Many of you have been waiting for a full tilt review of an Acer Aspire Revo 3610 Atom ION 330. Well, here it is. Possibly the first one on the Internet with this level of detail. It’s taken a week of use to get the full impression of it’s power and abilities and this review should leave no doubt! So, here goes.
Some of you may already know that I’ve been on a quest for the ultimate “cut the cable” solution and save $70 + a month on crappy cable service with bloatware content. Well, it’s been a year now and I’ve looked at a lot of software, desktops, NAS items and network media players. I’ve run different programs on Windows and Xboxes too, like XBMC and Boxee. Both of which I love! But none of those items were yet able to give my family a complete media experience. So, what is that experience? None of those devices or media center programs offers BOTH network share (music, video, pictures) and complete Internet content. Though Boxee comes closest, and their new improved Boxee Beta arrives December 7,2009, but it still falls very short of fulfilling my needs with regard to Internet content. That will change over time as media companies embrace Boxee and alliances are forged with media and hardware developers, but that’s a whole other post.
Also, with so many media formats like; Adobe Flash 10.1 Beta, HD, h.264 .mkv, AVI, MOV, mpg4 and Blue Ray, there is nothing yet available with the ability and power to play such a wide diversity of content. Plus, Boxee & XBMC do not provide an browser to view Internet content as well as surf the Internet from your couch. Ultimately, I kept returning to a HTPC with Windows as the only solution. And that’s where the Acer Revo 3610 with Windows-7 64bit comes in! Oh, I can hear the Linux and Mac people just wincing and building up steam. You guys can get the same thing too, so if that’s your flavor go for it. But this is a Windows thing happening here. So, lets get down to business.
What’s Inside?
The Acer Revo 3610 Atom Ion boasts the Intel Atom 330 dual core 1.66 GHz processor, Nvidia Ion GPU that supports full 1080P via an HDMI cable and 5.1 surround sound. Comes with Windows-7 64bit Home Premium installed. Wow, that’s a lot going on there and all for $330.00 USD!
Operating System- Windows® 7 Home Premium
Processor- Intel Atom Processor N330 (1MB L2 cache, 1.60GHz, 533MHz FSB)
Chipset- NVIDIA ION
Memory- 2GB (1/1) DDR2 800 SDRAM installed in two of two memory slots
User upgradeable up to 4GB (one 2GB memory card in each slot)* subject to availability of 2GB card
Storage- 160GB* SATA hard drive, 5400RPM, Multi-in-one card reader supports optional Memory Stick®, MultiMediaCard™, Secure Digital or xD-Picture Card™
Video- NVIDIA® ION™ graphics VGA and HDMI™ (High-Definition Multimedia Interface™) ports
Audio- High-definition audio support Two external USB speakers Headphone and microphone ports
Interface Ports- RJ-45 LAN VGA DC-in Headphones Microphone HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface™) eSATA Optical SPDIF Six USB 2.0 (two front, four back)
Card Slot- Multi-in-one card reader supports optional Memory Stick, MultiMediaCard, Secure Digital or xD-Picture Card
Communication- Gigabit LAN, wake-on-LAN ready802.11b/g/Draft-N WLAN
Expansion Slot- One PCI Express® Mini
Dimensions- 7.1″ (180.0mm) W x 7.1″ (180.0mm) D x 1.2″ (30.0mm) H without bezel
User Interface- Wireless keyboard and mouse- Included
Power- 65W AC adapter with power cord
Compliance- Energy Star® 5.0PC2001
Security Feature- Kensington® lock slot
Warranty-One-year limited warranty*
Included Software- Acer® Arcade Deluxe, Acer® eRecovery Management, Adobe® Acrobat® Reader, eSobi™ *, McAfee® Internet Security Suite (trial version), Microsoft® Works 8.5 (full version), Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2007 (60-day trial), MyWinLocker®, Nero® 9 Essentials* ,Oberon Gamezone*.*OEM, not full-featured, version.
The Atom Dual Core 330 1.66 GHz processor does not consume a lot of power at all yet has enough oomph to push up to 1080p Blue Ray HD content with ease courtesy of its close integration ION GPU that supports graphics acceleration and offloading. The Intel Atom & ION is a single mobo unit that incorporates the use of NVIDIA’s GeForce 9400M chipset. All this provides a low power consuming, high end video device in a tiny package! The unit is, dare I say it, silent! Even while viewing 1080P content, when the fan is throttled up I have to put my ear up to it in order to hear a whisper of sound. Unlike competitors such as the AsRock 330, which is somewhat audible at 26+dB. Also, the unit is cold to the touch at idle and barely gets warm to the touch when under heavy use.
