Acer Intro Aspire One Mini Notebook [‘Not Just Another (Eee PC Type, Atom Powered, Linux & Win XP Based) Notebook’ Say Acer]

Acer have announced their new mini/micro notebook, the Atom powered Aspire One, which, despite being billed as ‘not just another notebook’ bears all the hallmarks of being yet another Eee PC competitor complete with 8.9” LED display (the same display size as all Eee PC’s except the newly announced Eee PC 1000/H) and which comes with either Win XP or Linux operating systems preloaded.

Interestingly, Acer have chosen to announce their new Aspire One just when we are expecting an imminent official announcement from Dell that they will also be entering the mini/micro notebook market with a device known, at this stage, as the Mini Inspiration but then again, what with the Computex presently in full swing, perhaps this should not come as too much of a surprise.

So, apart from the aforementioned 8.9” display and Atom power under the hood, what does Acer’s Aspire One have to offer us?

Size-wise the Aspire One measures in at a compact 9.8” x 6.7” x 1.14” whilst it weighs in at ‘little more than two pounds’. The ‘masterpiece of technological simplicity’, as Acer’s press release bills it, sports a battery life of just 6 hours, a screen resolution of 1024×600, an integral CrystalEye webcam, comes with integrated 802.11b/g WiFi with 3G connectivity being a possible future option and offers either 512MB or 1GB of RAM dependant on the OS opted for (Linux and XP respectively).

Storage comes in the form of either a NAND flash module of 8GB or an 80GB internal HDD with a built-in memory card reader – supporting Secure Digital, MultiMediaCard, Memory Stick, Memory Stick PRO and xD-Picture Cards – offering ‘absolute data freedom’.

The ‘masterpiece of technological simplicity’ (we would bill it somewhat differently – perhaps ‘undoubtedly competent, reasonably desirable but hardly mind-blowing Eee PC competitor’), otherwise known as the Acer Aspire One, will, according to Acer’s press release, be made available in blue and white (with ‘two new soft, warm tones’ in the form of brown and – yes - pink becoming available at a later late) and will retail for around the not unreasonable $380 price point sometime in Q3 of this year.

Let’s hope that Dell’s Mini Inspiration is, to excuse almost a pun, somewhat more inspiring and at least brings something a little different to the table.

Acer