The Acer 5102 Thread

I know this is a new model and there are not a a lot of reviews out there on this one but anyone who has one want to share their opinions and feedback here please.
Mine is less than a week old and I am mostly liking it as I am typing from it right now,
I just migrated from a DV1000T HP centrino and I was a little spoilt by the EXTREME portbaility of that model and the Quick play features but I got the Acer at a steal (almost $600) so I am really having a hard time finding flaws

So, can one add Bluetooth after the fact on the board and one main question I have that can make this a overwhelming favorite over my older HP - Is there is an EXTENDED battery available ANYWHERE for this model?? I have looked everywhere with no luck.

So far no problems with the build etc. The speed is not as fast as I expected but I haven't played any major games on it.

Would this be considered a Gaming laptop?

Any other user experiences would be welcome. I did upgrade the ATI Catalyst drivers to make it recognize the 1100 model graphics card.

 

Acer does not sell an add-on Bluetooth module. And why do you need an extended battery? I've been playing with the settings, and I've achieved 4.5 hours on it. Just set CPU to medium and brightness to 20% using Acer utilities. It is also true that it is not as fast as an intel duo, primarily due to cache and architecture.

I've written a review that is going to be posted in a few days. Hang on and read it.

 

By the way, your tag should read 1.3 MP for the webcam. It truly is one of the beter webcams I have seen around. Very crisp video.
Tons better than the latest HP DV2000 series I had a brieft stint with.

I did have problems with the mic being too "far away" sounding using MSN Messenger. It wasn't much better even after using the mic boost option
Other than that the video portion was awesome.


Still playing with it and enjoying it so far!

Can't wait for the review

 

The webcam is 0,3 megapixel.

Anyone tried running Half-Life 2 on this baby? Is it playable? How about Quake 4?

 

wow, if its indeed 0.3 MP, then it does a pretty fantastic job in low light, far better than most webcams I have seen, even the high end ones. And I am talking about the default settings themselves.

I do a lot of MSN Video Messaging and the webcam played a big role in my purchase, especially the 225 degree tilt. It was pretty awkward using the HP DV2000 camera for following a 3 yr old...

 

As I continue to play with this one, I do see that the boot times for start up and shut down are kind of long. I remember changing the ePerfromance settings to use the Quick boot option so not sure why although I do have a lot of programs in startup - Norton, Windows washer, quick launch, and the basic ones too....
Also it takes it a little while to come out of sleep.

Typing on the keyboard is sooo much better than the cramped DV1000 I migrated from and I slowly but surely getting used to the larger screen size which is also crisp and clear.

 

The 5100 seems like a fantastic value for the money. For improving the performance of your notebook, take a look at our Tune-up guide here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=5787

I wouldn't consider the 5100 to be a gaming notebook. The integrated Radeon X1150 is a shared memory card (no memory of its own), and is generally weak as far as processing power goes. See more info on graphics cards here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=39568

 

The Orbicam is only 300,000 megapixels. I've tried the 1.3 on the aspire 5672, and the image on it looks a whole lot better than the 5102. Don't you think the 5102 has a grainy picture? Treominator, are you also having problems with sleep? It seems like sometimes I can't even get into sleep mode. The screen goes blank, but the hd and wireless keep running.

 

I think the Orbicam has pretty good pics for a 0.3 MP cam. The rotating feature is important too.
The mic seems to be a little weak, I might have to play with the settings some more.

As far as the Sleep Mode, nothing that I can see thats a problem, I shut the case and it dies until I hit the power button....

 

I've tried half life 2, and it seems decent. I've heard that hf2 has a great engine that scales to the system you are using.

Treominator, thank you for telling me about the rebate. I went to CC and they did the soft return. Now a good deal just got better!

 

Did you try and see if they would match the "no rebate" price of $749 at Staples?
The CC here did it and I tossed in the rebate form in the mail afterwards....... possibly looking at $600 for the unit now

 

Nope, they wouldn't do that. In fact the customer service guy even called the manager to confirm that i could even get the rebate. It took me 20 min just to get them to give me that rebate.

 

I'm also having problem with sleep mode. When I closed my laptop (without turning it off) and opened it the next morning, i realized that I can't seem to turn the LCD back on. I can hear the fan still running though. I've tried everything from typing random stuff on the keyboard, CTRL+ALT+DEL, to finally having to turning it off then back on.

