TechTV reviews the new Acer model.

Unfortunately, the reviewers expectations seemed higher than it's abilities. For example, the complaint that the unit has a poor battery life is interesting. Most notebooks don't have batteries that last this long ! Plus my FIC unit didn't even last through a guest lecture and I had to switch to paper near the end of the lecture. Now, that is a hassle.

Tablet PC's benefits

* It's easy to use.
* Handwriting shows up on the screen accurately.
* You'll never run out of ink.
* You can store notes and drawings by the thousands.

C110's shortcomings

* Lose the special pen and you're out of luck.
* Searching through notes for information can be frustrating.
* Handwriting-to-text conversion tool doesn't work well.
* It gets uncomfortably hot to hold after one hour of use.
* Battery life is miserable.

Now why would that be a [i]benefit[/b]? We all need the excuse of running out of ink ;-)

Hey everyone. This is quite a lengthy review of my experience with Acer so far.

What simply sparked me to write this was that so many erview sites gives Acer the thumbs up when it should really give them thumbs down.

The reason being? Well, my experience with Acer ever since I bought my Tablet PC from them has been an utter disappointment. That's an understatement by the way. Words cannot describe how appalling their product and their after sales service has been.

Where to begin? Well, when I bought my Acer TravelMate C111TCi in October 2003, it came incomplete without its battery. Me being a novice at these things, I thought I would double check with Acer themselves so I rang them up (which was no easy task - it took at least 20 minutes before I got through to someone) and they said that their should have been a battery in the box. So I just explained to them that I had spent £100 on a new battery because their wasn't already one in the box. They apologised for it and they said they would send me one. 2 weeks later a package arrived. I thought it would be the battery, but to my disappointment they had sent me a Clock battery instead! It was one of them cell batteries that you get in a watch! So I went straight back to the phone and called them up to tell them their had been a mix up. Only this time I simply couldn't get through to them. So I e-mailed them instead. It took a few days to get sorted out but after about a week the proper battery arrived.

I thought that all would be OK now. And everything was OK until December arrived. The hinge that kept the Tablet PC screen stable at the side became loose and no longer held the screen in place. I wasn't too happy that after only 3 months of use the build quality of the machine was already letting me down. I went through the same procedure again only I tried to get support over email instead because knowing it was Christmas time it would be busy...it's busy everywhere. It was early December but they refused to help over e-mail and simply told me to ring the support line. I was left with no choice but to do so. After waiting the usual 20 minute queue I finally got through to someone and told them what was wrong. Booked it all in for a collection which was next day courier service. The guy on the other end told me it could take as long as 2 weeks to get it fixed. If only it did! I gave them two weeks to fix the product before sending an e-mail to enquire about the status of the repair. I didn't even get a reply. I got a reply the following year however in January. At that point it had been 5 weeks since I had sent the laptop in for repair! Which is simply outrageous under any circumstances. It should not take 5 weeks to repair a hinge on the side of the laptop. I made complaints and enquiries as to why it took so long. Most of them were ignored. They simply sent a letter out the following week with a formal apology. That was the last time that I hoped that I would ever have to deal with Acer support again.

Only to my dismay another hinge broke. The catch that held the screen attached to the base of the laptop snapped right off. I couldn't believe it. I honestly could not believe how poor the build quality was. I questioned my own use of the product itself and wondered to myself, was I mis handling the product? Well, everything else still seemed to be working, it was only the parts that I used often that were breaking such as the hinge which allowed me to transform the laptop in to a Tablet PC and the latch which is used to secure the screen to the base....aspects of a laptop which should be able to handle constant usage. So I went through the same procedure of getting it repaired. Surprisingly it only took 2 weeks to get it fixed, which is a reasonable amount of time. About a month later however, ANOTHER fault was found. I don't know when the fault happened because I hadn't used the Firewire since it was sent in for repair, so it could have been damaged when it had been sent in. But anyway, the firewire wasn't working. I did the usual tests and it was definitely not working. So after spending another 20 minutes trying to get through on the support line, I finally managed to get a Case ID and got it booked in to be taken away again. This time it took 4 weeks to get it repaired. When I got it back I did a thorough check this time to make sure it was all working. I wasn't surprised at the fact that the product had ANOTHER issue. You would think that I would be completely annoyed by now, but it was just expected. Acer had managed to fix the firewire port but they had also managed to do something else at the same time. They managed to switch the processor for a lower spec model. It was now only running at 900MHz! This is a 1GHz model, OK, so it's a 100MHz difference, but if I had wanted a 900MHz model I wouldn't have paid that extra money to get the 1GHz model instead! This time it was the last straw. I wrote back to the Customer Services department asking them why this had happened and what they were playing at. They seem to me like they're a company that doesn't know what they're doing! I also demanded a refund....which in my situation doesn't seem like a un-reasonable request considering what had happened.

Several days later, the customer services rep that I was dealing with said that the refund request had been declined and that she had forwarded details of what has happened with the processor to the technical team. That was four days ago so I wouldn't expect a reply for at least another week.

And that is my experience so far with Acer. I thought that it is my duty to make sure that you are aware of my experience. You can do what you like with it.

Thanks for reading.

Hey Spike,

Sorry to read about the hinge and processor issue. 5 weeks without a computer is difficult to swallow. I spent 4 weeks without DSL and was beside myself and the company kept apologizing over and over again. I just wanted DSL. I suspect you just wanted your Tablet PC.

Having said that part, please realize that Acer support varies greatly within the company. Several years ago, I drove a motherboard directly to the Bay Area, sat in the car and waited for employees to arrive, and then talked to several different technicians. They were extremely kind and even gave me a tour of the place after they fixed the problem. I wouldn't recommend this action for everyone but sometimes it is good to eyeball someone with a smile and say please.

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Insane Politics

It's not really an option considering that Acer is at the other side of the country. I don't see any reason why I should need to drive to their offices to get the problem solved. A company like Acer should value the business they receive from all customers and do whatever it takes to resolve any issues.

Even after looking at the evidence it's quite blatant that Acer are trying to rip me off or they really are stupid enough not to have realised what's happened.

After all un-trained or in-experienced customer may not and probably would not have noticed that their processor had been changed!!! So I would question, how many times Acer has done this in the past, present and future and not have cared or noticed? Ok, in my case it's only a 100MHz difference, but that's not the point. I could have paid for the cheaper model and got the 900MHz version, but no, I paid extra so that I could have the 1GHz version, and who coulda known that Acer would decide to switch me back to a 900MHz version several months after buying hey?

It's disgusting, what a disgrace. Never will I buy from this company ever again.

5 weeks? I've not been without my Tablet PC for 5 weeks. That would be a dream come true. I've been without this Tablet PC for about 11 weeks out of the 10 months I've had it for. So in fact I've only really had it for 7 months. That is how rubbish they are (in the politest way possible).