Poll: Acer Timeline - Now or Later?

[helterskelter231]

Hi folks.

What I'm Looking For
I'm a college student looking to get a laptop. I've been using a home-built Athlon 64 desktop for going on 5 years, but not being able to type in class has become too annoying. After following tech blogs (Gizmodo, Engadget, Tom's Hardware and--of course--Anandtech) for a few months I'm pretty sure I'm going to get the 13.3" Acer Timeline. Here's my reasoning:
--It's portable being 12.7" x 9.0" x 1.1" and 3.5lbs.
--It's powerful despite the small size, with an Ultra-Low Voltage Core 2 @ 1.Ghz, 4GB of DDR3 RAM and a 320GB HDD. This is a huge plus over an Atom-powered netbook.
--Its battery lasts 8+ hours as tested by multiple reviewers. The limitation posed by short battery lives is what delayed my decision to buy a notebook in the first place, and this overcomes it quite impressively.
--It's only $650 on Newegg.

Plan A: Buy Now
Right now there's a version of the 13.3" Timeline on Newegg (see link above) that is not available anywhere else on the web (AFAIK). It's listed as $650, marked down from $750. This just came back in stock today after having been sold out for a couple weeks. If I went this route, I would buy this right away.

Plan B: Wait Until September
My concern with buying now is depreciation. I don't start school until September, and while it would be nice to have the notebook for the next 8 weeks (and get to know Win7 RC a little better) in no way do I need a notebook right away. Considering the leaked news about the 11.6" Timeline, I thought that Acer might be planning a full refresh of the entire product series including the 13.3" model.
On the other hand, they might not refresh it, and the $100 off from Newegg might disappear and I'd have to cough up another $100.

Any advice? Thanks for reading.

 

[IlllI]

i doubt it would refresh so soon since it just came out but it might have back to school promotion around august

 

[Parasitic]

That Timeline has a Core Solo. I would wait.

 

[IlllI]

core solo would still pwn the atom processor though

 

[Hacp]

It doesn't have a cd drive

 

[gus6464]

Originally posted by: Hacp
It doesn't have a cd drive

Who really uses a cd drive on a laptop nowadays that much to warrant it a necessity?

As far the Timeline goes I have the 13.3 model with the lower end Pentium SU2700 which is pretty much the same thing as the Core 2 Solo except it has 1mb less cache and runs 100 MHz slower. The main difference is that the SU2700 is 10w TDP versus 5.5w for the SU3500.

With the SU2700 I can play 720p video flawless in MPC with the X4500 optimizations and 1080p stutters a bit when using power save mode. I have Windows 7 installed on it and with a little bit of tweaking I hit 9 hours on the battery with wifi on and screen at lowest brightness. If you need something to watch video at 720p max and most productivity apps like office which is what most college students use this is a superb machine for the price. My favorite feature of this machine is the keyboard. I have been wanting to upgrade my macbook for a long time but couldn't find a keyboard I felt comfortable with until now. I wanted to buy the SU3500 but newegg was out of stock at time and Fry's had a good deal on the SU2700 so I pulled the trigger.

 

[hans030390]

Originally posted by: gus6464

Originally posted by: Hacp
It doesn't have a cd drive

Who really uses a cd drive on a laptop nowadays that much to warrant it a necessity?

Um...most people?

To the OP, I'd suggest this laptop.

I just helped my friend get a laptop, and he decided on this one. It may not be AS portable as the Acer, but it's still under 5lbs, thin, and very sleek. However, you also get a DVD-RW drive and a MUCH more powerful CPU. The keyboard is great, too. Similar to a Mac's.

On top of that, it still gets GREAT battery life (6-7 hours). I'd also argue that the ASUS is probably more reliable than the Timeline. Having used both in person, I'd say it's definitely built better and feels like it won't break as easily. I also think the ASUS is prettier.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: gus6464

Originally posted by: Hacp
It doesn't have a cd drive

Who really uses a cd drive on a laptop nowadays that much to warrant it a necessity?

Plus if you really want one, you can just get the 14" Timeline which only weighs 0.7lbs more than the 13" and does include an optical drive.

I've had my eye on the Timeline series for about a month now, and I'm quite tempted to buy one. I just wish the dual-core (SU9400) models weren't $300 more than the single-core ones.

 

[IlllI]

i wouldn't say most people. i think over the course of 4 years i've used my optical drive maybe a couple dozen times. most of the time now i use a usb media stick, since they are pretty cheap and i can take it anywhere since its so portable

 

[helterskelter231]

Thanks for the feedback all.

Originally posted by: Hacp
It doesn't have a cd drive

Since I'll still have my desktop, it's not a big deal to not have an optical drive on my notebook.

Originally posted by: Parasitic
That Timeline has a Core Solo. I would wait.

Originally posted by: hans030390
I just helped my friend get a laptop, and he decided on this one. It may not be AS portable as the Acer, but it's still under 5lbs, thin, and very sleek. However, you also get a DVD-RW drive and a MUCH more powerful CPU. The keyboard is great, too. Similar to a Mac's. On top of that, it still gets GREAT battery life (6-7 hours). I'd also argue that the ASUS is probably more reliable than the Timeline. Having used both in person, I'd say it's definitely built better and feels like it won't break as easily. I also think the ASUS is prettier.

