Acer Iconia A1-830 Wi-Fi tablet launched on Flipkart for Rs 11299

The Acer Iconia A1-830 Wi-Fi tablet which has hit India through Flipkart for a price of Rs 11299, is a slick piece of work mainly because of one element. If you haven’t spotted it yet, then we’ll point out that its design bears a faithful resemblance to the iPad mini.



Acer liked the look of the Apple device so much, it decided to make a version of it running Google’s mobile OS, we guess. The Iconia A1-830 is undoubtedly a good option for all those of you who’ve been craving for some Android action on an iPad mini duplicate.

This page on Flipkart shows the iPad mini 16GB Wi-Fi selling at Rs 17900 upfront and for approximately Rs 13900 if you trade in your old phone, tablet or laptop. From that point of view, there’s nothing but your love for Android stopping you from choosing the iOS tablet over the Iconia A1-830 Wi-Fi tablet variant priced at Rs 11299.

Acer Iconia A1-830 Wi-Fi specs at a glance:

- Dual core 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z2560 chip
- 7.9-inch 1024 x 768p LCD touchscreen
- Android Jelly Bean v4.2 OS
- 5MP main camera, 2MP webcam
- 1GB of RAM, 16GB ROM
- 32GB microSD card support
- Wi-Fi connectivity, no voice calling
- 4000mAh battery, 7.5 hours average use
- 138.4mm x 203mm x 8.15mm
- 375gm

Tablet Review - Acer Iconia A3 review

The Acer Iconia A3 is a 10.1in tablet with an entry-level price to match its rather basic design. At 560g, it's pretty hefty for a 10in tablet, and and this is something you really feel when holding it in one hand.

As the tablet is a chunky 10.2mm thick, we're not surprised it's heavy. As it's a budget Android tablet, we were also unsurprised to find the Iconia A3’s chassis is almost entirely plastic, which disappointingly has some flex when you exert any pressure to the back of the tablet. Still, you wouldn’t expect premium materials at this price, and the Iconia A3's weight and girth does at least make it feel robust.

Acer Iconia A3 thickness
The Iconia A3 is powered by a quad-core 1.2GHz MediaTek MT8125T system-on-a-chip (SoC) paired with 1GB RAM. This chipset has slightly lower performance than the Nvidia Tegra 3 we often see in similarly-priced tablets. In our SunSpider JavaScript benchmark, which is a good indicator of web browsing performance, it managed to complete the test in a rather slow 1,503ms. The tablet could be slow to render web pages and had some hesitation when scrolling around, but web browsing performance was generally acceptable.

The Iconia A3's graphics are handled by a PowerVR SGX 544 GPU. In our 3DMark Ice Storm Unlimited test, the tablet scored 2,553 and 1,539 in Ice Storm Extreme. This is considerably less than the Google Nexus 7 managed, with its score of 7,154. The Acer Iconia A3 handles less graphics-intensive games, such as Angry Birds, fine, but it will struggle to run more taxing titles such as Real Racing 3 at decent graphics settings.

The Iconia A3 has 16GB of built-in storage, which is expandable through a microSD slot located on the left of the tablet. In fact, the left side is where you'll find most of the controls and ports, such as the power button, Micro USB charging port, headphone jack and Mini HDMI socket. The right side of the tablet only has the volume controls.

Acer Iconia A3 tablet back
It's a shame the connections aren’t better balanced, as it can make the tablet a bit fiddly to use; for example, the charging port is located so close to the power button that unlocking the device is tricky when the tablet is plugged in to charge.

There are stereo speakers on the bottom-left and right of the tablet, but these are placed in such a way that it’s easy to cover them with your hands when holding the device, muffling the sound. The speakers are at least quite loud, so you might not always need headphones for Skype calls or YouTube videos.

The Iconia A3 also supports Dolby Digital Plus, which can create virtualised 5.1-channel surround from normal headphones. We found it created a wider soundstage for music and generally preferred to leave it switched on. It made music sound a bit warmer than we would have liked, but when we turned it off our test tracks suddenly sounded flat and lifeless.

When watching films, Dolby Digital Plus also made dialogue clearer and dialled up the overall punch of sound effects and explosions. It also increased overall volume, both when using the built-in speakers and with headphones. This isn’t the ideal tablet to use to watch films on a long journey, however, as we saw just 7h 20m of continuous video playback in our video battery rundown test.