Treominator, how long did it take your system to come out of sleep mode? I must have waited a good 3-5 minutes before resorting to the forced reboot. I just want to know if I had given my system to wake up...

Similar situation have previously occurred. While watching a video clip, the screen turned off on me, but the sound was still going. I later found out it was the power management option, which set the LCD/monitor to turn off ~3 minutes. Changed it to 20 minutes, and it seems to work fine with video clips.

I'm beginning to wonder if this Aspire 5102WLMi has a bug that prevent the user from turning the LCD back on after it has been turned off. Does anyone else notice this?

Other than this issue, I love this lappie Love the keyboard, better than Dell's Inspiron notebooks which share the same crammed keyboard on all of it's 14", 15.4", and 17"; it looks alright on the 14", but it looks very awkward on the 15.4" and the 17" model.

I was a bit disappointed to find out that this 64 x2 was defeated by Intel's Core Duo Darn cache. I'm also sad that this hard drive is only a PATA 4,200rpm... Having an SATA HD would have been nice. Another sucky thing is is the system comes preformatted with FAT32 on both partition; plus darn thing doesn't come with genuine windows CD or System recovery CD. I had to burn the system recovery CD myself

 

I have been thinking if the sleep issue is caused by bad RAM. I am reluctant to replace them, since i've already spent a load on college, and would like to save some money. I have been having trouble GOING into sleep. Coming out is fine for me, it is fast and works everytime. Going has been troublesome. Also, i have read that Windows XP MCE has a bug with sleep. Seems like a lot of MCE users can't get into/out of sleep. Do you think installing pro would help? Do you want to try installing new RAM?

 

I have never messed with laptop hardware before, so I don't think i'll upgrade it. I'm too lazy to try installing pro right now. Once the system gets bogged down by too many software, I'll definitely Install a fresh copy of pro and see how it does.

Windows MCE reminds me of Windows ME....
Win2k and XP does the job just fine, but MS just have to go and do something like this...

 

I am not sure why you guys are having trouble with the sleep option. I am assuming you mean closing the lid and watching it go hibernate in a few seconds and then when the lid is opened and the power button pressed it resumes after a minute or so.

It does this just fine for me, I haven't changed a lot of settings or anything, maybe you have a buggy unit ??? I would take it back to the store and get another one in exchange if it is <14 days of purchase or call Acer etc.
If you have a warranty from CC like I do, I would let them figure it out.

As far as the paltry HD speed, processor performance etc, etc, dude, you GOTTA look at what you have for the price ($749 for many) and possible $600 for myself.
There is NO way you can get even CLOSE to what you got here w.r.t. specs - I mean 120 GB HD!! A Rotatable Web Cam with a Microphone (imp for me) , fast RAM, Windows MCE in case you have a use for it), a decent graphics card etc.

The build seems just fine but I got the accidental warranty anyways thanks to my 3 yr old

This laptop at this price has GOT to be THE deal of the year. The specs shold be good enough to last you a while too (Vista etc.)

I have a history of getting bored with my laptop after a few days and exchange it for something else but try as I might I can't seem to justify the HD size, webcam, AMD X2 etc and the price I paid for it for a fancier looking laptop.

My motto is that I have to have my toys as CHEAP as possible to enjoy them!

I would have a hard time enjoying an expensive $1500+ machine even though I have the cash.

Thats my rant for the day.

Still two thumbs up after about two weeks for my first ACER (after a slew of HP desktops and laptops).

 

Also, I always get one of these from Day One of any laptop to protect the screen.
They are cheap and VERY good if you do it correctly.

Basically make sure that you have some extra mms on each edge etc more than the screen width and then using a thin credit card or fingernails guide the screen protector UNDER the edges of the screen and it will stay put and you will hardly notice it is there.

Dont make it for the exact dimensions of the screen or shorter since only the top edge has a glued portion and you might have the bottom portion flapping when you shut the lid.
http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=335539&pfp=search&tabtype=rv#moreinfo

 

Thanks for the link Treominator, after 3 years, my old laptop's lcd was pretty scratchy....

 

I have uninstalled empowering and everything seems so much faster, load times are better, and the sleep problem has so far not cropped back up. My problem wasn't getting out of it, it was going into it. Sometimes the HD refused to shut off even with the screen blank.

