During Google’s I/O 2011 event, Samsung took the spotlight by being the first major company to debut their Chrome OS-powered notebook, the Samsung Series 5 or codenamed Samsung Alex Chrome OS Netbook. Acer wants to build competition and announced the Acer AC700 Chromebook.
The first Acer AC700 Chromebook will only have Wi-Fi and retails in the US for $350. This Chrome OS product is powered by a 1.66 GHz Intel Atom N570 CPU that’s aptly complemented by 2GB of RAM.
Like Android OS, Chrome OS has a very small memory footprint but Acer wants to make the AC700 netbook a real alternative to Windows or Linux laptops.
Acer says their AC700 features a 10-second boot time and “always-on” capability. Since it isn’t running on a heavyweight OS like Windows, the Acer AC700′s 6-cell battery is guaranteed to last up to six hours.
In terms of looks, the AC700 looks slightly bigger than the typical netbook. It has an 11.6-inch HD widescreen LED-backlit screen. It weighs a decent 2.95 pounds and its body is 1 inch thick. The first generation of Acer AC700 netbook looks to be only limited to a black model but hopefully, Acer will ship this Chrome OS notebook in other flavors. It looks modern and utilitarian at the same time so the AC700 won’t win any industrial beauty award.
Like the Cheap OliPad 100 Android Tablet PC, Acer opted to use a 16GB SSD storage for AC700 Chromebook. Their justification is that customers would rather have their data stored online. Chrome OS is all about cloud computing so Acer is sticking to this mantra. I know it’s a bit disappointing to have only a mere 16GB space for this notebook. Some people do not have access to the web 24/7 and Acer acknowledged this dilemma.
Acer AC700 Chromebook will come with a 4-in-1 memory card reader and two USB 2.0 ports for expansion. Those who have an urgent need for more storage, just plug in any SD card or USB flash drive to quickly solve the problem. The cloud-computing nature of this product required it to have a full-size keyboard and 1.3 Megapixel webcam for online chats.
Acer says although Google has been pushing for their new WebM video format, the AC700 has full support for Adobe Flash 10.1 so there’s going to be tons of games available immediately to buyers of this product. The Intel processor and 2GB RAM of the AC700 makes it an ideal media player too. It can playback full 1080p HD videos easily and is therefore equipped with and HDMI output for watching movies on an HDTV like theSamsung 32″ 3D D6350 Smart TV.
Acer AC700 Chromebook was released on June 30, 2011. On the Amazon, the Acer AC700-1099 Chromebook model is available for $349.00 with FREE shipping.
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