Acer Introduces Aspire S7 Series Ultrabooks Discussion

Acer is promoting the all new 11-inch Aspire S7-191 and 13-inch S7-391 as "the world's thinnest touch Ultrabooks."

Read the full content of this Article: Acer Introduces Aspire S7 Series Ultrabooks

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Any owner would care to share his/her thoughts on on the Acer Aspire S7?
I am notably interested in:
- noise level
- keyboard, e.g. how easy/hard is it to get accustomed to special keyboard layout
- finish/wear

Thanks

 

I recently picked up a S7 191 locally. It has quickly become my favorite laptop. The styling is beautiful and extremely solid. I originally wanted a 13.3" 391 but could not pass up the deal. Here are my quick thoughts.

-excellent build quality. nice aluminum lid and extremely rigid.
-extremely thin and easy to carry especially in the OEM leather case.
-very quiet and fast with SSD.
-beautiful 1080P touch screen. bright, high pixel density and nice viewing angles.
-keyboard is small, back lighting is a bit hard to see and somewhat odd layout but overall easy to type on.
-surprisingly nice rich sound from tuned speakers when placed on flat surface.
-quick boot up and overall great Win 8 experience.
-battery life without extended battery could be better but with easy to install extended battery you get over 7 hours.
-track pad is responsive and multi touch gesture works well.

Not many other 11.6" 1080P touch screens to compare to. May still find a faster i7 13.3" if I come across a deal.

Let me now if you have any questions.

 

^ I had two S7-191 6447's for the course of two weeks and agree with most of your points except:

The SSD is definitely fast due to Lite-On's implementation of two separate SSD controllers in one module to mimic a RAID 0 setup. However, both of my units were the loudest ultraportables I've had. Even when the notebook is sitting on desk idle, the fan will occasionally spin up. I placed a sound level meter two inches away from the palmrest area and the fan will get as loud as 45 dB. I updated the BIOS to latest version (23?) and it did not make any difference. Downgrading it to Windows 7 was fairly easy, but unfortunately did not resolve the fan noise either.

The S7 without the extended battery lasted an average of 2 hours from full charge to automatic shut down via 10% power management policy with the brightness at 50% and WiFi enabled. The best I've gotten with the extended battery is a couple of minutes over 5 hours, which is merely average in comparison with other ultraportables.

The obnoxious fan noise was the reason why I exchanged the first one for the second one, and ultimately returned the second unit. If Acer can fix the fan noise, get the ultraportable to last at least four hours without the extended battery and make the backlit keyboard a level brighter, they will have the best 11.6" ultraportable on the market.