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Acer Goes True Blue With Aussie Launch Of Gemstone Notebooks
Posted by Nick Broughall at 12:02 PM on April 16, 2008
Last month, Acer held a big exciting event in New York to launch their new range of Gemstone Blue Entertainment notebooks. Yesterday, they held a much smaller, low-key affair to launch the laptops in Australia.
The range, which includes both 16-inch and 18.4-inch models, are available now for RRPs starting at $2,499 for the 16-incher and $2,699 for the 18.4 monster.
Each model incorporates its own Blu-ray player, a widescreen, 1920 x 1080p screen and Dolby digital sound. There is also their stylish, touch-sensitive CineDash media console, which looks awesome, but could be a little awkward for some people to get used to.
The 18.4-inch behemoth also features six integrated speakers for "surround sound", which could pump out decent audio, although not as loudly as you would expect. There's a port on the back for those who want their digital music through dedicated speakers though.
Battery life is around two hours playing back a Blu-ray disc, or so they said.
There's a fair amount of cool technology crammed into these machines, and the price is actually pretty decent when you take it all into account. If you're after an entertainment or desktop replacement notebook, this actually looks pretty damn decent.
[Acer]
Today in New York, Acer's big surprise is the Aspire "Gemstone Blue" notebook, equipped with a Blu-ray drive, true high-def screen, and CineReal sound, a second generation of Dolby Surround. Sexy, and yes, blue, and it doesn't appear to suffer from port envy like some other notebooks, though it is slender. In size it's somewhere between HP's dv series and Dell's XPS M series. That's not just a size comparison, but a qualitative judgment call: this thing looks unambitiously nestled between the two other PC giants' designs. With such mystery and fanfare, we were hoping for a tad more of an exciting, iconoclastic design. It is, however, a decent product, so have a look:
