Usually ultraportable notebooks are designed mostly for browsing, working with text documents and multimedia applications. Acer, however, has decided to boost the performance of travel class machines by putting Corei3 CPU, loading it with Windows 8 and still keeping the price below $500. This here is Acer Aspire V5.
The 11-inch V5 packs a 2x 1.5GH Intel Core i3 processor with 4GB of DDR3 system memory
Acer V5 family offers thin machines for the people on a tight budget who still don’t want to sacrifice performance for mobility. Starting at 10-inch up to 15.6 inches the machines offer nothing short of a notebook experience in a very compact shell.
The case of the machine corresponds the most to its low cost. The glossy plastic feels cheap and makes the whole construction look and feel weakly built. At least overheat is not an issue even during multitasking.
Our test device came at 11.6 inches or in pixels that is 1366×768. Screen brightness level nailed 183 lux, which compared to most of the devices in that class, is a pretty good result.
The visual performance here is handled by AMD graphics card using HD Internet technology
We enjoyed watching a few trailer videos, so if you don’t mind the 11-inch compact screen you will be ready to go watching movies on this one. The only discomfort you might experience comes from the glare display panel. Unfortunately, we were not that satisfied with the sound quality. It is quite flat and weak but then we again looked at the price we knew we could not possibly expect miracles from this one.
The island-style keyboard provides a smooth typing experience, the keys are sensitive and have a short stroke. The touchpad below is sensitive and responds to finger gestures.
Our 11-inch Acer Aspire V5 packs a dual core 1.5GH Intel Core i3 processor, combined with 4GB of DDR3 system memory. That’s probably the most you can get in terms of powerful performance for that money. The machine runs easy and smooth and we definitely would recommend it to people who often travel and like to optimize the time they spend on the road.
In short Acer V5’s family of ultramobile notebook machines provide the most you can get for under $500
Streaming full HD videos or playing common light games was not a problem as visuals here are handled by AMD graphics card using HD Internet technology.
To keep this machine lightweight and ultraportable Acer has sacrificed a little of the battery life. Heavy usage including surfing on WiFi will drain Acer V5’s battery in 4 hours. But it is still plenty of time to get a few things done.
What really surprised us was the presence of an USB 3 port here, there were 2 more USB 2 ports, as well as an HDMI port and a VGA dock.
In short Acer V5’s family of ultramobile notebook machines provide some of the best specifications you can get for under $500. You can find it both with Windows 7 and Windows 8 platforms.