Acer Aspire 2012 WLMi Review (pics, specs)

By Omar Saeed

On a recent trip to the Middle East, I was looking to purchase a laptop to bring back to the UK in order to use it for University. At first I considered some sub-notebooks such as the Sony TR and Fujitsu-Siemens Lifebook. After discovering that all of the sub-notebook options had integrated graphics, I decided to sacrifice some portability for power and started looking around for what may be classed as a DTR (desktop replacement) laptop.

Acer Aspire 2012 front-view, yes that is Sony VAIO wallpaper on an Acer laptop! (view larger image)

The selection of laptops available which met my requirements was limited at the time. (Pentium-M CPU, 15.4" widescreen and at least a Mobility Radeon 9600). The Acer Aspire 2012WLMiemerged as a good choice with a significant advantage in that it came with a one year international warranty as standard. Another option open to me was a similarly configured Acer M6N (with 64MB Mobility Radeon 9600). However, in the end I went for the Acer due to the fact that for the same price as the M6N, I was getting a 64MB Radeon 9700 and a DVD-Burner (the M6N was a fixed configuration with a DVD/CDRW combo drive)

There has been a lot of interest in the 2012WLMi recently due to its affordable pricing in North America and Europe.

Left-side view of Acer Aspire 2012 (view larger image)

Acer Aspire 2012WLCi vs. Acer Aspire 2012WLMi

rear-view of Aspire 2012 WLMi (view larger image)

In North America, the Acer Aspire 2012 currently comes in two configurations, the Aspire WLCi and Aspire WLMi models. The difference being that the WLCi has a 40GB hard drive, integrated Intel Extreme graphics and a DVD/CDRW combo drive while the WLMi model has a 60GB hard drive, 64MB Mobility Radeon 9700 and a DVD-dual drive (more about this later).

Right-side view of Acer Aspire 2012 (view larger image)

In Europe, both the WLCi and WLMi models come with the Mobility 9700 and only differ in hard drive capacity and optical drive as noted above.

With both models (WLCi and WLMi) there is a choice of operating system; either Windows XP Home or Professional.

Specification (as tested)

• 15.4¡¨ WXGA screen (1280 x 800)


• 1.5 Ghz Pentium-M CPU (1Mb L2 Cache)


• 1 GB PC2700 (333 Mhz DDR) Ram (2 x 512mb sticks of Kingston ValueRam)*


• 60 GB 4200rpm HDD (Hitachi Travelstar 80GN)


• 64 MB ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 GPU


• Intel 2200BG Pro Wireless


• DVD-Dual Drive


• Windows XP Professional with SP1 and all critical updates **


• Omega Drivers 2.5.58 (based on the latest ATI Catalyst drivers version 4.7)

* Note that as standard, the 2012WLMi comes configured with two sticks of 256mb PC2700 (333 Mhz DDR) memory.

** The purchased model came with XP Home but I fresh installed XP Professional.

Design, Build and Weight

The 2012 WLMi has quite a nice clean design, the lid is grey/silver and the rest of the unit is black with some silver around the sides.

View of the Acer Aspire 2012 WLMi from above (view larger image)

There is a"lip" which sticks out at the front of the laptop when the screen is closed, this houses the built-in microphone and indicator LEDs for: power (green), hard drive activity (blue) and finally battery status (blue when battery is fully charged and orange while charging)

Acer Aspire 2012 WLMi (view larger image)

The construction is all plastic, apart from the small metal Acer logo on the lid; however the laptop feels very solid overall despite this.

My only minor complaint about the build quality is that the screen latches are also made of plastic, I would have preferred these to have been metal even if only to reassure the user of their durability.

Acer Aspire 2012 Screen latch (view larger image)

The 2012 WLMi provides easy access to the mini-PCI slot, hard drive and one of the two RAM slots all on the bottom of the laptop and accessible by removing some covers. The second RAM slot is located underneath the keyboard and requires a little more disassembly to get to.

