Take your digital media into high-definition, widescreen territory with the Acer® Aspire AS5735-4950 Notebook featuring a cinematic 15.6” display, dual-core performance and digital media features that let you create, share and get more done on-the-go.
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Over the last year there haven't been many new Acer laptop releases, but those that have been released have been of top notch quality.
The most notable of the recent Acer laptop releases was the Ferrari 1100 that has added style and exclusivity to a gadget that is rapidly becoming every man's favourite toy. Another recent Acer laptop release is the sleek Aspire One ten-inch netbook, which is an upgrade of the previous Aspire one version and is immensely popular among portability-minded individuals. One of the most striking features of these laptops is the range of mouthwatering metallic colours they come in. Acer has cleverly maximised the screen size while still keeping the Aspire One light and portable. Ladies may be even more excited about the fact that the Aspire One Notebook now comes in pink.
The Acer 8930 gaming laptop, improved and released last year, is the antithesis of the Aspire one, as it is known as the giant of gaming laptops. The 18.4 inch monitor and NVIDIA GeForce 9700M GT graphics with 512MB of dedicated video memory offers one of the best gaming experiences around, although the price of $1800 (R18 000) is almost as hefty as this Acer laptop. The Aspire 8930 also boats a CineCrystal widescreen display and a Blu-Ray drive for a thrilling movie experience.
Three other notebook models powered by Acer's Gemstone platform were released last year: the 6930, 5735 and 4730. The 6930 is a hit with movie fans as the 16-inch HD Cine Crystal LCD panel and Dolby surround sound provide the laptop equivalent of home theatre heaven. The 5735 provides a large screen at a low price. The overall look and feel is that of a budget laptop but it does the job. The Aspire 4730 is almost priced as reasonably as a netbook but it offers all the added advantages of a laptop. This is the Acer laptop for the average Joe or college student; it is an average size and weight and has everything you need without all the unnecessary frills.
Online reviews show that people are generally very satisfied with their Acers laptops. They are of solid quality, good value and are the safe laptop option for many. Despite their reliable reputation, Acer is not stoic but keeps up with trends and the full range of Acer laptop options offer something for everyone.
Frances wrote this article for the online marketers My New Laptop laptops, notebooks and accessories a leading supplier of laptops, notebooks and accessories at prices to suit any budget.
Netbook manufacturers are bastardizing the netbook market with bells and whistles that are blurring the lines between a netbook and a notebook.
We noted in a Seeking Alpha article on March 10 that subsidized netbooks will start appearing.
Along with the growing competition among software service providers, we will see a new infrastructure taking hold, modeled after Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) (cheap printer, expensive ink) and the mobile service providers (cheap cellphone, expensive monthly wireless charge). This subsidized bundle model will grow the ARM netbook to greater market shares.
AT&T (T) seems to think it was a good idea. The wireless provider is offering subsidized netbooks for as little as $49.99 in two markets, Atlanta and Philadelphia. The catch is that buyers must sign a two-year contract for an AT&T data service plan, which starts at about $60/month.
The $49.99 gets you an Acer Aspire One with an 8.9-inch display, 1GB of memory, and a 160GB hard drive. One needs to sign a two-year deal for AT&T's Internet at Home & On the Go service, which starts at $59.95 a month.
We are seeing a blurring of lines between a netbook and a notebook. We envision netbooks for multimedia purposes for watching streaming video and DVDs. Asus (AKCPF.PK) is already marketing a netbook with a DVD player. Problem is, the netbook market is migrating upward to be a low-end notebook with a small screen for a few hundred dollars less, yet it is still a few hundred dollars more than the original intention of what a netbook was supposed to be.
Intel (INTC) probably hates the situation because it is getting practically nothing for its chip, which is eroding the notebook market. Microsoft (MSFT) gets smaller licensing fees as well. The only real winner is Asus, which is a 2nd or 3rd tier notebook supplier that is trying to get market share in the mobile space.
