ACER 4530 Review · DIGIT-ARC

*images.us.ciao.com/ius/images/products/normal/232/product-15543232.jpg
Basic info:

Screen: 14.1 inches

Weight: 5.3lbs

Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 QL-60 @1.90 Ghz

RAM: 1GB DDR2 SD RAM @ 667 MHz ( Upgradable upto 4GB )*

HDD: 160GB SATA Harddisk Drive

Communication: 802.11b/g Wifi Signal UP, Inbuilt EDR2.0 Bluetooth.

Graphics/Chipset: Offer Nvidia 9100M G with 256mb Dedicated memory.

Slots: 3USB 2.0, 1 LAN, 1 Modem, one Express/54 slot, 1 VGA out, 1 SD/MMC reader Slot at front

Extra: Volume Whell free and the ACER Empower Button The Laptop also offers 5 Multimedia Buttons very nicely configured at left hand side for, Wifi(signalUP), bluetooth, IE, EMAIL, Messenger.

The pointing device is also very nicely responsive and gives a significant touch level satisfaction.
This notebook comes with two offers for free 60 days trial for McAfee and Microsoft Office 2007.**

Battery/Charging: As for the battery part i would say it dissapoints we with only approx 1.5hrs on High Performance, 2.2 - 2.5 hrs on balanced and about 4 hrs approx. on power saver modes.
charging takes about 1-1.25 hrs to charge to 100% from 10%, so i would think it of a
PRO.

OS: comes with Free LInux

Pricing: I got it for 30K ( 30000INR*** ) with Rs.800/- Extra for another GB of Kingston RAM.

Windows Vista/7 Experience Index scoring
It gave me :
4.7 - processor
5.6 - RAM
4.0/4.4 - Desktop/Gaming GFx
5.3 - HDD transfer rates.
so Overall of 4.0 as for the Graphics..
Would like to add a point with windows 7 that it gives better gaming performance on this laptop than windows vista.

FINAL WORD: With comparision to the same type configration in DELL, TOSHIBA, i would give this one a extra mark on pricing. This one comes for 31000INR. only whereas others in the same category touches 40000INR. mark.i would give this one a GO 9/10 for pricing, quality and Build.. Vista takes about 10 seconds to load so its good. I even played Call of duty WAW and it gave me good performance on medium high graphics.. so it might as well suit you for some gaming needs.

A Perfect buy for casual Gamerz, home users and i bit of power user as well.. not for long battery lovers… *thecomputernext.com/blog/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif

PROS/CONS

PROS: Nice Configuration, Easy to access, Cool looks, Very cheap

CONS: Battery life.

* Some Models come with 2GB
** Offer at acer Website
*** Pricing may vary from place to Place

Thanks shantanu. Great review, helped me a lot. I bought this last week. Will recommend this to all budget users.

^^

yup nicely said... even (ankit_niitian) is looking for teh same kinda budget lappy, it will be a really helpful review for him..

THanx to Shantanu too..

Nice but the review could have been a bit longer along with some game benchmarks and pictures.

Did you buy this for yourself? If yes, I'd strongly advice getting extended warranty on the model.

*** And it would have been better if the laptop was bundled with option for Windows Vista as the OS as well as 2GB of RAM as de-facto. Would save the hassle of upgrading yourself.

A

nice man, I unnecessarily shelled 40k on vostro, not worth the cost.

One minus point is for camcorder users, because this laptop does not come with a firewire port, wheras the Acer 4520 had one.

^ Firewire is passé (or going to be). USB is here to stay.

A

Thanks shantanu for a nice review. Can you please tell a little bit more about your experience with the lappy. Did you try any games on it?? Does it gets hot very fast?? Did you try to do some intense stuff on it like running big applications simultaneously. I would be really thankful if you could tell a little bit about your experience with the lappy.

Thanks

sure man.. i am running GTAIV on it.. its okay on medium high settings.. giving almost 22 fps.. COD waw ran amazing on it.. so gaming is good.. from good i mean upto mark for lappy.. i run VS 2008 with SQL 2008 and windows 7 on it.. its really great.. the only con is the battery power that runs out in 2hrs approx in balanced.. the appy is not hot.. the fan goes on after 1/2 hr.. and the its really cool.. being a AMD X2 it handles the multitasking amazingly.. really.. and at 31k its a great deal..

sure man.. i am running GTAIV on it.. its okay on medium high settings.. giving almost 22 fps..