The weight of the 2012 WLMi (with battery) is around 3 kilograms which is reasonable considering the screen size and specification. The power adaptor is quite compact and adds about an extra 300-500 grams to the traveling weight of the laptop.

Speakers

There is not much that can be said about the speakers, they are about average for a laptop. Sound from the speakers lacks bass; however the volume can be turned up pretty high compared to other laptops I have used.

Optical drive

The 2012WLMi is advertised as having a DVD-Dual drive (this usually means it supports both the DVD+ and DVD¡V standards), however I was curious as to why Windows XP identified it as a DVD-RAM drive.

The optical drive is in fact a Matsushita (aka Panasonic) UJ-820S which is a 4x DVD burner, but it also supports writing to DVD-RAM disks, thus making it a DVD-Multi-drive. This particular drive is tray loading and is also used in some current Toshiba laptops. I have not burnt a DVD-RAM disk myself; however I am confident that the drive will have no problems with the task.

Optical drive tray open (view larger image)

I have not had much past experience with notebook CD/DVD burners, however performance seems adequate for this type of drive. Burning a full 700MB CD took 7:17 at 16x which is a little slow, however it is bearable. DVD burning with the drive set to 4x was disappointing with a 4.3GB burn taking over 27 minutes, this is usually how long desktop drives take to burn at 2x.

Unfortunately, there are two other downsides to the drive. The first being that the drive is a little on the noisy side when spinning up and operating at full speed (this can be solved by using a utility such as Nero DriveSpeed to limit the maximum read speeds in order to reduce noise)

The second downside is that Acer has implemented it as a fixed optical drive, meaning that it cannot be removed in order to save a little bit of weight. However, this is a very minor fault because most people would use the drive on a regular basis and the weight saving would only be around 250-300 grams.

Ports and Connectivity

The 2012WLMi provides an array of ports for connecting peripherals and for networking:

• 3x USB 2.0 ports


• 1x IEEE 1394 port


• 1x S-Video out (NTSC/PAL)


• 1x Infrared (FIR)


• 1x Parallel port


• 1x VGA output for external monitor


• 1x 32bit type II PCMCIA CardBus slot


• 1x speaker/ headphone/ line-out jack


• 1x microphone/ line-in jack


• 1x DC-in jack for AC adapter


• 1x RJ-11 jack (56k integrated modem)


• 1x RJ-45 jack (10/100 integrated Broadcom ethernet)

Wireless

The wi-fi functionality is supplied via an Intel Pro Wireless 2200BG mini-PCI card. The card is easily accessible by removing a cover at the bottom of the laptop, allowing for easy upgrading/replacement in the future.

Access to the internal wi-fi card is easy on the Aspire 2012 (view larger image)

There are two buttons on the front of the laptop, one of which lights up orange and allows for easy control of the wi-fi card and the other is marked as Bluetooth. However please note that the 2012 series of laptops do not offer any integrated Bluetooth functionality.

UFO? No, just the Acer Aspire 2012 wireless lights (view larger image)

Wi-Fi performance is good, I am currently using a Linksys 54G broadband router and the signal reception around my house is better than I expected.

Software

The laptop comes pre-installed with Windows XP as well as the following applications and utilities:

• Acer Notebook Manager


• Acer Launch Manager


• Norton AntiVirus 2004


• Adobe Acrobat Reader


• Intel PROSet (not installed by default)


• NTI CD Maker 6 Gold


• CyberLink Power Director


• Aspire Arcade

The strange thing about the default setup is that the hard drive is split into two partitions, both of which are FAT32. There also exists a small hidden Acer partition. Initially I managed to easily combine the two user partitions using Partition Magic and then convert the resulting single partition into NTFS. I later decided to perform a fresh install of Windows XP Professional (free student license provided by the University I attend).

Acer supplies four recovery CDs with an instruction booklet as well as Norton Antivirus 2004 on a separate CD. Unfortunately the recovery CDs do not allow the user to customize the Windows XP installation much at all, it is a simple restoration of a pre-made drive image. This does have the advantage of making the system restore process faster (drivers and such are already included as part of the system image).

