Acer Aspire 5112WLMi Review (pics, specs)

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Overview

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This is a review of the Acer Aspire 5112WLMI model (part of the Acer Aspire 5110 series). It is a mostly home-user oriented notebook with following specs:

• Processor: AMD Turion 64 X2, TL-50 (1.6GHz, 256Kb x 2 cache)
• Chipset: ATI Xpress 200 (1100 ?)
• RAM: DDR2 1GB (512x2 533MHz), max. supported - 4GB DDR667
• Video: Radeon x1600, 128Mb DDR2 (with up to 512 hypermemory), PCI-Express x16
• Sound: Realtek HD, 2 stereo speakers
• HDD: 120GB, 5400 RPM, SATA
• LCD: 15.4&quot;, WXGA, Acer CrystalBrite (Glossy), 200nit, 16ms response
• CD: DVD+-RW, Super-multi, Tray-load
• Ports: 4 USB 2.0, VGA, DVI, S-Video, Audio-In, Audio-Out, 1394, Lan, Mic-in, Modem
• Cards: 5 in 1 memory card reader, PC Type II card slot, Express card slot
• LAN: Realtek8169/8110 Gigabit (10/100/1000)
• Wireless: Bluetooth, Atheros B/G, Infrared
• Misc: Bluetooth phone (not reviewed here), 310.000 pixels CMOS Camer, Microphone
• Battery: Li-ion 8cell, 4800mAh, claimed life -- 3h
• Weight: 3Kg
• Dimensions: 358 x 269 x 33.8 mm (W x H x D)
• Warranty: 1 year international Travelers warranty

From the specs above one would think that this is a power horse. We'll see if that's true later.

Reasons for buying

This notebook was purchased at local computer store. The price here in Lithuania where it was purchased came to about 4000LTL ($1,480), with a student discount you can get it for slightly less at 3935LTL ($1,457), including Value Added Tax.

Build &amp; Design

The build is mediocre. It is not a notebook that will withstand a lot of abuse or rough handling as it is made from plastic and not magnesium-alloy or carbon fiber. The best place for this laptop to be used is on a desk or table top with little-to no road trips.

The silver lid does not look very scratch resistant, so a sleeve for protection should be used when carrying it around. However, the screen protection is good -- no ripples occur when applying pressure from the back of the lid. The hinges are strong, but the plastic latches are questionable. They have a sturdy enough feel that you know they won't break anytime soon, the hope is that they won't break after warranty expires.

The palm rests are a bit weak, they flex when applying focused pressure at a point, the same is true for the area above keyboard where media keys are located. Also, there are a little bit of squeaking and creaks you'll hear from the notebook when lifting and the carrying notebook around.

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Sitting on top of the package box	Size comparison with DVD box	Size comparison with standard AA battery	Right side with half opened display

The design is good -- this notebook definitely looks better in person that what you can tell from pictures. The screen has a nice piano-black border surrounding it, which is in harmony with glossy screen (especially when the screen is black or turned off and shiny and reflective itself). The silver-greenish color of the palm rests and lid top is not bright or disturbing. Nor do they look synthetic, like seen on some cheap notebooks. The one drawback I'll mention regarding the piano-black border is that it catches fingerprints very easily.

Screen

The screen is a 15.4&quot; WXGA (1280x800). Overall it is good screen. On paper Acer claims it has 200nit brightness and a 16ms response time, I can only confirm there is no ghosting detected and it is fairly bright (there are 15 brightness levels, for me level 10-12 is sufficient indoors), vivid colors and this particular screen had no bad pixels.

When looking at the screen not light leakage is noticeable -- all screen corners appear to be lit evenly.

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Max. brightness	Vertical angle	Horizontal angle	Notice reflections when screen is turned off

Of course there are reflections from the screen as it is glossy, but for home users such a screen type is usually preferred. For some the WXGA resolution on a 15.4&quot; screen may be too bulky, but for me it felt okay -- the text is larger than SXGA and so is less strain on your eyes.

Audio and Speakers

Audio is handled by a Realtek HD chip. There are 3 audio connectors: line in, line out, mic in. The line out also has SPDIF functionality. When connected to headphones and playing audio CD there is no noticeable hiss on loudest settings. The laptop has one integrated microphone.

There are separate volume control buttons, but, unfortunately, as in all notebooks these days, they are software buttons (no driver -- no sound control).

