Review: Gateway XHD3000

Big, beautiful, and full of features

There are a few things that come to mind when you’re in the market for a new monitor: size, features, and price. After only a week of use, I can already say that Gateway’s XHD3000 monitor delivers very well in all three of these areas.

The first thing you’ll notice about the XHD3000 is that it’s huge. It is a 30 inch monitor with a native resolution of 2560 x 1600. My previous monitor was Dell’s 24 inch 2407WFP, and the XHD totally dwarfs it. I’m currently using this monitor with my Macbook pro at native resolution, and the screen real estate is absolutely fantastic. I can have several applications viewable (and usable) at the same time.

Since the XHD3000 is in an exclusive group of 30 inch monitors with the likes of Dell, HP, Samsung, and Apple, what does Gateway bring to the table that the others don’t? Unlike any other consumer monitor on the market, the Gateway XHD3000 features the Silicon Optix Realta HQV video processor. In a nutshell, this processor upscales any non-native signal to the native resolution of the display. In even simpler terms, it make lower-res content look better. This gives a huge advantage to PC gamers that don’t have a $600 graphics card needed to run games on a 30 inch display. Instead of running games at higher resolutions, you will be able crank down the resolution to a playable level, and the HQV processor will take care of upscaling the picture. I’ve have tried out games like Team Fortress 2 and Call of Duty 4 running at about 1280 x 800, and they look excellent scaled to 2560 x 1600. The XHD3000 also boasts a bevy of inputs. It supports DVI, VGA, HDMI, Component, and Composite video. Other features include  a surprisingly good sounding speaker bar, an infrared remote, and a touch sensitive side control panel.

Gateway’s XHD3000 has a load of features at a very reasonable price (it fluctuates between $1500 and $1700). There are, however, a couple of issues. After the monitor is turned on or awaken from sleep mode, the monitor will blackout for a second or two within 5 minutes. I’ve heard about this from the reviews on Newegg, and it is a widespread issue. That being said, it has yet to hinder my experience whatsoever. Another problem I had was that it would not properly accept the signal from an xbox 360 using the VGA cable. Fortunately I was able to use the component cable and still had excellent results. Minor hitches aside, the Gateway XHD3000 is an excellent monitor that brings tons of great features for a fair price.

Pros:

• Great Picture Quality
• HQV Processor improves the quality of non-native res sources
• Loads of inputs (enough for a PC, xbox 360, PS3, Wii, with a VGA input to spare!)
• Included speaker bar sounds great and saves desk space

Cons:

• Screen blacks out within a couple of minutes of turning the display on (or waking it up)
• Issues with VGA input for xbox 360
• Some of the touch controls on panel could be more sensitive

Bottom Line: If you’re in the market for a 30 inch monitor, or a monitor with tons of inputs, this is the monitor to own. Highly Recommended.

Grade: A-