An upside is that on the first recovery CD, Acer has conveniently provided separate drivers for all of the system components, so users who wish to perform a fresh installation of the operating system do not have to hunt around the internet to find drivers.

Keyboard and Touchpad

I could only detect very slight flexing of the keyboard if the keys are pressed down very hard, with normal usage I think it would be extremely difficult to detect.

The Synaptics touchpad is comfortable to use and has a nice scroll feature which allows the user to scroll a page by using the right-hand side of the touchpad, however it does tend to attract dust. The mouse buttons are the main problem, they are quite stiff although they do loosen up a little to a more comfortable level after some use.

A view of the Aspire 2012 keyboard (view larger image)

Card Reader

The 2012 includes and integrated 4-in-1 card reader located on the front of the laptop.

A view of the Acer Aspire 2012 card reader port (view larger image)

The card reader supports the Secure Digital, MultiMedia Card, SmartMedia and MemoryStick formats. I have been using a Secure Digital memory card without any problems.

Heat and Noise

The laptop in general runs pretty cool, although lots of disk activity or gaming can push up the temperature significantly. I find it quite acceptable to use on my lap for non-gaming use.

The 2012WLMi has a single main air vent at the rear, there are a couple of vents on the bottom, however these do not have any fans and are thus passively cooling the underside of the laptop.

The laptop is pretty quiet during normal use (i.e web surfing and word processing), however the regular clicking of the hard drive can be heard if you are in very quiet surroundings.

When the temperature starts to rise (i.e when gaming or compressing/uncompressing large files) the fan kicks in and has two modes, low and high. The fan very rarely kicks into the highest mode and doesn¡¦t usually stay in that state for long at all.

Screen

The screen is fantastic, out of the box I did not have a single dead pixel and I still do not have any after over a month. However, I have read that others who have purchased the 2012WLMi have experienced one or two dead pixels so my advice is to check your laptop supplier's dead pixel policy if ordering online.

A look at the nice screen for the Aspire 2012 (view larger image)

Back to the screen, I have played quite a few games and movies and could not easily notice any ghosting. The screen has ten brightness settings, and I find a setting of five or six to be more than sufficient for everyday use.

Battery life

With the "Maximum Battery" power profile, the 2012WLMi manages over four hours of battery life with wi-fi being used for downloading and the screen brightness set to 5/10. I think this is a very respectable battery life.

Battery life while gaming is also very reasonable. Using the "Always On" power profile which runs the processor at 1.5 Ghz all of the time results in between 1:30 and 2:00 of solid gaming.

The Aspire 2012 battery is a removable Li-Ion with good life (view larger image)

Gaming and Benchmarks

In general, I have found that the laptop handles the current generation of games, including Unreal Tournament 2004 and Far Cry very well.

UT 2004 on the Aspire 2012 (view larger image)

In addition, I have run a variety of benchmarks on the laptop, configured as shown above.

• PC Mark 2004 (build 120): 2972


• 3DMark 2001 SE (build 330): 9925


• 3DMark 2003 (build 340): 2611


• AquaMark 3: 21,488 (default ¡§very high¡¨ benchmark setting)


• SuperPI: Time to calculate 2 million digits: 2:21 (this is the average of 3 runs, the best run was 2:18)

All of the benchmarks were with the Mobility 9700 at stock speeds (392MHz GPU and 202MHz memory). I do not count the 64MB of graphics memory as a major flaw as it is good enough for the current crop of games, however future games may benefit more from 128MB of memory.

Summary (4 / 5 stars)

Pros:

• Good overall build quality


• Great performance (general use and gaming)


• Bright, high quality screen


• Decent battery life

Cons:

• Latch on the lid could be stronger


• Noisy optical drive


• Touchpad attracts dust

Pricing and Availability

The Aspire 2012 WLMi is available nowin both Europe and North Amercia. In North America the WLMi can be picked up for $1,500 or less. Use the NotebookReview.com price comparison to find the online store with the best price for the Aspire 2012 WLMi.

