The E1-510 screen's 1366x768 pixels distributed over 15.6-inches result in a pixel density of just 100 ppi, which is roughly the rate that a 22-inch desktop screen with a Full HD resolution achieves. It is barely possible to find less nowadays, and thus single pixels and the grid are visible when looking at the screen from a close distance. Fonts could be finer, and there is not much room for very many elements on the desktop either. We would say that the image sharpness is acceptable.

This was also to be expected in view of the price: Acer's laptop does not quite reach an average brightness of 200 cd/m², which often marks the boundary of useful and useless for outdoor use. The black level of 0.49 cd/m² is sufficient. Since the contrast is relative to the black level and maximum brightness, the review sample only achieves a fairly moderate 392:1. These rates are common for 400 Euros (~$552) laptops.

Intel's Pentium N3520 has 4 physical cores with a very limited per-MHz performance and does not feature Hyper-Threading. The base clock of approximately 2.2 GHz can be increased up to 2.4 GHz via Turbo. Unlike the competing APUs from AMD's Kabini platform, such as the A4-5000 (4x 1.5 GHz, TDP: 15 W), the Pentium achieves a small advantage of 15% in the pure CPU performance (Cinebench R11.5 Multi-CPU). The performance plus is also approximately 15% compared with the Pentium N3510 (4x 2 GHz, no Turbo, TDP: 7.5 W), like in HP's 250 G2 (F0Z00EA). Toshiba's Satellite C50-A-1JU with the same SoC runs just as fast. We would have been extremely surprised about throttling, but the Turbo speed was maintained stably even during longer full load.

The system's performance primarily depends on the CPU/GPU and hard drive. PCMark 8 assesses this performance via typical application scenarios that are simulated synthetically ("Home," "Creativity," etc.). We compared Acer's E1-510-35204G50Dnkk with current office laptops, and found it at the lowest end of the spectrum as expected. However, single systems based on AMD's A4-5000 still perform 10 to 20% worse. Usage is smooth when using software with low hardware requirements, and the laptop is mainly used for browsing. Nevertheless, minor differences compared with devices that sport the considerably faster Intel Core i5-4200U, which is frequently found in 600 Euros (~$828) laptops, are noticed. The performance would also be boosted more significantly by using an SSD, which is not installed anywhere in this price range. Working with image-editing software, such as Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, is very sluggish.

The 500 GB Scorpio Blue WD5000LPVX hard drive from Western Digital that spins with 5400 rpm is installed in our review sample. The HDD achieved a decent sequential read rate of 102 MB/s in CrystalDiskMark 3.0. However, it is not enough for top rates because of the HDD's typically low performance in reading small random data blocks (Read 4k). Although it is good on average compared with other 5400 rpm HDDs, it does not even come close to rates of around 20 MB/s that an SSD would achieve.

The CPU-integrated Intel HD Graphics (Bay Trail) is a very weak graphics core for a laptop. Its performance just achieves the performance of a Sandy Bridge Intel HD Graphics from the before last CPU generation and is on par with Nvidia's mobile Tegra 4 SoC that is mainly used in Android smartphones and tablets. As can be seen in the results of the 3DMark (2013) Ice Storm benchmark, the HD 8330 in the Satellite outperforms the review sample's pure graphics performance by 50%, which can then again benefit from its higher processing power in the CPU-heavy Physics test.

StarCraft 2's relatively low hardware requirements were striking in its release year of 2010. Nevertheless, Acer's E1-510-35204G50Dnkk only managed a smooth 49 fps in the minimum settings using 1024x768 pixels. With this background we did not even have to try Diablo III, which is also rather modest. Thus, 3D shootersthat are younger than 8 years will not at all be possible. Examples of what would be thinkable in the lowest settings are World of Warcraft or Torchlight 2 from 2012 as an alternative to Diablo III. Users who want a wider spectrum of games but are not willing to pay more, are better off with Kabini laptops. At least FIFA 2014 (up to high!), Diablo III, and Anno 2070 (both minimum) usually run smoothly here.

System Noise

Hushed - the fan in our Aspire can only be discerned from the usual ambient noise when approaching the laptop with an ear even during load. HP's 250 G2with the only marginally slower Intel Pentium N3510 completely omits an active-cooling solution. We did not at all notice the hard drive in our review sample, which corresponds with our measurements. The keyboard was unobtrusive as well - when disregarding the slight clattering noise of the larger keys, such as space.

The absolutely uncritical temperatures of a maximum 35 °C (load, upper side, center) at all times do not require closer analysis - the chart below speaks for itself. The small amount of produced waste heat is discharged from the casing's side so that the device can be used on the lap without restrictions.