Thats not bad at all. Infact its great. If thats for yourself; congrats!
Being 9 series, I guess it supports CUDA and Physx. Did you try the latest Drivers?

Man, I'd definitely recommend this to anyone.

ankit_niitian said:
Thanks shantanu for a nice review. Can you please tell a little bit more about your experience with the lappy. Did you try any games on it?? Does it gets hot very fast?? Did you try to do some intense stuff on it like running big applications simultaneously. I would be really thankful if you could tell a little bit about your experience with the lappy.

Thanks

shantanu said:
sure man.. i am running GTAIV on it.. its okay on medium high settings.. giving almost 22 fps.. COD waw ran amazing on it.. so gaming is good.. from good i mean upto mark for lappy.. i run VS 2008 with SQL 2008 and windows 7 on it.. its really great.. the only con is the battery power that runs out in 2hrs approx in balanced.. the appy is not hot.. the fan goes on after 1/2 hr.. and the its really cool.. being a AMD X2 it handles the multitasking amazingly.. really.. and at 31k its a great deal..

Well, ankit, looks like u are sure to gonna buy this lappy now.. it looks promising to me too...

btw, wait for teh CQ50 review (in ur thread)..

Well, ankit, looks like u are sure to gonna buy this lappy now.. it looks promising to me too...

Hehe

yeah ! i am on latest drivers..

with physx i guess

A

Thanks Shantanu for sharing the information :razz:

. Is the 9100M better than 8200M on the CQ50??

off course man.. 9 series always better than 8 lol

Near my house this is for 32K with 2GB RAM and carry case inclusive of taxes.

Definitely seems VFM, but I still want benchmarks of 4530 vs 4520 GPU performance with same 2GB RAM and 1.9GHz CPU. Because 4520 looked better at 25K.

MetalheadGautham said:
4520 looked better at 25K.

Are you serious? Acer 4520 with 2GB RAM and carry case for JUST 25k? I heard its not avialable anymore.

I heard that 4530 has some issues with Linux?

IronManForever said:
Are you serious? Acer 4520 with 2GB RAM and carry case for JUST 25k? I heard its not avialable anymore.

I heard that 4530 has some issues with Linux?

lol, I said 4530 not 4520.
the 4520 for 25k is 1gb ram, 1.8ghz cpu, no carry case.

issues w/linux ? no idea.

^ I mean, you were trying to weigh the Graphics solutions of both laptops, 4530 and 4520. So, I thought you wouldnt actually pitt 1GB RAM laptop with a 2GB RAM laptop. Hence, I though the 4520you were talking about; had 2GB RAM. ..

4520 has geforce 7050.. its nothing comapred to 9100M .. trust me.. my friend has DEll with 7050 and Centrino 2 and 2 GB .. COD waw runs like a Slide show on his lappy.. whereas mine runs at decent Frame rates.. its very much playable at high settings..

so its good.. and i too got it with 2 Gb ram in 31k.. with Case .. i oCed the CPU to run at 2.5Ghz and its running awesome

Arey congrats man.

congo bro for the purchase

A

shantanu said:
i oCed the CPU to run at 2.5Ghz and its running awesome

Someone told me that if you overclock an AMD, then it will give problems

^^

well, it wasn't me for sure..

ankit_niitian said:
Thanks Shantanu for sharing the information . Is the 9100M better than 8200M on the CQ50??

And yes, OFCOURSE !!! the 9xxx series are WAY way better than their 8xxx counterparts, (tats the reason y i hv been telling alot of ppl to go for HP's DV series coz they hv 9xxx gpu as compared to DELL's 8xxx series of GPU..well i mean IF they hv that kinda budget...)

-----------

Cheers n e-peace...

hey....can u try on some other games on this laptop..like Prince of persia(the new one) ,crysis,nfs undercover,gta4,fallout 3 etc. and post the frame rate and your settings fro each game.. i'll highly appreciate your reply..

hey...n u've also mentioned in the specs that the geforce 9100 m g has got 256 mb DEDICATED memory..Are u very sure about it?? Do check if its not sharing it with the system RAM.. and lemme know..

