.
I am definitely looking at running a RAID 0, and upgrading the CPU sometime late this year, early next year probably.
I am also in the market for a really nice case/bag for this, if anyone has some suggestions along those lines.

I popped a T7500 that I happen to have sitting around any my 3dmark06 score went from 7800 to 8649.....