Acer Aspire Timeline Ultra M5-481TG-6814

Ultrabooks are mostly about trade-offs. You typically need to ditch a few niceties in order to cram everything into such a small package, so components like optical drives and capacious spinning hard drives tend to fall by the wayside. Not so with the Acer Aspire Timeline Ultra M5-481TG-6814. It packs an impressive array of features into a svelte, attractive chassis and is an exceptionally nimble performer at most tasks. Factor in a price tag below that of other systems in its class, and the Aspire M5 is an easy choice for those who are looking for a powerful ultrabook but don't want to burn holes in their pockets.

Design and Features

The Aspire M5 measures 0.79 by 14.43 by 10.05 inches (HWD), and at 4.16 pounds it's on the heavy side for an ultrabook, although its slim profile reduces any unnecessary bulk. That said, it does weigh more than other systems in its class, including the 4.08-pound Dell Inspiron 14z (Summer 2012) . The Aspire M5's chassis is decked out primarily in a handsome brushed-aluminum finish, but the black plastic underside feels somewhat cheap by comparison and detracts from the overall polished aesthetic. Fortunately, the Aspire M5 compensates for these shortcomings by packing features not typically seen on ultrabooks, like a built-in tray-loading DVD burner; aside from the Inspiron 14z, systems with an optical drive in this category are few and far between.

The 14-inch display has a maximum resolution of 1,366 by 768, which, though not as crisp as the Editors' Choice?winning Asus Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71 , is good enough for 720p video. But its attractively bright and glossy finish is marred by Acer's decision to inexplicably allocate only 14 inches of viewing area on the 14.6-inch screen, resulting in a distracting black bar around the display's edges. To Acer's credit, the display is advertised as 14 inches, so this doesn't come as a total surprise, but it's difficult to think of a reason why Acer wouldn't opt to simply cover this black portion with a slightly larger bezel.

The top row of the Aspire M5's chiclet-style backlit keyboard features shortcuts for toggling Wi-Fi, switching between displays, controlling system volume, disabling the touchpad, and turning off the display; the right side of the keyboard sports media playback buttons. Typing is a breeze, and we noticed no flexing during testing. The palm rest is generously sized and offers plenty of hand real estate, although your thumb may occasionally brush the touchpad. The touchpad itself is responsive, and provides a good amount of tactile feedback for two-finger scrolling and pinch-zooming. The left- and right-click buttons are integrated into the touchpad, not separate buttons; this looks nice, but it resulted in my clicking the wrong button on more than one occasion.

The Aspire M5's built-in speakers are fairly loud, and though the bass is somewhat flat, movies and music alike can easily be heard in small- to medium-size rooms. Of course, you won't be shaking the floor, but by the standard of ultrabooks the Aspire M5 pumps out decent volume levels.

Aside from the optical drive on the system's left side and the multiformat card reader (SDHC/SDXC/SD/MMC) and headphone jack on the right side, most of the action on the Aspire M5 can be found at the rear of the system. There, you'll find two USB 3.0 ports, an Ethernet port, and a full-size HDMI port. The last is particularly useful, letting you hook up the system to a larger display without having to faff about with any dongles. You will, however, have to use an HDMI cord: Unlike the Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71, Lenovo IdeaPad U310 , and HP Envy 4-1043cl , the Aspire M5 does not feature Intel Wireless Display (WiDi) technology, so wirelessly beaming audio and video to a larger screen isn't an option.

A 500GB 5,400rpm hard drive and a 20GB flash cache in the Aspire M5 provide both decent storage capacity and a speedy boot time. The 20GB solid-state-drive (SSD) is invisible to the user, working in the background during repetitive tasks and when you wake the system from sleep mode. The 500GB hard drive has plenty of room for storing data, though it comes loaded with a decent amount of preloaded software. As is often the case, the programs range from useful (Microsoft Office Starter 2010) to total bloatware (the Bing Bar and desktop links to Netflix, eBay, and Skype), with a few sprinkles of proprietary software (Acer ePower, Backup Manager, USB Charge Manager, and the like) and trial versions (30-day trials of Norton Online Backup and NTI Media Maker 9). That said, the slew of included software is forgivable because it ultimately contributes to the Aspire M5's affordable price tag.