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| Acer is planning to launch several Intel CULV based notebooks in late April. Interestingly, the outfit will have 11.6, 13, 14 and 15-inch models based on the new platform. When it introduced its first Atom netbooks, Acer chose to stick with just one design, the aptly named Aspire One that is. When it comes to CULV notebooks, it seems we will have a lot more to choose from. Quanta has gotten the contract to build the 11.6-inch model, Inventec will take care of 13-inch production, while Wistron will build 14 and 15-inch Acer CULVs. The 13-inch model will use a magnesium aluminium alloy housing, so we're expecting it to end up thin, light and hopefully stylish. Obviously the 13-inch form factor is the most heavily contested market segment, as most vendors are launching similar models, and we're expecting quite a few 11.6-inch units to appear as well. However, this is the first time we've heard of a CULV based 14-incher, and so far only MSI has shown off a 15.6-inch model, the X-Slim X600. Although the CULV platform is primarily intended for very light and thin 11 to 13-inch notebooks, we think bigger models are also a very interesting concept. Unlike the compact models, which are basically meant to be your second, or even third PC, these 14 or 15-inch dual-core notebooks could completely replace desktops for a wide range of consumers. They should end up weighing under 2kg, and looking much better than regular notebooks with similar panel sizes. Add to that a reasonable price tag, and vendors could have a winner on their hands. Goldman Sachs is expecting CULV notebooks to sell for between $560 and $700, although we already know the top spec'd models will sell for just under $1000. Interestingly, market watcher believe CULV notebooks could end up with a 20 percent market share in the global notebook market, as consumers turn to cheaper and lighter machines in lieu of feature packet high-end notebooks. We hope to find out more about Acer's upcoming CULV offer soon. |
| Acer Aspire 4937G and Acer Aspire 4935G looks exactly the same. However, there are some differences
The GeForce G105M is just a rebranded 9300M with slightly higher clock speeds and Hybrid Sli function. Performance wise, the Aspire 4730ZG is better overall. There is a new model just launched; Acer ASPIRE 4937G-874G32MN - Vista™ Home Premium which is a good choice
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The rise of netbooks challenges Microsoft and other companies whose high-end operating systems may not run on the portable machines.
The popularity of netbooks, expected to increase during the global recession, has caught many high-tech companies off guard, including Microsoft.By the end of 2008, nine of the top 10 PC makers had entered the once-idling netbook market, pushing shipments up 160 percent in the third quarter year over year, according to NPD Group Inc.'s DisplaySearch. The market researcher estimates 14 million mini-note PCs shipped in 2008, compared to 1 million in 2007.
"Windows 7 requirements are not going to be any less than Vista was," says Rob Sanfilippo, lead analyst of development platforms at Kirkland, Wash.-based Directions on Microsoft. "I don't think it's going to make sense right away to run Windows 7 on netbooks. If you want your apps to be good citizens on netbooks, you need to think about what Windows XP supports."
Although Windows 7 is built on Vista, Microsoft contends that it will start faster and offer better power management to help prolong battery usage. Many developers-if they didn't blink-witnessed Microsoft Senior Vice President Steven Sinofsky, head of the Windows 7 effort, demo the next OS running on an unidentified netbook during the keynote at Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2008 last October.
Despite Microsoft's informal discussions about "MinWin," a stripped-down Windows core (100 files versus 5,000 files in Vista) this technology is not apparent in the Windows 7 beta. Unless Microsoft comes out with a netbook version of Windows 7, the resources and licensing costs of the OS make it unlikely for mini-note PCs in their current form factors.
Headed for the Clouds
The sudden appeal of netbooks, forecasted by DisplaySearch to represent 16 percent of the global notebook market by 2010, throws new challenges into app development. Steps below the desktop and laptop, developers will have to wrestle with whether to build apps that can run with mini-note PCs' hardware and software limitations. Most netbooks offer 8.9-inch screens at WSVGA 1024x600-a lower resolution than today's 1024x768. Netbooks can support Web browsing, Internet streaming, Web cams and office applications such as word processing easily, but many of these systems are not yet engineered to adequately display video and high-end graphics.
