We had some hands-on action with Acer's new Aspire S3 Series Ultrabook this morning, in a packed and sweaty Berlin hall at IFA 2011.
The Taiwanese giant has really impressed us with its great value laptops this year, so we were keen to check out this ultra-slim lapt top, which is just 17mm at itshickest point, and 13mm at its thinnest. This makes it slightly slimmer than the Samsung 9003X, which was already impressively slender.
The metal chassis looks reassuringly solid, constructed from a lightweight aluminium/magnesium alloy. We were impressed at just how light the Aspire S3 feels when you pick it up, and the friendly Acer rep confirmed it weighs a measly 1.3kg.
The body is slim across its entire length and the lid in particular is impressively thin. Despite this, the centre did not flex when pushed, although the edges bent a surprising amount when pulled on. Thankfully, despite an ominous cracking sound, this didn't seem to damage the lid or the screen.
A full-size chiclet (or 'isolation style') keyboard stretches most of the width of the chassis. The keys are all firmly mounted, but as with most laptops this thin, their travel when hit is disappointingly shallow. In fact, they barely move at all, so you feel like you're hitting a solid surface.
Thankfully the keys are well sized (apart from the typically dinky arrow keys) and laid out logically, with no indented CTRL key or other craziness.
The Aspire S3 also boasts a bright 13.3-inch LED display with a 1366 x 768 pixel resolution. We only had enough time to check out some default photos, but these looked crisp and colourful. The glossy surface is highly reflective, which does hamper viewing when you have strong lights beaming down on you.
One of Intel's Ultra Low Voltage Sandy Bridge Core i7 processors had been packed into the ultra-thin chassis, backed up by 4GB of memory, but a range of processors are likely to be available in the final UK models, ranging from Core i3 to i7. Graphics on our display model were integrated.
Warm components have apparently been placed away from the palmrest and touchpad, and we didn't feel any warmth in the chassis when we tested it again after an hour of constant use. There are no vents at the bottom, so your thighs aren't scorched, with hot air being expelled from the rear instead.
You have a choice of SSD or HDD storage, and the Aspire S3 Series promises up to 7 hours of battery life with the SSD option. This estimate is based on MobileMark's general usage testing, which includes activities such as web browsing and messing around with spreadsheets. As usual, expect less if you want to watch films or play games on the move.
Dolby Home Theatre 4 technology is in place, and you have an HDMI port for hooking up a larger screen if you want to enjoy an HD movie at home.
Acer Green Instant On, which means the S3 Series resumes from sleep in 1.5 seconds. The 'Green' part refers to the power conservation, which gives you up to 50 days in system standby before the battery dies. We tested out the system resume and it really is impressively quick, with the screen flashing into life almost immediately when we lifted the lid.
The Aspire S3 also has Acer Instant Connect, which automatically scans and registers your most visited access ponts and connects to the web just 2.5 seconds after system resume, so you aren't hanging around ages to check your mails.That gives you more valuable seconds to spend doing your favourite hobbies.
Campbell Kan (President of PCGO) announced the Aspire S3 as a 'convergence of experience' between performance laptops and portable devices such as tablets. It aims to provide a means of consuming and creating content in a highly portable form, and Kan promised the S Series Ultrabook was just the first of many new ultraportable machines that Acer has planned.
Depending on the configuration, you can expect to pay between 799 and 1199 Euros for the Aspire S3 which has a UK release date of the end of September.
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