A hybrid drive or-better yet-a true SSD would open up the Aspire AU5-620-U12’s potential. There’s an Intel Core i5-4200M (a Haswell-class mobile processor) and 8GB of DDR3/1600 memory, but the system relies on an integrated Intel HD 4600 graphics processor and a 1TB mechanical hard drive that spins its platters at just 5400rpm. The Acer has an Intel Core i5 and 8GB of RAM.īut the real downside of this model is its performance.
The Toshiba PX35t-A2210 delivered a higher PCMark 8: Office score despite having only an Intel Core i3 processor and 6GB of memory. Acer does allow for expansion, however you can take apart the chassis to access a couple of mini PCIe slots. The optical drive is accessible from the right edge of the chassis, but it can’t play Blu-ray discs-it’s a simple DVD player/burner. The Acer also supports the latest and fastest Wi-Fi standard, 802.11ac (which is backward-compatible with 802.11a/b/g/n). These are all located along the left side or the bottom edge of the slim chassis, where they’re concealed by the display. The 2.0-megapixel integrated webcam captured decent images Acer designed it with small conference rooms in mind, and the microphones performed well for video calls.Ī slow hard drive contributed to the Aspire’s disappointing WorldBench 9 score.Įxpansion and connectivity options are more or less in line with what you’d expect at this price point: The AU5-620-U12 has five USB ports (although only two are USB 3.0), gigabit ethernet, HDMI-in and -out, a media card reader, a headset jack, and audio line out. The display was bright, with brilliant colors, and the speakers embedded at the bottom emitted reasonably robust audio. The AU5’s AV components are more satisfactory. The keyboard is as small as a laptop’s-why? Acer might be imitating Apple here-iMacs come with small keyboards, too-but Acer’s lacks quality. Keyboard action was also disappointingly mushy touch typists will hate it. I also didn’t care for Acer’s decision to go with a keyboard that’s smaller in both width and height than the ones you’d find on notebooks that are much more petite than this desktop. But its design leaves no way to stash the mouse and keyboard underneath the display, which will annoy some users (it bugged me). A robust hinge on the back of the Aspire AU5 allows it to stay at almost any angle.Īcer ships the AU5-620-U12 with a wireless keyboard and mouse, so there are no unsightly desktop cables, either.