initial impression of acer 8935g

Hi All,

I have just received an Acer 8935g and as there seems very little info on it I thought I would post up my initial impressions and add some photo's later.

Reasons for buying - I wanted a desktop replacement with decent sound quality and decent gaming quality so I can finally ditch my desktop. I have bought plenty of laptops in the past which have all been great for the odd LAN parties but would never replace my desktop. I am happy to say so far so good.

So first things first, Acers website is shocking and is very short of info. I spent days trying to dig up info on this model with very little success. The main thing that had been holding me back is the gfx card, in 1 sentence it says 4670 and in the next it says 4650. My main concern was that the 4650 would contain ddr2 ram.

I am pleased to confirm my model has the 4670. I went for the lower end model with P7350 as I already have a decent CPU to switch into it.

Build Quality - I have heard rumours of poor build quality and poor QA from Acer but I am happy to say my laptop is perfect, the construction seems solid and no defects to be found. It is very heavy at 4.1kgs but this is a desktop replacement for me, I wont be lugging it around on a daily basis ( I have a Dell studio 1555 for that)

Screen - The screen quality is average at best. It is far lower quality than my dell 1555 1080p screen. Although it is LED it does not have great brightness so I wont be using this outdoors. Also it is very glossy so lots of reflections. The contrast is also only average and colours look a little washed out. That being said Blurays looked good and 3dmark06 looked good, I am yet to install any games.

Keyboard - The keyboard is very good and easy to type on, it also has all the keys of a full size keyboard (so no Fn plus key for home etc). The keyboard is also backlit, I always thought backlit keyboards were a gimmick but now I have used one I would never go back, especially if like me you use your laptop in low light.

gfx performance - This was one of my main reasons for choosing this model, I have the 4570 in my studio 1555 and it performs brilliantly for such a bottom end card. I wanted just a little more power though so I can play TF2 and DOW2 in 1080p (the studio 1555 can just about manage but at 20-30fps). In 3dmark06 with my 2ghz P7350 I score 6500 at the 1280x1024 default res.

Battery - I have not fully tested this yet and want to test it with the intel and ati cards so will update later.

Temps - Wow this laptop runs cool! I have had it on for 5 hours and tried orthos and 3dmark to stress it. The laptop is still cool to the touch! (unlike my studio 1555 which you can fry eggs on!) The rear vent pumps warm air out whilst gaming but that is the only heat I can feel. I would actually contemplate using this on my lap.

Noise - What noise this laptop is incredibly quiet (especially if I compare to my 1555 which sounds like a jet engine whilst gaming)

To sum up I am very impressed. There is a fair amount of bloat I am currently removing but other than that I cannot find any niggles.

Any questions please fire away

 

Thanks for the heads up! I'm thinking of buying this laptop later today, so am very happy to hear such good first impression!

May I ask, which website this you buy this from? And for how much?

Also, do you think this Acer 8935G will fit (snugly) into laptop bags designed for 17" machines?

Thanks,
JC

 

I originally tried to order this from OCUK but as usual they let me down (website said 10+ in stock, I even phoned to check and 2 days later nothing, I phoned again and they said oops sorry our supplier let us down we dont know when! this is not the first time they have done this so its the last time I order from them)
I ended up buying this from ebuyer as I wanted it on a next day and Ebuyer have never let me down.
It was £30 cheaper from simply acer but I didnt mind paying the extra from piece of mind (ebuyer also have a decent returns policy)

 

Thanks ninja for the prompt reply!

By the way, I assume you bought your Acer 8935G after 26th June 2009? Is your laptop eligible for the free Windows 7 upgrade come October? This website http://www.acer.com/windows7upgrade is awfully in its vagueness.

That's pretty meaningless to me at this point, considering there don't expand upon what is a "qualifying PC". I called Acer pre-sales, customer support and technical support and there were as useful as a used condom in telling me what exactly is a qualifying PC; "you'll need to buy it first and enter the serial number on our Windows 7 website to know whether it's eligible" (says the guy who was reading it from the website). Eurgh, what a bunch of idiots. Anyway do you know?

Thanks,
JC

 

Yeah it does qualify although I havent gotten around to filling out the web form yet.

Acers website is shocking. They havent even got the product description right on the 8935.

 

Yeah, it really is. And I really believe the customer service people they hire are given all 30 minutes of training before they're put on the telphone. Lines like "I'm basically reading off the website and a spreadsheet and I know about as much as you" really doesn't inspire confidence. Well, to be fair, what corporation's customer service department isn't like that?

By the way, do you think the beastly 18.4" Acer 8935G will fit (snugly) into laptop bags designed for 17" machines? I know it's a bit of a how long is a piece of string question, but still...I'm simply wanting to know as I'm going to be movingout of the country quite soon, and am wondering what kind of baggage I will need.

 

oops sorry, meant to answer that question!

Mine fits snugly in my targus messenger 17" laptop bag. Let me know if you need me to send you a link

 

JUST. I bought a jansport from ebay:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/JanSport-Boost-17-18-19-Laptop-Bag-Backpack-Blue_W0QQitemZ130315931950QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Computing_LaptopAccessories_LaptopCasesBags?hash=item1e576f512e&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=65%3A12|66%3A2|39%3A1|72%3A1683|293%3A1|294%3A50

It is actually a 17" screen bag but i am able to close the zips over the top of the 8935g, but only just.

 

Do you have any photos?

 

- I bought 8935g (2.0 Quad , 4670 1GB) recently.... All works fine except for temperature...
- I think it is going very hot... What do you think?

 

I bought mine with the P7350 2ghz dual core. I have since swapped it for my P9500 2.53ghz dual core.

My P7350 did run hot (over 70c) and also the was a 10c spread between the 2 cores.
When I removed the P7350 and put my P9500 in I removed their SH*T thermal grease and replaced with AS5, my temps now do not go over 65c and the cores are within 2-3c of each other with orthos and furmark running (which I would consider normal).

PS can you run HWmonitor whilst gaming or with orthos/furmark so you can let us know what temps you are getting?