Battle at 11.6": Apple MacBook Air versus Acer Aspire TimelineX 1830T

If you are in the market for an 11.6" ultraportable notebook, there are two models which we think you should consider: the 11.6" Apple MacBook Air and Acer Aspire TimelineX 1830T. While the Acer was released internationally earlier, both the Acer and the Apple became available in the Philippines only last month.

Size and weight. An 11.6" ultraportable notebook is selected because size and weight are the primary consideration without sacrificing the size of the keyboard. An 11.6" laptop will have a 100% sized keyboard. The MacBook Air's dimensions are 11.8 x 7.56 x 0.11-0.68 inches and it weighs in at an amazingly light 2.3 pounds. It is trimmer and lighter than any 11.6" laptop that we can recall. The Acer's dimensions are at 11.2 x 8 x 1-1.1" and weighs in at 3 pounds. The Acer is thicker and heavier, but either is easy enough to slip into the suitcase and neither is a burden to carry around. The Acer is  still a small and light notebook, it simply cannot match the MacBook Air in this category. We give Round 1 to the Apple.

Battery life.  The MacBook Air has the equivalent of a 4-cell battery while the Acer TimelineX has a larger 6-cell battery. The MacBook Air promises 5 hours of battery life and will give you over 4 hours of battery life when used for web browsing on WiFi. The Acer promises 8 hours of battery life and will give you more than 6 hours. Both are a bit short of all-day computing. With 1.5-2 hours longer battery life, the Acer fights back and takes Round 2.

Performance. The Acer Aspire TimelineX 1830T currently being sold in the Philippines is powered by a Intel Core i3-380um processor running at 1.33GHz with a 3GB cache. The Apple MacBook Air 11.6" has a slower Core2 Duo 1.40GHz with a 3MB cache. The improved architecture of the Arrandale processor gives that Acer a more than 20% advantage on processing power. The MacBook Air has the advantage in graphics with an Nvidia GeForce 320M with 256MB of shared memory. While the Acer has a  decent Intel video card, Intel HD  Graphics  with 128MB of dedicated memory, this can only provide a third of the power of the Nvidia GeForce 320M. Aiding the Apple in the speed category is that it uses an SSD drive which results in faster hard driver access. This round ends in a tie.

Neither the Intel Core i3 powered Acer or the Apple is fast in current standards but both are sufficiently capable for what a person would normally do with an 11.6" computer. 

Storage. The Acer TimelineX has a conventional 250GB hard disk drive. The MacBook Air has a more modern but much smaller 64MB SSD drive. After installing the operating system, this leaves you with a bit more than 40GB. This is plenty of space for your productivity software, documents and spreadsheets. It will get filled up pretty fast if you install games and use it to store picture, videos and music. A 128GB SSD drive is available for the 11.6" MacBook Air, but this costs Php10K more. That is a lot to pay for 64GB more hard drive space.

The SSD also has the advantage of being less prone to failure in case you use the notebook in a moving vehicle. While we love SSD technology, we do think that people will find 64GB on the small side, and give this round to Acer.

Ergonomics. Both the MacBook Air and the Acer TimelineX have fine keyboards, the Apple keyboard being a bit more comfortable to use in our opinion. Where the two vary widely is that the Acer has a rather small 2.5 x 1.5" touchpad while  the MacBook Air has a generously sized 4.2 x2.6" touchpad. Both touchpads support scroll and zoom functions, but this feature is more useful in the Acer TimelineX. We give, this round to Apple. 

Fit and finish. Apples are well built, and the 11.6" MacBook Air is no exception. It has sleek sliver like aluminum chassis. It is not adorned by intakes and vents, the exhaust being hidden discretely behind the lid. All this makes it the most attractive ultraportable we have ever seen. Go out and see one for yourself, pictures do not do it justice. 

Unfortunately, the same thing can be said about the Acer Aspire TimelineX 1830T. While the palm rest has a brushed aluminum finish, the lid is made of plastic.  Basically, it looks a netbook. The rest of Acer's TimelineX series have brushed aluminum lids. It would have been nice if the 1830T was outfitted with an aluminum lid. Thankfully the plastic lid is well-designed, in that its textured finish is resistant to finger prints. The bezel surrounding the display is glossy black, and this does pick-up fingerprints and scratches quickly. Pressing on the lid with a moderate amount of pressure results in some distortion in the display. A slightly thicker lid would have been more desirable. 

