Barely two weeks after my post about the Aspire Revo being available in Malaysia comes news that it has dropped by RM 100 in price, and there’s now a free HDMI cable (used for connecting the Aspire Revo to an LCD/plasma TV/monitor) thrown in as well, with a reputed value of RM 99, so in effect, the price has dropped by almost RM 200. Surprising indeed – I didn’t know the Revo was selling so badly in Malaysia that they had to resort to drastic measures in an attempt to clear stocks!
In case you’re still in the dark about what I’m talking about, the Aspire Revo is a nettop – an all-in-one, sans the monitor, from Acer. It has an Atom processor, similar to the ones found in today’s netbooks. It also has an nVidia ION chipset which processes graphics much better than those lame integrated Intel solutions typically found on netbooks. So, it should be able to play back high definition (1280 x 720 pixels), as well as “true” high definition videos at 1920 x 1080 pixels just fine, compared to netbooks which will have a problem playing back 1080p HD video. It should also be able to support some games playing, though not those which are graphically very intensive.
I wonder if the Revo comes with a qualifying free upgrade to Windows 7 later this year. As far as I know, the Vista Premium product is a qualifying one for other vendors; pity the advertisement doesn’t say. If it qualifies for free, then I think this is a pretty good deal!
At this price, I’m very tempted to get one for myself actually. My old desktop passed on some time ago and it’s time I got a replacement, maybe to do my light video rendering work for my videos for this blog – I just wonder if this will cut it? No hope of getting a review unit I’m afraid – I’ve asked Acer Malaysia many times, but no matter how much I grovel and beg, it hasn’t made them budge from their stand that I am not worthy to review their products…sigh…
If you’re interested, the advertisement is in today’s Star newspaper, page N30.
RM16xx for an Atom-based PC? Hmm, if I am not mistaken, a normal (and much more powerful) Core2Duo PC is just around RM18xx..
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 4th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
@kumar, actually it’s RM 1,299 without the monitor. And it’s the price of miniaturisation!
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kumar Reply:
July 5th, 2009 at 8:52 am
You’d have to include in the LCD, buddy, it’s a nettop and not a netbook, eh?
it’s sad to realise that we (the users) are sacrificing so much for mobility and miniaturisation.. I mean, an Atom N280 is just a single core proc and it’s slower than a Celeron at the same clock speed..
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 5th, 2009 at 9:44 am
@kumar, the RM 1,7xx you mentioned included a monitor? Wow…that’s indeed cheap. Yes, when it comes to mobility and miniaturisation, consumers are willing to make sacrifices. Lots of them in fact. As for the performance of the N series Atom vs the Celeron, I wouldn’t know for sure, I haven’t checked to know for sure.
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kumar Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 2:09 am
I mentioned RM18xx (more specicially, RM1 below RM1900) – check out Swisspac’s ‘Family Pac’ offer (you can download the offer brochures in PDF format on their site).
In any case, i had to make the final decision between going with a PC for home use which gives zero mobility vs a netbook or notebook (yay to mobility, boo to performance). Ended up getting a Core2Quad box with 4GB RAM, and 320GB SATA HDD with a 20 inch Samsung LCD monitor for RM2500 to run Linux Mint 7 x64 edition.
I’m still closely watching the netbook/notebook space, though. Am waiting to see portables with reasonable 3D graphics and non-bundling of Windows OS (i.e. which will cut approx. RM250+ from the final price)..
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 9:52 am
@kumar, err…buying such a souped up PC to run Linux? I thought one could make do with a Pentium II processor, 64Mb of RAM and 100Mb of hard disk space?
Looks like Linux requirements have gone up quite a bit since the “old” days, eh? 
As for a small form factor notebook/netbook, defined as anything 12″ or smaller, I don’t think we’ll see one in a price range we’re accustomed to nowadays, not with a dedicated graphics component and a decent dual core processor. Plus Windows XP licenses to the OEMs are cheap, I don’t think they even go into the RM 200+ category…
Pal, I’ve seen one of this most affordable nettop, Compaq CQ2120L, in tesco last 2 weeks for only RM788, thats RM111 cheaper than you can find from Lelong.com.my. Though it comes with only FreeDOS, theres another model comes with Vista. Anyway, not sure how good does Atom 330 perform, but I think RM788 is a pretty good deal. Another downside is that this compaq is using Intel GMA950 as opposed to Acer nVidia ION, but hey, thats RM500 cheaper! Check it out!
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 4th, 2009 at 7:30 pm
@hkboey, really? In Tesco Penang or KL? I must go take a look. But not every Tesco sells IT products, I think. Probably have to go to the bigger ones. Yes, at RM 788 it is good value. But the nVidia ION does command a premium for the things it can do above what the lame Intel GMA can. I guess if one doesn’t need to enjoy HD content then the Compaq is the one to get, otherwise, he/she will have to consider the Revo!
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hkboey Reply:
July 4th, 2009 at 10:09 pm
Ya, its true about if you need HD or not. I saw it in Tesco Penang, not the Tesco Extra fyi. Tesco extra do sell IT products but they dont sell laptop/computer. So probably you can try the bigger store. Im thinking to get one as my dedicated IPcam recorder.