One of the Iconia A3's weaker aspects is its screen, and this certainly feels like an area where Acer has made compromises to keep the cost down. While it would always be difficult for the A3 to compete with more expensive tablets in terms of screen quality, we still found the display underwhelming.

The panel has a fairly low 1,280x800 resolution, which when paired with a 10.1in screen size makes for a pixel density of only 149ppi, so you won’t get the smooth text you see on tablets such as the Google Nexus 7 and iPad Air. Disappointingly, there is also no ambient light sensor, meaning you’ll need to adjust the brightness manually. At the display's maximum brightness setting, it was also difficult to see the screen in bright sunlight. We measured the screen's contrast ratio as 781:1, and our tests showed it could cover 66.4% of the sRGB colour gamut; neither of these are spectacular results. It's a fair screen for an inexpensive tablet, but is generally underwhelming.

The tablet runs Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, which is no longer the latest version of Android, but is common among cheaper models. It's not as pretty as 4.4 and you'll miss out on some fancy features such as Google Now integration, but 4.2 is still a perfectly fine operating system. Acer has not strayed far from the standard Android experience, aside from pre-installing a number of apps, some of which are more useful than others. It comes with a free version of McAfee Mobile Security which frustratingly you can’t uninstall and regularly prompts you to upgrade to a premium version; as you'd expect, this is deeply annoying. Even third-party uninstallers weren't able to touch it, at least not without root access.

Acer has included some of its own handy tweaks, however. Acer IntelliSpin detects when the tablet is lying flat, such as on a table, and can still detects when you rotate the device to adjust from portrait to landscape. With standard Android, you have to pick the tablet up from the table to make the screen rotate. You also get the Acer Remote Files and PicStream apps. The former lets you access files on your computer remotely, and the latter automatically backs up photos and syncs them with your home PC.

It may be low in price, but the Acer Iconia A3 feels cheap and has a mediocre screen. However, if you really want a 10in tablet for well under £200 than you'll be hard pushed to find much on offer. At this price you'll have to make sacrifices and the Iconia A3 isn't a bad tablet, although it's also worth considering the smarter-looking Lenovo Yoga Tablet 10, which has a great design but is saddled with an unusual Android interface. While you can still get the excellent Asus MemoPad FHD 10 for as little as £200 from Expansys.

Specifications:

Hardware
Processor	Quad-core 1.2GHz MediaTek MT8125T
RAM	1GB
Screen size	10.1in
Screen resolution	1,280x800
Screen type	IPS
Front camera	0.3 megapixels
Rear camera	5 megapixels
Flash	No
GPS	Yes
Compass	Yes
Storage	16GB
Memory card slot (supplied)	microSD
Wi-Fi	802.11n
Bluetooth	4
NFC	No
Wireless data	No
Size	260x175x10mm
Weight	560g
Features
Operating system	Android 4.2.2
Battery size	7300mAh
Buying information
Warranty	one-year RTB
Price	£180
Supplier	www.argos.co.uk
Details	www.acer.co.uk
Part code	A3-A10

Acer Iconia A1-713 with 3G and voice calling support launched at Rs 12999

With the Acer Iconia A1-713, the company has done well to infuse the Indian market with a powerful tablet that does voice calling and is available for just Rs 12999. Its components as well as its asking amount make it a worthy competitor to the newly announced Flipkart tablet named the Digiflip Pro XT 712 and others.

The Iconia A1-713 sports a 7-inch display which has its resolution locked at 1024 x 600 pixels. It runs the Android 4.2 Jelly Bean operating system, but Acer has promised an update to the 4.4 KitKat version which will be rolled out in the near future.

This device comes equipped with a quad core processor made by MediaTek, that has its clock speed set at 1.3GHz. It is assisted by 1GB of RAM, while storage-wise, the tablet offers a 16GB module. There’s a microSD card slot present on it as well, in case you’re a fan of expandable storage.

The Acer Iconia A1-713 has a 2MP camera placed on its rear surface, whereas a 1.3MP front-facing snapper also forms part of its offerings. This slate moreover, features a 3400mAh battery on it.

