Acer Aspire
Acer has been sort of schizophrenic as a computer maker over the years, as their focus has changed so much. In the mid 1990’s, the company began to emerge as a viable competitor to the dominant laptop manufacturers of that time, which were Compaq and Toshiba. Acer notebooks were well put together, and began to become very popular among users as a lower cost alternative to the larger brands. Then, the company began to shift its focus, instead making generic computers and allowing resellers to slap their own labels on them. Acer’s reputation as a computer maker took a nosedive at that point, as most people want a computer (especially a laptop) that is made by a well-known brand name, not Mom & Pop’s Electronics Store. And now, Acer is back with a new focus, and is selling computers under its own name once again. So it comes as a bit of a surprise that the Aspire line of notebooks is so good.

There are actually 13 different models of the Aspire, but they can be organized into three separate families – the 3000 series, the 5000 series, and the 9000 series. As for the components inside, these models run the gamut with everything under the sun going into them. For example, the lowest priced model, the Aspire 3000, runs on an AMD Sempron 3100 chipset, clocked at 1.8 gigahertz. In contrast, the best model which is the 9810 runs on an Intel Core 2 Duo at 2.0 gigahertz. Other processors used in the Aspire are the Pentium M and them AMD Turion 64 (single core).

In addition, many different graphics processing units (GPU) can be found in the various Aspire models as well, including a SiSM760GX integrated chipset in the 3000, an ATI Radeon family GPU in the 5000 series, an Intel 900 GPU in the 9000, and a top of the line NVIDIA GeForce Go 7800 graphics adapter with 256 megabytes of VRAM in the 9810. Similarly, the screens range from 15.4 inches diagonally in the lower models, to a jaw dropping 20.1 inches in the 9810. In a nutshell, you can have any level of quality in graphics processing and display that you want, because they are all represented.

And that holds true for every aspect of computing with the Acer Aspire. If you want an entry-level laptop that you can use to edit documents and browse the web, go for the 3000. If a souped up multimedia machine with lots of horsepower and a huge display is your cup of tea, then the 9810 is the choice for you (provided you have the money). If your preferences fall somewhere in between, there are 11 other models from which to choose, and I’m sure there is one in there that comes very close to what you’re looking for.