Tuesday, October 07, 2008

Acer Aspire One

I bought one of these recently, the 8gb ssd + 512k Linux version, £199 from PC World.

And I really like it, it turns on really quickly, attaches to wifi, and i'm browsing.

Recommended reading: first, El Reg's top 10 tips, then Aspire One Forum.

In a nutshell, I found the command line hackery more useful.  Run a terminal and enable desktop menu, and add the livna repositories, install VLC.  Install Skype.

I use a 4gb sd card in my work laptop, and use SyncToy to copy all my work documents to it regularly (so i've the originals on the hdd, and a copy on the sd).  Then, if i'm away on business, I pop the sd card in my acer, and away I go.  OpenOffice does a relatively good job at rendering my stuff, only issues seem to be some font choices in powerpoint, but not a showstopper.  Also, too many OpenOffice documents slow things down rather a lot.

I also bought a 16gb sd card too (here, from ebuyer) which works a treat; placed in the permanent sd slot, it merges it quite nicely.  I then copy films & music over from my external usb hdd easily enough.  For some reason, it complains about space sometimes - not sure why.  The 16gb card inherits your home directory, so i've a funny feeling it's some weirdness due to the merge (with nasty looking df nonsense if you look...)

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