Not the Best
Written: Oct 07 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Easy to Use, Fast, Easy to Break
Cons: Faulty ports, Cheap quality CD-ROM
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| soupcraze's Full Review: Gateway Solo 1100 |
I bought this laptop for school reasons. I own a PC at home and at school there were mostly Macintosh's :( I already had a Gateway PC of my own, and it has been quite a good PC for the exception of a few problems. I bought this laptop because it was made by Gateway and also was much cheaper and smaller than other laptops. Here's what i found with this laptop:
Size:
The laptop is fairly small and smaller than its IBM counterparts (Thinkpad series). It is smaller than many other laptops, and weighs quite a bit, but compared to other computers, it is smaller.
Durability:
The laptop is built to last for a while. Some parts of it are not very durable though. The CD-ROM for example is quite poor quality and broke on mine. Once when I ejected it, I pressed it in and it would just pop back out partially. I had to get the CD-ROM replaced. Then another time the hard-drive just simply slid right out and damaged some parts of the system. The repairs there were quite expensive. The laptop itself is quite durable and so is the screen, they are built to last.
Price:
This price is still very good. The tech support at Gateway is GREAT and you get for most part a great quality computer at a low price. This laptop outperformed IBM Thinkpads that are bulkier and more expensive. I'm not quite sure if there is a long-term warranty for the laptop though.
Screen:
The screen is relativly good quality. It will not break. The screen lets out high resoulution colors, but if it's viewed from different angles, the colors become quite messed up and weird.
Sound:
The speakers are very good. They are incredibly small, but still good. On this laptop though, there is a little knob that you rotate and it controls the sound, it is more annoying to use rather than the simple buttons that you press on Compaq Pessarios for example. The speakers are much better than most other laptops speakers. The sound that comes it is quite clear and crisp. This computer can make a great (but large) portable jukebox using MP3s or CDs.
The Ports:
Sometimes the ports (VGA, Parallel, and USB) become unresponsive. I once shut the computer off, the next day when I turned it on the mouse did not work. I constantly had to take the mouse out of the port and blow into the port to get dust???? (or something) out. The USB ports sometimes failed and it became very irritating by having to re-install all external hardware. The ports you get on this laptop are not the best. I suggest you buy a USB bus with 4 outlets.
Ease of use:
Like MS windows, this laptop is EASY to use. All the controls for sound and other similar things are on the side of the computer. I hate the touch-pads though, so I suggest you buy a mouse (DONT CONSIDER BUYING A USB MOUSE).
The Verdict:
This for most part is a good laptop. It works quite nicely if the problems are all taken care of proffessionaly (3 times for me). I don't know if other people had problems with these laptops, but I sure did. Gateway is stiull a great company and I stand by my G6-350 computer. I suggest this laptop if you don't want to spend a lot of money, and get plenty of features.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1199
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Celeron
Processor speed: 401-500
Internal Storage: CD-ROM
Hard Drive (GB): 4-6
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Epinions.com ID:
soupcraze
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Member: Soup Enthusiast
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Reviews written: 488
Trusted by: 185 members
About Me:
I enjoy many of life's passions... Music, medicine, people, and life itself.
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