Acer Aspire 5633WLMi review

A solid and robust machine

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The rear of the display is made of sturdy plastic, which helps to protect the panel in transit

TechRadar Verdict

A decent middle-of-the-road laptop with reasonable multimedia credentials

Pros

  • +

    Comfortable to use

Cons

  • -

    Keyboard flex

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Aimed at the regular consumer, the Acer Aspire 5633WLMi crams plenty of features and a good specification into its chassis. The 15.4-inch screen is bright and colourful, due to a Super-TFT coating.

The rear of the display is made of sturdy plastic, which helps to protect the panel in transit. Graphics come courtesy of an entry level GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) - Nvidia's GeForce Go 7300. It handles multimedia tasks with ease, and you'll even be able to play some older games.

The decent-sized screen means there's plenty of space for the keyboard, which offers large keys and a comfortable typing experience. The board is not the strongest, flexing in the middle, but the keys are firmly attached and responsive. The touchpad is one of the biggest in the group, and also proved precise.

The keyboard is flanked by multimedia keys, letting you instantly control various functions. Applications such as an email client can be launched, and you can also adjust the volume or skip through DVDs.

The Acer uses an entry level Intel Core 2 Duo processor, which runs at 1.66GHz. Performance was reasonable, and we found Windows Vista Home Premium ran smoothly. This was partly due to the 2048MB of memory fitted. The hard drive is also generous at 160GB.

A 1.3-megapixel camera is built into the screen surround. It rotates over 180 degrees, so you'll also be able to take first-person photographs.

It doesn't offer anything outstanding, but the Acer is a good choice. It's sturdy, offers good performance and is comfortable.

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tech.co.uk staff

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