Stereo speakers are located at the front of the notebook. The Speaker quality is mediocre -- they sound crisp and clear but not at the highest volume (although they are fairly loud and easily can be heard from across the room). Of course there is no bass.

Processor and Performance

In my usage this notebook felt snappy. I could run a Super-Pi test in the background and browse the Internet without any delays. For office tasks the Turion64 X2 TL-50 is fine. Of course we all know that AMD is slower

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Sticker with specs	AMD + ATI best friends from now on

than Intel when it comes to Audio/Video compression. But I don't think that would impact overall productivity, unless you are a video professional.

With a 120GB hard disk there is plenty of room to store data and the 5400RPM rotation speed is enough for everyday tasks. The included 8x DVD+-RW writes DVD's as it should - with no slowdowns (for example, the DVD drive in my Quanta MW1 works fine when using 2x writing speed, but when selecting higher speeds, burning full DVD takes longer than with 2x).

The notebook sports an ATI Radeon X1600 graphics card with dedicated 128MB DDR2 memory. This affects performance positively, too. You are able to enjoy hardware video decoding and do some 3D tasks. The graphics solution included here has got only one drawback -- ATI's &quot;hypermemory up to 512MB&quot; means that the graphic can take 384MB of system memory, but with 1GB of system memory on board, I did not feel any adverse performance effects.

Notice processor load, when doing Super-Pi test:

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It seems, that Turion manages to distribute load evenly between cores.

Benchmarks

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I don't know how AMD tests its processors, but in the real world they are much slower than quoted it seems, at least based on my tests.

All benchmarks are done with default driver settings, all Acer software installed, with antivirus running in the background, maximum performance mode selected and on AC power.

Super Pi

Notebook	Time
Acer Aspire 5112 WLMi (AMD Turion X2 1.6GHz)	2m 04s
Asus W3H760DD (2.0 GHz Pentium M)	1m 33s
Dell Inspiron e1505 (2.0GHz Core Duo)	1m 16s
Lenovo ThinkPad T60 (2.0GHz Core Duo)	1m 18s
Toshiba Satellite M100 (2.00GHz Core Duo)	1m 18s
Samsung X60 (1.66GHz Core Duo)	1m 29s
Dell XPS M140 (1.86 GHz Pentium M)	1m 41s
Sony VAIO FS680 (1.86 GHz Pentium M)	1m 53s
IBM ThinkPad T43 (1.86 GHz Pentium M)	1m 45s

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3DMark05:

Notebook	3D Mark 05 Results
Acer Aspire 5112 WLMi (AMD Turion X2 1.6GHz, ATI X1600)	2,406 3D Marks
Asus W3J (1.83Ghz Core Duo, ATI X1600 256MB)	3,925 3D Marks
Dell Inspiron e1705 (2.0GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400)	1,791 3D Marks
Acer TravelMate 8204WLMi (2.0GHz Core Duo, ATI X1600 256MB)	4,236 3DMarks
Alienware Aurora M-7700(AMD Dual Core FX-60, ATI X1600 256MB)	7,078 3D Marks
Lenovo ThinkPad T60 (2.0GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400 128MB)	2,092 3D Marks
Asus V6Va (2.13 GHz Pentium M, ATI x700 128 MB)	2,530 3D Marks
Fujitsu n6410 (1.66 GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400 128MB)	2,273 3DMarks
HP Pavilion dv4000 (1.86 GHz Pentium M, ATI X700 128MB)	2,536 3D Marks
Dell XPS M1210 (2.16 GHz Core Duo, nVidia Go 7400 256MB)	2,090 3D Marks

 

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I expected the score for 3DMark05 would be lower than 3200 in this test, but what I got is unexplainable. First I thought something was wrong with ATI/AMD drivers, or under-clocked hardware, or Acer's software that controls computer performance. But after some uninstalling and reinstalling (I had to reinstall Windows 3 times) nothing changed, the score was almost the same (yes, I tried Omega drivers too).

I doubt that if memory speed was 100MHz faster it would make any significant improvements. Maybe score would increase by 200 -- 300 but not more.

As the Radeon can use a big chunk of system memory, maybe faster (667) RAM would help, but somehow I doubt that would be a significant performance gain either. For those interested, the Radeon X1600 clocks on this notebook are (as ATI's Control panel shows): core 473, memory 369.

3DMark2006: 1214 (with WXGA resolution)

3DMark2006: 1065 (with SXGA resolution)

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WXGA resolution	SXGA resolution

After 3D Mark 2005 these numbers are guessable.

