We’ve seen plenty of nine-hour ultraportables and a lot of 15.6in powerhouses, but few laptops can claim to come close to successfully combining the two.
Acer’s Aspire TimelineX 5820T has a 15.6in screen size, yet it’s far sleeker than you’d expect: the lid feels as thin as that of a tiny Sony VAIO, but it has the strength of a road-warrior. The hinge feels rock-solid, and the only give in the base is around the soft-grilled speakers.
Its real strength, however, is battery life. Under light-use conditions the 6,000mAh battery gave 9hrs 29mins of life. It’s helped by the absence of a power-hungry discrete graphics card, but for a 15.6in laptop it’s remarkable, and beyond what many ultraportables can manage on a single charge.
Better still, it combines its all-day battery life with reasonable power. With a 2.13GHz Core i3-330M and 3GB of DDR3 RAM, our sample scored 1.23 in our benchmarks. This model is currently being upgraded to a 2.4GHz Core i3-370M (factored into the price at the top of the page), which in our experience should boost the score to around 1.40.
The laptop itself is a joy to use. The keyboard and number pad stretch the full width of the base, with only the cursor keys a little smaller than we’d like. The screen has a 1,366 x 768 resolution and a glossy coating, but the reflectivity is balanced by good brightness and a clean, balanced colour tone.
It has only a 320GB hard disk, but there’s a DVD writer along with four USB 2 ports, plus HDMI and D-SUB outputs. Gigabit Ethernet is joined by 802.11n Wi-Fi, and its card reader supports the major formats, including xD-Picture cards.
We’ve said it in a previous review and we’ll say it again: it’s hard to find a serious fault with the Acer Aspire TimelineX 5820T. It has extremely long battery life, while remaining powerful enough for all but the most specialist of tasks, and it does so while retaining fine build quality and plenty of desirability. At just £552 exc VAT, it’s hard to think of many better home all-rounders.
Warranty | |
|---|---|
| Warranty | 1 yr return to base |
Physical specifications | |
| Dimensions | 379 x 250 x 32mm (WDH) |
| Weight | 2.380kg |
| Travelling weight | 2.8kg |
Processor and memory | |
| Processor | Intel Core i3-370M |
| Motherboard chipset | Intel HM55 |
| RAM capacity | 3.00GB |
| Memory type | DDR3 |
| SODIMM sockets free | 0 |
| SODIMM sockets total | 2 |
Screen and video | |
| Screen size | 15.6in |
| Resolution screen horizontal | 1,366 |
| Resolution screen vertical | 768 |
| Resolution | 1366 x 768 |
| Graphics chipset | Intel HD graphics |
| Graphics card RAM | 128MB |
| VGA (D-SUB) outputs | 1 |
| HDMI outputs | 1 |
| S-Video outputs | 0 |
| DVI-I outputs | 0 |
| DVI-D outputs | 0 |
| DisplayPort outputs | 0 |
Drives | |
| Capacity | 320GB |
| Hard disk usable capacity | 285GB |
| Spindle speed | 5,400RPM |
| Hard disk | Western Digital Scorpio Blue |
| Optical disc technology | DVD writer |
| Optical drive | TSST TS-U633F |
| Battery capacity | 6,000mAh |
| Replacement battery price inc VAT | £0 |
Networking | |
| Wired adapter speed | 1,000Mbits/sec |
| 802.11b support | yes |
| 802.11g support | yes |
| 802.11 draft-n support | yes |
| Integrated 3G adapter | no |
| Bluetooth support | no |
Other Features | |
| Wireless hardware on/off switch | no |
| Wireless key-combination switch | yes |
| Modem | no |
| ExpressCard34 slots | 0 |
| ExpressCard54 slots | 0 |
| PC Card slots | 0 |
| USB ports (downstream) | 4 |
| FireWire ports | 0 |
| PS/2 mouse port | no |
| 9-pin serial ports | 0 |
| Parallel ports | 0 |
| 3.5mm audio jacks | 2 |
| SD card reader | yes |
| Memory Stick reader | yes |
| MMC (multimedia card) reader | yes |
| Smart Media reader | no |
| Compact Flash reader | no |
| xD-card reader | yes |
| Pointing device type | Multitouch touchpad |
| Audio chipset | Realtek HD Audio |
| Speaker location | Above keyboard |
| Hardware volume control? | no |
| Integrated microphone? | yes |
| Integrated webcam? | yes |
| Camera megapixel rating | 1.3mp |
| TPM | no |
| Fingerprint reader | no |
| Smartcard reader | no |
| Carry case | no |
Battery and performance tests | |
| Battery life, light use | 9hr 29min |
| Battery life, heavy use | 1hr 51min |
| Overall application benchmark score | 1.23 |
| Office application benchmark score | 1.02 |
| 2D graphics application benchmark score | 1.19 |
| Encoding application benchmark score | 1.17 |
| Multitasking application benchmark score | 1.53 |
| 3D performance (crysis) low settings | 15fps |
| 3D performance setting | Low |
Operating system and software | |
| Operating system | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit |
| OS family | Windows 7 |
| Recovery method | Burn own recovery discs |
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