Performance

The Aspire M5 outshined others in its class nearly across the board. This doesn't come as a major surprise considering its potent CPU/GPU combination. In addition to its third-generation 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U processor, the Aspire M5 comes equipped with both integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000 and discrete 1GB Nvidia GeForce GT640MLE graphics processors; the system switches between the two GPUs depending on available power, although the user has the option of manually tailoring the configuration down to specific programs. At any rate, the Aspire M5's Futuremark PCMark 7 score of 2,985 bettered the Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71 (2,523) but not the IdeaPad U310 (3,570) and, to a greater extent, the HP Envy 4-1043cl (3,962). As far as 3D rendering is concerned, the Aspire M5 screamed past the competition. Its impressive 3DMark06 scores (10,294 at medium detail settings and 1,024-by-768 resolution; 8,501 at native resolution with 4x anti-aliasing) left the Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71 in distant second place (8,627 at medium detail settings and 1,024-by-768 resolution; 5,148 at native resolution with 4x anti-aliasing).

The Aspire M5 pumped out equally impressive results in the gaming arena and barely broke a sweat while crossing the playability threshold of 30 frames per second (fps). Ultimately, few other systems did as well as the Aspire M5 in both Crysis (55fps in medium quality at 1,024-by-768 resolution; 25fps in high quality at native resolution) and Lost Planet 2 (50fps in medium quality at 1,024-by-768 resolution; 31fps in high quality at native resolution). The sole exception is the Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71, thanks to its discrete 1GB Nvidia GeForce GT 620M GPU (52fps in medium quality at 1,024-by-768 resolution and 6fps in high quality at native resolution for Crysis; 34fps in medium quality at 1,024-by-768 resolution and 10fps in high quality at native resolution for Lost Planet 2). No other system even came close to the Aspire M5.

The Aspire M5 wasn't as sure-footed in our multimedia tests. It completed our Handbrake video-encoding test in 1 minute 59 seconds, tying with the HP Envy 4-1043cl and outperforming the IdeaPadU310 (2 minutes 3 seconds), but falling short of the Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71 (1 minute 43 seconds). Its CineBench R11.5 score of 2.10 sputtered behind its entire class, and lagged behind the third-place-finishing HP Envy 4-1043cl (2.38). Conversely, the Aspire M5 completed our Photoshop CS5 test in a brisk 3 minutes 7 seconds, or 51 seconds quicker than the second-place Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71 (3 minutes 58 seconds). The Aspire M5's 54Wh battery lasted 7 hours 54 minutes in MobileMark 2007, longer than the rest of its class. Although the next-best system, the HP Envy 4-1043cl (7 hours 45 minutes) came very close, the others exhibited significantly shorter battery life. Still, this excellent result does little to mitigate the fact that the Aspire M5's battery is sealed into its chassis, so swapping it out can be something of a warranty-voiding, MacGyver-esque endeavor.

No, the Acer Aspire Timeline Ultra M5-481TG-6814 isn't perfect. Yes, it's loaded with bloatware, is somewhat heavy, and has a distracting black bar around its display's viewable area. But these missteps are outweighed by its nimble performance in both everyday computing applications and gaming. It's also an excellent value, costing less than the very systems it handily outperforms. It may not pack the sizzle of our current Editors' Choice ultrabook, the Asus Zenbook Prime UX32VD-DB71, but the Aspire M5 is nonetheless an easy choice for anyone looking to buy a powerful ultrabook but not burn holes in their pockets.

BENCHMARK TEST RESULTS:

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the Acer Aspire Timeline Ultra M5-481TG-6814 with several other laptops side by side.

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