You’ll be amazed at the run time of the Gateway LT2118u. With Intel’s Atom N450 CPU and 3150 GPU at its heart, as well as 1GB of memory, a 250GB hard drive, and a 10.1-inch, 1024-by-600-resolution display, Gateway’s pride and joy carried on for an astounding 11 hours, 17 minutes in the battery tests.
But how can a netbook that supposedly differs from its LT2120u sibling only in color run more than an hour and a half longer? As it turns out, the LT2118u uses a UMO9H36, 5600-milliamp-hour/63-watt-hour battery, while the LT2120u uses a UMO9H56, 5800-milliamp-hour/63-watt hour model. From those specs, you would expect the UMO9H56 to run longer, but we found no other difference in the BIOS or components, so apparently the UMO9H36 is the better option.
The Gateway LT2118u’s upper cover is a rich red with the rest of the unit in dark grays—a surprisingly classy look. The ports are standard for a netbook: two USB ones on the left, along with the AC jack and a VGA port, plus one USB port on the right with the audio in/out and a 10/100 ethernet port. A Kensington lock port is also on the right edge, as is an SD Card slot.
At 2.7 pounds, this netbook has about average heft for a 10.1-inch system with a six-cell battery. The hard drive and memory module are both accessible via screw-secured access panels on the bottom. A vacant Mini PCI Express slot is underneath the hard-drive panel for a possible broadband or other upgrade. Overall, the unit is a hardware tweaker’s delight. The Gateway LT2118u played high-def 720p WMV, QuickTime, and MP4 videos smoothly, though online Flash video and Flashbased gaming were noticeably jerky, extremely so with content at higher resolutions. Audio was ne through headphones, and decent enough through the speakers. The 640-by-480 Webcam’s images and recording were exceptionally smooth, and a pop-up Webcam utility appears when you roll over it with the mouse at the top of the screen.
The Gateway LT2118u, though it handled video a bit better than the average N450/3150-based netbook, scored the same 33 points on WorldBench 6 that most netbooks do, including its aforementioned sibling, the LT2120u. Overall, this gives the unit the same less-than-snappy but workable feel we’ve become used to with Windows 7 Starter netbooks.
Most people should adapt to the Gateway LT2118u’s keyboard just fine, as the majority of the keys are where you’d expect them; the feel, while a tad light, lends itself to touch-typing. One caveat: A large gap between the keys leaves a ton of space for dust and particles to collect. Vacuum this puppy regularly. The touchpad is stylish, and has raised bumps that make it easy to find by feel while remaining unobtrusive.
You’ll want to spend a few minutes ditching the preloaded software flotsam, with innumerable icons blanketing the desktop but dig around a bit, and you’ll also find a copy of the ever-useful Microsoft Works. The LT2118u is all about style and endurance. It’s a cut above the average netbook in looks and is easy to upgrade, and if you tend to have pretty long workdays, you’ll love the machine’s 11-plus hours of run time.
Gateway LT2118u 10.1-Inch Red Netbook – Over 10 Hours of Battery Life