Potential One buyer has a few questions

Hi gents,

I love the look and ide of the One and just have a couple of questions before I pull the trigger on one.

Will the Linux version be able to play BBC Iplayer, Spotify or my stored music through Media Monkey or Itunes? I have seen a refurbished Linux unit at a very good price.

If it won't it as an easy job to install Windows XP? (I have a disc and licence form my desktop PC.)

Thanks for your time,
Tim

 

XP installation is a doddle if you have access to a USB CD or DVD drive. The XP device drivers that you need can be downloaded from the Acer Support ftp site.

 

Thanks Ronime-this is the badger I was thinking of ordering-good price?
http://www.acerdirect.co.uk/Grade_A1_Ac ... ersion.asp
tim

 

If you're referring to the deal Laptops-Direct currently have on refurbished AAO's, I bought one from them last weekend (£160 for a blue AAO, 120GB HDD, IGB ram, Linpus Linux). The battery that came with the unit was a dud, it would not charge at all. Luckily I only live a fairly short drive from them (4 motorway junctions) so I drove back there on Sunday and they found me a replacement battery which is working just fine. Apart from the issue with the battery the unit is otherwise in "as new" condition, and top marks for customer service.

Incidentally when they gave me the replacement they advised me to:

* NOT plug the system into the mains
* REMOVE the battery
* HOLD down the power button on the AAO for 1 minute to get rid of any residual charge
* Replace the battery, plug in the mains, then LEAVE IT ALONE AND TURNED OFF for 1 hour before trying to use the netbook to give the battery time to charge (a bit) as they don't know how long the batteries in these units have been sitting in an uncharged state.

My impressions of the machine itself are fairly good overall, however Linpus Linux is AWFUL!! I will probably be installing XP this weekend, time permitting I should note though that when I asked about this last weekend I was told that installing XP *might* invalidate my warranty. As the warranty on the refurbished unit is from Laptops-Direct themselves I suspect this means if I turn up with a problem and XP is installed I'm probably on my own, unless I can reinstall Linux first of course.

EDIT: just noticed you put up the link for Acer-Direct... This is in fact the same as Laptops-Direct, (it's the same company) here's the link for the same thing on the "main" site:
http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/Grade_A1 ... p?PID=1315

 

Thanks Red5 I did not know the 2 comapnies were one and the same.

I think I'll order one now but I'll keep what you say about the battery in mind-despite the units being refurbished they should still be covered by the Sale Of Goods Act.

All the best,
Tim

 

No problem Timbo. If you live near Huddersfield/Brighouse (Yorkshire) by the way it's probably easier to just turn up and buy one over the counter like I did. I believe they also have a showroom in Huthwaite (Nottinghamshire)

 

Strangely I only moved from yorkshire last month (Pocklington nr. York) I'mm now down in Birmingham.

 

That's a fair price if it comes with a decent warranty period. 1GB RAM too, so I wouldn't bother with the pain of taking it apart just to squeeze an extra 0.5GB in.

There are a number of issues that commonly affect the original AA1 models, so give it a thorough test with the original Linpus installation before you slap XP on it:

Bad screen flicker on the lowest four backlight settings
Lock up on battery power with plenty of battery life remaining (60%)
Card readers not working
Noisy fans (all have noisy fans to some degree, but some are downright shocking)

I actually live in Huddersfield, but Laptops Direct didn't have any physical stock back in February when I needed one ASAP as a birthday present for my dad and I ended up paying £199 at play.com.

 

I'm not sure how "old" these units are.

I haven't noticed any screen flicker on my unit, but I believe there is a bios update/fix in any case. With my new battery I'm not having any problems... ran it right down to the point where it goes into standby until you plug it into the mains and press the space bar to resume. I must admit to not having used the card readers yet. There is some fan noise, but no more than I would expect, and it's barely noticable.

Unless those problems are specific to XP? (I'm still runing Linpus right now)

 

Please do not think that every AA1 is affected by these faults - they are not. However, as you might expect with such a low cost device, the failure rate can be somewhat high. 2 out of the 6 AA1s that I have purchased have been returned as faulty and none of these were refurbs.

The BIOS update does not cure screen flicker, it merely robs you of the lower backlight settings so that you cannot experience the problem.