Acer pros:
- graphics chipset with HD
- wireless keyboard/mouse
- built in wifi
- gigabit lan
- bundled with usb spk
- bigger ram
- genuine windows
Compaq pros:
- rm500 cheaper
- dvd-writer with lightscribe
There are so much pros of Acer compared to Compaq, so its the matter of you need ‘em for rm500. Another thing I doubt about Acer is the Atom N230 processor. Cant find much info about this processor. Probably Acer mistaken the Atom 330 for Atom N230? Not sure. A quick check on wikipedia, N2xx(single-core) series are meant for netbook, 2xx/3xx(dual-core) series are meant for nettop. Perhaps you have more info about this?
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 5th, 2009 at 12:03 am
@hkboey, I’m not even sure the 330 is a dual core Atom chip! Actually, if you think about it, that RM 500 difference between the two can be explained by the presence of a genuine copy of Windows Vista (this can’t be cheap!) and the nVidia ION graphics chipset on the Acer compared to the Compaq. Perhaps the price difference is not as big as we think it is?
But of course the Acer doesn’t have the DVD writer, which shouldn’t cost that much anyway.
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hkboey Reply:
July 6th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
The list of Atom processor are listed here.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Atom_microprocessors
Acer have made another mistaken on their advertisement again. The processor indeed is Atom 230 as opposed to Atom N230(which I dont think it exist). Found that a seller from Lelong.com.my, which has posted the specs sticked on the box.
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 6th, 2009 at 9:20 pm
@hkboey, LOL, this is not the first time they have made a mistake in their specifications. I have spotted other before, even after posting about it, the error is still there…
Anyway, when I was walking around last week, the retailers were still using the old price of RM 1,399. Disappointing…
dad , yes i saw in singapore , there is one nettop from comqaq or hp , selling also very cheap…., there is one oversea customer ( indonesia ) is asking to buy 3 units with discount.
but i did not look into , if u want it , i can call , is singapore BEST…shop in IMM …
dad , atom Z is better and faster than N , is it …can feel or not..
tq
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 4th, 2009 at 11:42 pm
@andy, no, no need to ask for me, I’m not interested! Atom Z series is slower than Atom N series – trust me, I have both!
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dAd, I’m not receiving any email notification for follow up comments.. Had to surf to the actual blog link to see them comments. What gives?
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 5th, 2009 at 9:42 am
@kumar, apologies for that, it’s never worked, there have been others who have complained. I don’t know if it’s my stupidity or Wordpress’ bug, but I guess I should get it fixed soon. I wonder if upgrading to the latest version of Wordpress helps? Anyway, I’m too lazy to go troubleshooting in the PHP coding and seeing as I didn’t customise anything in the Wordpress base coding apart from adding in some widgets, I don’t think it’s a coding problem…
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kumar Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 1:59 am
Well, I just have to visit your site more often to keep up with the comments and responses..
Not that I’m complaining (much)… :-p
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Souped up PC? It’s just a Core2Quad Q8400 CPU on an Intel DG45ID M/B with onboard graphics, bro. You should see the liquid-cooled overclocked behemoths that some of my friends use at their homes..
Well, Linux may probably run fine on a Celeron system with 512MB RAM, but I already had a 2K-2.5K budget in hand so I just went with the best specs I could get at that price.
The OS really ‘flies’ on my PC. Honestly speaking, I’ve not seen it use beyond 1.5GB of memory with all the stuff I’ve got loaded on it. Remember, I’m using my PC as a multimedia desktop and not a barebones server.
Back to the topic of netbooks, I suspect that the upcoming more powerful mini-portables with better 3D graphics will be priced like midranged laptops.
Are you sure that a Windows OS licenses won’t fetch at least a RM200 premium over the actual hardware’s price? I’ve seen some really attractive pricing from vendors who bundle Ubuntu Linux or FreeDOS with their hardware..
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 11:18 am
@kumar, I sometimes wonder what those liquid cooled machines are used for – are they for hacking into NASA’s computer network, I wonder?
Well, good to know you’re happy with Linux on that powerful machine that flies, although I would hazard a guess that a machine with those kind of specifications would fly almost equally as fast with Vista 
And yes, netbooks are slowly morphing into notebooks, specs and pricing wise. The creep is gradual so consumers don’t really feel it. Devious marketing ploy eh?
And I recall writing in some previous posts that the cost of an XP license to the OEMs is only in the region of around US$10. I think. I’m getting old, so I could be sadly mistaken!
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[...] HDMI (to connect the nettop to your LCD/plasma large screen monitor) cable worth RM 100 thrown in, as I reported in this post. And today, barely three weeks later, it’s been made even cheaper – at RM 1,299 with the [...]
Acer Taiwan released the Aspire Revo with Atom 330! at least its dual core means better performance than the absymal atom single core =/ and it also features a 500GB hard disk..wonder when it will land on malaysia?
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Da Alpha Dog Reply:
August 16th, 2009 at 11:25 pm
@Kong, thanks for the info. Any linkies to share with us?
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