 

Excellent review! Many thanks!

As for the questions, i've got couple of them.
1. If you had a chance to compare this machine to HP's machines (zt3000, x1000 and other) how would you rate build quality, screen, keyboard, overall impressions.
2. Does the plastic feel cheap? Does the silver finish have that nasty cheap unreliable feel some cheap notebooks usually have?
3. How good/bad is the sound output through the headphones/line-out jack?

Thanks for the answers!

 

Good review! I picked up the Acer 2012WLMi here in Canada about 3 weeks ago. Unfortunately, I ended up with 1 dead pixel near the top right corner. It's a green one, but atleast it's not where I'm going to notice it. Otherwise the screen is great. The extra space afforded by the widescreen (1280x800) is very nice, but the 16:10 aspect ratio does tend to throw off some games. You end up with a horizontally stretched 1024x768.

The keyboard feels good and solid, but I wish it had dedicated Home and End keys. The trackpad could also use some work. I too found the buttons stiff and my pad seems a little bit loose in the top right corner. Fortunately I spend most of my time using a Logitech wireless notebook mouse, so these things don't irritate me too much.

I've been impressed with the Travelstar hard drive. It sure seems snappy for a 4200 RPM model. I can remember how long it took Windows XP to load on my 5400 RPM desktop drive and this feels much faster. The occasional clicks are a mild annoyance, but disk activity is relatively quiet.

The plastic build seems pretty sturdy, but the silver really shows fingerprints. I also found the little sticker that protects the Acer logo on the top of the laptop to have been poorly applied. I wonder if I should peel it off...

Battery life is good. I get about four hours while performing various desktop tasks. It would be nice to have a plastic cover for the battery area in the event that I wanted to remove it.

Some right-side USB2 ports would have been nice for mice, keyboards, flashdrives, etc. Media controls would be cool too.

The Intel 802.11g works great with my D-Link DI-624 wireless router. No complaints there.

The default FAT32 install sucks. I wish these guys would just give you a Windows XP CD and a driver CD. I can figure out the rest by myself, thank you very much. Atleast it didn't come with AOL shortcuts plastered all over the desktop.

Anyways, I agree with Odie's rating of 4/5. This is a fast machine with great features at a very nice price. The only other laptops I considered that were in the same price range were the Toshiba M30's.

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by badmojo

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by vr5

 

Very helpful. Thanks!
I will give myself another week of research and go ahead with my notebook order.
aspire2012 from newegg.com or zt3000/zx5000 from hpshopping.com


<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Odie

 

Cheers for the review mate, I'm thinking about buying this machine. I have a question and am wondering if you could check it out for me: does the machine support booting from USB-HDD or USB-Zip? (boot options in BIOS)

 

buqingzi, I am pretty certain that the 2012WLMi does indeed support booting from a usb device.

Having said that, I was slightly disappointed that the BIOS does not really have many options to fiddle with. (although 99% of users wouldn't want to anyway! [ ])

 

Thanks for your prompt reply. shame... I like changing settings in BIOS, especially ones I haven't a clue about what they do.

 

atte

1. This is just unfortunate, however at this price point, the 2012WLMi has a very good price/features ratio.

If you like the 2012WLMi but would like the new Dothan cpus you might consider stretching your budget and looking at the 202X series which have dothan cpus as well as a 128mb Radeon 9700 and an aluminium casing.

2. This is also a minor downside especially since the 2012WLMi is pretty much a "fixed" configuration, however you will probably find that most manufacturers will do the same thing (unless you order a built-to-spec brand such as Dell)

You can always stick the two sticks of 256mb on ebay to recover most of their value (since they will be as-new)

I was lucky in that I purchased from a shop in the middle east who offered to buy back the two sticks of 256mb straight out of the laptop. They gave me close to their selling price for 256mb modules.

3. This cannot be helped, some users do prefer higher resoultions on their laptops in order to have more screen real estate.

