| Acer Iconia 6120 Dual-Screen Laptop |  |
| Reviews - Featured Reviews: Notebook | Compact PC | |
| Written by David Ramsey | |
| Tuesday, 26 April 2011 | |
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Closer Look: Acer IconiaThe Iconia's box isn't big on specifications or other useful information. Instead, you're presented with flowing images of Acer's "Acer Ring" software and its associated touch-based applications.
Included with the computer are a manual, the power supply, an optional filter for the power supply (noisy AC lines can apparently cause problems with the computer's touch screens if you use the computer while it's connected to AC), a tiny USB card reader, and a multi-language "Quick Guide". The USB card reader can handle Memory Sticks, SD and micro-SD cards, as well as "M2" Memory Stick Micro cards. As with most Windows laptops, there are no recovery disks, although Acer has a recovery partition on the hard disk and includes a utility to burn the 5 recovery DVDs you'll need if your hard disk dies. The absence of recovery disks is especially annoying considering that the incremental price increase would be well under $5, and you'll need an external DVD burner to make your own. On a $350 netbook, the lack of recovery disks is perhaps understandable, but on a $1,200 premium laptop, it's not.
The Iconia 6120 itself is a largish slab rendered in aluminum and black plastic. The "Intel Inside" and "Microsoft Windows" logos near the hinge are silk-screened onto the case, rather than being removable stickers. Since the Iconia's special drivers and software only exist for Windows, this is understandable. Notice the rubber strip across the top edge of the screen.
Opening the screen reveals what's different about this laptop: instead of a keyboard and trackpad on the lower half of the case, there's...another 14" screen. Both screens are multi-touch enabled, have a resolution of 1366x768 pixels, and are sheathed in Dow Corning "Gorilla Glass" with an oleophobic coating that makes it easy to wipe your greasy fingerprints off.
On the left side of the computer are the "keyboard button" on the edge of the hinge, the power supply plug, ventilation holes for the internal fan, an HDMI port, and two USB 2.0 ports. Pressing the keyboard button once invokes the virtual keyboard on the bottom display. Pressing it twice quickly is equivalent to CTRL-ALT-DELETE.
The right side of the computer has microphone and headphone jacks, a Superspeed USB 3.0 port, a slot for a Kensington security lock, an analog VGA port, a gigabit Ethernet port, and the power button mounted on the edge of the hinge. If you think you've missed something in looking at this computer, you're right: despite its size and weight, there is no optical drive.
Let's examine the Acer Iconia more closely in the next section.
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Comments
And how come the cheap and weak 3000maH battery is not user-replaceable? Why even bother giving a battery from the first place?
And, don't believe in the stability of hybrid USBs. Let alone in the known-for-not- being-so-durable Acer units.
Thank you for the review that reveals how spooky the laptop is.
Will wait for at least 3rd generation of this product before even start looking at it seriously.
Indonesian Acer users don't really need Bluetooth v3.0, and most that I know don't even need an internal Bluetooth at alol. External USB Bluetooth is already satisfying as well as easily replaceable in the case of any damage/malfunctioning, since durability is not Acer?s brag-ables anyway, is it? BTv3 is a cheap marketing trick initiated by Toshiba as a cover-up for their poor-sounding (Conexant audio!) and poor imaging (bad webcams) but yet expensive laptops. Yet no one buys Toshiba for that reason!
I agree, a user replaceable battery is a must.
This looks like it has a lot of promise as a dual screen system if you just add a keyboard, and allow the user to look at the system sideways.
Actually, you can change this, but when you do, you get an error dialog warning that the positions and rotations of the displays cannot be changed, and then after about 15 seconds, they switch back automatically.
I assume this is because most of ASUS' included software (like the various Touch apps) require this configuration.
Until now I didn'ti have any problems playing games with arrow keys nor awsd.
Battery CAN be removed, but you have to ipen the coverplate so that you can press 2 buttons. It even have the lock key for battery ((at first I thought I can't remove battery too), but I think there are a lot of alternatives to the build in battery performance (UPS for example - #en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninterruptible_powe r_supply) or external battery. In case you are watching a movie, you can of course turn off it's second monitor (they can be turned off one or another, or both). My record of battery usage is nearly 3 hours of watching movies (of course my model have even bluetooth 3.0, which models in USA don't have, at least as far as I know, but I am in europe and we have a slightly different model ...)
And best of, the price wasn't even that high ... only 850? (which is something like normal laptops cost in my country - Slovenia).
Click on Completely restore system to factory defaults. It will use these data. And than you can create a disk with factory defaults items installed.
If I install windows on it again, Ill probably need the programs for the touch pad and acer ring right?
Yes, if you reinstall Windows, you'll need to reinstall the Iconia utilities and drivers.
If you don't have a recovery partition and can't make the install disk set, then you need to go to Acer's web site to find and download the software. But I just looked and wasn't able to find anything about the "Iconia 6120", so you might be out of luck there. I suppose you could always call Acer tech support.
"C:\OEM\Preload\Autor un\AutorunX\". Inside that folder look for a file called "AutorunX.exe". Run it, click on "Contents" and install all files you see on the list that appears.
If you don't, please reply and I will try compressing it for you (it is 3 gigabytes large). Hope this helps.
if you get to pack this, can you please send me the share to it... I'm also having issues with getting this Keyboard and Ring to work.
PLEASE!
Anyway, here is the link:
ardentangel.com/iconia/OEM.rar
Anyway, here it finally is:
#ardentangel.com/iconia/OEM.rar
Extract it to your C:\ drive directly (using Extract here option)
After that, go to "C:\OEM\Preload\Autor un\AutorunX\" and launch the program called "AutorunX.exe"
Once it launched, you will be able to get a list with all drivers and applications (programs) to install (which are all already included, so you won't have to redownload them), including the Touch Engine, which actually is the Virtual Keyboard and Acer Ring. There is another thing to install to get all of the Acer Ring applications on the list, if you won't be installing everything that is there (however, I advise you that you do install everything ... don't worry, there are no demo games, that are preinstalled on ICONIA once you buy it).
Anyway, I learned of the existance of this AutorunX appliacation the hard way ... Acer support sucks and they insist that there is NO WAY of getting Virtual Keyboard nor Acer Ring installation executables. But I did managed to get it after all. :)
And that's why I am helping you on the first place, because I know how they sucks now (at least the UK one ... I am from Slovenia, so US acer did not wanted to help me, since they couldn't verify my model number or whatever ...). =P
If you have any more question, ask.
Many thanks...
#store.griffintechnology.com/a-frame
It holds the Iconia very well and there was no movement when using either touch screen.
#store.apple.com/ca/product/H1060ZM/A?fnode=MjA1MTEyODY
thanks david!
First....I booted up the pc for the first time and went through all the steps and to my surprise the ACER WALLPAPER (which i think is VERY cool) was not on the screen....I have looked through ALL the files and folders and cannot find this wallpaper. I am wondering if maybe I was sent the european version (i live in the us) because I also received the USB card reader which I was NOT expecting to get.
Also could someone please tell me what the DIFFEREMCES between the 2 models are and if someone could point me to where I could get that wallpaper, it would be GREATLY appreciated!
Thanks
Mine worked fine for the year or so I had it. I'm sorry you've had so many problems with yours.
I will go home tonight and start playing with it and let you know the outcome.
All, if your system seems unstable, please install the Touch Engine only and not the rest of the MS Touch applications.
edisk.ukr.net/?do=dir#cdir=shared
user name: iconia
password: 123456
Changing language pack tutorial:
youtube.com/watch?v=6lf8lAaop3c
Thank you in advance.