Review: Acer Aspire S3, the slim, light and powerful ultrabook

Ultrabook - that very phrase alludes to the convenient fusion of a super slim laptop with enhanced portability, solid battery life and well to do (if not opulent) specifications. In short, the concept has been projected as the master of all trades, targeting the newer, more technologically inclined customers of the already competitive world of laptops, albeit with some budgetary considerations. In relation to this there has been a slew of such ultrabook conceptions that have followed the 'slim is beautiful' dictum of Apple's MacBook Air. Well, the Acer Aspire S3 is one of them, and it does shake up the competition with its comparatively low price of $899 (which is about $300 less than its nearest peers of Lenovo and Asus).

Acer Aspire S3

What is it:

The ultra-thin propensities of these newer laptops have a clear influence of the 2008's released MacBook Air. Since then (and particularly in the last few months) Windows and Intel have floated and flaunted the idea of Ultrabooks - a laptop with portability, good battery life and reduced price. The latest in this evolved line of notebooks is the sleek Acer Aspire S3, which manages to 'almost' fulfill all the criteria of an ultrabook.

Key features:

Draped in a sober aluminum body, the Acer Aspire S3 comes with a light weight of 3 lbs (1.4 kg), while the thickness (or rather thinness) revolves around half an inch. The overall dimensions figure a swanky yet trimmed 12.6 x 8.5 inches, along with an ubiquitous 13.3 inch display.

Coming to mid ranged specs, the Aspire S3 is powered by a 1.6GHz Intel Core i5 2467M along with 4GB, 1,333MHz DDR3 of memory. The hard disk is paired in a hybrid configuration with 20GB of SSD along with a standard 320GB HDD. The operating system is of course the Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit), while the GPU is provided by Intel HD3000.

What’s innovative:

According to Acer, the technology infused inside this sleek notebook will make the machine wake from the sleep mode in just two seconds, while resuming connectivity with networks in two and a half seconds. Also in another instance, the company has affirmed that the S3 can chug off to work from 'deep sleep mode' (we read it as hibernate mode) in just about six seconds. And if that was not enough, the notebook has a 'touted' whopping stand by time of 50 days, which is actually 20 days more than MacBook.

Price and availability:

Despite all the hullabaloo over its touted technology and instant-on features (which only time and testing can verify), the real advantage of the Aspire S3 lies in its low pricing of just $899. In terms of comparison, a MacBook with similar specs costs about $1,299. As for availability, the notebook has already made its commercial debut in the United States.

Accessories:

Featuring a chiclet keyboard, the plastic keys (especially the more important arrow keys) could have been a tad bit larger for that optimized user experience. On the other hand, the click-pad style touch-pad is actually bigger than many of other Windows ultrabooks.

The up side:

On the aesthetic side of affairs, the Acer Aspire S3 emanates a nigh abstinent 'business class' effect with its composed metal finish on the outside. But beyond the sober visuals, the main pitch for Aspire S3 will always be its intriguingly low pricing.

On the scope of user comfort, the overall design does give us a feel of being light and thin, perhaps accentuated by the metallic aluminum cover. The softer edges also make for a more efficient ergonomic experience than the renowned MacBook Air. And all of these is fairly complimented by the satisfactory specifications (for a notebook), along with the much touted instant-on features.

The down side:

The styling of the Aspire S3 almost has that 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' vibe. While the outer bearing exhibits a crisp albeit sedate demeanor, the inside paraphernalia of keys revert back to tacky plastic, thus alluding to a lack of aesthetic continuity. The smaller size and stiffness of the keys also actually doesn't help the case of user comfort for S3.

Now, because of the machine's inherent low price, something has to give on the performance scale. Acer does that by cropping up a few attributes like no USB 3.0 support and the 1368x768 display having a lower resolution than other comparable ultra-books. The SSD also corresponds to 20 GB, while in comparison MacBook's SSD stores 128GB.

Finally, the battery life has also been found to be considerably low.

Our experience:

The overall outer look and feel of the machine is good enough to have that business class appeal. Though, the built is certainly lacking in some definitive features with a wobbling effect even when the laptop is set, or the plastic keys requiring considerable pressure for typing speed. In contrast, the bigger touch-pad exudes a much better multi-touch scrolling attribute than most other notebooks.

Bottom line:

The light and thin Acer Aspire with its cheap price and convenient instant-on features does have the potentiality to challenge the more costly MacBook and Samsung Series 9. So, in a way the contraption does exhibit a slew of new features. But the essence of the overall design and performance also makes a frank assessment (albeit unintentionally) on what could have been better.