There’s MORE on pages 2-3!
Similar Posts:
- Flash 10.1 Beta on Acer Revo 3610 testing Results
- Adobe Flash Player 10.1 Beta Released for Atom Ion
- New Acer Revo 3610 HTPC
- Acer Revo 3610 Atom ION-Video Demo
- Acer Revo 3610 Unboxed
Only tried boxee.. I didn’t see the newest nVidia update. I chose the ion card with a desktop. I’ll check again…
okay, found it and update both. youtube video looks fine in browser, but choppy in boxee (not the latest boxee release, but the previous one.. does that matter?)
Kaz,
Yeah, it could. The current boxee build is 11487 and had a ton of bug fixes. I’ll tell you though, I’ve found that some TV shows play better than others on boxee. It varies from episode to episode depending upon the encryption they used.
Lastly, boxee has not had a build release since the flash RC releases. I’ve asked the dev’s if they have anything coming in a future boxee build that may address this. We’ll see,…
I got an Acer Revo back when they first came out and I love it. Like you said, it seems to play back anything with total ease, and no noise or heat.
My only complaint about your site is that I didn’t see a date on the article – did I miss it. Given the fast changing technology word, it is crazy to not have a date, clearly displayed, on a review of a technology product.
Tom,
Welcome, glad you like the site.
All posts have a date on my blog. The date is at the top of the post on the main page of the blog with each posting. Once in the post itself, the date disappears. Most WP themes are this way. Good idea to have it on the post itself though…I’ll look into it. Thanks.
Have configured a couple of these and performance improved markedly after the included McAfee Internet Security trial was removed. Some lighter free antivirus like Avira allows the system to perform reasonably, but on any Atom based machines I seriously consider running without any antivirus software at all to save performance.
There seems to be a bug or something on this page or some fonts are not installed on my PC. Somehow not everything is displayed correctly. Any ideas?
Keyboard,
Works for me on FFox & IE on 5 different PC’s. Must be your system.
MKK,
Yup, I have this laid out on my set up post. Most any low resource AV works fine and does not impede the Revo. I’ve tested several and found the MS Security Essentials to work the best at not lagging the Revo.
They are great little boxen, are they not, Paul?
We got a single-core 3600 a year back, and it works just fine on our 720p TV. Got a couple of the 3610s a month back, cheap.
The trick that worked for us was to try Sabayon Linux (amongst many others) – cannot recall which revision it was, sorry – but it had the ability to launch XBMC from the main menu for Media Stuff, and then revert back to Sabayon for surfing etc. Not ideal, but it worked.
So I tampered with Ubuntu 9?? until the interface was what we wanted for TV and we could do enough of the XBMC stuff without using XBMC.
The Ubuntu Netbook version worked fine on the big screen – and the Ion/Atom environment worked fine.
It’s a similar problem, visually – the tiny netbook screen can be as hard to read as a distant TV – but it has big icons and so forth just like a Meeja Center.
Would not willingly use Win again, am too lazy to do the weekly repairs to its defences and forever fiddle with the b***** Registry.
Big Ben,
Glad to hear your revo works with Linux with XBMC.
I don’t talk or troubleshoot either on this blog or forum.
Weekly repairs to use Windows? Fiddle with the registry? Huh? Dude, I don’t know anyone that has to do that….
Besides, Windows environment works more smoothly for media than ANY other OS.
I’m about to pull the trigger on a AR3610-U2002, but I need some info about the Ion chipset: Is the Ion chipset in the U2002 (250G hdd version) the HD 1? I’ve been reading some not so nice things about the HD 11 Ion. As soon as I get a reply, (assuming U2202 is HD 1) I’m going to buy. Thanks in advance!
I’ve never heard of anything called “HD1″ or “HD11.” There’s a lot of hype out there on these boxes, so beware what you bank on.
The Revo 3610 is the dual core 330 atom with the ION Chip & CHipset. It’s all there is, there’s nothing else
The older 1600 single core (no longer made for almost 2 yrs) had XP and had the ION LE, which was limited to DirectX9 or less due to licensing issues that XP had. Direct X is mostly for video games and has nothing to do with HD playback. That’s the only Ion LE vs. Ion I’ve ever heard about and it has nothing to do with video playback.