Here’s a quick glance at the specs of the Acer Iconia A1-713 tablet:

- 7-inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display
- Android 4.2 Jelly Bean OS (upgradable to KitKat)
- 1.3GHz quad core MediaTek MT8382 processor
- 1GB of RAM, 16GB of storage (expandable)
- 2MP rear, 1.3MP cameras
- 3400mAh battery
- 8.9 mm thickness
- 298g weight

Like we said, the Acer Iconia A1-713 has been priced competitively at Rs 12999. It should hit retail channels within India in the days to come.

Acer Aspire V11 fanless, touchscreen laptop review

Acer recently introduced a series of affordable, portable Windows notebooks with low-power processors aimed at balancing performance and battery life. The Acer Aspire E 11 line of notebooks feature 11.6 inch displays, Intel Bay Trail processors, and starting prices as low as $250.

 

The company also sells a similar laptop called the Aspire V11. The key difference is that the V series models have touchscreen displays and prices that start at $350.

While none of these machines are speed demons, they’re portable notebooks that weigh around 3 pounds, offer reasonably long battery life, decent performance for basic tasks, and low enough power consumption to support a fanless design: Neither the Acer Aspire E11 or Aspire V11 have vents or fans. That makes them quieter than most laptops.

Acer loaned me an Aspire V11 touchscreen notebook to review recently, and while this isn’t necessarily the best choice for everyone, it’s a solid notebook that could make a great device for use on the go. And unlike cheap portable notebooks of the past, the Aspire V11 might not just be a companion to your desktop or full-powered notebook. This sub-$400 laptop might be the only PC you really need.

Overview
The laptop featured in this review is the top-of-the-line Acer Aspire V11 with a 2.16 GHz Intel Pentium N3530 quad-core processor, 4GB of RAM, and a 500GB hard drive. It’s available from the Microsoft Store for $369.

It has a 1366 x 768 pixel touchscreen display with support for 10-finger touch input. It has 1 USB 3.0 port, 2 USB 2.0 ports, HDMI, Gigabit Ethernet, and a 3220mAh, 48Whr battery.

The Aspire V11 features stereo speakers, 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, and Windows 8.1 64-bit software. Unlike the Acer Aspire Switch 10, this laptop ships with relatively little bloatware: aside from a user manual, recovery utility, and update tool, there’s not much Acer-specific software loaded on this Windows notebook.

Similar, but cheaper models include:

• $250 Aspire E11 w/Celeron N2830 dual-core CPU , 2GB RAM and 320GB HDD  (Amazon)
• $330 Aspire E11 w/Pentium N3530 quad-core CPU, 4GB RAM, and 500GB HDD (Amazon)
• $350 Aspire V11 w/Celeron N2930 quad-core CPU, 4GB RAM, 500GB HDD (Amazon)

Some of those models also have smaller batteries, but they all have 7.5 watt Intel processors and fanless cases.

Design
Acer’s been making notebooks with 11.6 inch displays for ages, but this is one of the first models to feature a fanless design. Interestingly it’s still a rather compact system, measuring just about 0.85 inches thick and weighing less than 3.1 pounds.

Since there’s no fan, there are no vents on the case. In fact, there’s nothing at all on the right side. You’ll find a USB 2.0 port, SD card reader, and headset jack on the left.

The rest of the ports are on the back, which is a little higher than the sides of the laptop. That allows Acer to fit a full-sized Ethernet jack, as well as power, USB, and HDMI ports.

The glossy display reflects a bit of glare in direct sunlight — if you have a choice, you might not want to use this laptop while sitting with your back to a bright window — it can make the screen look a bit like a mirror. But that’s true of most touchscreen laptops these days.


What’s a bit unusual about this model is that there’s a black border around the viewable area of the touchscreen display and a second, thin plastic bezel around the entire screen.

Since Windows 8.1 relies on touchscreen gestures such as swiping from the edge of the screen, you need a bit of an on-screen bezel on Windows devices with touch panels. But since this model doesn’t have an edge-to-edge glass display, it looks a little odd.

The non-touchscreen Acer E11 models simply have a larger plastic bezel surrounding the display. You get the same amount of viewable screen space either way, but the upshot is that the V11 sort of looks like it has two screen bezels while the E11 has just one.

While the 1366 x 768 pixel display might not win any pixel density awards, it offers decent viewing angles and I had no problems watching a video while tilting the screen back and forth and side to side (you know, as one is likely to do while watching a video on a laptop).

The keyboard features chiclet or island-style keys which are reasonably well spaced.

