PCWorld: Review – Gateway EC14D07u Is…Average
The $630 value laptop has a powerful enough processor for everyday computing and good battery life, but no features set it above competing products, PC World says.
“Want the go-anywhere spirit of a netbook and the full keyboard (and features) of a typical laptop? The Gateway EC14D07u ($630 as of March 22, 2010) attempts to merge the two, and in some ways it succeeds: The laptop feels light and yet manages to pack a DVD burner and an 11.6-inch screen. But in other ways–such as with its mediocre audio and video performance–it stumbles. Ultimately, it ranks as an average ultraportable laptop, albeit one that is fast enough for most applications and small enough to tote anywhere.
On our WorldBench 6 test suite, the EC14D07u earned a score of 64, strong enough to handle office work, Web browsing, media playback, and most other general tasks you may want to throw at it. The system’s 4GB of RAM help it run multiple applications smoothly. (The similarly configured, similarly priced HP Pavilion dv2 eaned a WorldBench 6 score of just 45.) But games and other 3D applications drag in the absence of a dedicate graphics processor. Even 3D titles from a few years back, such as Half-Life 2: Episode 1, are unplayable”