"My personal advice is for developers to start learning Web development and learning to harness cloud computing and Software as a Service," says developer Stephen Chapman, who reviewed the Windows 7 beta for Redmond Developer News and authors the UX Evangelist blog. "It would help to perhaps overcome limitations of, say, where you couldn't code an application to use DirectX [DX], you could harness something like Silverlight through a Web app. If a netbook does have the capacity for DX9, then perhaps WARP 10 in Windows 7 will be a way for a developer to achieve DX10 graphics without DX10 hardware-but then it's a matter of how powerful of a processor any given netbook may have."
Don Burnett, a Microsoft MVP and interactive developer and designer, tackled the subject of developing rich Internet apps for UMPCs and mini-note PCs in a recent blog, pointing to functionality in Expression Blend that supports building scalable, resolution-independent Windows Presentation Foundation and Silverlight apps. According to Burnett, developers can effectively run their work environments, Visual Studio Express and Expression Studio on mini-note PCs.
Directions on Microsoft's Sanfilippo says netbooks can't be ignored. "They're here to stay and they're going to get bigger in the next few years because they make a lot of sense," he asserts. "Given the economy, giving your workforce a $300 or $400 device rather than a $2,000 device certainly makes a lot of sense, because you're probably going to get 80 percent of the productivity out of a netbook as you would out of a $2,000 or at least a $1,000 notebook."
Think Small
For that reason, ISVs and enterprise developers need to start thinking in terms of, "What do we have to do to make existing apps make sense on a netbook?" These considerations range from downsizing the UI and supporting graphics resolutions that are a little bit lower, to thinking about what kind of hard drive space you're going to have locally and what you might move to the server, or even looking at cloud computing solutions that would make more sense when mated with a netbook, Sanfilippo advises.
Developers also need to keep an eye on how much of their focus is on Windows 7 apps for desktops or notebooks versus app compatibility with an OS that will work with netbooks. "You don't want to bet everything on Windows 7 unless Microsoft comes out and says, 'This is going to be on netbooks too,''' Sanfilippo says.
Meanwhile, Microsoft's headaches are mounting in the low-cost portables market. At CES last month, several vendors showcased technology that could make its way into even lower-cost netbook platforms: Qualcomm Inc. is running Google Inc.'s Android Mobile OS on its Snapdragon chipsets. Freescale Semiconductor is demonstrating ARM processors, expected to power ASUS netbooks running Linux at price points as low as $199. And graphics powerhouse nVidia Corp. is demonstrating its Ion platform, announced in December, which combines its GeForce 9400M GPU with Intel Corp.'s Atom processor.
