Gateway launches wide-screen notebooks

Gateway on Thursday unveiled a new M250 series of notebooks aimed at the professional and education markets. The systems weigh 4.8 pounds and are roughly an inch thick, the company said, although dimensions vary with options. The 14-inch wide-screen notebook has an optional high-capacity battery with a life of up to seven hours, according to Gateway. It starts at $849.99 for a basic model with an Intel Celeron M 360 chip.

The price moves up to $1,269 or $1,299.99 for other two models in the series, M250E and M250XL respectively. The top-of-the-line M250XL is powered by an Intel Pentium M 750 chip and has 512 MB of dual channel DDR2 533MHz memory and a 80GB hard drive, Gateway said.