Doom3, TimeDemo1, precached: 35.1fps (1024x768, Medium quality, default Radeon driver settings)

Doom3, TimeDemo1, precached: 39.3fps (1024x768, High quality, default Radeon driver settings)

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PCMark2005: 3102

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The PCMark score, which measures overall system performance, is not bad at all.

HD Tune

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Heat &amp; Noise

Note: Ambient temperature was ~25C when the notebook was on AC power with Acer's default power schema of maximum performance mode.

When doing office tasks this notebook does not get hot. You can however feel warmth coming from the top-left side of the keyboard. After some time, the notebooks entire left side gets warm, including the left palm rest.

The fan spins constantly at very low speeds; in a noisy room it's almost inaudible. The DVD drive is quite the opposite, which produces huge amount of noise, especially if a poor quality disk is used. Maybe if another power schema was selected (like lower power &quot;Word Processing&quot there would be no warmth or constantly spinning fan.

When playing games or doing other processor intensive tasks, the notebook's top-left side gets hot. And I must say -- uncomfortably so. This time both palm rests get warm. The fan spins at higher rates, but the noise is not high (definitely lower than my Quanta MW1).

Fan air intake is on the bottom and warm air comes out from top-left &amp; back-left fan outlets. This is a good thing for right-handed people.

Here I tried to do some drawing to illustrate heat distribution:

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Keyboard, Media buttons &amp; Touchpad

The Keyboard is a bit stiff when compared to my Quanta notebook keyboard, so it took a while for me to get used to it. When pressed harder the keyboard flexes a bit in the areas above left and right palm rests. The top-left and bottom-right corners are mushy, this is not terribly annoying, but still noticeable.

The [Ctrl]+[Fn] keys are positioned correctly and the arrow keys are separated and function keys grouped.

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Keyboard	Touchpad	Media buttons	Bluetooth & wireless on/off buttons

The touchpad has a 16:9 ratio (the same as display). At default settings it is somewhat unresponsive, but that's easily corrected with some changes in settings. The touchpad buttons are plastic and have a pleasant &quot;click&quot; sound when depressed.

There are 2 buttons on the front with 2 dedicated indicator lights -- one for Bluetooth and the other for wireless enable/disable. Unfortunately, they are software buttons and do not work until Windows is loaded.

One interesting thing to mention: it seems that there is some bug in Acer's software -- if wireless is disabled, after rebooting, the light next to it lights up, showing that wireless is enabled, but when Windows fully loads up the light goes out.

The DVD drive's open button is a little bit tricky to hit. It's almost flushed with the drive's front panel and requires a fingernail to push it.

Input &amp; Output Ports

Front

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Left speaker, Bluetooth on/off (blue light), Wireless on/off (green light), Power LED, Battery LED, Mic-in, Line-in, Spekers/SPDIF, Right speaker

Left side

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Kensington lock, fan outlet, USB, LAN, InfraRed, 5 in 1 card reader, Fire Wire, PC Card Type II, Express card

Back

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Modem, 2 USB ports, Power, S-video, VGA, DVI, USB, fan outlet

Right Side

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Only DVD+-RW drive is here

Bottom

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Top-right corner -- fan intake

* Microphone is located bellow keyboard on the right side.

Wireless

Wireless works as expected -- it even detects neighbors unprotected access point with no problem! A test of the infrared with a Sony-Ericsson Cell Phone shows that to work fine.

Camera

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Camera has ability to rotate around

For camera handling Acer provides OrbiCam software. It has a very simple user interface:

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Here is a sample picture taken with the web camera (indoors, with ambient light from window):

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Battery

I had no opportunity to do a full battery test, but when unplugged, wireless &amp; bluetooth off, screen on 7 brightness level, doing office tasks, the battery indicator shows the charge is 92% remaining with an estimated battery time of 2:28 h.

When on battery Acer defaults its mode to &quot;Word processing&quot; and the default core speed lowers to 798MHz (when on AC power and using default power scheme, the core clock is 1596MHz).

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		Battery and power adapter with DVD case for size comparison	Power cord has 3 pins.

Acer's QuickCharge feature allows you to charge battery to 80% in one hour.

Operating System, Software &amp; Doing Recovery

I can say there is no bloatware. Even Norton Antivirus is not installed, but Acer does provide the CD with it + 1 year license. Maybe it is possible to name Acer's ePerformance management tools and Acer's eArcade as bloatware, but apart from that you will find no unnecessary software.

