[scornduffer]

It looks like the specs on that laptop are pretty good for $499. Is it not? I heard from Best Buy that Gateway Laptop Computers are the same as Acer.

The Link is in the email on Circuit City post from yesterday

http://www.circuitcity.com/

[Tophinater]

The cheap $500 laptops aren't worth worth their weight in dirt.

[rainless]

Originally Posted by Tophinater

The cheap $500 laptops aren't worth worth their weight in dirt.

HEY!

I got my laptop for $500... but that wasn't the regular price.

Best Buy was supposed to have gotten rid of all of their Windows XP laptops, but they never sent a bunch of them in at the store near my uncle's place, so I got a $1200 laptop... with XP Media Center instead of Vista Premium (BONUS!) for $500... ANNNNNNND i got Vista Premium in the mail free from Microsoft!

EDIT: I don't see anything wrong with this laptop http://www.circuitcity.com/applicati..._17_G180-14101

You should go ahead and buy it. My laptop is a gateway... I've had it for about 3 years now. Runs great, battery still works, RAM died almost immediately, but it's DDR2... ten bucks... who cares.

BUY IT!

[cursor]

Looks decent to me...

[ShadowPho]

My laptop cost me $300.... two years ago... from ebay...

Still alive and kicking... still warms my legs, and my room during winter.

[MadMan007]

Originally Posted by Tophinater

The cheap $500 laptops aren't worth worth their weight in dirt.

Too general of a statement so I have to disagree. A new model $500 laptop probably isn't very good, but models that are just being EOL'd and are just being discounted can be some of the best values in laptops.

[hydrata]

I just ordered one. I've been waiting for an Ion platform netbook for the HDMI out, but for 500 bucks, getting a more powerful system with the optical drive and HDMI seems good to me. Hopefully it's sturdy and reliable!

[Enablingwolf]

Originally Posted by scornduffer

I heard from Best Buy that Gateway Laptop Computers are the same as Acer.

Hope this help those on the fence decide if the brand is ok or not. Not that I honestly despise Circuit City.. Even though it is owned by Tiger Direct.. Which is another store I do not like..

Acer owns the brands Gateway and eMachine.
They may have a common support system and again some common parts. It is still a different brand and target consumer.

It is like the marriage from hell of HP and Compaq.
Now for my impression of Gateway in general. Since for her birthday my wife had her pick of any machine she could dream of. Any machine.. and she chose a dang Gateway FX 6800-01. In November it is was a top of the line OEM machine. Especially for big box shops and OEM machines.
Surprisingly the OEM parts were aligned with the cost. You get what you pay for in Gheytway.

You are going to get an ok value out of that $500. The support for Gateway is US based. They are not superb, but a good: ok. The support site is easy to navigate and use.

I haven't had any issues in general with my wife's machine. Keep in mind. Even though Gateway in general is ok in the value segment. They seem to pop out lemons all the time for laptop machines. I give them credit for making good and fixing the issues. They re a bit better than HP/Compaq sort of in some ways

The only bad thing I can say about the Gateway experience. In my experience. Is that the machine was shipped in mid-November. It took more than 2 months for support to get everything in place to fully support the machine. Though the CSR, were a huge help and on top of it. It annoyed me to have to rely on a rep instead of looking up updated drivers and stuff like that. The machine shipped with a DFI board and an OK parts list I could get stuff going easily on my own.
Since Gateway - LOADS - more crap in the OS than any other OEM. Yeah the beat out Dell... You know the drill.

[rainless]

Originally Posted by Enablingwolf

Since Gateway - LOADS - more crap in the OS than any other OEM. Yeah the beat out Dell... You know the drill.

That may be so with desktops... but I didn't have that experience with my laptop. Just google desktop and maybe TWO other things I easily disabled.

And those annoying Tradewinds games that say "You can play these games FREE... but we're going to bounce all your private information all around the internet..."

Those I just deleted.