I installed AMD's driver's instead, and i am still getting 4+ batt. Everything is now automatic, as compared to acer's utilities when you had to set your cpu speed. What has your battery life been?

 

Can you post some more details as to what files you downloaded with any links etc.

I might give it a try too if you can give me some good step by step info that might be a good way to go about this...

TIA

 

Hello,
I just bought a Acer 5102 last week. Has anyone repartitioned their HDD? I want to make the data partition smaller. cheers

 

Yes I have, u just delete the partitions and make new ones with any OS cd

 

hi
i have acer 5112
and i cant have my computer on for more than 2.5 hours and it was written that 5102 have only 2.5 hr do u have the orignal battery that u got from acer
www.inte.se
they sell both

 

The battery that came with my Acer was an 8 cell. I did not upgrade. While it is true that Acer rates the batt at ~2.5 hours, it is also true that i've been consistently getting ~4 hours. That's even when I uninstalled Acer empowering and just used AMD's powernow. Set your power to laptop/portable, and AMD should automatically adjust CPU usage based on need. I've been doing web browsing and i've gotten 4 hours. Just don't listen to music, game, work with graphics, and stuff like that and you might achieve long life.

The absolute truth is, I don't know. That's what I've been getting. Also, reading your specs, you have dedicated graphics, which use more power than my integrated. In addition, you have a faster 5400 rpm HD versus my 4200 rpm HD.

 

Hi. I am new to this web and forum offcorse. At first I want to thank to deltafx and his great review of this amazing notebook.

I bought it today and all I can say is that I am amazed by it, maybe its first day weeknes, but i dont think so... I think I ll go through that little tricks for tuning my notbook posted by deltafx (thanks for that, allso), but its allso very fast right now!

I have one question now. How can I uninstall XP Home, and then install Pro? I mean, i know how to do it, and I would allso like to make different partitions, but what will happen with pre installed programs in my laptop! I m not woried for some programs, but I am woried for drivers, and Acer utilities that came with it, and there is no any CD except for Norton.

Acer notifies me each time I turn on XP that I should record DVD which will have factory default seatings, but i dont think thats it.

So, please, help.

 

you cane instal win xp pro
but dont delete the hiden partiton (pqservice) if u delete that patition u wont be able to use acers bakupp cd
.......................................
Acer notifies me each time I turn on XP that I should record DVD which will have factory default seatings, but i dont think thats it...
...................
do it if u dont do that u wont be abel to reinstal windows xp home when i get any problems it s a backup cd

 

So, all that is on hiden partition + XP will be recorded on DVD or only XP home?

And, when repartitioning, i will see that hidden partition but I must not touch it!?

BTW
Is there any way to delete that hidden partition and get all that drivers and software from somwhere?

 

The Acer website shoud have all the drivers needed. I downloaded the drivers that Acer said to and burned them CD as I plan on installing XP Pro soon.
cheers

 

So, i should download all this:
http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_3100_5100_5110.html

and then i can freally remove hidden partition, and install fresh XP Pro and then all this stuff?

P.S. I would like if there is somone who allready done this to confirme it?
deltafx, did u try it? BTW I have no problems going in sleep mode.

 

I haven't tried installing Pro because mine came with Pro/MCE. Going into systems says that I have XP Pro with SP2. I plan to upgrade to Vista Ultimate when it comes out (wait at least 1 month before buying to see what bugs it has, if you want to buy it at all) and I don't plan on removing my partitions right now, but i plan to when i install vista.

I think the sleep problem is an isolated incident. Some people have reported bad ram in Acer, and I think that might be the cause. I'll soon replace my ram with 2 x 1 GB sticks to enable dual channel and see what happens with new ram.

 

But do you know if this should work, to download all drivers and software on that page, repartition all HDD, including hidden partition and then install mine XP Pro and all that downloaded drivers, etc.. ?

 

Anyone tried Quake 4 on this machine?

 

My acer 9503ewsmi with celeron M 1.5 does super pi 2m at 2 mins 23 seconds a full second slower then the turion TL 50. but man that integrated ATI rapes my GMA 900 so I think i will be getting one of these soon. what are the differences of the ati 1100 vs the ati 1150?

 

It should work. I was reading Acer's support page, and it said that eRecovery is built INTO the harddrive. This means that you don't have to download eRecovery. however, other acer software i would stay away from, just to speed up the notebook. FYI that you would lose powerdvd/acer arcade if you have it, since those are OEM and not downloadable. That's alright if you have a personal copy.

