The Acer Aspire 1825PTZ may be small, but it’s no longer acceptable for slim laptops and netvertibles to compromise on performance. Modern tablets – such as the Apple iPad – offer near instant speed performance, so the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ and its Intel setup will have to be good if it’s to compete. Read on to find out how it gets on in this section of our Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review.
Read the rest of our Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review:
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review: Tablet tested
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review: Speed and performance
The 11.6-inch screen on the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ is the perfect size for portable use, and the 1366 x 768-pixel panel is sharper than the majority of laptops. There’s enough space to fit a couple of windows side by side when used in landscape mode, although text can be a little too small for comfortable use.
The touchscreen uses capacitive technology, responding really well to finger prods. The Windows 7 touch pack software provides an onscreen QWERTY keypad if you need to type anything in tablet mode – it’s fine for typing basic URLs, but unlike the Apple iPad it’s lacking correction software, so can be a pain when writing anything more than a line or two.
Battery life is one area where Acer Aspire 1825PTZ excels, lasting for over seven hours on a single charge. You’ll have to work hard if you want to meet Acer’s claimed eight hour time, however, with the screen dimmed and Wi-Fi turned off.
It’s a bit of a shame really, as the screen looks nowhere near as vibrant when not at full brightness, with colours appearing muted. That said, you’ll still be able to get around five hours with the radios turned on and the brightness whacked up full, so it’s not all bad.
Part of the reason the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ achieves such a decent battery life is down to the size of the battery. With a 6-cell battery life place, it dwarves the likes of the Samsung X120, which only has space for a 3-cell battery. The problem with sticking in a big heavy battery is that it can unbalance the machine, and this is what’s happened with the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ. It’s uncomfortable to hold in one hand in tablet mode, unless you hold the side with the battery itself, the problem then being the size of the battery – it’s far too clunky for those of us with smaller hands.
All this is sounding a bit disappointing, especially if you compare the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ with the uber svelte Apple iPad. Put simply, the 1.8kg weight is simply too heavy to hold for long periods of time. Our hands ached from gripping it tightly, our wrists ached from the unbalanced weight, and overall it still feels a bit like you’re holding a normal laptop.
Another factor that helps the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ to achieve a decent battery life is the use of low powered components throughout. The screen is an LED backlit panel, using less power than traditional fluorescent backlighting. Acer has also fitted a low powered Intel Pentium processor in the Aspire 1825PTZ, running at 1.3GHz.
The processor in the Acer needs just 10W of power, whereas traditional Intel Core 2 Duo chips require 35W. If you’re looking for more power, a low voltage Core 2 Duo processor is available in the more expensive Acer Aspire 1825PT.
Graphics are handled by an integrated Intel GMA X4500 GPU, again saving on power and keeping the price down.
Performance is in line with most other integrated GPUs. This means that all but the most basic of games are out, but otherwise it copes fine with most everyday tasks, even running 1080p video files without trouble.
Aiding the Acer’s portable pretensions, it is possible to buy the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ with an integrated 3G adapter, letting you check out Electricpig wherever you go. We didn’t get the opportunity to try that out, however, as our review sample omitted this feature.
As to whether the Acer Aspire 1825PTZ performs well or is a disappointment depends on what your requirements are. If you’re expecting an out and out rival to the iPad, then it’ll be the latter. However, it remains a lot more versatile, and even if it’s slower it’s capable of a lot more for those who require a working file structure.
Review sample supplied by saveonlaptops.co.uk
Read the rest of our Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review:
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review: Tablet tested
Acer Aspire 1825PTZ review: Speed and performance