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 |  Dell CEO Michael Dell has done little to dispel rumors that his company is working on a mobile computing device. In fact, he all but confirmed them while traveling in Japan on Mar. 24 when he said: "It is true that we are exploring smaller-screen devices." What form those devices will take remains a matter of heated debate. Talk is that Dell plans a smartphone that would compete with Research In Motion's BlackBerry, Apple's iPhone, and the various devices running software from Microsoft Dell has tried its hand at smartphones before, with little success. The company discontinued its Axim personal digital assistant in 2007 following several years of lukewarm sales. "They didn't have a particularly exciting portfolio," says Neil Mawston, director for wireless device strategies at consultant Strategy Analytics. Carriers that reviewed its most recent effort saw little to set Dell apart from the competition, Wu says. "There's some interest, but not a whole lot," he says. Meantime the market is growing crowded. Rival PC makers such as Acer, Asus, and Lenovo have all jumped into the smartphone market. Palm is about to release a much anticipated device, the Palm Pre. Apple is expected to unveil a dramatic hardware A Jammed Smartphone Market Maybe now is not such a good time to launch a smartphone. Instead, Dell might want to introduce a different kind of handheld known as a mobile Internet device, or MID. These machines are larger and more powerful than smartphones, yet they're far smaller and of lighter weight than even the tiniest notebook computers known as netbooks. Consumers are amenable to using MIDs in place of smartphones, according to a recent survey by consultant ABI Research. The category is just emerging, so less competition would allow Dell to stake ground early. Companies such as Dell "will find a much easier time entering the [market for] 4- to 8-inch-screen devices," says John Bruggeman, chief marketing officer of Wind River Systems, which helps companies match hardware and software for handsets and MIDs. In contrast, even existing cell-phone makers, including Motorola and Sony Ericsson, are struggling in the smartphone market. "The incumbents are entrenched, it's difficult to break in," says Ashok Kuman, an analyst with Collins Stewart. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Chennai: Hewlett-Packard retained the top spot in the overall India client PC (notebooks and desktops combined) market with a share of 15.6% by unit shipments. Dell dislodged HCL from the second spot with an 10.9% share, while HCL was third with 9.6% of total PC shipments, according to IDC’s India Quarterly PC Tracker release.
HP looks to enter smaller towns
The overall domestic market shipments remained lower at 7.98 million during January-December 2008 as against 8.06 million in 2007. Desktop PC shipments dropped 10.1%* while notebook PC shipments recorded a growth of 31.5%* on a year-on-year basis.
HP expects EDS to extend service offerings
Table 1: India PC Shipments and Growth by Form Factor: CY 2008 over CY 2007*
| Form Factor | CY 2007 in '000s | CY 2008 in '000s | Growth 2008 over CY 2007 |
| Desktop PCs | 6,303 | 5,664 | -10.1% |
| Notebook PCs | 1,760 | 2,315 | +31.5% |
| Total Client PC | 8,063 | 7,979 | -1.0% |
*According to IDC’s India Quarterly PC Tracker 2008, 4Q 2008, March 2009 release
During the October-December 2008 quarter, the overall India client PC shipments were 1.56 million units, a drop of 22.7%* over the same period previous year. The desktop PC shipments dropped 24.7%*, while notebook PC shipments recorded a 17.4%* degrowth.
Hewlett Packard faces Rs 100-cr tax penalty
Table 2: India PC Shipments and Growth by Form Factor: 4Q 2008 vs. 4Q 2007*
| Form Factor | 4Q 2007 in '000s | 4Q 2008 in '000s | Growth (4Q '08 over 4Q '07) |
| Desktop PCs | 1,473 | 1,109 | -24.7% |
| Notebook PCs | 549 | 454 | -17.4% |
| Total Client PC | 2,023 | 1,563 | -22.7% |
In terms of desktop PC shipments during fourth quarter of 2008, HP and HCL were tied at first position with a market share* of 10.6% each, while Dell ranked third. In terms of notebook PC shipments during 4Q 2008, HP retained the top spot with a reduced market share* of 27.6% followed by Dell at the second spot while Acer came in third.
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“The home and SMB segments recorded the lowest drop (in percentage terms) in CY 2008 vis-Ã -vis CY 2007. The measures announced by the RBI to free up credit are expected to revive demand from these segment and a moderate recovery in shipments may result during the second half of CY 2009,” said Sumanta Mukherjee, Lead Analyst, Computing Products Research, IDC India.
“Despite these measures, CY 2009 could still see a drop in overall India Client PC shipments. Judicious inventory management, coupled with marketing initiatives to explore the hitherto untapped ‘long tail’ of customers in the Indian heartland could be the key to survival in a tough year,” opined Kapil Dev Singh, Country Manager, IDC India.
