Aspire 8920G-934G64BN

First of all, hi there, new forum member.

I have a compaq laptop (question about it I will post in another thread), a desktop PC that I plan on selling soon and 1-2 laptops that I have my eyes on to purchase sometime till the beginning of September.

The Aspire 8920G-934G64BN is my main focus and I would like to ask you guys a few questions about it, if you could answer them, great.

1)Is it me or is it available in two colours, grey and blue?

2)I am planning on buying one (laptop) and keeping it/using it as my main (and only) PC for the duration of September 2008 - Summer 2010 (Northern Hemisphere). Less if I get a good job early, more if I don't.
From what you guys know of Acer, do their laptops even last this long? It will be in a room most of the time and I don't plan using it outside. Being not my first laptop ever I think I can take care of it. My first laptop is a Compaq Presario 2816EA that should still be working after, 6? years now. Or is Acer not known for well built systems?

3)Gaming, I plan on playing on it only current games (as of July 2008, Crysis not included). For my future gaming for 3D games (FPS mainly, driving etc) I will focus on my Xbox 360, and I will use this laptop for turn based strategy games and FPS games that were top like 6 months to a year ago. Will the geforce 9650m be enough, even for reduced resolutions, say 1650x1050 or a bit lower? For FPS games my personal limit for framerate is at high 20s if the game is not too fast.

4) I found it here cheaper than anywhere else in Greece (where I will be till this September) for 1679 euros including tax and another 45 euros for a bag large enough to keep it inside while travelling (just a couple of times for the first year, unknown for the next). I tried to "custom build" other notebooks from greek and other european sites that ship to mainland Greece and whenever I try to build one with similar specs, the price goes way way higher. Is it just me or is it a very good offer? Or is the system going to collapse/too slow/etc?

5) Not directly relevant to the specific notebook, but, is it safe for the notebook to be scanned at airport security with those xray machines or whatever they use?

6) As far as I know, it comes with pre installed Vista 32bit Ultimate, MUI edition. Any idea if I can change language on the fly for the menus? What about updating to 64bit without buying a new copy of Vista? Ultimate come with both 32/64bit AFAIK, but since this is pre installed....?

7) I have read that this laptop is very cool, but what about noise? Are the fans very loud when working at full speed? How about the optical drive?

8)On my Compaq I had this problem where when I plugged in headphones, I could hear the hard drive through them...very annoying. Since I will mostly use headphones with it, any bad experience with them and this laptop?

9)Anyone knows if Acer will release a newer version of this series in the next couple of months with perhaps faster graphics card (if needed ^^ ) or something else?

10)Does it have a PS/2 connection for keyboard/mouse?

11)Does it come with a joystick port? (just kidding)

12)The system comes with 2x320GB SATA drives, any idea what they are?

I can't think of any other questions right now, thanks in advance.

 

1)Is it me or is it available in two colours, grey and blue?

No only one colour

2)I am planning on buying one (laptop) and keeping it/using it as my main (and only) PC for the duration of September 2008 - Summer 2010 (Northern Hemisphere). Less if I get a good job early, more if I don't.
From what you guys know of Acer, do their laptops even last this long? It will be in a room most of the time and I don't plan using it outside. Being not my first laptop ever I think I can take care of it. My first laptop is a Compaq Presario 2816EA that should still be working after, 6? years now. Or is Acer not known for well built systems?

This system has an excellent build quality & should last you.

3)Gaming, I plan on playing on it only current games (as of July 2008, Crysis not included). For my future gaming for 3D games (FPS mainly, driving etc) I will focus on my Xbox 360, and I will use this laptop for turn based strategy games and FPS games that were top like 6 months to a year ago. Will the geforce 9650m be enough, even for reduced resolutions, say 1650x1050 or a bit lower? For FPS games my personal limit for framerate is at high 20s if the game is not too fast.

The 9650m will be fine.

4) I found it here cheaper than anywhere else in Greece (where I will be till this September) for 1679 euros including tax and another 45 euros for a bag large enough to keep it inside while travelling (just a couple of times for the first year, unknown for the next). I tried to "custom build" other notebooks from greek and other european sites that ship to mainland Greece and whenever I try to build one with similar specs, the price goes way way higher. Is it just me or is it a very good offer? Or is the system going to collapse/too slow/etc?

Seems a very good offer, get one!

5) Not directly relevant to the specific notebook, but, is it safe for the notebook to be scanned at airport security with those xray machines or whatever they use?

Should be OK, never had a problem.

6) As far as I know, it comes with pre installed Vista 32bit Ultimate, MUI edition. Any idea if I can change language on the fly for the menus? What about updating to 64bit without buying a new copy of Vista? Ultimate come with both 32/64bit AFAIK, but since this is pre installed....?

With Vista Ultimate you can download additional languages for free through Ultimate extras, menus will be in the language you choose.

7) I have read that this laptop is very cool, but what about noise? Are the fans very loud when working at full speed? How about the optical drive?

All very quiet

8)On my Compaq I had this problem where when I plugged in headphones, I could hear the hard drive through them...very annoying. Since I will mostly use headphones with it, any bad experience with them and this laptop

No hard drive noise

9)Anyone knows if Acer will release a newer version of this series in the next couple of months with perhaps faster graphics card (if needed ^^ ) or something else?

Who knows?

10)Does it have a PS/2 connection for keyboard/mouse?

No

11)Does it come with a joystick port? (just kidding)

No

12)The system comes with 2x320GB SATA drives, any idea what they are?

WDC WD3200BEVT-22ZCT0 http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=377

 

There is a in-depth review of the laptop here:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Acer-Aspire-8920G-notebook.9245.0.html

Hopefully it will answer some of your questions.

 

Thank you for the replies.

What about 64bit? Ultima is supposed to include both 32 and 64bit, do you get the option to install the 64bit when you first turn on the machine? If not, what about upgrading to 64bit for free, is it possible with this?

The colour, I have seen both dark grey and blue that's why the original question. You can see the grey one here:

And the blue one here


A couple more questions.

Is correct aspect scaling properly supported by these mobile versions of nvidia or not, any idea?

I have heard that the customer support form Acer is atrocious. Does that mean buying the +3 years of cover is a waste of money?

 

No? ok, one more question perhaps, does anyone know if the laptop can take more than 4GB of RAM?

 

Although this is one of the best laptops available at the moment, I will probably not buy it. After reading more and more about atrocious customer service from Acer, I just can't be bothered with that if I have a problem.
Thanks for those that replied to my questions.