Where to start this review is the question, because I have a LOT to say about it, so I guess I'll begin by saying, repeating rather, my synopsis: the Acer One 1.6Ghz/1GB/160GB/6-Cell 5700mAh battery feature set gives Acer by far the best, finest, and most versatile, best-performing Netbook being made right now, and that includes a LOT of other netbooks from HP, Lenovo, Toshiba, et al, all of them included! That's a big, long sentence, with a lot of BANG to it, so let's start with the interface and go from there.
Acer decided to use Windows XP Home Premium 32-bit for the OS for the Acer One, in all configurations apparently, and they couldn't have been more right-on, spot-on in fact, in this choice. It's pretty much fix-me-free by now, with SP3 installed, extremely well sorted-out, trouble and maintenance free, and most of all, it's fast-booting and takes little overhead from the 1GB of physical RAM that comes in this configuration, with the 160GB SATA II Western Digital (in my case) hard drive.
I heartily recommend one PC program for maintenance of the Windows Registry, and it's called simply "Registry Mechanic" which you can get over at CNET's site, as they give it "5 Turcows" rating, the highest they give utility software suites, and if you use Registry Mechanic on a regular basis, certainly after adding/removing any programs, you'll be 99% to the good in XP Home Premium SP3!
I am writing this review from an expert's point of view, trying to not get too technical for all you readers, honestly I am and will do my best there. I'm a certified Mac/Apple Tech, and though I am not an MSC Microsoft Certified Tech at this point, I can pretty much rip apart, fix/repair, and troubleshoot any OS problem on a PC also, including a tech's worst nightmare, 64-bit Vista problems!
To give just a couple examples of how nice Windows XP Home Premium SP3 works out on this little netbook would help, so let's give some. The Acer One boots up in less than 30 seconds from a cold start, and from sleep/hibernation less than 15 seconds, which is sort of miraculous considering all the potential traps, and other obstacles most Windows computers stick in the way of a fast boot process. It also does a nice job of handling multiple programs on a mere 1GB of physical RAM, which would be literally impossible, ludicrously so if it happened to be running any iteration of Vista!
Acer also ships the One with a minimum of indigenous proprietary software, very little eye candy or "brand candy" either, a nice touch, pretty much limiting that stuff to an Acer "screen saver" program, and the MacAffee Anti-Virus program, which can be quickly and judiciously dispensed with using XP's default "Add/Install Programs" application. This is a major coup for the Acer consumer, and shows good judgment on their product team's part, as we don't have to remove a trial copy of Norton Systemworks, for example, which humbles most computers of any sort with its crazy, stupid, and offensive (!) so-called "integration" into virtually all edgemarks of Windows Vista or XP systems. It's my favorite "I Hate You" program to knock and warn users against having in their PC's of any type, and will tell those of you using it now for no fault of your own probably, that your notebook/PC desktop's performance will increase by a factor of at least 50% if you REMOVE IT from the computer right now, and install something that makes sense in terms of virus, spyware, adware, and a firewall of some sort...something like Trend Micro's Internet Security program, or maybe AVG for those on a budget. Just anything other than the Norton product/program is a good thing to have in the tank, just a fyi and I'm done with the warning bit.
So, the OS is an xlnt choice here, I mean for a little netbook you don't even need XP Pro, just this simple XP Home Premium does fine in this setup, thus Acer earns bonus points for that, a most important item to congratulate them on doing, noteworthy enough to make it the No.1 item I mention in this review.
Acer does give the user a "trial copy" of MS Office 2007 for those who need a WP program, a convenient thing and not a bad choice, but personally I prefer Office 2000 Professional, which I've been using in PC's I own for some 7-8 years now, so I dispensed with the 2007 version, and installed my own Office Pro 2000 suite and took care of those needs. Other than the MacAfee Anti-Virus problem/program, there's little else to mention that you have to get rid of right off the bat to streamline, smooth, and speed up the netbook's OS and responsiveness, so kudos to Acer for not burdening the new owner with a ton of BS and crapola as I like to call a manufacturer's eye candy and "freebies" which are always more trouble than a benefit in PC's, it turns out.
With a Mac everything you get is functional and virtually necessary for the machine's processing and program inventory, while with PC's they're always trying to sell you something, clutter up the OS with virtual garbage of one sort or another, so Acer really earns my praise here by not trying to give the user anything except a nice, fast, virtually ready for market netbook instead of a major project, one that needs a lot of coaxing and prior-feeding to make it perform normally, or shall I say exceptionally well versus being a slug in the rug.