I find the 1280x800 resolution is more than good enough for me, however if you are looking for a higher resolution, then you may have to look at other models (I am not sure if the 202X models offer WSXGA or higher)

- Odie

 

I'm thinking of bying an Aspire 2000 series but there a few things that bother me a bit:

1. In Belgium (where i live) the aspire 2010 series anly ship with 1.5Ghz processors with the old 130nm tehnology (1mb cache) instead of the new 90nm technology (2mb cache: 725 / 735 / 745 / 755)

2. I'm an architecture student at the university and i will be using it alot for CAD and 3D rendering, therefore i would like 1Gb ram instead of 512mb, unfortunately it ships with 2x 256!!! so I cant even add 512, i have to replace them both [V]

3. I like working on a screen with high resolution and its a pitty the resolution wont go any higher than 1280x800

 

Nice review Odie, I just wanted to ask you a few questions [ ]. Thanks

1. Does it have Internal(built-in) Mic as stated on the website? And have you tried it? The quality?

2. Does unit get hot after (for instance, plugged-in) 5 hours of straight gaming(non-online)?

Thanks again.

 

Hi 403fobby:

1. It does have a built-in mic, located on the "lip" alongside the indicator leds. I have not had a chance to use it yet.

2. It does get quite hot after a few hours of intense graphical gaming (five hours of solitare probably won't increase the temps [ ]), but it does cool down pretty quickly afterwards.

- Odie

 

I'm just wondering whether there's a way to keep the software that come with the laptop, if you install a new OS (like WinXP Prof.)? I'm not talking about an upgrade... Any ideas please?

 

buqingzi - yes. The first restore cd contains all of the pre-installed software (acer arcade, cd/dvd burning software) as separate installation files which you can use after you have done a fresh install along with all the required hardware drivers.

- Odie

 

Thanks again Odie.... good to know, good to know.

 

Hey Odie & all,

Brilliant review! I'm currently torn between the 2012WLMi and the 8002LCi. Strangely, they are about the same price and I'm wondering why, as the 2012WLMi has a bigger screen (albeit lower resolution) and a DVD burner. If anyone could tell why the 8002LCi is worth the extra cash, I'd really like to know.

Rob

 

Hi Rob,

Thanks for the comments on the review.

As for the 8002LCi, however the model number does ring a bell... try doing a search on http://www.notebookforums.com/ I think a user there had the 8002 or 8003 model and had some good things about the build quality to say, as well as some problems.

- Odie

 

Thanks Odie and everyone whose insights have helped me on this wonderful site! Make mine a 2012WLMi!

Rob

 

Just wanted to let everyone who is considering purchasing a 2012WLMi and who is in the USA... it seems lots of online retailers are going nuts with price reductions on it.

Apparently NewEgg.com has it for about $1285 on a limited time sale (expires on the 3rd of August)!

Link: http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-115-116&depa=3

- Odie

 

I live in Belgium, but in belgium acer does not retail the "more advanced" 2020 series. Does anyone know which would be a good site to buy it online (and ship it to europe)?

 

hey all. for those who are concidering purchasing this model:

it should be noted that the dvd-ram drive is a bit of a biach. for the basic user, its fine. let me explain.

The specifications on the DVD-R is that it can burn at 4x ... well i have used just about every brand of DVD-R i can get my ands on and it only seems to burn at 2x(even tho nero detects it as 4x it takes the same time t burn as a 2x). However, Panasonic DVD-R burns at correct 4x - funny that - the drive is made by panasonic.

Also, The drive is hardware region locked (RPC-2). Meaning u can change it 3 times, but after that its permanately locked and you can only play DVDmovies in the region you locked it at. Usually u can get around this by using RPC-1 firmware upgrades - problem is u wont find any. This drive has never been updated, and is no longer supported by panasonic(mat****a). 3rd party programs such as DVDidle, or Region-free software WONT work as he drive has buit in hardware detection that stops it from "ripping CSS keys".