While I’m not in love with the way Acer crams the arrow keys, volume, screen brightness, and Page, Home, and End buttons into a tiny space in the lower-right corner on its 11.6 inch laptops. But I was able to type comfortably at my normal typing speed while testing this laptop.

There’s a bit of flex in the keyboard, and it’s not backlit. But I wouldn’t expect any different from a laptop that sells for under $400.

Below the keyboard is a wide touchpad which supports multitouch gestures including two-finger scrolling and tapping.

Flip over the laptop and you’ll find the bottom panel is held in place by 13 screws. Remove then and you can pop off the cover pretty easily to get at the insides.

Once you’re in there you can remove a few more screws and lift the motherboard a bit to slide out the laptop’s slim 2.5 inch hard drive. It’d be pretty easy to replace the drive with a SSD or other storage.

You can also easily swap out the wireless card or remove the battery — although it’s pretty clear Acer didn’t really intend for the battery to be user replaceable, or it wouldn’t be protected by more than a dozen screws and hidden away inside the case.

If you want to upgrade the RAM you’ll have to go a bit further and detach a number of cables holding the motherboard in place, lift it entirely out of the case, and flip it over to access the single memory DDR3 memory slot. It’s doable, but a bit tricky.

The lid has a brushed metal look and a small Acer logo.

Performance
Intel’s Bay Trail processors are low-power chips based on the company’s Silvermont technology and Intel HD graphics. That means the Intel Pentium processor powering the Acer Aspire V11 has the same as the Atom chips in Windows and Android tablets like the Acer Aspire Switch 10 Windows tablet and Asus MeMO Pad 8 Android tablet.

But the Celeron and Pentium chips in this family use a little more power, run at higher clock speeds, and offer better all-around performance. While Intel Atom chips of yesteryear were clearly low-power processors, you could easily spend hours with the Acer Aspire V11 without realizing it has a chip that’s related to an Atom processor.

The laptop never felt sluggish while surfing the web with a dozen or more browser tabs open. I had no problems streaming HD videos from the internet. And it’s reasonably fast at CPU-intensive tasks including transcoding audio and video files.

Sure, a computer with a 7.5 watt Bay Trail CPU isn’t going to be as fast as a model with a Haswell processor — but the difference isn’t as great as you might expect. I ran a series of benchmarks on the laptop and compared the results with other systems including a Dell XPS 11 system with an 11.5 watt Core i5-4210y Haswell processor, the Acer Aspire Switch 10 with an Atom Z3745 Bay Trail CPU and an HP Envy X2 Windows tablet with an older Intel Atom Z2760 Clover Trail chip.

The Aspire V11 was more than twice as fast as the Clover Trail-powered system in most tests, significantly faster than the Atom Z3745 model, and not-quite-competitive with the Dell XPS 11… but the Acer laptop sells for a third of the price of the Dell tablet.

Note that the Aspire V11 also supports Intel’s QuickSync video encoding, so I was able to transcode the same video test file using a nightly build of Handbrake with QSV H.264 encoding in about 41 seconds.

That said, there are a few things to keep in mind with the Acer Aspire V11 when it comes to sheer performance. First, the notebook has a 5400RPM hard drive instead of a faster solid state drive. This means that some tasks might not run as quickly as they would on a system with an SSD.

For instance, it takes longer to create a large ZIP file on this laptop than on most of the other systems I’ve tested recently because those other systems have solid state drives. It also takes longer for Windows to boot or resume from sleep or hibernation.

Another thing to keep in mind about the hard drive is that it is the only component of the computer with moving parts (unless you count the keyboard and screen hinge). That means that while you won’t hear any fan noise while the system is running, you may occasionally hear a little whirring or clicking from the hard drive — although I rarely heard any noises at all during the week or so that I spent using this laptop.

Note that you can replace the hard drive with a solid state drive by opening up the case, but you’ll need to clone your disk image if you want to keep your Windows 8.1 setup. Otherwise you’ll need to install an operating system from scratch on your new drive.

In order to keep the notebook from overheating during use, Acer uses a passive heat sink rather than a fan. Most of the time it seems to work pretty well.
During average use, the CPU temperature of the Acer Aspire V11 seems to hover between 56 and 60 degrees Celcius. The bottom of the laptop gets moderately warm during extended use, but it’s not uncomfortable. You might also notice a little warmth in the keyboard, but most of the heat goes out through the bottom of the laptop.