The best place to start praise for this netbook in my view is with the hardware choices that Acer made for this little machine, because there are certainly plenty of choices on the PC side to start out with, and they did an exceptional job with the One, choosing everything with care, simplicity, and xlnt performance in mind. First there's the Intel Atom N270 CPU, the heart of the beast so to speak, and at 1.6Ghz with 533Mhz PC SDRAM along for the ride, the netbook is plenty fast, has a quick, but inexpensive memory ramp-up feature set, another good choice by the maker.
The CPU uses an incredible 10% (yes, read it and remember it) of the potential energy outlay for a comparable AMD, or Intel C2Duo CPU chip/die set, which does two things you should remember: 1) it has very little overhead in terms of battery use, and 2) it generates few heat management problems, which everyone should know and understand is the heart of most notebook/netbook problems. HEAT KILLS CPU's AND NOTEBOOKs, it's just that simple to write or say, and the Intel Atom N270 is a miracle of design and functionality that does what many CPU's would kill or die for, which they'll never have, and that's provide a modicum of speed with virtually no footprint of heat, or battery drain! Isn't that a treat!! I think so, so another xlnt choice by Acer there.
The hardware features a fast 5400RPM SATA II 2.5" 160GB hard drive, which should be plenty large enough for even the most rampant physical space user, and it's best to note that here 2nd. The SDRAM @ 533Mhz works well with the equally fast system bus, so tasks are handled well even though there's only 1GB of physical RAM.
The only shortcoming here is that RAM, as it's NOT user serviceable/accessible, with an Intel netbook chassis design that will allow a maximum of 1.5GB of physical RAM addressable, so even if you want to void your warranty and take it apart and install a 1GB DIMM in that single SDRAM slot (512MB being hard-soldered onto the chassis, and not removable) , to yield 1.5GB of SDRAM, the benefits are questionable.
I would like to, at some point, try out a 2GB DIMM in that slot, and see if the netbook functions and addresses 2.5GB of SDRAM as that would make a lot more sense in terms of increasing the available physical RAM allocation, so when I get in the mood later this month with a weekend-extended off, I'll take an hour or two to do that exercise, and if successful I'll update this review accordingly!
Let's talk for a minute about the netbooks' Wi-Fi (for better words) concepts, and see how it works in practice vs. theory right now. The most important aspect of these netbooks that are out now is the connectivity issue(s), because certainly everyone expects one to work wirelessly out of the box! And so it is with the Acer One's setup.
The network adapter is an Atheros AR5007EG "A, B & G" (notice, no "N" availability) unit, and it's got a simple physical switch on the front of the netbook for turning it off and on, and I might mention that it's switched "ON" at the factory, so the moment you fire up the Acer One it's going to be searching for a wireless network, and will find one/them quickly... that is it will hierarchically list them in order of strength and logical importance in the Network Control Panel without you prompting it to do so. That's a nice feature, and Acer scores points here also.
If you're using a typical user's WPA-TKIP network encryption vs an "open" or unprotected network at home/office, you'll be prompted for the password once the notebook is fired up past the User Configuration Screens of XP Home Premium, and once that password is entered check the box for "remember me", and you're set as far as connecting to your local wireless network from then on. On a scale of 1-10 for connectivity, I'm giving the Atheros network adapter a solid 9 for performance, if you wondered about it. It picked up not only my network here at my home office, which includes 8 other Macs and PC's of various sorts, but it also scored my 3 neighbors' networks also, without any problems.
So Acer's placement and structure of the physical part of the adapter is good also, ie the "antenna" is routed through the little chassis strategically, apparently (I have yet to discover it by taking it apart, but will soon!), and it's a strong network performer, which is essential in a notebook/netbook.
I haven't taken the Acer One on an outside trip yet, though we will definitely be using it for travel instead of my tried (read tired also) and true Apple iBook G3, vintage 2002 @ 600Mhz G3 territory with a 12" screen vs. the Acer One's 8.9" widescreen LCD display, so I can't comment on its ability to pick up outside Wi-Fi 'HotSpots' but I'll betcha it's just fine in that regard.
Now we come to the details, and they are the best and most fun parts of the Acer One, so here goes...
