Every bit as slimline as its predecessor, Acer's new media PC packs even more of a punch - including a DVB-T tuner. Jørgen Sundgot gets up close and personal with the Aspire L250.
Once you've gone slimline, I guarantee you'll be hard pressed to go back. I'm talking about media PCs, of course, and the experience of having a stereo component size box in your living room that lets you run high quality audio and video output straight to a home entertainment system without having to rely on a media extender solution - the latter of which often encounter throughput issues when streaming high resolution video.
Acer's new Aspire L250 is just one of these products, and although its looks can only be described as modestly attractive, what is beneath its aluminium exterior is what really makes the difference. Inside the 430 x 266 x 53 mm chassis runs an AMD Athlon 64 3400+ processor, accompanied by 512 MB RAM - expandable to 4 GB by standard means; it's enough, but nothing more.
Similarly, the 160 GB SATA drive of the Aspire L250 delivered blazing access speeds at 7,200 RPM, but the choice to include such a powerful processor as the Athlon 64 3400+ whilst skimping on memory and storage space seems a bit odd. For those who need more of either, however, expansion is fortunately an option.
The graphics card of the L250, however, appears to be spot on, as from what could be gleaned during Acer's presentation, the ATI Radeon Xpress200 with 128 MB of VRAM churned out hi-def video seemingly with no effort at all. Equipped with a hybrid tuner, the L250 may very well be the most versatile media PC for the European market at this point as it not only supports analog PAL and SECAM standards, but also digital terrestrial reception via DVB-T, a standard predominantly employed in Europe.
Also capable is the dual layer DVD drive of the unit, whereas connectivity is well taken care of through the inclusion of Gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi 802.11g and an abundance of ports. These include four USB 2.0 ports and a FireWire port mounted in front; four rear-mounted USB 2.0 ports adjacent to yet another FireWire port; two PS2 ports; DVI; VGA; S-Video and Composite connectors both for video in and out; and 5.1 channel audio courtesy of line in, line out and SPDIF coaxial - as well as something as unusual as a Parallel port.
Delivered with a somewhat spacious wireless keyboard with a built-in pointing device, the Aspire L250 also comes bundled with a few good pieces of software including Norton AntiVirus 2005 and CyberLink PowerDVD.
Due out in November of 2005 in Europe, I'm afraid the pricing of the Acer Aspire L250 will remain a state secret for the time being as Acer officials declined to comment.
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