When running my video transcoding tests with the CPU running full blast, the temperature rose to 70 degrees Celcius for a little while before returning to a more comfortable 60 degrees. While both temperatures are well within Intel’s safety guidelines, the warmer the CPU gets the warmer the bottom of the laptop gets.

I was sitting in a coffee shop with the laptop on a table during these tests, so I had to pick it up to check the bottom — but it was uncomfortably hot to the touch. It might not get quite as hot when resting on an uneven surface with no airflow… like your lap. But it’s worth noting that the bottom of the Acer Aspire V11 can get pretty warm when running resource-intensive tasks.

While the Aspire V11 isn’t exactly a speed demon, and it doesn’t really have the graphics chops for playing bleeding edge games, it has more than enough power for editing documents, surfing the web, watching videos, or playing casual games.

It also gets reasonably good battery life, thanks in part to the same low-power processor that allowed Acer to create a fanless laptop.

Acer promises up to 7 hours of run time, and based on my tests, that seems just about right. You’ll probably run down the battery more quickly if you’re watching a lot of videos or doing other heavy duty tasks. But with the screen brightness set to around 50 or 60 percent, WiFi on, and an awful lot of web surfing, I regularly got around 6 or 7 hours of battery life from this laptop.

That’s not quite all-day battery life, but it might be close enough for many people — and it means you can probably leave the laptop’s charger at home some of the time. That helps make this 3.1 pound laptop truly portable. 

Touchscreen notes
A few years ago I was skeptical of the idea of slapping touchscreen displays on laptops. Sure, a touch panel makes sense for a 2-in-1 system that transforms into a tablet, but why would you need a touchscreen on a normal laptop?

Well, most of the time you don’t. But it’s actually a pretty nice feature to have if you’re using the notebook on your lap since you can reach up to the screen and tap the icons, links, or other items you’re looking for. Sometimes this is faster and easier than reaching down to the touchpad, dragging a cursor to the correct spot, and then tapping.

If you use an external mouse with this system, you might never need the touchscreen. But laptops with touchscreens don’t cost much more than non-touch models these days and the only down side is that you almost never see touchscreen notebooks with matte displays. But most non-touch laptops on the market have glossy displays too.

Anyway, aside from the strange double-bezel design of the Aspire V11, the touchscreen works pretty much as you’d expect. It support tapping, dragging, and swiping as well as multi-touch gestures. And the hinge is pretty sturdy, allowing you to tap the screen without causing it to wobble too much.

Linux notes (Updated)
An earlier version of this review stated that there was no USB boot option in the bootloader, which was a reasonable assumption since that’s the error message you get when you use the Advanced Startup options in Windows to try to boot from a USB drive.

It turns out you can boot from removable USB device like a CD/DVD drive and that lets you run Ubuntu or other operating systems. But you’ll need to use the Advanced Startup options to enter the UEFI Firmware settings, and do one of two things:

1. You can enable legacy boot mode, make sure to plug your removable storage device into the USB 2.0 port on the left side of the laptop (the USB ports on the back won’t work), and make sure to either adjust the boot order so the laptop checks for a USB drive before booting from the hard drive or enable the F12 boot menu option so that you can hit F12 when the PC is loading and manually choose the device you want to boot from.

Note that when legacy boot mode is enabled, Windows 8.1 doesn’t seem to load. So you may have to re-enabled UEFI boot in order to return to Windows.

2. You can leave UEFI enabled, but make sure to enable support for the F12 boot menu from the UEFI firmware settings. You might also want to disable quick boot so that you’ll know when to hit the F12 button during boot.

Now you can plug in a USB drive to the left-side USB port and choose it from the boot menu after hitting F12 during startup. Note that if you simply use the Windows 8.1 Advanced Startup options to try to boot from a USB drive, you’ll get a message stating that the system “doesn’t have any USB boot option,” so you’ll need to use the F12 boot menu.

Once legacy boot was turned on, I was able to boot into an Xubuntu 14.04 liveCD and take Linux for a spin on the notebook. Just about everything seems to work, including WiFi, the webcam,  the keyboard, touchscreen, touchpad, and two-finger scrolling.

Some keyboard shortcuts seem to work — I was able to mute the laptop by pressing Fn + F8, for instance. But when I tried to use the shortcuts to adjust screen brightness I saw a pop-up notification suggesting that I was dimming and brightening the display, but it didn’t actually get any brighter or dimmer.