The Acer is built well enough if you buy one of the lower end Core i3 models. If you buy one of the more expensive i5 or i7 models, the build quality becomes more of an issue. The Apple is just excellent. This round goes to Apple.

Other differences. Both laptops have 11.6" 1366 x 768 LED screens. Both have b/g/n wifi. The Acer has an HDMI while Apple has its Mini Display Port. Acer has 3 USB ports, while the Apple only has 2. The Apple does not have a Ethernet port, so connecting to the Internet cannot be done through a LAN cable. The Apple is simply too slim to accommodate an RJ-45 connector.

The most significant differences are that the Acer has a 5-in-1 card reader while the Apple does not and the Acer supports Bluetooth 3.0 while the Apple supports the older 2.0 standard. The absence of the card reader would be an issue to the camera buff and the Acer does have more connectivity options, so we give this round to Acer.

Cost. The word value for money and Apple really do not belong in the same sentence if you are looking purely at specifications. When you factor in the build quality, the 11.6" Apple MacBook Air is worth its Php51,990 asking price. The Acer is priced a lot less, at Php32,500. Not bad for ultraportable with an Intel Core i3 processor. There is no winner in this round. Both are well worth the asking price.

Conclusion.  Which one is better? We think either one is a good choice. It really depends on your set of priorities. Neither is "perfect." If I were to redesign the Acer, I would push the battery back to increase the size of the touchpad, give it a stiff aluminum lid and a matte finish on the bezel. As for the Apple, I would make it a bit thicker and heavier and give it a bigger battery and larger hard drive.

If I were buying one of these machines, I would buy the Acer. It is cheaper, has a longer battery life, a faster processor and its video capabilities are sufficient. The MacBook Air's advantages are not so clear-cut, but its svelte aluminum ultra-thin case is the kind of thing that results in impulse-buy decisions.

Christmas 2010 10.1" Netbook Buyer's Guide

Netbooks have two of the most desirable attributes in a mobile device: they are light and have a long battery life. As a bonus, they are inexpensive. The early netbooks came in a variety of sizes and configurations including some with small SSD drives. One year after their release, the netbook design settled down to a basic configuration of a 10.1" 1024 x 600 (WSVGA) pixel resolution screen, powered by a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor, outfitted with 1GB of RAM and carried a 80GB to 160GB hard drive for storage. Equipped with 6-cell batteries, these small computers weighed in at a light 2.6 to 3.2 lbs., which brought as much as 9 hours of battery life. The real penalty for having a netbook was having keyboards which were 89% to 92% of the size of a full sized laptop and tiny touchpads.

Toshiba Mini NB305

In a world of generic netbooks, the Toshiba Mini NB205 and its successor, the NB305, have earned Editor's Choice award after award. With several notebooks with a battery life of over eight hours, the Toshiba NB205's full sized metal island keyboard and largest in class 3.1 x 1.6 inch touchpad makes it a cut above the rest. With a sleeker body and better designed battery placement, the Toshiba Mini NB305 took over from where its sibling left off.

In the Philippines, the Toshiba Mini NB205 did not really take off. Brought into the country with a 3-cell battery rather than a 6-cell battery and at a price of Php29,990.00, it had a hard time competing against other netbooks which cost 30% less and had double the battery life. The current Toshiba Mini NB305 offered for sale here since the first quarter of 2010 was offered at a more competitive price of Php25,990 and was outfitted with a 6-cell battery. Although it did cost 10% to 20% more than its competitors. Still, it was the netbook I recommended to friends.

The generic netbook market has gotten more interesting as of late, and in this new field, is the Toshiba Mini NB305 still king?

Toshiba Mini NB305. The Toshiba Mini NB305 currently retails at Php25,990. It is powered by a 1.66GHz Intel Atom N455 Processor with 1GB of RAM, a 160GB hard drive and sold with Windows 7 Starter installed.  The Toshiba Mini NB305's dimensions are 10.5 x 7.6 x 1.2 inches and it weighs in at 2.8 lbs. 

Its keyboard and touchpad are still best in class, but at its premium price, it is getting harder to justify this recommendation. Let's see what the competition has to offer.

