When I was out looking for a laptop, one of the tech guys warned me that no matter what (non-apple) brand or type of laptop I chose, after 1 year the battery life would diminish by half, and then after the second year it would decrease by half again. So a 4 hour laptop battery would last only 1 hour after 2 years. I dont know if this is true, but in my experience my old windows based laptops never had long battery life.
So I looked a long time for a netbook with a long battery life. I was willing to give up computing power and processor speed for battery life, and I only wanted to run the MS Office suite and a browser. If you are like me, you'll find your needs nicely met with the AOD255E, which lasts for a full 8+ hours and recharges quickly. I charge it about once a week, and I use it about 3 days per week.
Not sure why, but battery life seems to be a function of both the processor (how the processor efficiently uses battery power) and the number of battery cells. This netbook uses an Intel Atom 455 and a 6 cell battery and gets at least an 8 hour charge, so far. I dont know if Acer designed for this combination or if they just merged these two features together, but so far it has resulted in good results.
It comes with Windows 7 starter. I dont really want to upgrade to the full version of 7 because I like the spare starter version. Not a lot of bells and whistles, but also very quick to load and quick to operate. Out of the box this netbook is sloooooow, but I bought the 2 GB ram upgrade suggested by Amazon, which I confirmed with Crucial was the correct one. Because the AOD255E is such a new model, Crucial did not have pictures of the netbook, so they couldn't send me pictorial directions on swapping out my memory chip. So I had a computer friend swap it out for me- he said it is easy to figure out if you've swapped out netbook memory before. He said I could swap out for as much as 4 GB RAM, but in checking wikipedia, it says the max for System 7 Starter is 2 GB RAM.
When I first got my netbook, and was paying attention to this kind of thing, I could use it for about 2 hours and it would still tell me it had 9 hours of power left. I dont really notice anymore because I havent hit the battery life wall yet.
It is very light and cute and doesnt give off a lot of heat while operating. I carry it in this hard case: Notebook Hard Case up to 14.1" color Green with shoulder strap - Low Profile. which I bought on sale for cheap from Amazon, and decorated the netbook with this matching skin: iPod Touch Skin (High Gloss Finish) - Lime Punch which was way too expensive but I couldnt resist it. I get lots of admiring comments when I whip my notebook out because it looks adorable, but mostly I am happy with the performance and at 2 lbs, my shoulder never aches from carrying it around.
I think that it currently comes only in black, which fingerprints way too easily, but with a skin on, its fine. Acer Aspire One AOD255E-13633 10.1-Inch Netbook (Ruby Red)
1) Yes, Windows 7 Starter *does* support 2GB of memory. It says so on Microsoft's website.
2) A 2GB memory module that works is Crucial's part number CT1596442, which is an 8 chip (4 on each side), single rank, PC8500, DDR3, 2GB module. Its Micron part number is MT8JSF25664HZ-1G1D1.
3) I removed the keyboard by releasing the *four* tabs at the top ("North") side of the keyboard using a very small screwdriver and levering up with an old driver's license (which was a little stiffer than a credit card). I then was able to slide a much thinner plastic card I had underneath the top of the keyboard and then work the card around underneath the keyboard (a playing card also might work well for this).
4) There is an excellent video on YouTube for an Aspire One D255 titled "Acer Aspire One D255 Ram Upgrade" that shows the steps pretty well. The internal layout of the D255 shown in the video appeared to me to be essentially the same as that of the D255E (I happily discovered!).
5) I like this netbook a whole lot, especially with the nice speedup that's a consequence of upgrading the memory to 2GB from 1GB.
Addendum -- Crucial part number CT25664BC1067, has two flavors. The one Amazon appears to be supplying, at least to some people, is CT25664BC1067.16xx. This is a 16 chip dual rank module that will not work in an Acer Aspire One D255E. The CT25664BC1067.8xx version is an 8 chip single rank version and is an alternate name for the CT1596442, the one that Crucial is selling for the D255E. Apparently, the D255E does not like dual rank. The number of chips is neither here nor there. The term "rank" refers to how the chips are connected together on the module.
This is taken directly from their support site "While the Aspire One AOD255 series supports a total of 2GB of DDR3 RAM, due to the design of the netbook the RAM on the Aspire One AOD255 series is not replaceable and Acer does not support upgrading or replacing the RAM."
This should be noted in the description, not that it stopped me since I was able to determine how easy it really is to replace the RAM. Not that I am going to do so, since it would void my warranty. ;)
For those who wish to void their warranty and install 2GB's of RAM, it should take you about 10mins tops to swap it out. ;)
I needed a netbook that would be light enough for me to cart when I needed to do school work. I have a tethering program on my Blackberry so this makes things easier for me when I am in a location with no wifi. I got this netbook because I currently have one of Acer's laptops and was very impressed with it. They said that the battery is supposed to last about 8 hours with light use in the description but when I finally got to work today and unplugged the power I found that the battery power read off 2 hours and 59 minutes on a fully charged battery. Now, I am not sure if the battery drains slow because my break was only about 20 minutes but when I powered the computer off the battery said 1 hour and 48 minutes. Interesting! I also find that the glossy screen makes it hard to see what is on the screen when sitting outside, so this is another detraction. Internet Explorer froze too many times to count, but I cannot add that as a detraction because it's not necessarily the machine, it's the browser. When I get home I will be glad to install firefox and deactivate I.E. Other than the fabrication of the battery power I think this is a solid little machine for typical uses of the internet and maybe Office, which I have not installed yet. I do not plan on upgrading the RAM or installing a DVD drive so I cannot really speak on how easy those processes will be. However, if you are looking for a hard core machine that allows you to graphic design, etc then I would consider getting a high powered desktop, not even a laptop, to execute those actions. If you can look past the battery power, which is no better than a normal laptop and a slightly slower overall machine then this is the netbook for you. In my experience, I don't believe there is a such thing as a high powered netbook anyway. I would definitely buy. I got my netbook from Walmart for $239.98 so looking around and pricing could save a bit of money. I do like the color of the machine, I got the red. The wifi also connected quick and easy, and the tether program installed quick and connects to the internet within a few seconds. I am not thrilled that with the Windows Starter I cannot change the backgroun, but I guess I can live with that and otherwise I am satisfied!'
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