Acer Aspire AS3003LCi Notebook (1.8GHz Sempron 3000+, 256MB DDR, 40GB, DVD/CD-RW Combo, Windows XP, 15

Acer Aspire 3003LCi

Aspire AS3003LCi Notebook (1.8GHz Sempron 3000+, 256MB DDR, 40GB, DVD/CD-RW Combo, Windows XP, 15 Review, by Carla Thornton October 31, 2005

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• Reviewed by: tellulaterzzz

  Strengths: Thought it was a good brand for reliability

  Weaknesses: The LCD screen back light failed at 2.5 years of limited use. Now in a dark room you can see the information on the screen but in day light you can see nothing

  Overall: Acer wants $449 to repair the screen - a outrageous price since I paid around $500 for whole computer brand new. Acer technical service was useless - they will not sell me a new back light power board, the back light or even a whole screen unit nor will they even give me a part number. It is "not user replacable" yet somehow they can do it for $449. Now I have to try to transfer all my files and programs to a new computer - you can bet it will not be an Acer

• Reviewed by: mikezzzz

  Strengths: Flawless out-of-box operation. WinXP recovery CDs are included. Standby and hibernate work fine. Efforless wireless setup - works great. Ditto wired networking. No promo software installed.

  Weaknesses: Big for a 15" unit - possible issue for airplane use or schlepping around; needed updated driver to use scroller with Firefox; no slipcase included; skimpy printed docs.

  Overall: I'm quite satisfied with this machine. Here are some items that haven't been discussed. The hard drive is partitioned into two equi-sized FAT32 partitions - C: holds the whole Windows install while D: is used for Norton Ghost (cut down version included - nice) backup/recovery (launched with alt-F10 at boot time). There's plenty of room on D: for data, however. Apparently you can convert C: to NTFS but are warned that converting D: will disable Ghost. 64M of RAM are initially allocated to video. You can free up 32M of this in the BIOS (F2 on boot up) with no obvious video degradation. (Probably only an issue if you stick with the standard 256M. Adding another 256M significantly reduces application load times.) WindowsXP included no updates since SP2 so plan on doing some downloading. Regarding unit size, note the promotional photo used is incorrect. The real left and right screen margins are about 1", which is more than depicted.

• Reviewed by: sbstang

  Strengths: Good looking, light weight, thin, decent performance.

  Weaknesses: Battery dosen't last seem to last long (haven't investigated all the power saving settings).

  Overall: This $500 laptop (Buy.com) performs better than a Compaq (Presario 2100) that cost me &850 about a year and a half ago (Circuit City) after numerous rebates. Although there are reviews panning the locations of the USB connectors, I found their location easier to work with for connecting cameras, and flash drives. The Compaq only has rear USB jacks and it's irritating to connect my flash drive. I use a wireless printer so I use no permanently attached USB cables (maybe this affects my judgment). This laptop is a great value for the money.

• Reviewed by: RONNEE79

  Strengths: light weight, lots of options/capability

  Weaknesses: battery life. No office software

  Overall: For the price I couldn't find another machine that offered this much. I like the fact that Acer doesn't load their machines up with a bunch of needless introductory software. This is one of the cleanest new machines I've ever turned on.

• Reviewed by: JMARA323

  Strengths: SLIM DESIGN, GREAT PRICE, EXCELLENT VALUE

  Weaknesses: A BIT WARM WHEN OPERATING

  Overall: THIS LAPTOP IS A GREAT BUY. ITS HARD TO FIND A VALUE LIKE THIS FROM THE BIG NAMES. ACER SUPPORT EXCELLENT. WOULD HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT TO SOMEONE. CAN'T LOSE WITH THIS ONE.