The 3 USB 2.0 ports are a killer connectivity system (ie very very good!), with twins on the right side of the chassis, and a single on the left side, along with an Ethernet port, plus a VGA portal for extended desktop duty, since the Intel Mobile 945 Express graphics chip will support an external monitor, a very nice feature if you want to do a presentation with PowerPoint via a large VGA LCD display, or perhaps hook it up to a larger screen for a slide show at work, or for friends and family during the holidays! Very versatile feature set here!!
Also of import are the twin card reader slots, the left side being the one for an SD/SDHC card (yup, it WILL read SDHC cards, no limit as to size AFAIK), the right side slot for everything else, MMC, Memory Stick Plus, etc etc...just no CompactCards that's about all it doesn't provide for, so you Nikon/Canon folks will have to use an adapter and make do with that! As for the network switch setup, the switch is on the front, but the LED is on the top surface where the keyboard is, so nicely done, Acer.
The power port for the AC adapter is on the left side, and it's not an ergonomically quiescent system like Apple's "Mag-Safe" system, and you CAN rip it out of the Acer One by tripping on the cord and potentially damaging the netbook, so the usual cautions about the AC adapter apply here...it's NOT an Apple product, typical PC stuff here with the power port/battery charging mechanism. I wish PC manufacturers would learn their lessons about this intimate subject, but they don't, or won't, as I can't think of a PC notebook with a truly ergonomic AC adapter port offhand. Just be careful with this part of the Acer One, and all will be good to go!
That pretty much covers the feature set and ports, so to wrap this up I'll mention a couple other items and be done with this review in a flash, I promise!
The Synaptic Pointing Device (trackpad in AppleSpeak) is easy to master, if you're not using an externally driven laser/USB mini-mouse like we do for pointing duty (we chose a Logitech V220 for this notebook at Amazon.com for about $25 shipped, a truly superior laser mini-mouse IMO, and one I've grown fond of for use with my "normal" Acer laptop, a bit dated, but still useful 5920-6727 15.4" widescreen GemStone Chassis unit). The trackpad has the normal right and left side clickables to it, it's infinitely adjustable for touch and speed via the Windows XP "Mice and..." control panel, and it works well without using an external USB/laser mouse, as there are times (like when laying in bed doing some late-night web surfing with the Acer One) when an external mouse is superfluous and impossible to use.
The keyboard takes a bit of getting used to to be fast on it, but fast you can be with a little adaptation, and if your hands aren't too big to make such things impossible. It's physically about 60% the size of the "normal" keyboard on a regular laptop, lacks the number system keys totally (they just aren't there), but of course has Page Up, Down, Side to Side, full function keys from F1 through F12 for controlling the boot process, initiating a file recovery or System Recovery exercise, whatever...it's all there for that sort of thing, so score more points for Acer One there!
Touch? On the keyboard, 1-10, 10 being the best possible, I'm going to give it a 7.5, because once you're acclimated to using it via its small size, the feel could be a little better IMO, there's a definite "click" and "clack" to the keyboard strokes, but of course nothing like a vane-type keyboard from the old days...just a subtle reminder that you're not using a $2000+ notebook's keyboard, and it IS a lot smaller physically than a normal keyboard, takes some getting used to for speedy typing, and judicious and deft use of your fingers lest you be constantly making mistakes.
The LCD screen, at a resolution of 1024x600 pixels (natively so) is plenty big with the widescreen aspect ratio working for the Acer One to yield a much "bigger" feel and view, with outside viewing from odd angles possible, but certainly less so than with a full sized screen. With 32-bit color quality picked (highest possible), it's clear, crisp, clean and has xlnt definition, even with the smaller fonts required (or shall I say necessary) with an 8.9" diagonal sized LCD display.
I wouldn't want to do a term paper on the Acer One, but for nominal typing and WP work, and certainly net surfing and keyboard fun, the LCD display works well. I'm giving the Acer One a solid 9 out of 10 score for the display, which is by the way, nicely set off, and back from the edges of the frame, but not too distantly so, which is a good way or designing in some protection for the display, while still leaving plenty of room for the ports of a WebCam and a mono microphone, the Acer "Crystal Brite" ("Crystal Eye" Webcam!) technology setup, standard fare in their products if you're at all familiar with how Acer makes a laptop.
The webcam and microphone do work great, of course, as you would expect them to, but I wouldn't want to use any pictures taken with the little webcam for Photoshop work, for example. It's plenty good for local use and net use, and I've used it for conferencing with Skype, and Yahoo Messenger clients with successful results in both cases.
