Acer unveils Iconia W3, the world's first 8.1-inch Windows 8 tablet

Acer has made a string of announcements at the ongoing Computex, and one of the major ones among these announcements is the Iconia W3. The tablet is the industry’s first 8.1-inch tablet running on Windows 8. It is worth noting that the tablet runs on an Intel chip with Windows 8 instead of an ARM-based chip on Windows RT. This means that the 8.1-inch tablet will have all the capabilities that a typical desktop PC does.

The 8.1-inch LED display has a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels, which gives it a pixel density of 186 ppi. The tablet is capable of displaying videos at 720p resolutions just fine. It is equipped with two cameras – both being 2 megapixel shooters.

The Iconia W3 has a micro-HDMI port that allows users to connect it to a TV or external display. There is also a micro USB port that allows connection to devices such as phones, MP3 players, USB drives and even a mouse. It comes in two variants—32GB and 64GB capacities. Both variants have microSD card slots with support for cards up to 32GB.

The tablet runs on an Intel Atom chip that is said to be optimised for mobile devices. All of this is kept alive by a battery with a quoted life of 8 hours. The device uses Connected Standby, which helps the battery life by turning the display off while the tablet remains powered on to perform other tasks in the background. Connectivity options on the Iconia W3 includes Wi-Fi.

The Iconia W3 is the world's first 8-inch Windows 8 tablet

The tablet comes with Microsoft Office Home and Student 2013 pre-installed, which includes softwares like Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote. The company claims that the tablet is small enough to operate one-handed when it comes to simple tasks like reading and web browsing.

The Iconia W3 weighs in at 540 g and is 11.35 mm in thickness, which makes it one of the most portable Windows 8 tablets that we’ve seen. The tablet can pair with a full-sized Bluetooth keyboard that can hold the device upright. This makes the tablet a portable replacement for a laptop. The keyboard mirrors the size of a 13.3-inch notebook. The company claims, however, that the tablet was made with thumb-typing on the virtual keyboard in mind.

Since the Acer Iconia W3 runs Windows 8, it can keep files, photos and contacts synced across other Windows 8 devices, so users can work on documents and programs on the go and then access the most current version from another device.  Because it runs full Windows 8, the Acer Iconia W3 is also compatible with x86 legacy Windows programs.

Both the 32GB and the 64GB variants of the tablet are expected to hit store shelves in Q2 2013. As of yet, Acer has not revealed the pricing for the Iconia W3.

Acer to launch 8.1-inch, 32GB Windows 8 tablet soon

Yesterday, we reported that Microsoft would be working on a 7.5-inch Windows 8 tablet in order to compete with Apple’s iPad mini and Google’s Nexus 7, both of which have been runaway hits. It turns out that this isn't the only small-sized Windows 8 tablet that we’ll be seeing.

An "accidental" listing on Amazon.com of an 8.1-inch, 32GB Windows 8 tablet by Acer was reported by PC World. The tablet was listed at a price of $379.99, which is extremely competitive given that a 32GB Wi-Fi-only iPad mini costs $429.00.

The listing was spotted during an event by Acer in New York where it unveiled a wide range of gadgets. The Taiwan-based company introduced a 15.6-inch Acer Aspire R7, an 11.6-inch Acer Aspire Ultrabook, the 7.9-inch Iconia A1 tablet and a series of touch notebook computers. The Iconia W3 that was listed on Amazon.com wasn’t unveiled, which is probably why the listing was yanked off in a matter of minutes.

The leaked listing (Image credit: PCWorld)

The listing of the Windows 8 tablet revealed that the 8.1-inch tablet was running on a 1.5GHz Intel processor and 2GB RAM. The presence of an x86 architecture processor means that the tablet would be running the full version of Windows 8 rather than the Windows RT OS. The leaked listing also showed that the tablet sports a 2MP rear camera, with no mention of a front-facing camera. The screen resolution was listed as 1280 x 800 pixels, which  is on par with the Nexus 7 and higher than the 1024 x 768 reslotion of the iPad mini.

The early range of Windows 8 tablets had displays that were 10 inches or larger and recently Microsoft has tweaked a whole lot of features and specs of the Windows 8 OS in order to make its environment compatible with tablets sporting smaller displays. The OS's hardware certification program recently reduced the minimum allowable screen resolution for Windows 8 tablets from 1366 x 768 down to 1024 x 768 pixels. The leaked builds of the Windows Blue update, which will be out soon, all sport a Snap feature that works well on smaller tablets. This is a major tweak as the feature worked only on displays with the approved 1366 x 768 resolution in the earlier version of the OS.

This new tablet by Acer is expected to be launched in the coming weeks and this along with the other rumoured smaller Windows 8 tablets will give Microsoft some chance of increasing its share in a market dominated by Android and iOS

Acer launches four budget Windows 8 touchscreen notebooks

Notebooks with touchscreens are becoming the norm rather than the exception, and Acer, one of the leading PC makers in the world, has kept the trend going. The company today launched the new Aspire V5 range, with prices starting from Rs 34,550 and going up to Rs 47,500. At that price, the low-end model is one of the cheapest Windows 8 notebooks available in India.

The Aspire V5 is available in 14- and 15.6-inch sizes and will have processors ranging from the low-end Pentium Dual Core processors to third generation Ivy Bridge Core i3 and i5 processors.

The new Acer Aspire V5

The 14-inch unit is 20mm thick and weighs 2.09 Kg, while the 15.6-inch laptop has a 21mm thick waistline and outweighs its smaller sibling with a 2.27 Kg bulk. Those figures are very close to the requirements for Ultrabooks put in place by Intel, but Acer will be using regular CPUs in these new models. Sadly, neither of them will be shipping with with SSDs or SSD cache drives. There is no mention of the resolution of the laptop, but these are budget offerings and so should equip a display with a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels. Please, Acer. Surprise us with a 1600 X 900 display.

Acer’s Chief Marketing Officer S Rajendran believes consumers are “on the lookout for products that offer ease of use and enhanced user experience. We are confident that consumers will seamlessly adapt to touch technology in their day-to-day use as touch is a natural instinct to mankind."

The notebook features a 10-point touch display with a large trackpad designed with the intention of improving multi-touch gestures, a crucial part of navigating the Windows 8 UI.

Acer is touting the integrated Dolby Advanced Audio technology as one of the best in the market. The company has also integrated a homegrown social networking app called Social Jogger that syncs with Facebook, Twitter and other popular social networks. The laptops feature a built-in slim DVD drive.

Another point to be noted is that there is no mention made of discrete GPUs, which will seriously dissuade gamers. Acer does say the laptops will come with Intel’s HD 4000 graphics and you will get the usual complement of USB 3.0 ports, 802.11n wireless (with Acer Instant Connect you can restore your saved networks in just 2.5 seconds), and Bluetooth 4.0+ High Speed. From the pictures, it is evident that the company is using chiclet-style keyboards, which is departure from the usual floating keyboard that Acer had taken a strange liking to.