Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 – GarageHP.com previously wrote articles about Motorola XPRT, Kodak EasyShare Z981, and Vizio E550VL. Now we are talking about Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431, Portable Design. The aggressively priced Acer Aspire TimelineX 3830TG-6431′s combination of gaming-ready graphics and a fast processor in a 13-inch body offers a great punch for a good price, provided you can live without a DVD drive.
A few years ago, the Acer TimelineX was one of the first of what we then called “thin and light” laptops, 13-inchers with sleeker, lighter frames, long battery life, and a more easily portable design than a standard notebook.
Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 Review
The TimelineX series still exists, and Acer’s latest version features newer Intel second-gen Core i-series processors and impressive Nvidia graphics. Still, the landscape has expanded to include many thin laptops: the Sony Vaio S and Toshiba Portege, and the extremely thin Apple MacBook Air and Samsung Series 9. The $779 Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 is thin, but not as thin as a MacBook Air. It’s not that light for its size, either–the Sony Vaio S and Toshiba Portege are lighter, and they include optical DVD drives. The TimelineX doesn’t, although it looks large enough to accommodate one.
Battery life is good, but we’ve seen even better from the Toshiba Portege R835 and MacBook Air. What the Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 does have is a competitive price that’s on the lower end for thin 13-inchers, and a set of features that, optical drive aside, is superior to those of many of its competitors.
Does design matter more to you, or the features you can get for the price? If it’s the latter, the $779 Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 is worth your consideration. It’s not the sexiest thin laptop around, but it’s certainly one of the fastest, and it is one of the cheapest small laptops with this level of graphics power that we’ve ever seen.
We’ve seen a number of TimelineX laptops over the years, and while Acer’s new version isn’t much different on the outside from the TimelineX we saw a year ago, it does have some new design wrinkles. The blue aluminum exterior, with a matte finish on the back, has a clean angled look that tapers in the back down to a large cylindrical hinge reminiscent of older Sony Vaio laptops. The metal finish tends to pick up smudges, but it looks sharp, and the Acer logo sitting in the middle is low-key. The large round hinge straddles a center battery, occupying space so that the bottom of the TimelineX lies flat.
Inside, the look goes two-tone. A metallic blue plastic palm rest lies below a silver plastic keyboard tray with black raised island-style keys studded edge to edge. The efficient use of interior space gives the TimelineX a clean look.
While a trim 1 inch thick, this Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 is on the dense side: at 4.1 pounds, it’s heavier than both the similarly sized Sony Vaio S and Toshiba Portege. On the other hand, it’s still lighter than most mainstream 13-inch laptops. Basically, it’s a laptop you’ll feel more comfortable holding under your arm than in your hand.
The Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431′s power cord plugs into the rear of the left side via a standard L-shaped plug. There’s no optical drive door for it to get in the way of, since there’s no optical drive. Other ports–USB, headphones, HDMI–cluster around the forward-facing edges of both side panels.
We wish we could like this Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431′s raised keyboard more, but the plastic keys felt mushy and a cut below similar keyboards we’ve used on Sony and Apple laptops. A right-side column of Page Up/Down keys and the like cramps access to the Enter and Shift keys. Even odder, the Enter key directly abuts the backslash key above it. Typing isn’t a disaster by any means, but we’re sticklers for good keyboards.
A single “P” button above the keyboard launches Acer’s power management settings. Volume and screen brightness are relegated to the direction-arrow keys: you’ll also need to press the Fn key at the same time, which is needlessly awkward.
The Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 touch pad beneath is narrow and cramped, leaving too much available space above and below that could have extended finger room. Two discrete buttons beneath are small but functional. Between the keyboard and the touch pad, this Acer’s not going to impress you greatly with its ergonomics, but both get the job done. Those who prefer basic touch pads will be satisfied, at least, as there’s no buttonless clickpad technology here.
The TimelineX 3830TG-6431′s 13-inch glossy display is perfectly fine: its 1,366×768-pixel resolution is standard-issue, with middle-of-the-road brightness and clarity. We couldn’t see the screen well at extreme viewing angles, but then again, that would have exceeded expectations for this type of notebook. Streaming videos and games looked good, and documents were sharp and easily readable.
Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3830TG-6431 Laptop
Assisting the display is a stereo speaker bar situated above the keyboard. Labeled “Dolby Home Theater: Professionally Tuned,” the speakers are superior in volume and quality to what you get in other thin 13-inchers. Movie watching and game playing both benefit.
The included HD Webcam has a maximum resolution of 1,280×1,024 pixels, and looks about as good as HD Webcams we’ve seen on other recent 2011 laptops. Colors looked warm, and exposure levels auto-adjusted decently.
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