New Acer 18.4" AS8951-G9600 Review

I just got my new Acer AS8951-G9600 and wanted to share some of the good and bad points about this desktop replacement laptop.

Pro's
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* Free upgrade to Windows 7 Ultimate OEM (no media) from Home Premium
* Bright LED-backlight 18.4" screen
* Edge-to-edge LCD glass
* Great comfortable keyboard
* Bright white keyboard backlight
* Entire system runs extremely cool, even when sitting on my lap
* Cool air exhausts out the left side of the system with slow variable fan speed
* Great built-in 5.1 sound and Dolby processing, however, max bult-in speaker volume still is soft
* Excellent volume from headphone jack
* Important notebook function keys like WiFi On/Off and Keyboard Backlight enable work via BIOS -- Acer software not necessary
* 2nd hard drive bay available for expansion
* USB sleep-N-charge is convenient
* Subtle appearance and uniform blue/black color scheme easily outclasses other gaming notebooks

Con's
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* nVidia Optimus s*u*cks -- this is my first Optimus laptop, and it may be my last
* Bluetooth is automatically disabled at every cold power-on!?!?
* Missing a dedicated BluRay / DVD eject keyboard shortcut function
* No recovery media for system, applications, or drivers -- make your own in a 3 hour 5 DVD burning and verification ordeal
* 750gb hard drive is only 5400 rpm
* Acer system documentation is poor and generic -- mentions modems and ExpressCards, but doesn't describe the operation of the detachable trackpad
* Cheap component vendors for 802.11 and Bluetooth -- Atheros makes netbook-grade wireless parts
* WiFi dropouts where Intel Wireless 6300 has no problems at all in another machine
* Plenty of crapware is pre-loaded like the Bing toolbar and McAfee anti-virus trial
* Removable trackpad is a gimmick
* Trackpad surface is not smooth enough, have to increase mouse accel. to max to make it usable as a trackpad
* Keyboard backlight can't automatically trigger itself in low light conditions

 

hi , please read this review and tell us what you think?==> Review Acer Aspire Ethos 8951G Notebook - Notebookcheck.net Reviews

 

Your model had a SSD and max 16 GB of RAM from the factory.
I plan to do those upgrades myself eventually.

Did you encounter the problem I am seeing with Bluetooth?
The built-in software switches it of automatically at cold power-on. I assume it's trying to make a wireless connection to the trackpad. And then it just leaves it off until you manually enable it again.

 

foganime , I did not buy yet .

 

huge disappointment - Acer havent really moved from a better panel since the 8920/30G

 

hey foganime,

I have the same option as yours, ..only different (country) model-nr.
--2nd hard drive bay available for expansion-- and not full 16GB pre-installed.

but I'm sitting with a mystery.... How does your 8951G look under the cover?... Have you checked the RAM-Slots?
Cause in mine I found only 2 slots (...under the main back-cover)
--and the weirdest thing is, mine came pre-installed with 2x2GB ddr3 memory,... jet opening up the back-cover,... those 2 RAM-slots I saw,..where empty!!
-----I've double / tripple checked In windows,.. with differt HW-monitors, and they 'all' clearly show there are 2x2GB modules installed in slot 1 & 3,.. !!
Slot 2 & 4 are there... but where are slots 1 & 3??

----To make sure I didn't make a mistake, I've filled those 2 empty slots with 2x4GB modules,.. and now every HW-Monitor, and Windows, say I've now got 12GB of RAM memory....

I really want to swap those 2x2GB with 2x4GB modules.
So...
---does your 8951G also have this weird configuration under the cover?... ---and if so,.. do you have any idea where the other 2 slots are placed?

I wonder what about those with 16GB pre-installed,.. ??

 

Hi, I haven't had the chance to open my laptop yet.
8 GB is actually working out OK for my needs right now.

I spent a lot of time getting Blu-ray playback up and running after a reformat last weekend. WinDVD 2010 is completely incompatible with the Optimus video on this machine. CyberLink PowerDVD works OK and I guess it was used as part of the Acer Arcade that was pre-installed on the machine.

The Applications & Drivers DVD you can burn for this machine includes no installer for Blu-ray software or the Acer Arcade.

I would be very interested if some one can get WinDVD 2010 working with some patch from Corel or to the nVidia drivers. It looks like there's an "unsecure playback environment" error because it can't properly detect the nVidia video drivers due to Optimus and get authorization to decrypt AACS content on a Blu-ray disc.

 

The 9851 has 2 hidden memory slots that you have to remove the keyboard to get to. I have the 8950 and all 4 memory slots are visible. Mine has a 8 gb configuration with 4 - 2 gb memory modules installed.

 

ArcSoft Total Media 5 works fine on this laptop playing Blu-rays with hardware acceleration if anyone else needs a backup to the CyberLink software.

Still no luck with anything from Corel playing Blu-rays on the 8951G.