There are no recovery CD's though -- you must create them yourself, so when buying this notebook, buy 1 DVD+-R or 4 CD-R's. A reminder window pops-up every time you start windows, asking you to put in a blank DVD or CD to write all needed recovery information.

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Software installed automatically after recovery	Acer's recovery tool

The hard disk is divided into 3 partitions -- a 4GB Acer recovery partition, 58GB FAT32 system partition and 58GB FAT32 data partition.

I tried to do a system reinstall using a recovery DVD and before doing so repartitioned &amp; reformatted the hard disk into 2 NTFS partitions (40GB for the system, 80GB for the data) using 3^rd party tools. The recovery disk worked without any problem, only a few questions were asked at the beginning and after about 1 hour I had notebook up and running.

Only 2 notices: 1) Acer's recovery tool does not ask where to install the system, it automatically installs into partition C: ; 2) The recovery tool reformats system partition to FAT32.

Stability &amp; Hardware problems

As I had reported after playing games for almost 8 hours, the notebook didn't crash. But when I checked HDD info with HD Tune, it reported the following error:

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I don't know what is wrong with HDD, but it works fine. In fact if not for the HD Tune report, I would never think that there is something wrong.

Customer Support

I wrote an email to Acer asking about HDD problem above. Almost 2-days had gone and still no answer, but then I got a letter from my mail provider that such mailbox does not exist.

Conclusion

For Home User (as desktop replacement)

For Business Oriented User

Pros: Acceptable performance (both gaming and office); Good design, looks nice; All needed ports; Integrated web camera; Glossy screen with vivid colors, good brightness and response time; Bluetooth/Infrared/Wireless; Fan outlet on the left side (good thing for right-handed people); No bloatware; 5 in 1 memory card reader; Cons: To slow for eye-candy game settings; Mushy keyboard; A bit pricey for such performance; Can not withstand abuse (if your child likes to play with your things J );

Pros: Lots of ports; Good performance in office tasks; Good graphics processor for not super intensive graphics tasks (3D modeling), light gaming, video; Vista capable; Has 64bit computing ability; Bluetooth/Infrared/Wireless; Free Bluetooth phone + integrated web camera for internet conferences; DASP - Acer's HDD protection; No bloatware; Keyboard layout is OK -- [ctrl] and [fn] keys are not swapped, arrow and function keys are separated, additional keys for $ and E symbols; Travelers warranty; Cons: Heavy; A bit flashy; Not the strongest build (but for the desktop replacement is ok); Because of bottom air intake, may be uncomfortable on lap; Mushy keyboard; Glossy screen;

Unpacking

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Excellent review!! It seems like we now know the reason why the Aspire 5102 was missing so much stuff!! They were reserved for the 5112. Looks like you got a great deal. Everything I wanted and didn't get you got, lol. Good Luck with the notebook.

 

great review, thanks!

 

OH man, that's one lovely review right there! Awesome job!

 

Thank you guys and
Big thanx to Andrew for helping me with this review

 

Really nice reivew. Well done

To explain your lowish 3D mark05 results, what was the core speed and memory speed of your x1600???

 

He had it in his review.

Great review! Love all the detailed pics.

 

the best review i've seen in notebookreview.com.

i have 5112 also.

have you checked memory bus bandwith of x1600 with everest ultimate? it seems to be 64-bit whereas ati's website claims 128-bit.

i think its because of hypermemory and i suspect it is common for all hypermemory cards after read that page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radeon_R520

 

Nice review and I agree the 3Dmark score seemed a bit low, maybe they, Acer, seriously UC'd it. Nice cell phone btw, I have the same one!

 

Very professional review I'd say. I am intending buying the same laptop. Pitty that the build quality is not the best u can find but still...
I wonder if larger L2 cache will help boost the 3D mark score satisfactory, say 512kb as built in TL 52..etc.

 

Graphics memory is underclocked by 100Mhz, I can post some scores with OC memory tomorrow if you want...

 

Great review and very good looking photos .

I hope you'll get the 3Dmark problem sorted out , enjoy your new notebook .

 

The SMART problem is due to new attributes that the software doesn't understand. I have the same problem with a new SATA hard drive in my desktop.

Attribute BE is airflow temperature. It would suggest that the drive has overheated although I wouldn't be too sure. On my desktop drive the temperature threshold and the airflow threshold are the same (55), so I don't know why the threshold should be 45 for a laptop. Perhaps someone else knows more about this!