Finally, there's the incredible performance of the 6-cell battery with this netbook's Intel Atom CPU, and it yields up to 5-6+ hours or MORE time on the machine, if you maximize Energy Saver settings, allow CPU cycling, etc etc, and really squeeze out the last drop from the tank. I was totally and completely surprised when I installed my favorite PC laptop battery monitor system on the Acer One, Embtech's EmBatPower utility, and found out that the Lithium Ion 6-cell battery has 5700+ mAh of power reserve built in! WOW! That's a big battery for even a normal laptop! And in the Acer One it just kills any competition in the "last a long time" department!!
The Acer One scores 11 on battery performance, OFFSCALE TOTALLY!! You just can't buy a more CPU efficient, long lasting battery/laptop/netbook battery system than the 6-cell system in the Acer One. It's the meat and potatoes of all battery systems I've even come across, and I've seen a few that claimed to have 5-6-hour capacity, but never delivered. THIS ONE DOES!!
Construction yields a solid 9.5 on the Acer One, as the netbook's LCD screen hinge system is very heavy-duty, and should last a long long time even with severe/heavy use, has a nice "feel" to it in terms of being strong and viable, it's not a weak point of the netbook where with others it can be and is a weakness. The materials for a sub-$500 netbook are supreme, the feature set is almost if not perfect (only lacks FireWire, if you care to be ultra-critical about this sort of thing!), it just seems to "all be there" with the Acer One netbook.
Overall, I'm giving the Acer One 5 stars, or 10 out of 10 if you want the extended version of a rating, for overall performance, feature set, battery performance/life, construction, and that xlnt Crystal Brite Acer 8.9" LCD widescreen display with its 1024x600 pixel size. I like everything about the Acer One, especially the sub-$400 pricing that's available at certain places on the 'Net these days, for this particular configuration, the top of the line now.
Have I covered everything? Geez, I hope so! The only thing I haven't mentioned is the light weight, being 894 grams if you're counting it that way, no battery, or 1223 grams WITH the 6-cell battery in place...still well South of 3 pounds! Trust me, that's its accurate weight, as I just used my xlnt Radio Shack USB Scale on the Acer One, and double and triple checked how much it weighs.
I can't tell you how impressive this netbook is, and it's obvious why it's the No.1 selling computer of ANY TYPE OR KIND at Amazon.com right now, why it's stealing business from every quarter of the market. Acer can hardly keep up production to supply the demand for the darn thing, it's so popular right now! So if you want it all, "the works" in a netbook, there is no substitute: get the Acer One in this configuration, with the 6-cell battery, the 160GB SATA II hard drive, 1GB SDRAM, and all those standard features that are killing the competition.
From a tech's viewpoint this is a great system to be able to service, it's a simple one to take apart and get to the important pieces (don't tell Acer I said that just yet!), and the 'modular' chassis gets a "10" too! From the consumer's viewpoint there is no finer bargain in the marketplace than the Acer One "LU.S050B.133", Model ZG5, configuration (the one off the product's box).
I've written a LOT of reviews over the years for various computer systems and products, but I cannot emphasize enough how good a product this is, especially compared to all the rest of the netbooks out there for sale.
The Acer One ZG5 is the No.1 selling computer of ANY SIZE, TYPE, or CONFIGURATION in the world right now, and there's a good reason why. Acer did their homework, found all the right pieces to the puzzle the consumer wanted in a netbook, and here's the result! Get one now, or get one ASAP, because you're missing out on all the fun, all the goodness anyone could have possibly built into a netbook in the year 2008-9.
I predict that Acer will keep making these bulletproof little market-killers until the sun stops shining in the West and its competition is crushed even further than it already is. Good Luck to HP, Toshiba, Dell, the whole lot of you other PC manufacturers, because this is the King of the Hill, and you'd best get used to looking up at the new No.1 computer maker in the world, Acer and the Acer One!
ADDENDUM 01-20-2009:
I was up late working on a hardware project of very complex capacities one night last month (Dec), and a thought hit me: I had 2GB (1 GB DIMMs) of Apple-Spec OEM SamSung PC 6400/800Mhz SDRAM (SODIMMs) sitting in my "extra RAM" box, right next to my workstation's chair where I sit at the controls of 2 PC's, a Dual Core G5 PowerMac 2.3Ghz running a FirmTek SeriTek 2eEN4 RAID 0 configuration (bootable RAID), and my trusty 24" Intel 3.06Ghz iMac, which is my main photo editor. Interesting thought!
