Gateway NV73A17u 17.3-Inch Laptop (Satin Black)

I was so excited to finally get a new laptop in 3 years and opened the package with glee, only to be disappointed later when the computer blue-screened within an hour of setting it up.

The computer itself is gorgeous.

The touchpad is easy to use, responsive, and can be locked and turned off.

The keyboard is a good design and all of the buttons are easy to use.

The screen is large and the graphics, for this price, are marvelous.

Also, it's fast.

But the thing won't work.

I got the laptop on Friday and will be mailing it back Monday. I hope to return it for a similar model because I like the specs. I'm crossing my fingers that I somehow managed to get the one malfunctioning device out of the pile.

I will update this review if I get another laptop of this model.

Dear Amazonians,

Up front, I am impressed with the versatility, affordability, and durability of the Gateway® NV73A17u laptop computer. With that statement, I will start with the good news.

The good news is the use of a powerful, triple-core AMD chipset known as the Phenom II N850 working at 2.2 Ghz. That coupled with 1333 Mhz FSB and 1.5MB L2 cache makes this a productivity giant in a little box that easily competes with Intel (pentium-based) dual core processors running at 2.4 Ghz. You might ask, "why would I want to buy an AMD triple core that ONLY competes with an Intel dual core?". The answer is this: Intel pentium-based and i-series chipsets/processors are power hogs that run very warm. To have this powerful AMD processor in the very stylish, sleek but limited ventilation design of the Gateway® NV73A17u laptop case could save one to two years (if not more) of life for your processor. Definately, it would be "crispy critters" inside the case with an Intel processor any more powerful than a celeron (or celeron II).

More good news is the amenities of this Gateway® NV73A17u laptop. It sports a 500 GB SATA hard drive and anybody in the know about the market understands that is a good bit of storage for a low to midrange-priced unit. It also has 4 GB DDR3 ram memory on the board (upgradeable to 8 GB DDR3). It comes with 3 USB 2.0 slots (one more than the average you'll find on a laptop), multiple memory/media card reader, HDMI connect slot, VGA connect slot for external monitor, and a DVD+R/RW double-layer reader/writer combo drive. Windows 7 premium (64 bit) is installed on the Gateway® NV73A17u laptop out of the box.

Overall, the good news makes this a better than average buy for the $500-$700 USD range. Now, for the bad news.

The bad news is pretty extensive and the reason for 2 star loss with this review. Much of what I am comparing to, informationally-speaking, is the advertisement write-up from the Gateway® site concerning the NV73A17u laptop. Some of what they state and/or omit should be somewhat alarming to the consumer considering this product.

The bad news is that Gateway® advertises this laptop specifically as a powerful gaming laptop. Not quite. The ATI Radeon 4250 HD with 256 MB "dedicated memory" is just not enough to run the likes of Lord of the Rings Online, Pirates of the Burning Sea, or World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. At the lower graphics settings, the mouse controls are continually sluggish even when adjusting mouse sensitivity options. This means it is really the graphics capabilities that are slowing down this machine's performance. A Windows 7 rating of the performance is at 4.2. After checking the breakdown, the 4.2 score is the result of the graphics statistic (the ability for the machine to manage graphics capabilities of AERO). Big surprise, eh? Even worse is that the card is built into the motherboard which makes it extremely difficult to upgrade (yes, there are ways but it would defeat the purpose of this being a laptop sort of).

Now, I cannot imagine why they would hamstring this prospective beast with such a low end video card that is built in, not slotted, within this machine. Nor do I understand why they would not just include bluetooth hookup built in. It is a low cost item and would save users of the Gateway® NV73A17u laptop from having to use up a USB slot for that upgrade which would be in addition to adding the mobile wireless mouse (2 USB ports used up). That leaves one USB port for switching to any number of other components ranging from printers, scanners to Blackberries, iPhones and SONY Walkmans. Does that seem like a lot of switching to you? Well, trust me, it is.

If you are looking closely at the picture of this product on Amazon.com, the picture tells a thousand words but, as you know, the picture's telling can be misleading. Look hard at the DVD/CD door. You might notice the BluRay Logo. Well, read the description you hopeful prospective customers. That description distinctly does not state anything about a BluRay reading capability and this machine, at the time of this review, does not include BluRay viewing capabilities. Again, now that the costs have deminished greatly concerning this technology, there really is no good reason why they did not just build that in and maybe up the price $50 USD (still within the range as stated above).

Overall, the reason for the drop in two stars is because of 1) the advertised purpose by the manufacturer concerning this laptop and 2) the missed opportunity to making this a full-range, top notch machine that it has the structure (processor, memory, x64 build) of being. To me, this is wasted potential of Gateway for a product that could have put the rest of the market in the mid-range laptop on its heels. Too bad. 3 stars out of 5!

Buy Gateway NV73A17u 17.3-Inch Laptop (Satin Black) Now

I am going to send this back...I have been working with Gateway Tech support to find out why my computer keeps crashing and still haven't resolved this...all they tell me is that it's a hardware problem and if I want I can send it back to be fixed...it's been getting blue screen errors/mini crash-dumps 2-3 times per day since I opened it up! Hoping that Amazon will take it back and send me another one! The computer is very powerful when it's running, and has great user-friendly features...but this one just seems to be a LEMON!

Read Best Reviews of Gateway NV73A17u 17.3-Inch Laptop (Satin Black) Here

Have to say, "Way to go Gateway". This Is My second Laptop from Gateway and this one is even better. The Laptop runs perfect and for a price you could not beat anywhere else, trust Me I looked. The specs on this Laptop are out of this world! I would recommend this Laptop to all My friends. Amazing. Thanx Gateway and Thanx Amazon!

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Unlike the other reviews, my unit has been running just fine with no issues. The screen is huge and great for watching movies, and it's also bright enough to be used in dark areas with no eye strain. Keyboard is fine for laptops, but due to the size of the thing it might be hard to rest your wrists comfortably for extended typing sessions. No blu-ray drive is unfortunate but would likely increase the price of the unit to be above what most would consider a good deal. Webcam is great for the price and works as intended. I haven't played any video games on it yet so I can't say how it performs in that area, but HD content runs great.

The touchpad is where the laptop loses a star, as it is rather small when compared to other laptops and it's easy to lose control of the cursor. The responsiveness is adequate but you might need to change the Windows settings after you buy it. There is also a feature where you can use two fingers at once to do tasks such as zooming in, but it might be annoying if it happens unintentionally (only happened to me once so far however).