 

Thanks for an excellent review!

 

Superb review! Thanks.

 

Hey , I am somewhat surprisd . The laptop you have shoul have 2G Ram and 160 G hard drive ( 160rps) .
See the following
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10077029&catid=

 

Awesome review. I liked the dual conclusion at the end.

The scores for AMD's X2 Turion are lower than I was hoping. It seems to be dragging down the 3DMark score as well.

Another explanation: It is pretty common for notebook makers to cut costs by using 64bit video RAM instead of 128bit. This effectively halves the memory bandwidth - as another poster pointed out that may be the cause of the low score. They probably did this to create a performance barrier between this and the new Ferrari.

For $1399 CDN you got a hell of a deal. Wow! Faster than my old Ferrari and probably pretty close to the 5000 series Ferrari that just came out.

I wonder if there will be a TravelMate version of this laptop.

 

Dude, order one! That is a sick deal!!!

 

Here are scores with OC'ed graphics card memory (back to ATI's recommended 470MHz). Scores are higher now, but not much...

1'st pic -- ATI Tool with new freqs
2'nd pic -- OC'ed 3D mark 05
3'rd pic -- Doom 3 med settings
4'th pic - Doom 3 hi settings

when OC'ed notebook works stable, no significant heat or noise increase is noticeable.

 

You better check with them, maybe they made error in specs (or in model number ).
If not -- then I don't know why specs are different...

 

yea, I think it is a pretty go deal , even way better than my laptop (gatewat mx7515) .
But in this case, I think the x1600 will hold the whol performance back . Don't you think the same .
another point , I think this laptop will be a little behind when the new Vista and DX10 games come alive . Am I worng .

 

Nice review.

Anybody notice the availability in the US? All my searches turn out “Aspire 5102WLMi” only.

I also wish there is a configuration better than TL-50, for double cache size.

For comparison, I believe ASUS Z92T has a slightly better configuration. It is just showing up on those “Build on ASUS” stores on the web.

OR should I just wait for Core 2 Duo? This waiting is killing me.

 

5112's radeon mobility x1600 hm uses 64-bit bus ram:

look at http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=72946 for details

http://img108.imageshack.us/img108/447/everestcd1.jpg

 

That's pretty disappointing....

 

I think I already know the answer, but I'll ask anyway. Does the suspected 64bit bus resulting from the Hyper Memory(TM) apply to the dedicated video memory, or just the shared memory?

Also, is the processor user upgradable?

stephen
ps. I'll join the chorus - Great Review! The best I have read on Notebook Reviews.

 

dedicated video memory bus is 64-bit. it is not efected by HM
there are ati HM cards which dedicated video memory bus is 128-bit.

 

ATI Tray Tools shows:

Display adapter ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 (0x71C5)
Core Name M56
SubVendor Acer Incorporated (1025)
SubDevice 009F
BUS 1
Device 0
Function 0
Base Address 0 C8000008
Base Address 1 00009001
Base Address 2 C0100000
Base Address 3 00000000

Bus Type PCI Express
SMARTGART Installed No

Driver Version 06.7
Release Version 8.282-060802a-035181C-ATI
QuadBuffer Stereo Support No
Catalyst Registry Path
System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Video\{8893E6AB-1A96-4460-B7ED-52D19B775E61}\0000

______________________________
Clock Information
BIOS VPU 0,00
Current VPU 0,00
BIOS MEM 0,00
Current MEM 0,00

______________________________
Radeon PCI configuration space
00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 0A 0B 0C 0D 0E 0F
00 02 10 C5 71 07 00 10 00 00 00 00 03 08 00 00 00
10 08 00 00 C8 01 90 00 00 00 00 10 C0 00 00 00 00
20 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 25 10 9F 00
30 00 00 00 00 50 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 12 01 00 00
40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 25 10 9F 00
50 01 58 02 06 00 00 00 00 10 80 11 00 A0 0F 00 00
60 10 08 00 00 01 0D 00 00 02 00 01 11 00 00 00 00
70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
80 05 00 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
90 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
A0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
B0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
C0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
D0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
E0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
F0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00

______________________________
Hardware Information
Installed memory 128 Mb
Memory Type GDDR3
Memory Width 64 bit
Active Rendering Pipelines 4

