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Real HD 16:9 Screens Top Acer’s Multimedia Notebooks

Tempted by today’s home-theater laptops? That’s fine, according to Acer — until you want to watch HDTV or Blu-ray movies on one, and discover that the display has a resolution ratio of 16:10 (such as 1,440 by 900 or 1,920 by 1,200 pixels). That prohibits full enjoyment of high-definition content, which has an aspect ratio […]

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Datamation Staff

Mar 22, 2008

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Tempted by today’s home-theater laptops? That’s fine, according to Acer — until you want to watch HDTV or Blu-ray movies on one, and discover that the display has a resolution ratio of 16:10 (such as 1,440 by 900 or 1,920 by 1,200 pixels). That prohibits full enjoyment of high-definition content, which has an aspect ratio of 16:9.

Enter the Acer Aspire Gemstone Blue notebooks — two models with 16:9 (1,920 by 1,080) screens, ideal for hi-def viewing in all its 1080p glory, with wider color gamuts than other notebook displays. What Acer calls a Full HD CineCrystal LCD also moves away from the familiar 15.4- and 17-inch laptop screen sizes: The mobile-multimedia Aspire 6920’s measures 16 inches, while the desktop-replacement and home-theater-replacement Aspire 8920G’s is a panoramic 18.4 inches.

Both have HDMI ports with HDCP support for displaying video on an bigger HDTV screen. The larger laptop has a 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9650M GS graphic controller for high-speed gaming (screen refresh rate: 8 milliseconds) and handling video-coding chores without involving from the Core2 Duo CPU. The 6920 relies on a slightly tamer GeForce 9500M.

Both combine stylish blue shells with a touch-sensitive CineDash control panel to the left of the keyboard for media control and menu navigation. The latest Dolby Home Theater audio technology bolsters the 6920’s 2.1 and the 8920G’s 5.1 speaker setup. The 9-pound Aspire 8920G and 7.7-pound Aspire 6920 are available with Blu-ray or DVD±RW optical drives, with hard disk storage up to 640GB (two hard drives) and 320GB, respectively. Prices and ship dates have not been announced.

This article was first published on Hardware Central.