First Look: Hands-on with Acer's new low-cost laptop

 

Gallery

Posted on 4 Jun 2008 at 18:12

Acer has announced its assault on the ultra low-cost ultra-portable market with the Aspire one. It's a rival for other cheap laptops such as Asus's Eee PC and MSI's Wind, and, like the Wind, it uses a processor from Intel's new Atom range.

The Aspire one weighs less than a kilogram. It has an 8.9in screen with a 1,024x600-pixel resolution, so webpages will fit without the need for horizontal scrolling. The screen has a glossy reflective coating, which should produce vibrant colours, but reflections in the screen could be a problem if you're using the laptop in the sunshine or under fluorescent light. The Aspire one has integrated wireless networking, and you'll be able to buy it with built-in WiMAX support or an HSDPA 3G modem.

The laptop will be available with a customised Linux operating system or Windows XP. The Linux version will cost just £199, while the XP version is £299. The standard Linux version has 8GB of flash storage, while the XP version has an 80GB hard disk. You can specify the 80GB disk and the Linux operating system, however. The hard disk will have an effect on battery life; Acer claims the standard 3-cell battery will give you 3 hours of life with the flash disk, but this drops to 2 with the hard disk fitted. A larger six-cell battery will be an optional extra, which should increase battery life to seven hours and five hours respectively. There are SDHC and CF memory card slots for additional storage.

The Aspire one uses the 1.6GHz single-core version of the Intel Atom processor, and has 512MB of RAM as standard. We've yet to test the Aspire one's performance, but on paper it looks easily powerful enough for surfing the web and normal office tasks.

The Linux version of the Aspire one looks like a bargain. It should be faster than Asus's Eee PC, has more storage, and the option of an integrated 3G modem. The XP edition also looks like good value, but has some stiff competition in the shape of MSI's Wind, which has the same processor but 1GB of RAM and is just £30 more. We'll need to thoroughly test both laptops to see which is the best, so look out for full reviews coming soon.

Author: Seth Barton