Bottom line, it should work fine.

 

I just bought this model with 2GB ram. This is a desktop replacement laptop without being to heavy or big.

Does not come with bluetooth installed, so I just got a $30 very small bluetooth usb adapter. Does not have IR sensor either, but who uses that any more.

Screen and Graphics and perfect for me, works without a problem with games and the hi-def vids that came with the win xp media edition os.

The built in cam sucks when used with explorer (default), but is very clear when used with apps like adobe etc:

Speakers are ok but not the best I've seen in a laptop. My last acer laptop was better, but it had a built in sub-woofer.

Using AMD Turion64 x2 TL50 1.6 GHz and 2gb ram, laptop has not froze up yet. And I'm a heavy user of programs.

The DVD/CD burner is as good as any other.

The wireless Lan picks up signal with no problem.

I get about 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 hours battery life on the "word processing" setting


This is basically a powerfull laptop, without a ton of added on extras.

 

.
if u delete hidden patition u wont be abel to use acer backup cd (win xp home)u cane donload all ther drivers from acer s website

 

Well, then I ll try to download all drivers and sowtware and install mine XP Pro... I dont think that loosing Arcade is big problem.

 

So i'm planning on buying this laptop this week and i got a few questions...
does the laptop get hot after using it for while and is the hdd noisy since it's
only 4200rpm? Thanks

 

The laptop's HD portion under the palm rest and near the trackpad does get warm, and almost hot if you are playing graphics intensive games for long periods. Otherwise, if you are just surfing or word processing, it doesn't get hot at all.

The hard drive is a little noisier than other faster HDs. However, even this is minor, and you don't really notice the noise say if you are in the living room or somewhere that has other background noise. Consider upgrading the HD to something faster if you want faster load times and such. Right now, the windows bar scrolls by about 25 times before I load.

If you want the specs, read my review!

 

The HD and fans are very very quiet compared to other notebooks that I have. If u pop in a 5400 rpm drive in there it will be even quieter.

BTW, to give u some performance #s: Out of the box, with all the bloatware and the outdated gpu drivers and 533 ram I got 1300 points in 3dmark03. HL2 plays nicely at 800*600 all high settings at about 40fps.

I plan on gettin 667 ram to up the gpu clocks some more, install the new omega drivers and format and will prolly see a nice improvement in gaming. Also, more memory will also help as the source engine is almost maxing it out, so that might even improve frames too.

 

You're getting 1300 marks with an integrated card? That is amazing!

How do you know ur fps. I can't seem to find a way to get that info.

 

Its 3dmark03 tho, which is not too great of a score, but still. I think with the faster ram, and the new drivers and formatted HD I should improve that score.

Umm, in hl2 (if thats what ur reffering to) go into the console and type net_graph 3 or cl_showfps 1. The first shows u all sorts of things like connection speed, lagg, fps and all other crap. The latter just has fps.

 

Thanks! I'll try that and see what I get.

 

Hello everyone.
I just purchased one of these, and i am having a problem. I have a linksys wireless g router, and a desktop that is also on wireless. My desktop gets good signal and good quality, but with this laptop even right beside the computer the signal is **** near perfect, but the quality is really bad

I have tryed misc things like changing the channel, switching between static and dynamic routing, changing from short and long preamble, and etc with no luck. Anyone have this problem? is there something small and stupid that I am overlooking?

Thanks for the help

 

nope, can't say i've had this problem. My wireless signal has been very strong, even outside in the yard. And I'm only on a wireless b network.

 

well ive done reading and the only answer i have kinda found which isnt directly related to this model laptop, but i could have a bum radio chip or something? does that sound right?

 

Could be, try switching your router with a friend's or another one that you have and see if the problem persists. If it doesn't maybe it was your router causing trouble. If it still persists, contact Acer support or exchange your computer and for a new one.

 

I have another question, I burnt the dvd back-up discs so my question is:

Can I delete the hidden partion thing, and if so how?
thanks

 

You can delete the partition thing, but then the backup dicks would be useless as there is no way to return the computer to its factory state if u remove the restore partition. Just use any os cd, boot from it and select to delete such partition.

 

I bought my 5102 about 3 weeks ago. So far I have several things I love about it and several I loath. My quick question is I searched through the box and found no os cd. What can one do about that? Any ideas...