Verdict
If you’re looking for a laptop with a blazing fast CPU, a high-resolution display, an all-metal case, or a backlit keyboard, the Acer Aspire V11 isn’t it. But this little laptop does offer an awful lot for $369.

It’s reasonably fast, gets reasonably good battery life, has a quiet, fanless design, features a touchscreen display, and it’s rather compact.

There are cheaper models in this series with slower processors (and smaller batteries), but when a top-of-the-line model costs just $369, I can’t think of many reasons to opt for the lower-priced models (unless you really don’t need a touchscreen, in which case the $330 Aspire E3-111-P8DW model looks like a great deal).

If you’re looking for a truly silent system and one that offers a little more performance, you might want to consider replacing the hard drive with an SSD. But with the prices of solid state storage falling, it’d be easy to do that by spending an extra $100 or less.

Acer C720 Chromebook Has the Power of a Real Laptop

Acer wants you to know that its Chromebook can beat up your Chromebook. The company just launched its C720 Chromebook, which packs a fourth-generation ("Haswell") Intel Core i3 processor — the same kind of chip you'd find in a "real" laptop.

Until now, almost all Chromebooks used mobile processors such as those from Samsung or Intel's Atom line (the big exception being the Google's Chromebook Pixel, which has a third-generation Intel Core i5).

The Acer is the first in a new line of "high performance" Intel-powered Chromebooks, first announced back in May.

With a Core i3 chip on board, the C720 should address one of the most common criticisms of Chromebooks: the lack of ability to multitask. With several browser tabs open — such as a YouTube video, a social network and other cloud-based services — a Chromebook's performance can often slow to a crawl.

The Haswell processor is better equipped to handle that kind of use, while also providing good battery life: The C720 is rated to last 8.5 hours. And there's another speed bonus: booting up the laptop takes a mere seven seconds, the company says.

Although storage doesn't matter as much on a Chromebook, since Chrome OS is almost entirely cloud-based, the Acer has 32GB instead of the usual 16GB. The 11.6-inch display has 1,366 x 768 resolution. Ports include USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 as well as HDMI for connection to an external monitor.

Acer is releasing two versions of the C720 with 2GB or 4GB of RAM, priced at $349.99 and $379.99, respectively. That's about $100 more than the average Chromebook. Clearly, there's a premium for performance.

Correction: The correct model number of Acer's new Chromebook is C720, not C270.

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.

Acer Aspire Switch 10 review: Affordable Windows 8 tablet and laptop in one device

At its New York launch event earlier this year, Acer announced its new hybrid tablet and laptop with Windows 8. Here's our full Acer Aspire Switch 10 review. 

The Switch 10 comes pre-installed with Windows 8.1 and can be picked up for £289 – a little more than the Toshiba Encore. Acer will be taking on the Lenovo Yoga and other hybrids like the Asus Transformer range and Samsung Ativ Q.

It's certainly affordable but that doesn't mean it's a good deal. Read our Acer Aspire Switch 10 to find out what this hybrid has to offer.

Acer Aspire Switch 10 review: Design and build

Like Lenovo's Yoga devices, the Switch 10 can transform between four different modes: laptop, tablet, tent and display. It does this with what Acer calls its 'Snap Hinge' which, with the help of magnets, clips the tablet to the keyboard dock. It does so fairly easily although quite aggressively – the two are unlikely to separate unless you want them to.

This is the device's main selling point and it works well, but the hinge doesn't fold all the way round like the Lenovo Yoga though, so don't try that unless you want to risk breaking it. Instead you have to spin the tablet around 180 before folding it back down onto the keyboard, leaving it upright in display mode (below) or standing the device in tent mode.

We have discovered an unfortunate design flaw in the Switch 10. If you push the screen away from you in laptop mode the device eventually falls over due to the weight of the main tablet section. This perhaps won't occur if you buy the keyboard dock with a hard drive but we can't say for sure.

The keyboard dock doesn't have a battery to charge the tablet like some hybrids but does come with an optional 500GB hard drive. It has a USB port on the right hand side as standard which is handy for plugging in a mouse or an external hard drive – the main tablet doesn't have one.

As is all too common, the keyboard and trackpad are nothing special; the former makes for pretty fiddly typing due to miniature size keys and the latter was quite sporadic during our time with the Switch 10. It also requires a deep press for mouse buttons.  

