Acer Aspire 9800
Notebook Reviews > Acer Aspire > 9800

Review Date: 28th July' 2006

It seems that big is the new craze when it comes to notebooks. While there has been much advancement in technology allowing more and more components to be smaller than ever, there seems to be a strong customer demand for bigger and more powerful desktop-replacement media-centric notebooks.

The Acer Aspire 9800 is a clear example of this. It's so big it's almost hard to call it a notebook. Perhaps the biggest driving force behind this notebook is its huge screen. At 20.1 inches, this widescreen LCD display looks more like something you'd find at a desktop than on a notebook.

With a screen this big its no wonder this notebook is so huge (and heavy). But being targeted as a desktop-replacement media center allows it to be so, after all these are not meant to be carried around on regular basis. Being so big offers the obvious advantage of extra space for Acer to cram in as much high-end components as possible. One area where the benefits of its size are clear is the Aspire 9800's keyboard - you get a full-sized keyboard complete with a separate numpad.

One of the key selling points of the Acer Aspire 9800 is its integrated HD-DVD drive making it one of the two only notebooks commercially available with such a drive (the other is a Toshiba Qosmio).

But Acer doesn't stop there, the Aspire 9800 is filled with such top-notch components to ensure that it has a good counter-point to its big size and heavy weight (besides the 20.1" screen that is). Computing power is provided by the Intel Core Due T2600 processor running at 2.16 GHz. You'll also get a generous 2GB of DDR2 RAM for that heavy multimedia experience. Graphics are provided by the dedicated nVidia GeForce Go 7300 card with its own 256MB of video memory.

Storage wise, the Aspire 9800 comes with a whooping 240GB of hard drive space. But the huge storage capacity is not the best part here. Acer did what's so rarely done on notebooks and achieved this capacity by joining two 120GB SATA drives in a RAID-0 (stripping) array, boosting hard drive performance to a much higher level.

As a media center notebook, the Aspire 9800 comes ready with quality audio components. There are Acer's 3Dsonic stereo speakers coupled with the Acer BasSonic sub-woofer. You also get two integrated microphones and SPDIF support. Best of all is the fact that the Acer Aspire 9800 is equipped with Dolby Digital Live and DTS Connect™ support.

Video wise, the Aspire 9800 comes with the usual plethora of ports such as VGA-out, AV-in, S-video, TV-out and DVI-D port with support for HDCP (High Bandwidth Digital Content Protection). In addition, the Aspire 9800 also comes with a TV-Tuner that supports both digital and analog signals and a remote control unit to top it all off.

Overall, the Acer Aspire 9800 is just too heavy (17.2 pounds) and with a very short battery life (only 1.5 hours max) to be called a notebook. But considering that mobility is not its aim you'll find that the Aspire 9800 shines as a desktop-replacement with a strong potential to be a great media center PC.