Acer Laptop

[Lee1978]

8O
I'm looking to buy a laptop. As I've never owned one before I could do with some help. It will be used mostly to edit images using Photoshop (I'm a photographer).

My budget is £700. I've been looking at the Acer series of laptops, specifically the Acer Aspire 5612WLMi.

The spec is as follows:
Intel Centrino Core Duo Processor T2300 1.66GHz
512MB DDRII SDRAM
60GB Hard Drive
DVD Super Multi Dual Layer Drive - To read DVDs and CDs and write CDs, DVD+, DVD-, large Dual Layer DVD and DVD-Ram
15.4" XGA Widescreen TFT Screen with CrystalBrite
Intel 945GM shared graphics
4 USB 2.0 Sockets
Integrated LAN and 56k v.90 data fax modem
Integrated wireless 802.11 a/b/g LAN - Call for advice on Wireless networking
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition Pre Loaded
FREE Microsoft Works
2.5-hour Battery Life
Weight 2.89kg

With VAT & delivery this will cost £637.59.

If I upgrade the RAM to 1GB and take a 3 yr warranty it would cost £696.54.

I would like to know what people think about the spec in relation to price and any other comments you may have.

Thanks in advance.

Lee

 

[mobileT]

Well, let's see... that's about $1211 (including tax and delivery).

How much are they charging for the RAM upgrade, and how will it be configured? Is it going to be one 1GB module or two 512MBs?

Second, what are the RPMs of the hard drive that you'd be getting? 4200 is too slow. 5400 *may* be OK. 7200 would be best. It's not always easy to get the 7200RPM in many consumer notebooks off of the retailers' shelves.

Additionally, the Apple MacBook is lauded for its performance with Photoshop. Have you considered this machine? I don't know much about Macs or their cost.

 

[killernotebooks]

First, Killer Notebooks ships ALL OVER THE WORLD, so check us out.



My personal feelings on extended warranty's, and I tell this to all my customers, even the one's trying to just GIVE me free money. Extended warranty's are a money making scam. The dealers love them, but laptops rarely fail, when they do, they are from the hard drives becasue they are the last mechanical parts in the thing.

Unfortunately, ALL system builders (besides K/N) use OEM drives, the warranty is junk. I use RETAIL drives... it costs a lot more, but you get a 3-5 year warranty on your drive.

You are going to want a 7,200 rpm hard drive in that system. It will make a huge performance difference. My g/f has an ACER travelnote (most expensive deck of cards in the world). I took out the 5,400 rpm drive and threw in a 7,200 and the thing is seriously faster (it is only a Celeron 1.5 Ghz anyway).

For Photoshop, definately get the 1 GB of RAM... it will make the MOST bang for the buck performance difference in the system.

 

[3lfk1ng]

Get the Acer Aspire 5102WLMI

 

[sepffuzzball]

I've sold a few of these Acers, and they're actually pretty reliable machines.

I've checked out Killer Notebooks computers, and they make me giggle like a little schoolgirl they're so sexy. 8O

But anyway, the Acer's not a bad machine at all. The price seems a tad on the hefty side...I would've expected something a little more powerful than that intel 945 chipset. I'm sure with a little searching you can find a notebook of comparable price with at least a GeForce 6100.

And you definitely want the 1 GB of RAM for photoshop.

I use photoshop and macromedia flash on my Powerbook G4 with 2 GB of RAM and it runs nice...and it has the least amount of RAM of my 3 main computers I own, and it seems to even outperform my desktop with photoshop.

However, Mac pricing sucks. A lot. If you're on a budget, you'd have to get one used...

So all in all, the Acer is a good machine, but I think it may be a tad overpriced from what I'm used to.

 

[killernotebooks]

This is a pretty decent machine I found also,

ACER Turion


Acer AS5003WLCi AMD Turion 64 ML-32 1.8GHz / 802.11b/g Wireless / 15.4-Inch WXGA / 512MB DDR / 60GB HDD / CDRW / DVD Combo / Windows XP Home / Notebook PC