Overall, the Aspire Switch 10 feels a bit chunky but sturdy at the same time. The tablet alone is 8.9mm which isn't bad but at around 1.2kg when the device is docked to the keyboard is pretty heavy for a 10in laptop.

The build quality of the keyboard dock is distinctly cheap and plastic but things are better when it comes to the tablet. It feels solid and although it also uses a certain amount of plastic, the brushed metal rear cover is a nice touch for a device as affordable as this.

Acer Aspire Switch 10 review: Hardware and performance

As you can gather from the name, the Aspire Switch 10 has a 10.1in screen which has good viewing angles thanks to its IPS panel. The touchscreen display is bright and colours pop nicely. It uses a 1366 x 768 resolution which is about right for the price.

Although the screen is one of the best features of the Switch 10, we found the adaptive brightness unpredictable and annoying so switched it off. We also feel that Acer could have fitted in larger screen due to those fat bezels – 11.6in would fit by our measurements.

Not only would this make watching video and web browser much more enjoyable, it would make Windows 8.1 easier to interact with. Luckily, the touchscreen is nice and responsive but it's not always easy to accurately hit where you're aiming. On the software front, there's fair amount of added bloatware – mainly Acer's own but also other items like eBay. You can easily uninstall anything you don’t wish to keep hold of.

Inside is an Intel Atom Z3745 (Bay Trail T) 1.33GHz quad-core processor and 2GB of RAM. Performance is reasonable and you'll be able to do regular day-to-day tasks like web browsing and word processor on the Switch 10 but don't expect the device to cope with anything remotely strenuous.  

We measure the Switch 10's performance with PCMark 7 and got a result of just 2486 points – somewhat disappointing for a quad-core x86 processor. Our graphics benchmarks using Stalker: Call of Pripyat yielded a poor result averaging 10fps over four different tests.

On the battery life side of things we measured 6 hours 15 minutes in our looped-video rundown test - playing an HD quality film over Wi-Fi with the screen set to a comfortable 120 cd/ms brightness. A reasonable result which means the device should get you through a day of varied use.

There's a choice of 32- or 64GB of internal storage and our 32GB review sample has only 10GB free out-of-the-box so it might be worthwhile investing in the higher capacity model or the keyboard dock with a built-in drive. Alternatively, there's a microSDXC card slot on the side of the tablet so you have a few options here.

Alongside the microSD card slot are a couple of handy ports. There's a microUSB port (not for charging) and a Micro HDMI port. These make it easy to connect other devices to the Switch 10, or hook the device itself to a larger display.   

Acer includes a 2Mp front facing camera for video calls and it's refreshing to see front facing stereo speakers which are mounted below the display.

• Build Quality: 
• Features: 
• Value for Money: 
• Performance: 
• Overall: 

Although the Acer Aspire Switch 10 is very affordable, it's another hybrid which is neither great at being a laptop nor a tablet. It's both bulky and fiddly. We like the IPS screen and the multi-mode ability thanks to the magnetic hinge (minus the top heaviness). However, the keyboard and trackpad are lacklustre and there really nothing to get excited about in terms of specs and performance. We're yet to be convinced by a hybrid.

Acer Asphire S7 Review : Just Short of Amazing

Price : 102,000

PROS

·         Slim form factor

·         Gorgeous screen

·         Great build quality

·         Heat management

CONS

·         Average battery life

·         Keyboard could have been better

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Our Verdict

It's hard not to fall in love with the Acer Aspire S7's looks and fall in love we did. This Ultrabook isn't only about looks however. Intelligent design and hardware choices means that this device performs just as good as it looks. If only the battery life was better and the keyboard more ergonomic, this could have been the best Ultrabook yet.

The thing with fancy gadgets is that they’re fancy. They’re meant to feel like a million dollars and to make you seem like you’re worth a million dollars and that’s exactly what the Acer Aspire S7 392 seeks to achieve. It’s a beautiful, sleek slab of gorilla glass, metal and plastic that weighs next to nothing and is still a very capable computer.

Design and Build

If ever there was a laptop that was built just for showing off, this has to be it. It’s a very slim laptop at just barely 1.2cm tall. In fact, the entire device is slimmer than the just the screens of most laptops. As a consequence of the device being so slim, it’s also very light and thus, very portable. We carried this device on our trip to COMPUTEX 2014 and all we can say is that our backs were very thankful to the low weight and slim form-factor.