1. More grunt less cash - Asus Eee PC 1005PEM. The Asus Eee PC 1005PEM released last September 2010 priced at Php21,995 is almost 4K cheaper than the Toshiba Mini NB305. Despite the lower price, the Asus Eee PC 1005PEM sports the new Intel Atom N550 dual core processor which provides 20% more power than the N455 unit found in the Toshiba and still provide 8 hours of battery life. The Asus Eee PC 1005PEM also comes with a larger 250GB hard drive. At 10.3 x 7.1 x 1.4 inches and 2.8 lbs it is approximately the same size and weight as the Toshiba.

Asus Eee PC 1005PEM

Another advantage, though this is subjective, is that the Asus Eee PC 1005PEM comes with a matte screen normally found in business notebooks. This makes it a lot easier to read outdoors.  

Ergonomics is still not as good as the Toshiba Mini NB305. The new chiclet keyboard is close to that of the Toshiba, but not quite as good. Although the 2.5 x 1.5 inch touchpad found in previous 1005 models, has grown to 3.0 x 1.6 inch, which substantially closes the gap in ergonomics. With more power under the hood, more storage and a lower price, the Asus Eee PC 1005PEM is a better option at the present time.

2. Thinner and lighter - Acer Aspire AOD255. The Acer Aspire AOD255 has the same specifications as the Asus Eee PC 1005PEM and the same battery life. It has one advantage over its Asus rival-- It is smaller and lighter. At 10.17 x 7.28 x 0.95 inches it is smaller and thinner than the 10.3 x 7.1 x 1.4 inch Asus Eee PC 1005PEM. The Acer Aspire AOD255 tips the scale at 2.4 lbs., which is 0.4 lbs. less than the Asus.

Acer Aspire AOD255

The Acer Aspire AOD255 retails for Php23,900, almost 2K more than the Asus. We think the lighter weight and slimmer case which slides easier to drop into a suitcase or handbag may be worth the additional 2K.

3. High Resolution - Samsung NF310. If you are going to spend over 25K on a netbook, the Samsung NF310 is the one to get. The Samsung NF310 is also powered by the same Dual Core Atom N550 found in the Asus and Acer models we just looked at. What justifies its higher Php25,995 price is that it has 2GB of RAM, double the amount of RAM as compared to the Toshiba, Acer and Asus and a larger 320GB hard drive. It also comes with a high resolution 1366 x 768 pixel resolution screen. Very few netbooks offer this feature. The Samsung NF310's keyboard and touchpad are fine. While a bit bigger than the others, it still weighs in at just 2.8 lbs. There really is nothing wrong with the Samsung NF310.

Samsung NF310

Despite being 4K more than the Asus, this is another good buy option. The additional costs are justified by the higher specifications. The new "Shark" design is something that takes getting used to though. 

4. Best Budget Netbook - There is nothing special about eMachines' eMD350. It is pretty much an Acer 523H netbook with a matte finish case. While visually less pleasing, the glossy case of the Acer 435H is actually more practical since it is less resistant to fingerprints. It is run by a single core N450 Atom processor, 1GB of RAM and a 160GB hard drive. These were the specifications of a top of the line netbook a year ago.

The only thing to be excited about is the price*: Php11,990 with Linux installed and Php13,990 with Windows 7 Starter. There are other netbooks for sale at this price range, but the eMachines eMD350 is the best designed and more importantly comes with a decent 6-cell (4400 mAH) battery, unlike most its low cost competitors, with a 3-cell battery.

*Prices are for Christmas 2010: The regular price for the eMD350 is Php2,000 higher.

Verdict. Depending on your priorities, all the netbooks we looked at here are good choices. Ergonomically we still like the Toshiba Mini NB305, but it is not a value for money option. More importantly, it does not have the new Dual Core Atom processor. Netbooks are a bit slow, the 20% increase in speed is much welcomed.

Bottom line, the Asus Eee PC 1005PEM at Php21,995 is a great deal. If you want the big dog  in the bunch, then go for the Samsung NF310. If instead the smallest and the lightest appeals to you, we recommend the Acer Aspire AOD255. On a tight budget, eMachines eMD350 isn't as much of a compromise as you might think. Bang for the buck, it cannot be beat.