1. Acer Aspire One AO751h-1893

On the hunt for student-friendly notebooks, peripherals, and accessories? Check out our guide to outfitting a student lair with the most practical gear.

Back To School season is upon us, but this year feels different. Students want to be prepared for the school year, but can’t afford to break the bank. With that philosophy in mind, we’ve tracked down what we think are reasonable, practical tech products for most students in their teens and twenties (that would be high school, college, and graduate school).  We’re not simply touting the cheapest product in a given category. Instead, we’ve striven to find the best compromise between affordability, quality, and style. We’ll start with four laptops—each for a slightly different student scenario. Then, this guide moves on to other gear categories. We’ve got every notebook peripheral and port covered.

Laptops

Acer Aspire One AO751h-1893

$379.99, Acer.com

When There Can Be Only One, Compromise

Fantasy movie lovers all know that “There Can Only Be One,” but when it comes to Intel Atom-based netbooks, it seems "There Will Be Many." Acer goes out of its way not to call the Aspire One 751h a “netbook,” but what else do you call an inexpensive, three-pound, 1" thick portable PC running on Intel’s Atom processor?

To be fair, Acer has made some smart improvements here. The 10", 1024x600 screen that has been de rigeur on netbooks until lately now expands to the 751h’s 11.6" with 1366x768 native resolution. This is a much needed improvement as, frankly, 600 lines leave us unconsciously hunching our shoulders every time we try to view a Web page. Better yet, the resolution bump will now accommodate 720p HD video, including YouTube HD.

This raises an inevitable question about what you’re supposed to do with this sort of unit. Of course, it’s small enough to go anywhere. The 751h tucks easily into any backpack or messenger bag and can rest firmly even on the most diminutive of lecture hall desks. Web, email, and office apps are safe bets for the smaller screen. We’re a little bummed that the unit only supports 802.11b/g and 10/100 Ethernet rather than 802.11n and Gigabit Ethernet, but again, what would you do with the faster specs? You’re not going to game with this machine. With a maximum 250 GB hard drive, you’re not going to move mountains of data. Nor are you likely to stream 20 Mb/s of HD video streams, although the integrated GMA 500 graphics core does support MPEG-2, VC-1, and AVC hardware acceleration for HD video content. The reality is that the 11.6" screen and unusually comfortable keyboard make this a more productive and entertaining alternative to a smart phone.

If that sounds cynical, realize that Acer stocks the 751h with Intel’s 1.33 GHz Atom Z520, a model originally aimed at the seemingly stillborn “mobile Internet device” category. The 1.60 GHz Atom N270 has been the common pick for netbooks. So while the Z520 is slower, it also uses half as much energy (2 W instead of 4 W) and, unlike the N270, supports virtualization for all of those crazy ultraportable virtualized applications like...umm. Okay, forget that. Bottom line: The N270 was painfully slow for anything beyond basic 2D applications, and the Z520 is slower yet.

Our particular “1893" model ships with 2GB of 667 MHz DDR2 memory, Bluetooth, a six-cell battery, integrated Webcam, integrated card reader, and a 250 GB hard drive. As with other netbooks, the One does not contain an optical drive, which can make adding applications on top of the pre-installed Windows XP and slew of trialware a tricky proposition. Oh, and about that OS. Out of curiosity, we took our unit for an informal spin with not only the default Windows XP but also Vista and Windows 7. While we didn’t run any official benchmarks, there was no doubt that Windows 7 ran markedly faster. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Windows 7 performed well while XP and Vista were sluggish.

It’s easy to be prejudiced against netbooks when you’re used to much higher performance 15" or 17" notebooks. Just remember that netbooks are meant to make basic applications more portable, not to replace conventional PCs. We don’t imagine the 751h being your only school computer. But for taking notes in class, working on papers with study mates over dinner, or simply having a cheap unit to stay productive around campus while your main system remains safely Kensington-locked to your dorm desk, this netbook is plenty adequate. The Aspire One 751h, capable of a six-hour battery runtime, cuts the corners that students should need least while giving them more of what matters most: a comfortable viewing and typing experience.

• Aspire One AO751H-1545...
• • ElectronicsPLUS
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