So I decided to tear the little Acer One apart right then and there, at 4AM or so, and put on my grounding cable system, plugged myself into the wall socket (literally, that's how it works!) to complete the anti-static treatment, found my trusty jeweler's mini-screw-driver and TORX sets, and set them next to me, and in about 10 minutes I had carefully, quickly taken the One apart down to the logic board, bare as a naked lady, ribbon cables for the trackpad, LCD display, and keyboard carefully taped down where they could do no harm. I pulled the 512MB SODIMM out of its carrier on the underside of the double-tiered logic board setup, carefully measured it with a micro-micrometer, measured the Apple 1GB SODIMM, and it was a match! I had already looked up the specs of the Acer SODIMM I had removed, and its registry and buffers were compatible with the Apple SODIMM, so in it went! Snap! The carrier accepted the Apple RAM easily, and I had the netbook back together in about 20 minutes, taking my time and not over-torquing the mini-screws on the chassis, especially those connecting into ABS plastic!
If you're careful, ground yourself 120% before you start working, and do NOT get up and move around while you're working to generate any static electricity, and DO NOT DROP components onto each other, or hard surfaces, you too can do the above exercise in a few short minutes. It's really not too hard, nothing complex about it, just BE CAREFUL with those 25 or so mini-screws you've got to remove, draw pictures if necessary about which ones go where when you disassemble the One, so you'll remember where they all fit when you re-assemble it.
Cute netbook though! And easy easy easy to take apart, and get to the important things, mainly the RAM and the hard drive, should you ever want to replace the OEM HD with something larger, say a Samsung F1 Spinpoint H6 500GB SATA II 2.5" HD, which I'll do next to the Acer One...
Anyway, the good news: it all worked out just great. The Acer One *LIKES* the Apple DIMM a lot, and is performing extremely well with the higher-clocked SODIMM installed. 1.5GB of RAM is a huge improvement over 1GB of RAM in the Acer One, as you're increasing the physical RAM by 50%, so expect BIG performance increases, faster boot times, more application-friendly OS windows for multiple-program-open situations, etc etc.
I have found that the One cannot address a 2GB DIMM under any circumstances, so don't try it if you were thinking about it...
The logic board's BIOS just is not able to deal with the high bandwidth a 2GB DIMM would generate, so until and/if Acer decides to use a different BIOS arrangement on the logic board, 1.5GB is the limit on RAM in the Aspire One netbook series.
Once more however, I will warn those of you who have never taken apart a laptop to be very cautious, and careful, and deliberate, and operate in S L O W M O T I O N when you are doing this installation...just use common sense, keep track of those mini-screws, one by one if necessary with a diagram drawn as to where they all go, because some ARE different than others, and you must re-assemble the One with the correct screws in the correct sequence, or there will be problems, and we don't want that do we?
I simply wanted to update this Review with the news that 1.5GB of physical RAM in the Acer One is a good thing to have, and if you know what you are doing, you are NOT limited to using a 533Mhz SODIMM of PC 5300 SDRAM. If the buffers, timing, and registry sequences are good to go with a PC 6400 800Mhz SODIMM, it will work in the Acer One, certainly at least as good as with a PC 5300 533Mhz SODIMM. That's just a FYI should you happen to have any Apple-spec 1GB DIMMs laying around from an update/upgrade to an Intel iMac, Mac Mini, or MacBook of a certain vintage, as those type of 1GB DIMMs will work perfectly fine in the Acer One, and I shall testify accordingly if asked about it!
I don't know if there are any actual benefits to running higher-clocked SODIMMs in the Acer One's logic board/chassis arrangement, but what the hey, I have proved it possible to use higher-spec'd SODIMMs in the Acer One with success, my One using that SODIMM for some 5 weeks and counting now.
You know what, tech work is pretty interesting some times, and this is one of them...I got to use some spare parts that were sitting around here doing nothing at all, and I got to save a little $$$ in the deal too...
Enjoy your Acer One, and remember one thing about this Acer product that IS important: it is apparently very "flexible" and easy to work with in terms of upgrading/updating the components inside the box. Be very, very careful should any of you attempt this exercise, use a correct guide/instruction set from a reliable source, specifically on the netbook you own...as there ARE differences between the different models of the Acer One netbook, difference INSIDE of the chassis that could throw you a curve ball if you're not acting wisely.
Wavey Davey, 01-20-2009
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Acer Aspire One AOA150-1126 8.9-Inch Netbook - White.