In regard to performance I don't need anything super powerful since I'll still have my desktop for photoshop/indesign, HD video and other demanding tasks. I've borrowed my friends old laptop running a Pentium M Dothan 1.6ghz with WinXP and it does everything I need. Obviously Vista is bloated compared to XP, but I'll probably install Win7 RC over it.

Originally posted by: gus6464
As far the Timeline goes I have the 13.3 model

One question Gus6464--did your Timeline come with a Windows 7 upgrade brochure? This is assuming you bought it after 6/26 of course.

I'm going to stop by the local Micro Center to get a feel for it before buying the Newegg one sometime in the next couple days. Thanks again for the advice--I'd be happy to hear more.

 

[gus6464]

Originally posted by: IlllI
i wouldn't say most people. i think over the course of 4 years i've used my optical drive maybe a couple dozen times. most of the time now i use a usb media stick, since they are pretty cheap and i can take it anywhere since its so portable

Yeah same here with my old macbook. In the three years I owned it I probably used the cd drive around 10 times. Within the last year I owned it I used the drive once and it wasn't even for something critical. Plus a usb dvd burner can be had nowadays for 50 bucks or less if you really need one.

 

[gus6464]

Yeah basically you just go to an acer website and put in the machine's serial number and that's it. You don't need to send your receipt or anything for it because it already knows when you bought it somehow. I also heard that for systems with no cd drive they are going to send you Windows 7 in a usb stick instead of a cd.

 

[gus6464]

I forgot to add that the system with an SSD and Windows 7 is quite impressive if you take into account the specs. Also the 5.5w SU3500 will get you better battery life than the SU2700 because of the cpu and also you get an intel wifi card which tend to be more power efficient. I read in a danish website that the battery life difference can be up to a good 40 minutes.

 

[helterskelter231]

Thanks for the fast replies and additional information--I definitely appreciate it.

I just swung by Micro Center on my way back from work and I really like the layout, design, and size of the 13.3" Timeline. Keyboard feels good, its a great size and weight. The one qualm I noticed while testing features was the strangely recessed touchpad buttons. Fortunately a little bit of foam padding could easily fix this.

Unless I suffer a total change of heart in the next few hours, I think I'm going to pull the trigger on the Timeline AS3810T-8503 at Newegg for $649.

Is there any reason to get an extended warranty or breakage coverage? I am in college afterall...but I don't know if it's worth it.

 

[Parasitic]

Originally posted by: helterskelter231
Thanks for the fast replies and additional information--I definitely appreciate it.

I just swung by Micro Center on my way back from work and I really like the layout, design, and size of the 13.3" Timeline. Keyboard feels good, its a great size and weight. The one qualm I noticed while testing features was the strangely recessed touchpad buttons. Fortunately a little bit of foam padding could easily fix this.

Unless I suffer a total change of heart in the next few hours, I think I'm going to pull the trigger on the Timeline AS3810T-8503 at Newegg for $649.

Is there any reason to get an extended warranty or breakage coverage? I am in college afterall...but I don't know if it's worth it.

If you don't need it until September I would wait. The Solo may be phased out soon, I would imagine.

BTW Dell Outlet has Vostro 1320's in stock and you can get them configured with a DVD-RW, Nvidia 9300M GS and Core 2 Duo's for under $600.

 

[gus6464]

Originally posted by: Parasitic

Originally posted by: helterskelter231
Thanks for the fast replies and additional information--I definitely appreciate it.

I just swung by Micro Center on my way back from work and I really like the layout, design, and size of the 13.3" Timeline. Keyboard feels good, its a great size and weight. The one qualm I noticed while testing features was the strangely recessed touchpad buttons. Fortunately a little bit of foam padding could easily fix this.

Unless I suffer a total change of heart in the next few hours, I think I'm going to pull the trigger on the Timeline AS3810T-8503 at Newegg for $649.

Is there any reason to get an extended warranty or breakage coverage? I am in college afterall...but I don't know if it's worth it.

If you don't need it until September I would wait. The Solo may be phased out soon, I would imagine.

BTW Dell Outlet has Vostro 1320's in stock and you can get them configured with a DVD-RW, Nvidia 9300M GS and Core 2 Duo's for under $600.

The SU3500 is a brand new CPU designed for cheap thin and lights like the Timeline.

 

[helterskelter231]

Well I pulled the trigger and ordered it last night. Should be here tomorrow or Monday!

After I get things going, I'll probably shrink the main partition and add a new one so I can dual boot Win7 RC. Let's just hope the installation can run from a flash card

Thanks again fellas.

 

[gus6464]

Originally posted by: helterskelter231
Well I pulled the trigger and ordered it last night. Should be here tomorrow or Monday!

After I get things going, I'll probably shrink the main partition and add a new one so I can dual boot Win7 RC. Let's just hope the installation can run from a flash card

Thanks again fellas.

Nice I am sure you will enjoy it. Also when you get it if you want to play HD content and want to use the X4500 to offload on the CPU follow this guide to set up MPC-HC.

http://go.notebookreview.com/?...264-videos-using-dxva/

After doing that hd video playing has improved quite a bit.