Acer's impressive One
For the past week I’ve been working on an Acer Aspire One running Linux and I have to say that it hits most of the right notes.
For a start the interface is exactly what you need on a netbook: simple and clean. The idea of extended dropdown menus, piles of desktop icons and the launchers usually seen on PCs is completely at odds with the intention of a netbook.
Acer does this right by making just the most obvious and needed launchers available to the user. So on the desktop you get a custom interface with launchers for a browser, email client, word processor and the likes. The browser is Firefox, the email client is dreadful and I have no idea of its heritage, and the office suite is OpenOffice.org. The email client just didn’t play nicely. It would have been a far better decision to include Thunderbird as the default mail client which has all the features that one could want.
Apart from the obvious launchers for these applications, most of the rest of the system is hidden away from the user which, frankly, is a good decision.
I know some of the more ardent Linux fans have been critical of the Linpus-based operating system on the system but I actually think that it’s not that bad at all. What I think most people are missing is that this is a netbook and it is intended not as a primary work machine but as a portable device for checking the Web and email while on the road. If you want to run Debian or Windows Vista or Ubuntu and hack it to death, then get a desktop PC or entry-level laptop. But if you want a portable Internet device then a netbook like the Acer is the way to go.
Comparisons
I’ve also been using an Asus EEE PC 701 – the one with the tiny screen – for some time now. The Asus EEE is a little smaller than the Aspire and it also has a much smaller keyboard. Which is one of the reasons the Aspire is more appealing. It’s keyboard and screen – it does 1024 pixels wide – make the Aspire much easier to user. The EEE’s tiny size makes working feel a little like trying to type a document on a mobile phone.
Of course the EEE is a lot cheaper at around R3 400 which makes it a much easier thing to buy than the Aspire which starts at around R4 500, which is starting to border on the price of an entry-level laptop. On the other hand, if looks are important to you then the Aspire One is the machine for you. Its shiny casing and neat design really makes it stand out.
Specs
The Aspire One uses the Intel Atom processor running at 1.6GHz which gives it a nifty feel but just 512MB of memory which feels a little underpowered. With an 8GB flash hard drive, an SD card slot as well as a 5-in-one card slot, however, there are good options available to add storage capacity. Interestingly, when an SD card is inserted into a slot the system automatically integrates the storage into the entire system. In other words, the 8GB capacity is extended by the volume inserted and it appears to the users as one, larger, drive instead of being mounted as another drive. There are benefits and pitfalls to this approach but I suspect the upsides outweigh the downsides in the end.
At its current price the Acer Aspire One is perhaps a little pricey but you do get a good machine if you have the cash to splash out on a netbook.
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