This laptop is awesome, besides the drive problems mentioned above. nice wide screen - which is clear and bright. 512ram is plenty - and has a spare upgrade slot for anyone that wants more. Grapics card has its own build in memory making it ahead of other "shared memory" laptops - its plays anything i throw at it noproblem. It has a Pentium-M 1.5ghz Chip in it with 1mb n board cache (this is not the new DOTHAN chips, they have 2mb) - It has the same performance as aprox a Pentium 4 2.6ghz.

Cheers
Brad

 

Does it really have an open slot for extra memory? Are you shure? because in the specs on their website it says 2x256mb

 

As far as I am aware, the memory configuration of the 512mb ram is 2x256, eg no free slots.

- Odie

 

I'm having a hard time finding out a screen setting that I like. The 1280 x 800 is very clear, but with that setting, only about half the screen (left half) is used to show a Web site. The 800 x 600 fills the screen the best, but seems a little large, distorted and slightly fuzzy. The one I like best is the 1024 x768, but even that uses a little more than half the screen. Any suggstions?

Generally, I love the machine, with just a couple of small nits, besides the screen setting. The keyboard is a little small for the space. I would have also preferred the power cord in the back, rather than the right side, where it can get in the way of most external mice (since most people are right handed). Finally, the light/button in the front right is in a vulnerable spot. I've bumped it several times already, disconnecting me from wireless Internet connections. Fortunately, you can reconnect easily by pushing it again.

 

I prefer 1024x768 because it offers a good balance between text size and screen real estate. It is kind of the standard, so most pages will display fine with it.

*******************************************************
Fujitsu S6210: 1.6Ghz PM ~ 768MB RAM ~ 60GB 7200RPM Hard Drive
*******************************************************

 

I bought mine about two weeks ago. Here are my observations:

No "ii" problem, but I could see it happening. The keys are "wobbley", meaning that sometimes if you hit a key off center while flying along in an email, the letter doesnt show up on the screen because the key wobbles to one side instead of hitting the contact. All this is to say the key pad could in no way be described as "strudy". After adjusting my typing style a bit, I am able to make all the keys work just fine. So, not an insurmountable problem. Also, the keypad is way-the-heck up there on the computer. It's a bit difficult to get used to at first.

Folks have talked about how the computer ships with fat32. This is actually not a surprising or bad thing. They ship fat32 because some people *like* fat32. And, you can easily shift from fat32 to NTFS without any performance loss in NTFS (versus a fresh insall) if the fat partitions were created with XP. You cannot, however, easily go from NTFS to fat32. So, they put the default partition as fat32. Makes sense to me. What doesnt make sense is the hidden partition. Tough to deal with unless you shell out for partition magic, or take your chances with sketchy freeware. If course, at 100m, it's really not worth worrying about, but still it just bugs me.

Battery life is outstanding.

Screen is bright and clear. wonderful.

I'm very happy with the speakers. Better than my previous think pad, that's for sure.

mine shipped without a Dothan. Damn. Ahh well, I got it for under 1300 so I can't complain. Got it from CDW. In retrospect, I should have known it wouldn't be Dothan since they say right on the Website that the computer has 1mb L2 cache. That's what I get for failing to read the details.

I tried a 3d game on it (demo of Half Life 2 or something) and it seemed to perform quite nicely. However, it turns out that I am a cyber-retard when it comes to walking around in 3d shooting games. After getting pasted too many times to count by AI, I gave up the ghost.

I had a problem with the mouse pad about two days after receiving the computer. Basically, it dissapeared, and wouldnt show up under hardware even after a complete reinstall of the OS. Remarkably, it turns out that simply starting the computer in safe mode solved the problem. hmmm. Makes me a bit nervous.

It is a good looking computer, and I was absolutely shocked at the size. I was going to get the sony vaio s150, which is a ultra-portable. I opted for this one figuring that given only a two-ish pound difference, it must also be non-monsterous. Well, it is a VERY big machine. Not heavy, but big. It doesnt really fit into any of my existing computer carrying cases. The Widescreen is what really makes it large. What really blows me away is that you can get 4ish hours out of this machine given the size of the screen and it brightness.

hope this helps folks. I post this here because everyone else's reviews helped me make an informed decision, so turn about is fair play.