You may not notice it at first, but the lid of the S7 is actually coated in Gorilla Glass. Yep, the same stuff that adorns your smartphone. We were a little apprehensive of the idea of a glass lid, but all apprehensions were laid to rest when we spent some time with the device. The glass lid gives the laptop a very premium air and it’s made of good glass, so we didn’t notice even one scratch over the month or so that we spent with the device.

As you would have understood by now, the device is very well-built. There is obvious attention to detail and everything about the design feels very polished and refined. If anything, the only slight issue we have with the design is with the power adapter, which feels like something that would belong a cheap netbook than an expensive Ultrabook (especially one that costs over Rs.1,00,000). But this is such a tiny little issue and we’ve only mentioned it because it’s the one discordant note in an otherwise exquisitely designed laptop.

Also, the device comes with a very nice laptop sleeve that’s just as well designed as the S7 itself and is the perfect companion to such a device.

Features and Ergonomics

Despite being so slim, Acer didn’t scrimp out on features. The hinge can swivel to 105° and 180°, you get two USB 3.0 ports, one on either side, and you get an SD card reader along with the usual Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity and HDMI support. But that’s not all, Acer also provides an “Acer Companion Port” with adapter; a combination that gives you an extra USB 2.0 port, an Ethernet port and a VGA port. There is no optical drive, but who really needs one these days?

In terms of ergonomics, the laptop is actually quite comfortable and that’s primarily because it’s so slim that you don’t notice the weight. That said, the keyboard could definitely have been better designed. It’s adequate, but after getting used to the truly sublime keys of a device like the Toshiba Portege Z30t or Lenovo Yoga 2, these seem a little frustrating. Ditto the touchpad, which, again, while adequate, could have been much better.

The touch-screen on the other hand, is the exact opposite of the touchpad and keyboard because it’s very responsive and a pleasure to use.

Performance

For a device that’s this slim, the S7 doesn’t compromise on performance in the least. It’s powered by the Intel i5 4200U CPU which seems to be a very popular option nowadays. What’s interesting is that the CPU doesn’t seem to be throttled back, something that we’ve seen on other devices in this category. The load temperatures are quite high at 79°C, but the “TwinAir” cooling design (as Acer calls it) is surprisingly effective and we didn’t feel the heat in the least. This is a very good example of intelligent design because it allows the CPU to run at full blast while keeping your lap safe from the heat.

Keeping that in mind, it wasn’t a surprise to see that the performance was at par with just about every other i5 4200U powered device in the market. Now the 4200U is, by itself, quite enough for most laptops, but it’s the overall package of the S7, with the bundled SSD, that makes the PC feel so zippy.

PCMark 8	2145
3DMark	41535
Peacekeeper	4451
Cinebench R15	230
Sniper Elite V2	13.1
Battery Life	200
Screen Brightness	226.08
Contrast Ratio	550:1
Max. Temperature	79

The screen is also quite excellent and features a brightness of over 200cd/m² and a contrast ratio of around 550:1, which is exceptional. The measured battery life was a bit low at just under 3.5hours, we did expect more from the device, but that can be attributed to the fact that the device is so slim that it couldn’t possibly hold a higher capacity battery. Our battery tests do stress the system considerably so you should expect between 4-5 hours usage from this device at the very most.

User Experience

The Acer Aspire S7 is very capable as a portable laptop. We found it to be comfortable to carry and use and we never really had any complaint with regards to the performance. Everything was fast and zippy and very responsive. The one major complaint we had was with the keyboard. While it’s adequate for typing something short, such as a URL, a short e-mail, etc., it’s definitely uncomfortable when you have to type long articles. Also, the volume of the speakers is also a little less than we would like, but at the same time, the screen is so nice and the colours so punchy that while watching movies, it really felt like we were noticing some details for the first time.

Verdict

The Acer Aspire S7-392 could have been the very best Ultrabook in the market, but minor issues with the keyboard and battery life prevent it from achieving greatness. That said, this is still a great Ultrabook and is better than most. While it’s not perfect, it’s definitely a device worthy of consideration. The asking price is very high, but maybe that’s a price you’re willing to pay for gorgeous looks. This is a device to lust for, not something you need.