Performance

　　Setup and Installation

　　Unfortunately the computer feels more like a marketing scheme to sell a slightly souped-up system as a “Video Editor PC” as opposed to a computer engineered from the ground up for video editing purposes. The lack of documentation on how to set up the second display (although a step trivial to overcome) implies they had reused the documentation from one of their mid-range systems and just threw in an extra display. Likewise, the fact that all the specialty video editing software bundled with the 700XL is not preinstalled implies the 700XL is a high-end computer first and video editing system second for those who are so inclined.

　　The system fortunately includes Gateway’s “Survive & Thrive” manual titled “Capture, Create and Share Digital Movies” which covers the basics of several of the pieces of the software. Between that and the manuals for Pinnacle, the DVD authoring software that comes with it, you should have enough to get going. It’s a long read though, so planning on taking some time to get to know the software and system before doing much with it.

　　One of the main missing components on this system was something many people will want when starting a digital video collection – a way to convert their old videos to digital. Although the system comes with multiple USB and FireWire ports, there are no analog video-in methods, S-video or otherwise. So don’t expect to be making DVD versions of your old family videos with this system as it comes – this is ready for new work only. This specific system also had an issue with the DVD drive skipping while playing moves (regularly every 5 – 10 min.)

　　Performance and Benchmarks

　　Minor complaints aside, the system still performs like a champ. After all, there’s not much to compare the 700XL to in the consumer level PC market. Pretty much everything in this system, when is comes to hardware, and speed, is as good as it gets.

　　Game tests with the Radeon 9700 PRO video card showed it to be able to handle the highest settings on most 3D games with ease. We attempted playing one high-end 3D game on this system with all the setting set to the top. Even at 1280X1024 the 3D graphics were flawlessly smooth. In fact, the system almost out-did the game, as at that resolution you could actually see the individual polygons. Please click on the performance tab above this review to see pictures of our benchmarks.

　　Pros

　　Two 18″ flat screen displays

　　Great performance

　　High class look and feel

　　Cons

　　No analog video input.

　　Video editing software is not pre-installed

　　Not much room for expansion

　　Conclusion

　　This Gateway 700XL system ends up really succeeding best at something other than film making (its intended selling point) and that is as a high performance desktop system. You can’t beat the 700XL if you’re simply looking to get one of the most power packed systems on the market. If you were expecting this to be the best bang for buck on a Digital Film Maker system, well, since nobody else is making such a comprehensive suite it’s still a great package. But, you need to know upfront that it is tends towards overkill in some areas (the video card, or the sound system, for example), while lacking in the integration and features you’d really like to see to let you hit the ground running. The film making promotional software included with this system is an added bonus. If you’re willing to put the time into the 700XL, it can certainly get your digital filmmaking hobby off the ground.