Acer AS1430Z-4677 11.6-Inch Laptop (Diamond Black)

At just over 3 pounds, the Acer Aspire 1430Z (model AS1430Z-4677) notebook PC offers great performance features in a netbook size that lets you travel light. Enjoy music, video, photos and more on the 11.6-inch HD display and work comfortably on the full-size keyboard wherever you are with Wireless-N Wi-Fi networking and long battery life--up to 4-1/2 hours. It's powered by a dual-core, ultra-low-voltage Pentium processor and includes 3 GB of installed RAM.

The Acer AS1430Z laptop with 11.6-inch display and
Intel Pentium processor (see larger image).

Pinch, flick and swirl your fingers on the Multi-Gesture Touchpad for an intuitive navigation of web pages, photos, and more. A Touchpad Lock Function Key prevents accidental cursor movement from your wrists and fingers while typing.

The 1.3-megapixel HD webcam lets you go face to face in online chats and VOIPs with a 1280 x 1024 resolution, and you can go even bigger by easily connecting to your HDTV via the HDMI port--delivering crisp high-quality visuals and high-fidelity audio through a single cable.

This Acer laptop comes pre-installed with the Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium operating system (64-bit version). You'll also experience new ways to deliver your best work with Office Starter 2010.

Note that this notebook does not include an optical drive, but you can use optional external DVD/CD drives that connect via USB.

Key Features

Up to 4.5 hours of battery life with included 6-cell battery
11.6-inch HD widescreen CineCrystal LED-backlit display
1.33 GHz Intel Pentium U5600 ultra-low voltage processor (3 MB L3 cache) offers two cores of processing power and features Intel SpeedStep technology, helping your system to dynamically adjust processor voltage and core frequency to decrease power consumption and heat production.
320 GB SATA hard drive (5400 RPM)
3 GB of installed DDR3 RAM (1066 MHz)
Intel HD Graphics (with 128 MB of dedicated system memory) deliver turbo-charged performance and fast throughput and provides support for Microsoft DirectX 10 games.
Wireless-N Wi-Fi (802.11b/g/n) for ultra-fast connectivity to home and business networks.
1.3-megapixel webcam integrated into the display bezel for easy video chats and conferencing (1280 x 1024 resolution).
Multi-Gesture Touchpad allows you to pinch, flick and swirl your fingers across the touchpad for more natural photo and video viewing as well as intuitive navigation of websites such as Google Earth. It also enables you to scroll, zoom in and out and flip through Web pages, photos, spreadsheets and more. (Learn more)
Stereo speakers with 2nd generation Dolby Sound Room audio enhancement transforms the experience of movies, music, and games.
Windows 7 Home Premium makes it easy to create a home network and share all of your favorite photos, videos, and music. And you can watch shows for free when and where you want with Internet TV on Windows Media Center. Get the best entertainment experience with Windows 7 Home Premium. (Learn more)
Preloaded with Microsoft Office Starter 2010 free software offering selected functionality of Word and Excel for your text and spreadsheet tasks. Plus, if you decide you want the full suite, just purchase a product key to activate an ad-free version that also includes the latest Outlook, PowerPoint, and Publisher programs. Complete your PC. Buy full-featured Microsoft Office 2010.
Weight: 3.1 pounds
Warranty: One-year parts and labor limited warranty with concurrent International Traveler's Warranty.

Ports and Connectivity

3 USB 2.0 ports
HDMI high-definition audio/video output allows a single cable to transmit uncompressed high-definition video to your digital TV or LCD
Gigabit Ethernet (10/100/1000)
Multi-in-1 Digital Media Card Reader compatible with Secure Digital (SD), MultiMediaCard (MMC), Memory Stick (MS), Memory Stick PRO (MS PRO), xD-Picture Card (xD)

What's in the Box

This package contains the Acer Aspire AS1430Z-4677 notebook PC, rechargeable lithium-ion battery, AC adapter, and operating instructions

Learn More

The Acer Multi-Gesture Touchpad

A Multi-Gesture Touchpad allows you to pinch, flick and swirl your fingers across the touchpad for more natural photo and video viewing as well as intuitive navigation of websites. The Multi-Gesture Touchpad enables you to scroll, zoom in and out and flip through Web pages, photos, spreadsheets and more.

The TouchPad can also be disabled with a one-touch button, eliminating accidental cursor movement with palms and wrists when using an external mouse.

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium

Pre-installed with the Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium operating system (64-bit version), you'll be able to easily create a home network and share all of your favorite photos, videos, and music. Windows 7 is the easiest, fastest, and most engaging version of Windows yet. Better ways to find and manage files, like Jump Lists and improved taskbar previews, help you speed through everyday tasks. Windows 7 is designed for faster and more reliable performance, so your PC just works the way you want it to.

And with Windows Anytime Upgrade, you'll be able to add new features to your PC in as little as 10 minutes. Windows will walk you through the simple upgrade process, it requires no software or downloads, and you'll keep your existing programs, files, and settings

Owner Reviews, Ratings, Comments and Criticism
Just a quick few comments. I bought a 1430Z (from another vendor, where it was cheaper at the time) mainly because: o It has more screen pixels than 10.1" netbooks do o CPU benchmarks I found on the web were much better than for typical Atom processors o It's considerably lighter and smaller than 13.3" notebooks o It comes with more memory than typical netbooks do My intention (as with all my computers) was to run Ubuntu Linux, dual booting occasionally into Windows. My impressions so far: Pros: o Nice compact form factor. It's even a tad lighter than the spec; mine weighs just under 3 lbs o Ubuntu 10.10 works. But I had to blacklist 2 modules (intel_ips and acer-wmi). o External VGA gives you a full extended desktop (at least in Ubuntu, haven't experimented in Windows): I get 1366x768 on the notebook and 1680x1050 on a 22" external monitor at the same time. This has not worked well or at all on other notebooks I've had in the past. o Applications respond snappily -- this is subjective of course. Video is good. I also run my own CPU-intensive simulation benchmark on all my computers to compare them. The 1430Z (Intel U5600 CPU) is about 26% slower than a desktop with an AMD 5000+ CPU, 18% faster than a notebook with an Intel SU7300 CPU, and 11% faster than a notebook with an Intel Pentium M 1.73GHz CPU. Cons: o Battery life is OK but unexceptional -- this is only subjective since I haven't measured it. But battery life has never been a high priority for me. For all my laptops it has dropped precipitously after a year or so, no matter how impressive it may have been when new. o The Keyboard lacks the feel of a great keyboard, like the classic Thinkpads of yore, or a decent desktop keyboard. And the Home/End/PgUp/PgDown/Up/Down/Left/Right are squashed together in the lower right; I don't know if I'll ever learn to find them without looking. Overall then, this fits the bill for me: portability, performance, and Linux.