REPLY MAN!!! ITS BEEN TOO MANY DAYS SINCE I"VE POSTED AND NO ONE'S REPLIED!!! C'MON!!

shantanu said:
4520 has geforce 7050.. its nothing comapred to 9100M .. trust me.. my friend has DEll with 7050 and Centrino 2 and 2 GB .. COD waw runs like a Slide show on his lappy.. whereas mine runs at decent Frame rates.. its very much playable at high settings.. so its good.. and i too got it with 2 Gb ram in 31k.. with Case .. i oCed the CPU to run at 2.5Ghz and its running awesome

WHAT ? You OCed the CPU of a Laptop ?
And that from 1.9GHz to 2.5GHz ?
Thats pretty good.
How is battery life with OC ? What about performance difference ?
It looks totally COOL

Isnt overclocking for laptops dangerous...and from 1.9 to 2.5 would be like makin ur system temp. go really high!?! is your lappy really runnin fine?!? Reply shantanu man!! ASAP!!

very sorry for not replying.. i was busy..

, the temp has gone up a bit, about 2 deg. not much.. games are running fine on this.. !! The laptop is running great.. infact its almost running normally like it should..

another reason is that i am using the coolermaster notepal for cooling..

What does coolermaster notepal cost ?
any pics of your setup ?
battery life ?

thnx for the reply...but if possible try to run the games that i;ve mentioned and post the frame rates and settings for each... and also check if its got dedicated video memory or shared one... thnx again..

256 mb dedicated

ohkk.!! then its really really nice!! and now if u find time...then if possible pleaes post the frame rate and settings for whichever games u try on it..(crysis,PoP 2008,fallout 3 etc.)...

fine.. will do what i can..

shantanu said:
256 mb dedicated

Are you sure?

1. Does the lappy support 800MHz RAM? Im sure it does as FSB is not limiting here.

2. Do you know the price of 2GB 800MHz Transcend/Kingston/Any-damn-company Laptop RAM? I need to know those prices ASAP.

800mhz ram is for 900/- per GB Kingston/Transcend and yes its dedicated i checked in Nvidia control panel system information.. yes it supports 800Mhz..

shantanu said:
256 mb dedicated

I dont think so. The total dedicated memory on 4530's GPU is 64 MB. Rest of it is pulled from RAM.

yea..even i think so that it doesn have dedicated memory...coz on the Acer india website its mentioned that the graphics are integrated and theres no mention of DEDICATED graphics anywhere..however on some international or US sites the config. mentioned has DEDICATED GPU...but i cant say that for the indian model of 4530..if possible plz take the screenshot of your nvidia control panel where it shows the ram associated with the grafix card...

Picked up an Acer 4530 laptop today for 29k with carry case et al at SP Road Bangalore. Weird thing is that in all the shops that i enquired in SP road, are displaying the Processor model as TK 57 as opposed to QL 60. They were adamant that it was a TK57 and not a QL60!!

BTW, the gfx card RAM is NOT dedicated, its shared. 256mb gfx and 768mb for the comp. However, I'm facing a problem wherein i can't change the video RAM size in the BIOS from 256MB to 64MB. I change the settings, save it and when i restart, it goes back to being 256MB. Apart from that, everything else working beautifully. Drivers for XP and Vista are provided in a DVD.

Its a very very good deal. Totally recommended!

man..why do u want to change over the ram frm 256 to 64 anyway...it'll affect ur grafix performance...and even u try to run some latest games on it..crysis ,PoP etc. and post settings and frame rate for each..cause i also plan to buy this one soon...and i wanna know if its capable enuff for the latest games.. thanx!

thats the buffer size in BIOS and not the share memory...

*img341.imageshack.us/img341/3571/shanjy3.th.jpg

*img341.imageshack.us/img341/3358/shan2zm5.th.jpg

see the screenshots above..

256 is dedicated.. its written .. and the Dxdiag panel also shows full RAM ..

also please check out acer india site.. they have written in the config that 256 is dedicated and there is no version 9100M G which does not have dedicated..

and for the TK-55 57 proccy thing the same lappy comes with that processor and 4 gb RAM too..

shantanu said:
thats the buffer size in BIOS and not the share memory...

