To some people, tablet PCs are a novelty--good for occasional touch-screen doodling and not much more. For others, especially note-taking students and conference room PowerPoint jockeys, tablets have become indispensable, even if they're often saddled with out-of-date components. Gateway's M285-E is a, combining features of a traditional laptop and a tablet PC. A single hinge in the center--not two as you get on most laptops--connects the screen and also allows it to spin 360 degrees and fold back over the keyboard, converting it into a tablet PC. With the latest updates to the M285-E, the system graduates to Intel's line of CPUs, meaning it can hold its own performance-wise against today's nontablet systems.
The base price of the M285-E is $1,449, but our review unit came with extra RAM, a bigger hard drive, and a faster processor, bringing the price to $1,933. If you want tablet functionality without sacrificing performance, this system offers a good mix of components at a reasonable price, though your dollars will stretch a bit further with the. At first glance, the Gateway M285-E looks like an everyday mainstream laptop, matching the current black-and-silver color scheme of Gateway's product line. Measuring 13.5 inches wide by 10.3 inches deep by 2.0 inches high (measured using the larger 12-cell battery that came with our review system), it's a bit bigger than other tablets, which traditionally have 12-inch screens, such as the.Weighing 7 pounds, or 8. Download Beos In Vmware Tools. 2 pounds with the A/C adapter, it's hard to see carrying this around all day in your arm, jotting notes on the touch screen.
The key feature of the Gateway M285-E is its screen, connected to the rest of the chassis by a rotating center hinge. When in its default position, the screen looks and acts like a normal laptop display. The 14-inch wide-screen LCD has a native resolution of 1,280x768, roughly in line with a 12.1-inch laptop. Most nontablet PCs of this size have 15.4-inch screens, which bump the resolution up to 1,680x1,050. The larger type and icons you get with 1,280x768 help when using the tablet functions, which are generally viewed from an arm's length away.