Customer Reviews

Acer Aspire AO533-23571 10.1-Inch Netbook (Glossy Black)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I own two of these netbooks. So far I am very satisfied with their performance. I bought them with the intention of upgrading to W7 Professional, increasing the RAM to 2GB and the HDD to 500GB. I have been successful on both of them without too much trouble. The biggest trick is the RAM. There is only 1 RAM slot. Upgrading to 2GB requires buying a 2GB SO DIMM to replace the 1 GB that is installed...AND IT NEEDS TO BE EXACTLY THE RIGHT TYPE. I tried Patriot and Kingston without success. Then I ordered the memory recommended by Crucial on their website. Removing the keyboard is pretty much like any laptop. Find the retainers (above the F4 and the INS/DEL key on the 533), push them in and leverage the keyboard up with a credit card or similar device. Then there are two screws marked (1). Remove those two screws and then (and this is a little different)... push a screwdriver into the hole labeled (2) and gently apply pressure to pop off the back. RAM and HDD replacement are pretty straight forward. Assembly is the reverse. I have seen at least one good video on You Tube (that is what clued me in to the memory issue). All in all, no complaints. Great little machines for use on our home network, email readers, internet surfers and controllers for our Sonos Multizone Music system.

I had an HP mini 1137NR that cause me many problems (there was not video output - I need to buy an extra cable; the LCD has broken after 1 year and there was not HP support outside USA)

I decided to buy a new netbook instead fix my HP (the price would be similar). I bought this Acer because it has 1.83 GHz Intel Atom N475 processor (the latest processor available in intel site for netbooks)

In comparison to my HP:

- Operational system:

Acer: windows 7 starter

HP: windows XP

I think that XP is faster when I use a program but windows 7 is faster to initiate.

- Keyboard

Acer and HP are very good, the acer is a little better

- Touchpad

Multi-Gesture Touchpad in acer is good but the quality of touch in HP is better

- Screen

I think that Acer has a better quality than HP; videos have better quality in my acer

- Processor:

Acer: 1.83 GHz Intel Atom N475 processor

HP: 1.6 Ghz Intel Atom N270 processor

- RAM Memory - 1 GB in both, but Acer is DDR3 and HP is DDR2. There was not information about upgrade memory in Acer site, neither in manual product.

- Acer has more USB ports (3 versus 2)

- Acer has a memory card reader that accept more types of cards

- Speakers are weak in both netbooks

I am very happy with this acer and I recommended it. In this moment I think that just 1 GB of ram is ok for my needs (internet browsing, skype, Office documents, videos - I could see DVD movies on my external samsung DVD recorder without problems). I use this netbook all the time and I am using my desktop just for downloads in Ares.

Best bang for your buck... I love it, works great, battery life is at least 7 hours.

I got this notebook computer 6 months ago. It worked ok while it lasted. Recently it started to reboot itself without warning and now it won't restart at all (it says check some connection inside). I've had a padded case for it, but I don't think this is very durable. If you aren't planning on taking it anywhere, then it may be ok, but if you want a portable notebook, you're better off with another brand. Saving 50 bucks isn't worth it when you have to worry about losing your files. Luckily I backed up everything.

Also, this comes with Windows 7 Starter, so you can't use it more than about 25 times before the whole machine becomes useless. If they can't provide the basic operating software, they shouldn't be selling it. I'm currently looking for another brand of small notebook computer, but for sure it won't be an Acer.

As a college student I bought this netbook to replace my old laptop in classes and I ended up using it my main computer. It has an incredible battery life (5-6 hrs), runs many programs fast, and has a nice sleek look and keyboard. I would recommend this netbook to anybody!

I don't get the criticisms of this netbook. It's capable, stylish, affordable, the keyboard is great, the LED screen looks excellent, and the battery life is insane compared to any other machine I've owned. I didn't like Windows 7 Starter however. Some of the networking is removed and there's no theming. You even break the license agreement by changing the wallpaper, which has to be done with 3rd party apps that need to be memory resident. I installed Linux Mint 10 and all the hardware is supported. Win7 Starter used about 500MB of memory on idle, while Mint uses 140MB. Recommended. It's a great deal.

Windows is just goofed up and cheap these days. Windows 7 Starter I don't care for really, though I'm sure that Windows 7 is fine. The only real problems we've had, though they're mainly preferences, are that you cannot change the desktop background. It's harder to pick the customization for themes and other options also. You'll probably find other little things that are annoying with Windows 7 Starter, but the Acer name is still great. The biggest difference just in the computer itself in comparison to a laptop is that there is not a cd drive, but that's fine by me, all I need is a flash-drive with music on it if I want to put music on my netbook. The sound and graphics are better than what I expected for a little netbook. There's plenty of hard-drive space for what I needed it for, the processor is fast enough - it hasn't been 'slow' for me at all. The battery life has been fantastic - its ranges, on full battery, from 8-12 hours. The webcam works very well. I deleted some of the programs that came with the computer and added my own similar programs to replace those, and the computer has handled that great and not given me a problem. overall, it's been a great buy. the only problems lie with Windows, but I may be switching to Ubuntu in a year or two so that i do not have to upgrade to a 'better' version of Windows.

This model is sold with 1GB of DDR3 RAM. It is NOT upgradable to 2GB. I just had an exchange of email with ACER, and Their answer is that:" yes this is a limitation, and you should have known about it. This computer is only meant to to run Win 7 Starter."

It does not matter that it is delivered with "Windows Upgrade Anywhere."

So, given the current trend of all software to needing a lot of memory, I would not recommend this model.

And I would not recommend ACER, given their service or lack thereof. And misleading product description.

Upgrade capabilities are VERY important criteria.

Bought this in September of last year and in admittedly limited use (office work and light web surfing once or twice a week) it has worked very well. It's quality, lightweight, and comfortable, with a nice long battery life.

The only thing I feel needs highlighting is that, as configured, 1 GB means the machine is slow at times. Given my light usage of this computer it is noticeable but not annoying. However if I used it more frequently I'd have to upgrade the memory as it would get tiresome rather quickly. I cannot penalize the netbook for this, however, because at the time I bought it 1 GB was standard for all machines in the price range.

I wanted a small computer to take when I leave home for a while so I can keep up with mt bills, this Acer 10.1 was perfect.it has a good long life battery and it's easy to use.