______________________________
ASIC details
Family 63
Emulated Revision 10
Gfx Engine ID 3

______________________________
Radeon Registers
RADEON_BIOS_0_SCRATCH 00040000
RADEON_BIOS_1_SCRATCH 00000000
GB_TILE_CONFIG 01410011
HWDREG_00000000 210004AC
HWDREG_00000001 00000001
HWDREG_00000002 00000000
HWDREG_00000003 0000000C
HWDREG_00000004 24000388
HWDREG_00000005 00000001
HWDREG_00000006 00000000
HWDREG_00000007 0000000C
HWDREG_00000008 00000005
HWDREG_00000009 00000000
HWDREG_0000000A 00010015
HWDREG_0000000B 110FAC8F
HWDREG_0000000C 33220000
HWDREG_0000000D 00073011
HWDREG_0000000E 00000000
HWDREG_0000000F 0F3FF01A
HWDREG_00000010 0F3FF01A
HWDREG_00000011 0F3FF01A
HWDREG_00000012 0F3FF50A
HWDREG_00000013 0F3FF01A
HWDREG_00000014 0F3FF01A
HWDREG_00000015 000000CA
HWDREG_00000016 000001CA
HWDREG_00000017 0000018A
HWDREG_00000018 0000010A
HWDREG_00000019 0000014A
HWDREG_0000001A 0000060A
HWDREG_0000001B 0000040A
HWDREG_0000001C 0000001A
HWDREG_0000001D 00000012
HWDREG_0000001E 00000017
HWDREG_0000001F 00008028
HWDREG_00000020 00000000

______________________________
Video BIOS Information
Version 009.012.001.015
Part Number LCD/DVI/TV/CRT 475E/375M
Date 2006/06/14 12:26
Vram Type HyperMemory

______________________________
Controller Configurations
Controller 0
Active Connections:
-LCD Panel (Laptop) (0) 1280x800x60
Controller 1
Active Connections:
No Active Connections

______________________________
Displays supported by adapter
0 (1) Monitor (CRT1)
1 (2) LCD Panel (Laptop)
2 (4) TV
3 (8) Digital Flat Panel
4 (16) Component Video Output

______________________________
EnumDisplays
Display Type 0, Extended Type 1 , Max Resolution 1600x1200
Display Type 2, Extended Type 0 , Max Resolution 1280x800
Display Type 1, Extended Type 0 , Max Resolution 1024x768
Display Type 3, Extended Type 1 , Max Resolution 2048x1536
Display Type 4, Extended Type 0 , Max Resolution 720x480

 

I have not disassembled this unit, but processor
must be easy upgradeable, 'cause CPU uses S1 socket and there is a big access panel on the bottom, whitch is simmilar to Quanta MW1 (one access panel for CPU, GPU, RAM, Wireless).
I suspect, that CPU and GPU chip are connected via heatpipe and on one of them (most likely GPU) has Fan on top of that.

 

Your assumption is probably right.
Here is the pictures of Aspire 3102 with open back.
Both AS5102 and AS5112 share the same platform, so the copper heat pipe is going from GPU to CPU and then to the went fins.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/include/...2371892&Sku=A180-1286&imgcart=1&imgcounter=18
http://www.tigerdirect.com/include/...2371892&Sku=A180-1286&imgcart=1&imgcounter=19

Also, is somebody with Aspire 5112 can look into the location and make of the Bluetooth card on their machine?
I'm with Aspire 5102 and want to put it's Bluetooth-ready functionality in work.
For some reason Acer decided not to include the Bluetooth card in this model, while it's completely Bluetooth ready and only BT card is missing.

 

So yea, is does seem like the 5102 is the unfinish product of the 5112.

I just bought a $30 bluetooth dongle, works great but why put a bluetooth button in front if there is no bluetooth card installed. The button/switch can't control the usb bluetooth dongle.

Also I wish I had out s-video or regular aud/vid output.

Besides that I can't see a huge differ between these two models. BOTH ARE GREAT THO.

 

WTF? It's 12 pixel pipelines card!

 

I just bought one today after reading the review... i know the turion is slower than the core duos but why is my laptop running so **** slow?? the cpu usage was at around 20-30% and it feels like a 80% load single core... why is this happening? all i have running on the background was the default software comes with, norton anti virus, Everest, and deamon tools... also is the cpu suposed to be ideling at 50c?? my super pi at 1M was 1:28s..... is this suposed to be this slow??!!!

 

no, something is slowing down your machine.