I stand corrected.

@abhisheksohal: I'm not into gaming. Thats why i wanted to change the buffer size.

R

Moreover now they are giving any of the following three gifts namely vodafone usb internet card, extternal hard disk drive and canon printer. This offer is valid only between 13th december 2008 to 1st january 2009. It is web based redemmption. No details are available regarding printer, hard drive etc. see here *www.acer.co.in/promotions/SFOCustomer.pdf

Can anyone tell me what is the Core clock speed, Shader clock and Memory Clock for the geforce 9100 M G in this laptop? REPLY ASAP!

shantanu said:
800mhz ram is for 900/- per GB Kingston/Transcend and yes its dedicated i checked in Nvidia control panel system information.. yes it supports 800Mhz..

I wanted to know about 2GB 800MHz stick? According to you, till when will the prices keep reducing? Or stay almost stagnant like DDR1 has been for last 2 years or so.

the prices will drop after 15th jan as told by the dealer to me.. 800Mhz(2GB) is now for Rs. 1870/- at my place.. i dunno about other cities

^ Actually I mean to ask this.

During a product's active phase, it's price reduces with time. But after a period the Price no longer reduces. When do you think will DDR2 RAM hit that stagnant* phase? Your opinion.
* stagnant => like DDR1 is nowadays.

DDR3 will be common in mid 09.. so i think in march or april.. the prices will get stagnant..
something ::: DDR 3 cheapest chip is now out : it costs Rs. 3300/- for 1 GB

the prices dropped today in 2009..

i just got the update.. the chipset is Dynet PRo.. the cheapest DDR2 maker..

[offtopic]
^ You said you had indications that hardware prices will reduce after 15 Jan or so. Does that apply to all hardware? CPU, Mobo, GFx Card? Laptops as well?

yeah applies to all.. afaik

U told before that u have run Windows 7 on this...so hows the performance in it?? And any idea about how much difference there is in the gaming performance in windows 7 and vista?? And do all the drivers which work in vista work in Windows 7 too?!?

^ AFAIK Windows 7 offers better performance than Vista in gaming and many other things.

abhisheksohal said:
U told before that u have run Windows 7 on this...so hows the performance in it?? And any idea about how much difference there is in the gaming performance in windows 7 and vista?? And do all the drivers which work in vista work in Windows 7 too?!?

There is a considerable difference in gaming FPS & yes, Vista drivers work on 7.

i have already mentioned the windows score on first page.. and yeah windows 7 provides awesome performance..

shantanu said:
sure man.. i am running GTAIV on it.. its okay on medium high settings.. giving almost 22 fps..

I cant digest the fact that u r running GTA IV !!! on this laptop!!!! and that too as you say on med-high graphics!!! IMPOSSIBLE MAN!! do u know that the processor of this laptop is slower than many of the new intel processors like T7250,T5800 etc. !?!?!? also the geforce 9100M G stands nowhere compared to Geforce 9600 or 9800 which struggle hard to play GTA IV on even med!!! ???

GTA IV as people say is a very CPU intensive game! moreover the GPU aint powerful enuff....
Is it that u r thinkin that GTA:san andreas is GTA IV?!?!

Please clarify...

kid dont act that smart.. i aint a fool, i am playing the GTA series from GTA II even tried GTA I

it was 2d cartoonish.. leave it.. but i said about GTAIV not SA ...and nothing is impossible .. live search or google on the tweaks people are using for the game.. i used them all and if you forgot.. the game remains same even if you go to highest of the settings..

i have a 9600GT with me & a 4850 both give me same FPS i have the Screenshots posted in the GTA game discussion thread.. see them and next time make your facts right..

^ So how should GTA IV work on 2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo Macbook with 2GB 1066MHz DDR3 and Geforce 9400m with 256 MB dedicated? Good enough? I wanted to play at native settings.

I mean native resolution, 1280x800 on my MacBook.

@shantanu
Man!! Do u get pissed off so easily?! ?

