Gateway NX570X (Core 2 Duo)

While other notebook makers have gone glossy with their exterior designs, Gateway has gone its own way with the 6.3-pound Gateway NX570X, and we like it. Where past Gateway laptops were fairly forgettable, the new look and top performance make the NX570X our top pick.
 
The exterior is a pebbled, matte-finish, high-impact composite that looks and feels great, and Gateway claims it is more smudge- and scratch-resistant than the shiny plastics being used by others (we think they mean you, HP and Toshiba). Open the lid and you'll find a keyboard surrounded by brushed, aircraft-grade aluminum alloy, which adds rigidity and an extra degree of class. The keyboard itself is full sized, though a bit more clicky than others we've tested, and the touchpad's mouse buttons felt a bit stiff. We still bemoan the lack of dedicated multimedia control buttons.
 
Our test unit came with the optional matte 15.4-inch high-res widescreen (1400 x 1050 pixels); you can instead opt for a glossy 1280 x 800-pixel panel and save $100. The higher-res screen makes sense if you'll load all sorts of widgets for the Vista Home Premium OS and have them floating off to the right, but DVD playback will look more vibrant on the glossy panel. Audio output is passable for personal use, but the speakers sounded thinner and weaker than the audio delivered by the Dell and HP entries.
 
Performance, however, is not weak. With its 2GB of RAM and 1.83-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, the NX570X delivered a PCMark05 score of 4,105--the best in this roundup. In fact, the NX570X was first in the group on five of the eight tests, an impressive feat for the underdog computer company. Its Windows Experience Index graphics subscore of 3.9 is also the best here, thanks to the ATI Mobility X1400 GPU. The NX570X is no gaming rig, but you can play 3D games at decent frame rates if you stick with the autodetect settings. We got 104 fps on F.E.A.R., the second-best score in the group. Wireless throughput of 17.1 Mbps at 50 feet was very good, and the unit's battery life of 2:02 was decent, given the screen size and eight-cell battery.
 
Gateway adds to this system's appeal with a decent selection of software. In addition to the goodies found in Vista Home Premium, you get CyberLink's Power2Go CD/DVD suite, Microsoft Works with a PowerPoint viewer, Napster audio-library software, and Gateway's BigFix utility suite for system troubleshooting and recovery. Port selection is standard and includes a PC Card slot and a 6-in-1 card reader.
 
We like the direction Gateway has taken the NX570X' design, but we love the system's performance-per-dollar ratio even more. This is a mainstream machine we highly recommend.

 

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