Acer Aspire One D257 – An elegant and light 10 inch netbook
On a more and more competitive market of mobile gadgets where users can choose between smartphones, notebooks and tablet PCs, netbooks seem to have an unsure future. You will easily find over 400 models of notebooks on internet shops, but you will find much fewer netbooks. In addition to this, even if now there are not too many available tablets on the market, more and more producers are becoming interested of this niche and are trying to launch attractive models. IPad 2, Galaxy Tab 10.1, Blackberry Playbook, HP TouchPad are just some of the tablets that were announced in the first two months of this year.
Also this year, in mid-February, Acer launched the Aspire One D257 netbook model at the Mobile World Congress 2011. The new model features an elegant design, small size, and a series of basic applications that ensure you can communicate anywhere you are.
Taking in consideration the fact that the product has not yet been launched, the technical specs are not really well known. It seems that the Aspire One D257 will use a dual core Intel Atom N570 or N550 processor, and we can expect the new model to have multitasking capabilities. It is also worth mentioning it will have DDR3 memory (1 or 2GB), Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 3150 with DirectX 9 support integrated video card and a hard disk of maximum 500 GB.
Acer Aspire One D257 has an original and elegant design
Even if it is compact the netbook will have a LED 10.1” screen capable of a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels. The screen will of course use the Acer CrystalBrite technology. The keyboard is 93% of a normal keyboard and is very comfortable. The touchpad is big enough. The webcam called Crystal Eye is placed above the screen and will be easy to use to video chat on Yahoo Messenger, Skype, etc.
At the connectivity chapter Acer chose to give this model an RJ-45 port for the internet, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 3.0, 3 USB ports, a VGA port, and 2 3.5mm jacks for headsets and a microphone.
Acer Aspire One D257. Which color do you like?
Acer Aspire One D257 with a 3 cell battery will only weigh 1.2 kg, while the 6 cell model will weigh 1.3 kg. The netbook is extremely thin (2.4mm). The 6 cell Acer Aspire One D257 will have autonomy of up to 8 hours.
The netbook will come with a dual boot option being able to run both Windows 7 Starter and Android (this option will not be available in the US). Acer thought about offering buyers more possibilities when it comes to the color of the case: blue, white or brown.
Price and availability
Data about the price or the launching date of the Aspire One D257 is not known yet. This information will probably be available in the next months. Until then you can view the following short material on the new Acer netbook, from MWC 2011.
Acer Aspire One D257 hands on preview:
Ionut is Chief Editor. He has a degree in Computer Science BA and worked in IT since 2002. Ionut is now managing several tech sites, including GadgetRoad. Find me on Twitter
I hesitated between choosing two netbooks – Acer Aspire One D257 and Dell Inspiron Mini 10 (dell.com/uk/p/inspiron-mini-netbooks). In the end I went for Dell because I wanted to try out something new as most of my friends have the Aspire model. The netbook I bought from Dell matched the descriptions and was in fantastic working order. I don’t regret buying it at all!