 

Hey thanx for the fast response. i;ve installed adaware and deleted thoese tracking ware. the machine feels alittle responsive. is there anything more i can get rid of to gain some more performance? has anyone tried overclocking the videocard? ati tray tells me overclocking is disabled... ? sorry for asking noob questions... this is my first AMD/ATI computer

 

For overclocking ATI use ATI Tool. Do some googling and you'll find this utility.
Processor use when IDLE'ing must be ~0%..2%.
You may want to overclock graphics memory, 'cause it's downclocked by acer.

Of what "tracking-ware" you're talking? There must be no such programs on fresh install from recovery DVD.

 

I am using the omega 3.8273 drivers, but ati tool shows overclocking disabled and i have reinstalled twice to make sure i didn't do anything wrong. and i still can't enable the overclocking feature in ati tool...

the tracking ware i meant the tracking cookies >< ya there are no such programs.

 

To enable overclocking in ATT go to ATT folder, find atitray.ini and edit this part:

; disable overclocking at all
; will be useful on unsupported hardware
opt_disable_ovr= 0

It's gotta be "0" there.

As for tracking cookies- this doesn't slow down your machine in any way- these are just text files.

Regards

 

if cpu usage is still more than 8%, you can use task manager to see which process takes most cpu and ram.

 

hey downloads thanx for the response. i checked in the folder, as you said the option is at "0" and i still can't do any overclock... it just go back to default when ever i trid to apply the setting >< .

@Martynas: i checked in task manager, every process is at 0 but the cpu usage is at 15-20% usage constantly... this is dissapointing for me... anyways i am planning to exchange for an intel based system. the toshiba A100s with T2500 core duo, geforce 7600go, 1gb ram and 120gb 5400rmp hdd for 300 dollars more. do you think it's worth the extra money?

 

if you're looking for power, of course -- yes.

 

Yeah, at this price range i DO expect it to pack with some punch. 19fps on COD2 is just disapointing. thanx for your help tho.

 

hey guys! maybe there is possibility to change this 64bit x1600 into the 128bit? maybe new bios, drivers or any other modification?...that's only my dream but there were some ati desktop card which could been changed

 

emm i don't think so... it's the hardware architechure itself not software... don't think you can upgrade too.

 

Has anyone measure temps on this machine? Notebook Hardware Control should give you accurate readings.

Also, has anyone here tried undervolting the CPU to reduce heat?

And finally, I also noticed the massive panel door on this unit. It will not void your warranty to open it and take a picture. Can someone do that?

In Canada this notebook is an exceptional deal $1299 for the MCE version with 2 GB Ram and 160 GB HDD.

 

I choose
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4133532
over
http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/prod...Q5JXF21KGJQ8myp5nMv6b!975925376!1160439246434

1. Have i made the right choice??
2. Is this a good deal??
3. Any other Acer 5112 users opinion here??

 

Well, it really depend on what your going to do with it. if you just want a laptop for school and play some games then you can go for the 5112wlmi as it has amazing value and features. but if your using it for gaming and heavy multitasking. i suggest you go with core duo systems. i ended up getting the toshiba a100-sk9 with T2500 and geforce go 7600. much more powerful system.

 

Thx, i think i'll stick w/ the acer..
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=1613786#post1613786

 

Someone around sugested that the poor 3d mark performance might be related to the multiple partition of the HD. After all, some parts are in NTFS and others in FAT32.
What do you guys think?

 

Poor 3D performance is strictly the matter of 64bit RAM. FAT or NFTS does not matter at all. Even mine Aspire 5024 with x700 (8 pipelines, 128bit memory) slightly OC'ed is faster than Aspire 5112.

Still there is an interesting thing to read on ACER support- "release" for the newest BIOS v2.0 has VBIOS for M66-P (x1700) with it's own freqs. (Previously the bios was there but with no freqs).

Would it mean new version with x1700 (I really doubt they would use 64bit again- you can't be that dumb )

BTW: Have you all updated to the newest bios? For ASPIRE 5024 bios update changed RAM freq increased) Maybe there is some improvement.

 

I bought mine in US here:
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.pro...MIRT2&JRSource=zdnet.datafeed.ACE+5112WLMIRT2

Do i need to reinstall it?
Should i upgrade to XP media center??
Is it worth the price??? (cause i heard in another review that we can get it w/ XP media center edition for 1300 CAD in Canada)
BTW, i live in WA..