Have Acer started down the better path with the Acer Aspire REVO R3600? Well that may just be exactly what they have done. Its good looking fast has a big hard drive, a GPU and runs VISTA rather than XP.
The good stuff.
The Acer REVO is another one of these net top PC’s albeit a little different.
First off it can handle allot more than just net browsing and word-processing, which is all its pre-deceases could handle. This is due to its Nvidia GeForce 9400M graphics. Having this means that where as previously net top PC’s have just been for net browsing and a little light word processing, you can now start to venture into the media world,
The Acer REVO can handle HD media without any major hiccups and also comes with a HDMI port for instant connection to your living room HDTV making it one of the first net top media PC’s, and this along with its very sexy dark blue side panels on white main body make for an elegant living room PC. It also has a VESA mount allowing you to mount it to the back of most standard monitors meaning that you can save on space in your office if that’s what you choose to do with this baby.
The Acer REVO also comes with a 160GB hard drive and an eSATA port meaning that again we are in HTPC territory and that you can instantly connect cutting edge external storage (not that you need it) for your media pleasure.
We also have your basic 4 in 1 card reader and a gigabit Ethernet port and SIX USB ports, wow they really wanted to pull out all the stops on this baby, oh and it also contains a WI-FI card.
Not so good.
This PC only has a single – Core 1.6GHz Atom processer and 2GB RAM which means that as its running Vista, it can’t really do a lot more than that. It lags on multiple program usage and multiple window opening so doesn’t really pull up to the rest in its range on speed and performance, but that can be fixes with a simple downgrade of Operating system.
It is also lacking an external or internal optical drive meaning that all my hype over its media capacities comes crashing down when you want to watch a DVD.
Also the stand that comes with the Acer REVO leaves much to be desired. It’s an oval shaped piece of plastic that slots into a groove on the bottom of its main body. But even when slotted into place it wobbles precariously making the use of flash drives a complete nightmare, but even this isn’t that much of a problem as you can lie it down and/ or use the VESA mount.
Conclusion.
The Acer REVO works and well. It’s no faraway place from the net top PC community, but it’s a great stop in the right direction with its GPU making all the difference. It’s no gamer’s paradise but it’s certainly your cost effective, general media, home use dream.