As The Apple Turns points out, in inimitable style, the new laptop from Acer. The Acer Aspire 1710 is the answer to Apple’s PowerBook with the 17 inch screen, released a year ago. Unfortunately, Acer has quite a way to go to catch up:
According to CNET, it weighs in at a flabbergastingly flabby “nearly 16 pounds”; Acer’s web site clarifies that to be 15.7 pounds “with combo drive and battery.” Note that Apple’s 17-inch PowerBook weighs a mere 6.9 pounds by comparison, which makes the two products look like some forgotten set of Jared Fogle before-and-after photos that Subway forgot to use in an ad.
In the “Glass Half Full” statement of the year, CNET notes that the Aspire 1710 is “still easier to carry or stow away than a desktop.” Well, yeah, guys, but so’s a dead trout, and that doesn’t mean we want to drag one along on a business trip slung over one shoulder. And it’s only a marginally true statement in the first place, since the original Macintosh 128K was a full-fledged desktop system, and at 16.5 pounds, it was less than a pound heavier than the new Aspire– and it had a handle.
…We did notice one other little thing: whereas the PowerBook carries a sticker price of $2,999, the Aspire (at least in the configuration we looked at) costs only a smidge over half that: $1,599. More than half the price, more than twice the weight; that almost makes sense, you know? Think of it this way: all the money you’d save by getting the Aspire instead of the PowerBook would go straight to your chiropractor.
As if that wasn’t enough to recommend this state-of-the-art computer (it is 1988, right?), it’s pointed out that the battery lasts, depending on configuration and usage (which means best case scenario) a whopping 1.0 hours.
Next thing you know, Acer will be selling us cell phones. You know, the ones that come with a cord attached to a big bag with a shoulder strap?
