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Acer's Aspire One Can Run OS X

But upgrading its memory can be quite a nuisance

Jul 7, 2008 15:14 GMT  ·  By
The Acer Aspire One running OS X
   The Acer Aspire One running OS X

Acer's Aspire One netbook has already been shipped to a couple of lucky users and some of them have wasted no time in ripping apart their new device and posting pictures of it on the web. Thanks to them, but especially to their pictures and opinions, other users should now be able to better understand Acer's ultra portable computer system. But this should also raise a couple of questions regarding the product's performance level.

The new Aspire One netbook is rather different than its competitors, namely ASUS' Eee PC or MSI's Wind PC. It all fairness, it looks like that Acer could have used a little more time spent in developing this product, as it might even need a better design.

According to the opinions of an Aspire One user, it will be difficult to upgrade the netbook's memory, as there's no external access to the memory slot. This should be a standard feature for any portable computer system, but it is now clear that Acer isn't of the same opinion. So, in order to upgrade the memory of your Aspire One netbook, you will probably have to call in a professional, who will - obviously enough - rip the machine open. That is, if you aren't used to opening netbooks and upgrading the system yourself.

Another one of Acer's Aspire One features will not allow you to upgrade the storage capacity. This happens because the device comes with a proprietary SSD drive interface, which connects the Solid State Drive to the main PCB via a ribbon cable.

What is rather interesting is that one user managed to install an OS X operating system on his Aspire One netbook. Considering the price tag that usually comes attached to an Apple MacBook, compared with Acer's Aspire One, the actions of this particular user are quite understandable: he probably just wanted a portable computer system that could run Apple's OS X, even though Apple would never approve of something like this.

So, to conclude: Acer's Aspire One can run Linux, Windows XP and OS X, but it will not allow users to easily upgrade the memory and storage capacities.