Acer Aspire AS5534-1096 15.6″ Laptop Notebook – AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core L310 / 4GB DDR2 / 250GB HD / SuperMulti DVD drive / Windows 7 Home Premium

5 comments

1. 

   Jim C. Hatton on December 9, 2009 at 4:39 pm

   Like most of the people here I bought this at walmart for less then 350. Very nice computer for the price, wished it had a hdmi outlet, but for the price you couldn’t really expected to find that on here. The keyboard is comfy enough, like the numpad feature as well. the screen is crisp and bright. Haven’t had any issues with the imcompatability of any programs so far. It loads and shutdown down fast enough for a budget desktop, Acer could have thought the design a little better with the USB ports 2 on the right and one on the left. I use Nero 9 for the dvd burning which is pretty fast.

   If you looking for a computer and don’t have alot of money to spare. this could be for you..

2. 

   Iris Ruiz on December 9, 2009 at 4:39 pm

   I bought this awesome computer at walmart the other night for $350.00!! Totally worth the money. I don’t know much about computers but this computer was selling for the price of most net books so I could not pass it up. So far is has been working great for all my computer needs. I mainly send email, upload photos, download music and simple everyday stuff and it seems to be working fine for my needs. I own a small online business and it has been wonderful having a fully functioning laptop that is very light and sleek to take around with me when I need it. The built in fan is great at keeping the laptop cool and I have not had any really problems with it heating up or anything like that. The screen is nice and big and bright and perfect for my needs. I have yet to try to the burner but I will assume that it works. I was able to connect to the internet as soon as I go it out of the box and it is just cool and I can not believe it got it for this price. The 10 key pad is definitely a plus and the keyboard is a nice size and very simple to use. I type pretty fast and I haven’t had any problems with it as far as position and confortablility. The only problem that I have had so far is I can’t get my zune program on it it which is frustrating because zune is made by Microsoft and shouldn’t be a problem at all. This computer is not the fastest computer but it gets the job done. I love windows 7!

3. 

   K. Haase on December 9, 2009 at 7:13 pm

   I agree with previous 2 reviews that this is a decent machine for the money (under $400).

   I wanted to list these instructions for folks looking for solution to the IE Flicker issue I have seen others like myself had.

   From the ACER support site (applies to Windows 7)hopefully this gets resolved soon:

   Q: Video driver update can resolve internet flickering in Windows 7

   A: Windows 7 customers may intermittently experience the following symptoms when using battery power only.

   Flickering while viewing internet pages
   
   JPG files not visible with the Windows Photo Viewer application. The viewer only displays the word “loading” on the screen.

   These issues can be resolved by downloading a newer version of the VGA driver.
   
   However, a short term solution can be used if access to high speed internet is not readily available.

   Preferred solution:
   
   Download and install the ATI VGA driver V8.635 (or later).

   Short term solution:
   
   Change the ATI Powerplay Settings in Windows 7.

   Click on the Windows icon
   
   Click on Control Panel
   
   Click on Hardware and Sound
   
   Click on Power Options
   
   Click on Change plan settings
   
   Click on Change Advanced Power Options
   
   Scroll down to ATI Graphics Power Settings
   
   Change the battery setting from Maximum Battery Life to Maximum Performance

4. 

   PICTURE VIDEO D on December 9, 2009 at 8:10 pm

   nice touch pad control mouse built in . easy to use.
   
   nice screen colors are excellent. wide 15 inch screen.
   
   memory card reader is excellent and fast.
   
   reads sdhc, xd, sony mark 2.
   
   the computer boots up in 1min40second.
   
   battery power ( 2.5 hours moderate power usage )
   
   I like windows 7 it is faster than win xp.
   
   very quiet system.
   
   I rendered video for 2 hr one day it heated up a little.
   
   IT has a fan built in. I put a chill mat under it.
   
   has 4 gig ram, says 250 but it is 220 gig usable hard drive.
   
   windows 7 is very organized. easy to use.
   
   it has win 7 ( 64 ) bit . I dont have any 64 bit progames.
   
   IM using my 32 bit programs. they run fine.
   
   plays dvd movies excellent, burns dvd + R sony the best.
   
   make back up disks of your system and also a immage file ( or ghost)
   
   also set a restore point. so if you have to go back before you install a new program. I installed the programs ( say yes ) let the program change things on your computer.
   
   running ( sony vegas studio 6.0 ) streets trips 2006, picture it 2004,
   
   had to install quicktime 7 for sony vegas to run right.
   
   this computer is equal to my athlon 64 single core processor 3500.
   
   the 4 gig memory helps in playing video in windows media player.
   
   it is a fun computer. the screen makes this computer usable.
   
   have burned 5 or 6 dvds so far and it takes 7 min to burn a 4 gig dvd.
   
   I plug in a external hard drive. it works fine. usb2.
   
   for the price is nice.
   
   great for picture edit. ( render video – willup date later when I do more.)
   
   plays mp4 video in windows media player.
   
   duel core processor – so far I can open 4 programs
   
   and use them . and still have 1 gig memory free.
   
   will update later. power supply is nice only warms up a little.
   
