New Acer Aspires get mobile Core i5, Radeon HD 5000
updated 12:35 pm EST, Sat January 9, 2010
Aspire AS5470, AS7740 both major upgrades
Acer has taken advantage of CES to upgrade its Aspire notebooks to new hardware launched at the show. The 15.6-inch AS5740 and 17.3-inch AS7740 both use Intel's new mobile processors; the smaller system is actually the faster unit with a 2.26GHz Core i5 and a similarly new Mobility Radeon HD 5650 to give it a significant gaming capability. Despite its size, the AS7740 is a budget model and uses a 2.13GHz Core i3 along with Intel's new on-processor integrated graphics, which can still decode Blu-ray and other HD video.
Both models carry 4GB of RAM and 500GB hard drives in typical configurations, though the faster AS5740 uses only DVD while its larger relative often comes with a Blu-ray drive. Both systems ship on January 17th and as described should cost around $750, though lower-end versions will start at $600.