 

Hey, rovingdiver,
Did you pay any sales tax on your purchas at CDW?
They are the only ones who have good price on 2012 right now but I don't want to pay sales tax which is 8.5%.

Thanks for the review.

 

Is it possible to watch tv using the 2012 wlmi or do i need an usb tv-card?

Cheating on you? ME? Oh well you schratched my rims

 

To save me some research and digging up time, can I just confirm the DVD-RAM drive in question here is Mat****a DVD-RAM UJ-815A? I have a different laptop but this drive seems quite generic (e.g. the 2003LWMi has the same drive).
I'm not that bothered about the region lock mechanism (although it's always a good time to learn), but if it only burns DVD-Rs at 2x, I'd be a little concerned...

 

no, no sales tax, but remember no dothan either. Performance difference is slight (perhaps "next-to-nada" would be a better word(s) here) but if you can find a dothan for 50ish bucks more, I would go with it. Otherwise save the $$ and get it from cdw.

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by vr5

 

Unfortunatelly, newegg does not have any 2012's in stock. The only two places that have 2012 in stock with low prices are: CDW and niceelectronics. I've been foolish to go with niceelectronics. If they don't process and ship my order tomorrow I will cancel it and buy from CDW for a few more bucks.
Thanks for the answer.

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by rovingdiver

 

Hi Odie,

I just got my Acer 2012WLMi last week in US thru online. I like this model very much considering the price and specs.

I am a little bit disappointed [ ] as I got 5 single dead pixels in the screen. I can do nothing about it because the Acer dead pixel policy is as shown:

Defects Allowable Number
single pixels up to 7
2 pixel defects up to 2 sets
3 pixel defects up to 1 set
4 pixel defects none

Also, the brightness seems to be unevenly bright over the screen when I lower the brightness. I like the brightness setting to be low because it gives less strain on my eyes (personal preference). The uneven brightness just got worst when set to the lowest brightness as shown. It is normal? It seems to be darker at the bottom left and right corner of the LCD.

How to upload the photo to this forum? I want to show the uneven bright LCD to illustrate my concern.

Pls advise.


infeyity

 

Great review Odie, thanks. I bought this notebook also because of your review. I got it from egghead, dotham cpu, i'm very happy with it, no dead pixels.

Odie you replied to buqingzi, that you're pretty certain that the 2012WLMi does indeed support booting from a usb device. However, when I looked up the bios settings, there's no option to boot from usb. Is that because I have no external usb drive connected at the moment?

I'd like to connect an external maxtor to clone the system partition for backup. if the acerdisk fails I could then boot from usb and keep going. But if the acer bios can't boot from usb... I'm stuck. Any suggestions?

I called acer support and asked them what the second fat32 partition is for, they say it's just in case you need to save data if you need to restore the system to the first partition. I deleted the second partition and converted everything to ntfs. BTW, someone on the egghead customer review thread recommends to use bootit NG to align the fat32 partition before converting it to ntfs. I didn't - just used CONVERT and it works fine.

 

infeyity: That does not sound good at all, I would contact the dealer you purchased from to see if they can do anything, and then to contact Acer themselves to see if they can offer an exchange/repair. 5 dead pixels is really quite bad. Acer might not be following their pixel policy rigidly and you might get lucky.

s3p: I have still not tried it myself, but I would be quite surprised if the 2012WLMi does not support usb booting. Have you tried the boot menu (enable first in the bios, then I think it is F12 during bootup will bring up a dialog that asks which device to boot from...I'm guessing you need the usb device plugged in for that part)

I used the CONVERT method when I first got the 2012WLMi (before I did the fresh install of XP Pro) and did not have any issues at all. So you should be fine.

- Odie

 

Hi Odie,

Thanks for feedback.

I have made up my mind that I am going to refund my notebook. Luckily, the CDW online store has the return policy.

