Review of Gateway's M685-E notebook and Samsung's YP-K5 music player

Network World, 12/08/06

The scoop: M685-E notebook, by Gateway, about $1,800.

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Click to see: Despite an odd-feeling keyboard, the M685-E is a nice, powerful business notebook.

What it is: The small-business notebook line from Gateway has been updated - the M685-E includes the latest Intel Core 2 Duo processors (T5500), along with a 17-inch display (WXGA resolution). The 8-pound notebook has 512MB of memory, a 100GB hard drive, DVD burner, four USB 2.0 ports, an IEEE 1394 port and an NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600 graphics card with 128MB of video memory. The notebook includes a Gigabit Ethernet port and integrated 802.11a/g wireless connectivity, and is wide enough to include a 10-key keypad in addition to its full-size keyboard.

Why it's cool: The notebook offers the latest in power and memory to let users multitask their applications without having to upgrade to a supersized multimedia entertainment notebook or (shudder) a gaming notebook. This looks and feels like a normal notebook, although the 17-inch display will make users' co-workers a bit jealous. I loved the addition of the 10-key keypad; that's something normally not found on a notebook.

Some caveats: Something on the surface of the keypad made me feel like I was typing on sandpaper - it was very disconcerting after a while. The notebook tends to get hot after a lot of work, so investing in an appropriate notebook cooling system is recommended. There's also no external volume control, so adjusting the sounds in some applications has to be done through the PC.

Grade: four stars (out of five)