And first u need to get YOUR facts right....ur tellin everyone that this laptop of yours has got dedicated memory...jus go to the acer india website and get your facts right! Heres the link for you btw...i think u might have gone to the acer US site... :lol:

*www.acer.co.in/products/product_explore_view.asp?pid=129&model=Aspire 4530&cid=11
Can u read the word integrated here?!?! No mention of Dedicated anywhere!! And u've been tellin that its written on the acer india website that its dedicated! :razz:

and Mr. shantanu ...can u plz post the screenshots along with fraps ..for gta iv runnin on ur acer 4530?!~?! Coz the screenshots u;ve posted on that gta iv thread are on a higher card..judging from the fps ur getting....

A

ashu888ashu888 said:
Well, ankit, looks like u are sure to gonna buy this lappy now.. it looks promising to me too...

btw, wait for teh CQ50 review (in ur thread)..

Hi Shantanu,
How come u can pla GTA 4 in ur acer 4530?
I have 4gb ram and having lots of logs when i'm playing GTA 4 and Saints Row2? the game is running so slow even in medium setting.
I use XP 64bit and windows 7 64bit OS. 4gb ram is not detectable with a 32bit OS.

abhishelsohal said:
Can u read the word integrated here?!?! No mention of Dedicated anywhere!!

Integrated cards can have dedicated memory.

@aning
Perhaps you forgot to mention the graphics card you have. Or are you on integrated?

abhishek you dont seem to have seen the screenshots in this same thread where i have shown that this 9100M has 256 MB dedicated.. open your eyes man.. in the Nvidia COntrol panel system information .. please for gods sake look there.. how can i make someone so not into facts understand the thing.. phewww.. and i aint playing GTAIV no more. ended it a month ago.. now moved on.. so just to prove something i cannot reinstall the game and thing..sorry.. have loads of work.. might do when i get free.

so yes this card performs ok in GTAIV with tweaks and proper drivers. card has 256MB dedicated.

and if you are having a 9400M and 4GB you might just try the tweaks man.. and the drivers..
windows 7 is not official till date.. so i cannot talk about it just yet..

Thanks

Heyy everyone!! i've been following this thread for a while now and just decided to register lol umm.. i bought the acer 4530 here in Canada ( as well as that tiny 8.9" one, forgot the model), it "should" be the same specs as the version some of you have available and i just wanted to share my thoughts on it cuz you guys are awesome enough to as well

First of all, it looks and feels very spiffy, A+ there compared to older Acers. The smaller 14.1" size and roughly 2kg weight make it ideal for carrying around. Yes i do plan to play games on it at school, so the N draft wireless on it is awesome. Sadly i havent gotten around to tweaking this thing, i need help for that.. another reason for joining this forum >.< .. Another huge plus point for me is that it barely gets hot!! Keeping a typical HP or Gateway on ur lap at that performance level would send you to the hospital for first degree genital burn.

Lets see, the LCD is beautiful and there's a webcam blah blah blah.. i really wanna get gaming with this thing, then i will have some real feedback.. Im guessing WIndows Seven and the latest drivers with Physx and Cuda would be the place to start ( really wish i wasn't so technologically inept XD ).

Anyway, happy to be a part of this group, look forward to constructive posting in the future, love from Pak/Can.

^ Welcome! Hope you stay with us.
The small laptop is Acer Aspire One. You Shoul have known the name, you just bought it!

And, how about a bit more detailed review of the Acer 4530 from your side?

where can I get best price for Acer 4530 in mumbai, with 4GB ram.
I am planning to use this laptop for practising labs on Virtual machine, please share your experiences about vmware or MS VPC on acer 4530.

my budget is around 32K, is there any other option available.

motobuntu said:
where can I get best price for Acer 4530 in mumbai, with 4GB ram.
I am planning to use this laptop for practising labs on Virtual machine, please share your experiences about vmware or MS VPC on acer 4530.

my budget is around 32K, is there any other option available.

Guys please suggest, I've to buy the laptop by the end of this week.

N

Hi all, this is my first post, and like another poster from earlier, I am also from Canada, and would like to share my thoughts on the Acer 4530, I hope can help out, and fit in with the community!

