Up Close With the Aspire Gemstone Blue (Acer Aspire 8920 Series)
We just got some quick hands-on time with the Acer Aspire 8920 and wanted to share our first impressions. This system has a brilliant glossy display and the viewing angles on this 18.4-inch LCD are great.
The CineDash media console is the star of the show, though. It looks like LED crop circles at first but it worked pretty well in our tests. You can use it not only to play and pause media playback but also to launch the Acer Arcade Deluxe menu, which resembles Media Center.
You can use the circular control around the Enter button to scroll through the options, and we liked that this circle's ridges were slightly raised for good tactile feedback.
A big wide 5.1 sound speaker bar is above the keyboard, and we dig the glowing blue power button. We also like that the area beneath the keyboard, including the touchpad, is textured. There are no ports in the back, which we prefer, and the Blu-ray drive is on the right along with 2 USB ports. The HDMI port is on the left, and there's a fingerprint reader between the mouse buttons.
Last but not least are the circular, polished metallic hinges. The left one houses the power jack. Just check out these photos and a short video of our hands on time. Excuse our choppy video there was lots of pushing and shoving to see the hot new machine.
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