Table 3: India Client PC (Desktop + Notebook) Shipments: Top 3 Vendor Market Shares (% of units), 4Q 2008 vs. 4Q 2007*
| 4Q '07 Client PC Shipments | 4Q '08 Client PC Shipments | ||
| Vendor | Market Share | Vendor | Market Share |
| Hewlett-Packard | 17.6% | Hewlett-Packard | 15.6% |
| HCL | 10.8% | Dell | 10.9% |
| Lenovo | 8.9% | HCL | 9.6% |
IDC is the global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets.
After having their hands full at the MWC announcing new smart phones, Acer is now ready to start bringing some of these handsets to market. The DX900 should be available at the end of this month. The device is a touchscreen, 3G model that holds two SIM cards (one for high speed HSDPA and the other for the more pokey EDGE) and runs on Windows Mobile. As the calendar flips over to April, Acer is expected to release the X960. This device features a 2.8 inch touchscreen, a 3.2MP camera, GPS, a 5-way navigation button that lies under the screen and also runs on Windows Mobile.
Acer plans on a second quarter release of their two 3.8 inch touchscreen models, the M900 and the F900. The latter is a thin, stylish handset that anyone could use while the former, with a QWERTY keyboard slider, is aimed at the business market. Pricing and carrier availability for all of the handsets has not yet been mentioned.
| The thin F900 and the dual SIM DX900 |
| The X960 and the M900 with its QWERTY opened |
Whenever I get a new laptop for review, I tend to carry out a highly unscientific test that I like to call the backpack test.
I put the laptop/notebook in my well-worn backpack, jump on my bike, then cycle the 10km to work with it on my back. If I've got a sore back by the end of the trip I know I've got a heavyweight.
With Toshiba's NB100 ($999), there was hardly any indication that it was there, but then why would there have been, it weighs just over a kilogram and is smaller than an A3 envelope. The lack of a DVD drive helps keep the weight (and the price) down, as well.
With the NB100, Toshiba are taking on other netbooks from companies such as Asus, HP, Dell and Acer, and while it's not a bad effort, it's hindered by some design flaws.
Being smaller than a standard notebook, the keyboard is much more cramped (compounded by a battery that sticks out the back, forcing the keyboard forward) than on a standard laptop and it does take a bit of getting used to, especially if you're a touch typist, as I am. Users with podgy fingers will struggle.
The NB100 is finished on top in a nice, shiny black finish with speckles through it - although it will attract fingerprints - and the 8.9-inch screen is bright and vivid, but the finish was a little conservative, especially compared with some of the other Toshibas I've seen.
Battery life, too, seems less than what I had expected.
The NB100 ticks all the right boxes but I seriously missed not having a DVD drive to watch movies on - which made me question why Toshiba included its very own DVD playback software. Are they expecting that potential buyers will buy an external DVD drive as well?
I can see the NB100 perfect for a school that wants a pod of portable netbooks for its pupils that does the job for a good price but I'd rather pay a couple of hundred dollars extra and get a laptop that has a DVD drive already installed, even if it would make my bike commute that little bit harder.
This is sure to kick up the ol’ “what’s a netbook and what’s a notebook?” debate. The macles* blog says that Acer isn’t content with their 8.9- and 10-inch netbook models, so they’re outing an 11.6-inch Aspire One. Hmm… it probably should be the Aspire Three at this point, but I’m no marketing or product-naming guru. Anyway, this looks appealing if you want a tad bigger screen and higher resolution than most of the comparable netbooks out there. Acer’s going with a 1366×768 display, which I think is close to ideal: I’ve long thought that my 13.3-inch MacBook could squeeze in a res greater than 1280×800.
Even with the bigger display, Acer expects solid battery life thanks to the newer Intel Atom Z530 and Poulsbo chipset: four hours on a standard battery is the plan. The keyboard looks redesigned as well: it has a look simliar to Dell’s Inspiron Mini. Acer tends to compete very well on price, so whether you call this a netbook or a notebook, I suspect you can call it your own for under $450. Just a guess on my part since there’s no official pricing or availability details yet.