Here in Canada, I bought the 4530 for $650CAD, or roughly RS25900 with the following specs:

AMD Athlon X2 64bit QL-60 @ 1.9Ghz.
3GB DDR667 In Unganged Dual Channel mode
250GB SATA 150 HDD
Atheros a/b/g/n WiFi w/ WiMAX support
Gigabit 1000Mbit Ethernet
9100m-G Integrated mGPU
Vista Home Premium 32bit SP1
Sadly, NO BlueTooth in Canada models..

Before I go write a review of the Acer 5430, I thought I'd clear up an disagreement I heard earlier in the postings; The 9100m-G mGPU is integrated, and contains no dedicated RAM, dxdiag is misleading. The dedicated part is simply stating, in this case, that 256MB of the *system RAM is dedicated, and cannot be used by the OS or applications. The remains *system RAM is RAM that is currentlyused by the mGPU, but is accessable and able to be reclaimed by either the OS, or an OS-level app.

pheeew.. what a mouthfull..

Well, hope someone finds my review (I'm posting it in a new thread) helpful, and I look forward to more posts in the future!

P

hello just bought 4530 past 2 days..everythings okay except for the gaming part..

I even get lag when playing a flash game in browser?

I have installed all drivers.

any idea why im experiencing this.

btw, this is a good lappy

I JUST NOTICE MY PROC is TURION, NOT ATHLON..but still same model and other specs

N

That's odd.. I'm playing Titan Quest very nicely on mine.. Try installing a reasonably current game like Titan Quest etc, and see if it runs alright. Make sure you are running the power profile of Balanced or above, preferably High Performance.

If it doesn't , get a copy of Everest Ultimate and check to make sure the hardware in your notebook is legit and as advertised. Barring that, I think maybe the flash games are faulty, next maybe bad Windows Install, lastly (and unlikely, but not unheard of) faulty notebook.

Some do come with a Turion instead of a Athlon X2, IF it's a RM-70 or above (ZM) you have a better processor than athlon, if it's TK-xx or TL-xx, than it's last gen. and Athlon (QL-xx) is better.

Very good review and lappy. I can't believe that i had been missing this thread till now.

I got mine last week with 4gb ram in 32k.

P

NoCashBob said:
That's odd.. I'm playing Titan Quest very nicely on mine.. Try installing a reasonably current game like Titan Quest etc, and see if it runs alright. Make sure you are running the power profile of Balanced or above, preferably High Performance.

If it doesn't , get a copy of Everest Ultimate and check to make sure the hardware in your notebook is legit and as advertised. Barring that, I think maybe the flash games are faulty, next maybe bad Windows Install, lastly (and unlikely, but not unheard of) faulty notebook.

Some do come with a Turion instead of a Athlon X2, IF it's a RM-70 or above (ZM) you have a better processor than athlon, if it's TK-xx or TL-xx, than it's last gen. and Athlon (QL-xx) is better.

its a ZM-80...its working good now..I used the VC driver from windows update before I found one in google. I reformatted and used the new driver and it runs like heaven.

^^..good lappy

G

Hi! 4530 is the very best you can get at that price agree,but i don't know why acer cut down some features 4520 had,that too some imp ones.4520 had 4 USB ports while 4530 has only 3,4520 had a firewire too but this doesn't ,4520 had Dolby Certified speakers but not in 4530,also the key board part is not the smooth plastic which was there in 4520,also the touch pad misses the middle scroll button...

Update: In Times Of India Bangalore, every monday in IT Classifieds I found this laptop with 2GB RAM upgrade from 1GB for Rs. 25,000 plus tax excluding carrybag.

^^^
any idea about how much it costs including carrybag and tax???

Carrybag at Rs. 2,000 and tax @ 4%(VAT).

Rs.25000+Rs.2000(for carrybag)+Rs.1000(4% vat)=Rs.28000
not bad deal, i think

O

Can you please tell me the tweaks you did on GTA 4 cuz I really want to know even thought i tried some XD!!!

and one more thing what did you use to overclock it

?

Tech.Masti said:
Rs.25000+Rs.2000(for carrybag)+Rs.1000(4% vat)=Rs.28000
not bad deal, i think

But what about warranty ? I heard *unplesant* stuff about Acer's service.