The other reason to push me to refund the notebook is that the International Warranty (ITW) issue. Do you know that ITW is valid ONLY when the citizen (purchaser) of the country buy the notebook that markets in that country. For example, I am from Asia and bought the notebook in United Stated, even though I travel back to asia I will not get any international warranty. Simply because I am not the American who buy the US model (2012WLMi). In this case, I am still valid for US local warranty. Therefore, for those who purchase the notebook outside of the origin country must watch out of this ITW rule.


infeyity

 

infeyity, I think I've heard that ITW rule rumour.

I purchased in the middle east (UAE) and I live in the UK.

However when sending the laptop for ITW service, there is probably no way that Acer can tell whether you live in the country or not, unless they ask you and you tell them [ ]

- Odie

 

I've just received mine. One stuck pixel (red). I am certainly not going to bother returning it to the store.

As everyone stated, the notebook is great. Simply the best deal around.

I will be urading to 1gig sometime and probably will install bluetooth.

Any questions? Will be glad to answer. It is my turn now to help you undecided people.

 

infeyty, perhaps if you purchase an extended warranty package - it's worth having one anyways - in your country, you'll be better covered than with just the ITW.

vr5, please post your howto of 1GB upgrade and bluetooth install, TIA. Are you going to install bluetooth internally, or use a USB interface?

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Odie

 

check thisout
http://www.notebookreview.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=5348


<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by s3p

 

SP3: Thanks for yr suggestion. I am not entitled to purchase extended warranty (EW) from my home country Acer. Furthermore, to purchase EW in US, it is only valid in US. I got these information from home country Acer and they are the one who suggested me to return the notebook.

Odie: Thanks for yr suggestion. I do not want to take the risk bcos I am asian and i do not speak american slang. It will be easily recognised i am not an american who owns the US notebook........i have returned the notebook.

To those who own the notebook.....congratulation...........i wish i can own one when i get back to my home country.....however, it will be so so so more expensive

infeyity

 

Guys,
I wanted to buy this laptop so bad. I couldnt find it anywhere (in stock). I called up Acer and they told me that, this product has been discontinued. Pretty sad.

Can any body suggest other laptops that are equally good. I am ready to spend upto 1300$

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by kkg

 

Guys,
why do you think Acer is dicontinuing this product if it is so good and selling so well?

-Kiran

 

Hi spYwax
What a coincidence. I live in Boston too. Please email me your contact details to [email protected] . We can work out the details.

Thanks

 

kkg, who really knows why companies do what they do... seriously, most PCs and notebooks are meant to have a very short shelf life, they're manufactured in one single big batch and when that batch is sold out the product is permanently out-of-stock hence discontinued. pc manufacturers do their best to predict how big a batch they need to get to the next (replacement) model, but if a product is more successful than they predicted they're caught by surprise, and end up with no stock, no way to fill in, and no replacement product (temporarily). if the 2012LWMi is so successful as this thread and many others seem to imply, then acer could simply be out of stock and with no replacement yet. if you wait a couple of months (or more?) - as with any other consumer electronics product - you'll be able to buy a slightly better notebook than the 2012LWMi at roughly the same price.

 

hey
I've got a acer aspire 2012WLMi as well but i won't get my infrared and bluetooth started.
Are there some drivers or programs I need to get it started.
please help me
thnx

 

Merro - The 2012WLMi does not come with bluetooth installed.

As for infrared, make sure it is set to "on" in the BIOS during bootup. The XP drivers should already be pre-installed, however they are also on the first recovery cd if you browse the cd from Windows.

- Odie

 

Hi everyone,

Just bought an acer 2012WLMI and am very happy with it. Had only 1 dead pixel, which is not too bad. My only issue with the Acer is that the case seems to bend inwards toward the middle of the computer. It almost feels like it dips in the middle where the mousepad is. I was wondering if this is normal. I've assumed that the construction is this way since the mousepad naturally is not a smooth surface and therefore the dip. However, even looking on the bottom, it seems to stick out more towards the middle.

Also, I think Neobits still has Acer 2012 left. They are in California and can be found doing a google search.

Thanks.