Acer Aspire One 532h-2588 (LU.SAL0D.277) Netbook

I have had one of these for the past weeks and I have enjoyed it. It is very small and light, although the battery seems to be about half of the overall weight. The battery life is very long on this, I usually get about 10 hours. The only downside of the long life is that the battery is large and sticks out from the bottom, but I don't mind it because it gives the keyboard a slight tilt when it's on a flat surface and the little buldge is bearable for the extra hours of life it gives. I have been pretty impressed with the performance. It's not a supermachine but I'm not always waiting for it to load stuff either which is good because I tend to be very impatient with computers.

I had it for a few days and then decided to upgrade to a 2gb memory stick from the 1gb that comes with it. Things seem to open faster with the new memory and there's not as much lag, so for about $40 dollars I would recommend upgrading to the 2gb memory. Be sure you buy a 2gb stick to replace the 1gb stick that comes with it and not an additional memory stick because there's only 1 slot for memory. I made that mistake and had to return the extra 1gb stick I ordered and get just 1 2gb stick. Replacing the memory stick was super easy it's just unscrewing 1 screw on the bottom and then flicking a couple of buttons on either side of the old memory stick to unlock it, and then take it out and lock the new stick in.

I like the design of the netbook, and I think it looks sharp. The keyboard is a little bit cramped and takes some getting used to but that's expected with something so small. I like the touchpad, it has a nice texture to it, but the little ribbed scroll bar to the right of it that you can use to scroll through up or down through long pages does not always seem to pick up that I want to scroll, and sometimes you will have to try a few times before it scrolls instead of just moves the mouse. I think pushing down on it and being sure to be all the way to the right of the touchpad helps but it's still not as effective as I would like. Also, the 1 mouse click button you click to right or left click seems to be somewhat sticky sometimes and doesn't feel like it is designed with high quality parts. I usually just double-tab on the touchpad to open things.

The screen is nice and bright and looks good, although as with most netbooks some windows will cover beyond the screen size since the maximum resolution is not high. It comes with some decent software, although I haven't played around with the Acer software too much since I have my own set of software I have been using for a while. The webcam is also nice, but as far as I can tell through the software that comes with it you can only save pictures, not save movies but there is probably another software that will do that out there.

The speakers that come on the system are weak, although they have decent sound quality. They are also on the underside of the front so if the netbook is on a flat surface I find it's not loud enough. It seems I have to turn the volume all the way up and also make the equalizer settings high to get what I consider loud enough, and even then it's just barely loud enough for me, although I tend to like my music louder than most people I think.

I really like the internal bluetooth that comes with it, although for a while I thought it was broken because you have to turn it on via a keyboard shortcut (the function button and F3) and when you start the computer you have to turn it on every time as it starts with the bluetooth off by default to save energy. As far as I could tell that fact is not listed anywhere in the manuals and took me a long time to figure out. There are also some other keyboard shortcuts for things like changing the volume and turning on/off the wifi although at least the wifi starts as on by default. 

It is great for internet browsing because I can connect to my cell phone as a bluetooth modem and use my cell phone's data plan to browse the internet and download things when there is no wifi or broadband connection. I have a Nokia 5800 on AT&T and the nokia PC suite lets you do this easily as well as control many other things with the phone as long as the PC suite is installed on the netbook, but I'm not sure if all phones have that capability. It's really nice to just be able to take the netbook anywhere with 10 hours of battery life and be able to use the internet as long as my phone is on and there is data service in the area I'm in. It is extremely light and portable, although as I mentioned the battery is pretty heavy and if not for that it tends tips over from lack of balace.

So basically I am liking this system, other than a few things like the touchpad and mouse buttons, the cramped keyboard, and the weak speakers it is very nice and more than sufficient for most tasks like browser the internet and doing word processing. The battery life is great and it is good for taking anywhere you need something small but with a lot of capabilities you can't have with a cell phone.