   64 bit is the future ( hope the programs get 64 bit soon )
   
   want to get 64 bit video editor to see if it is faster.

5. 

   Serg on December 9, 2009 at 10:58 pm

   I got it in Walmart for promotional price – 350. That was the reason. Personally I am not fan of AMD. Last One I had was 486 (pretty old) after that I used to buy Intel. AMD had some issues in the past like slow down and freeze with overheating, bad compatibility with Corel Draw 7 and so on. As for this model it’s Ok so far. 1.2 GHz with Dual-Core, 4Gb DDR2 and 64 bit Windows 7 is pretty fast but slower then my desktop Intel Core 2 Duo E4500 2.2 GHz with 4GHz and 32 bit XP Pro. Lets say in compare these configurations on Corel Video Studio Pro X2. This Aser can handle that Video Studio but with very noticeable delays. So if you planning on working with graphic it wouldn’t be very right choice.
   
   The Multi Super DVD is not very multiple in reading. It couldn’t read CD -R, which easy readable in my HP DVD and two other DVD ROMs. However I managed to throw the data from that CD -R over my network to the Aser and burn that data at the same type of CD -R (TDK) using “NIT Media Maker” (came with this laptop). It burned CD and it was readable – “Eureka!”.
   
   Good thing for this Windows 7 which come essentially with this laptop, that if you had MS Office for XP (32 bit) it can be installed on Windows 7. At least you can save some money. I also was able to install the program which I bought 8 years ago (ABBY Lingvo 6) and as I said Corel Video Studio. Both work fine.
   
   DVD movies work flawlessly on this Aser model same for Yahoo movies trailers. I can’t tell about the games though. It was not meant for this in my case.
   
   Another noticeable thing that because of Win7 (64 bit) you may going to need new drivers for your multimedia. Windows trying to resolve it looking for drivers in Internet. In my case it could find driver for Webcam MS 3000 and HP PhotoSmart printer but could not find for Sasmsung ML 1210 laser printer.
   
   The monitor quality is pretty good. You can see clear under different angles ( at least 5-10 degrees from sides and about 45 from top and bottom). The resolution from 800×600 to 1366×768 and it’s very clear picture. There is not distinguished color pixels (white is clearly white).
   
   By the way it works ok with Skype. The only thing about a screen, Aser has 16:9 and in Skype it’s like in 4:3 screen (two black stripes on sides). Well actually after several attempts to talk on Skype Video the transmitting and receiving video signals getting worse. The video image getting more and more in square pixels as on my side as for another. I’m blaming Windows 7 in it (or driver which Win7 found for MS LiveCam 3000) because the same camera with the same Internet connection with the same Skype version works fine in Win XP Pro. And It does not show video picture in squares if camera connected to Aser and I use LiveCam manager for camera settings and video preview.
   
   This model AS 5534 -1096 does not have a built in camera but it has a built in microphone. There is built in stereo speakers. They do not provide too much sound quality but they are sufficient for laptop.
   
   The keyboard is pretty comfortable ’cause it designed close to desktop standard keyboard and it does not bend down when you press at buttons.
   
   Laptop has 3 USB, SVGA for additional monitor, Ethernet port, Mic and headphones ports. It has built in Memory stick reader for SD, MS Pro (not MS Due though)and XD. I had no problems with reading MS Pro so far.
   
   It got 802.11b/g which works pretty fast. Video ATI Radeon 256 Mbg.
   
   There is a good feature as touch-pad lock button that helps to avoid mouse cursor accidental jumping during the typing.
   
   Laptop does not heat a lot. Even after 3 hours at your laps it does not burn you even with direct skin contact. It light but does not look too flimsy. Power jack located on the right side. Not much but I prefer it would be in the back. The battery life seems long enough. I did not measure though precisely. However it worked for over 2 hours continuously for sure with “Balanced” power plan (full brightness)and plugged in second monitor.

   Be aware there is no back up disk for any application or even for Windows 7 installed on this laptop.

   Windows 7 so far is getting irritate me by incompatibility with most software I have and multimedia which is required compatible driver with Win 7 and there is not always one available on line for download. Well that’s for Windows 7

   In total it is nice laptop. I’m going to keep it. However I’d prefer at least 2 GHz CPU, more readable DVD and built in camera.

   Three weeks later.
   
   The touch pad way too sensitive. Most of the times it triggers a click at any link where cursor was pointed at but there was not direct touch to confirm that click. In opposite to that the scrolling on touch pad not sensitive at all until web page loaded up. The sensitive area for scrolling is too wide. When you need to bring just cursor at the down screen whole page starts scrolling because of the wide scrolling area.

   A Month later. Windows 7.

   Windows 7 works with Corel Video Studio Pro X2 but not totally correctly. After I finished my video project and created menu I noticed that I can’t burn it simply because there are a lot buttons missing in dialog window especially button “Next”. There was only half button “Back” in dialog window of creating DVD. So I ended up with saving project as MPEG file then transferred it to the computer with Win XP inserting this file in to the new Corel’s project creating new menu and then burning it eventually.