Acer Aspire V7-482PG-6629

The Acer Aspire V7-482PG-6629 ($ 899.99 as tested) ultrabook midrange delivers excellent performance along with a 1080p HD resolution top-notch 14-inch In-Plane Switching (IP) touch screen. You also get separate graphics and a diverse selection of I / O ports. The V7-482PG-6629 justifies its price premium over the entry-level Ultrabooks we've seen recently, and it has the goods to satisfy the widest possible range of power users. All of this helps them to earn our Editor's Choice Award 'for Ultrabooks midrange.

Design and Features
Dictates the 14-inch screen size and shape of the system. It measures about 0.9 by 13.5 by 9.5 inches (HWD), which is close in size ultrabook Editors' Choice entry-level Lenovo IdeaPad U430 Touch and Satellite Toshiba E45T-A4300. At £ 4.18, it is imperceptibly lighter than either system. The chassis is a bright silver to imitate the look of brushed aluminum (Acer calls it "Cool Steel"). The panels are actually made of plastic / polycarbonate, allowing Acer to invest more in a separate graphics card and a 1080p HD screen.

The 10-point touch display is bright and clear, with a 1,920-by-1, 080 resolution, which corresponds to other midrange Ultrabooks such as the Lenovo Yoga 2 13. The one-piece touchpad is as wide as the space bar, which is very convenient if you do not want to move your hands from the home position to use the touch screen. The backlit, chiclet-style keyboard is comfortable to use, with solid feeling keys. The Backslash key is equal to the Enter key, the result of the Acer repurposing the same keyboard deck cutouts in other markets using a larger Enter key.

Placed under the chassis pump out great quantities of Four audio speakers. It could use a subwoofer for the low notes, but generally you are happy with the sound from the video games and everything but the cavernous room. You can, of course, connect a pair of headphones or external speakers for better sound.

There are two USB 2.0 ports on both sides of the chassis and an SD card slot on the right. On the back, you'll see an Acer port Converter (for VGA dongle included), an Ethernet port, an HDMI port, a Kensington lock slot, and a single USB 3.0 port. Rear-mounted port is rarer to Ultrabooks and other laptops these days, but more convenient if you need to semi-permanently connect your laptop to the wired Ethernet and / or an external display. A minor drawback is that the two USB ports on the side are both USB 2.0. The presence of at least an extra USB 3.0 port on the side will be more convenient for faster data transfer with peripherals equipped.

There is a bit of bloatware on the 500GB hard drive, including apps such as Amazon, eBay, Hulu Plus, and Wild tangent games. The caching 24GB mSATA solid-state drive (SSD) ensures that the ultrabook reboots and wakes from sleep quickly. The system has a standard one-year warranty.