CES 2012: Acer Reveals World’s Thinnest Ultrabook, AcerCloud

Acer has unveiled the world’s thinnest ultrabook at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, alongside its new cloud service, AcerCloud.

The Acer Aspire 5 is due to be released in the second quarter of 2012 and is one of a number of ultrabooks expected to be shown at CES.

2012 – ‘year of the ultrabook’

Acer says that the ultra-slim device measures just 15mm at its thickest point – 2mm thinner than the Apple MacBook Air. The 1.35kg computer boasts a 13.3 inch LCD screen, an Intel core processor and a powersmart battery pack which offers a three times longer life cycle than traditional batteries.

The Taiwanese manufacturer also took the opportunity to announce the Acer Timeline Ultra, which boasts a battery life of eight hours. The Timeline Ultra measures in at just 20mm thick and features an Intel Core processor, dedicated graphics for 3D gaming and a slim DVD-Super Multi optical drive.

Acer claims that the new ultrabook, which will begin shipping in the first quarter of 2012, is slimmer and lighter than previous entries in the Timeline series and that it could “provide an entire day of computing on a single charge.”

“The Ultrabook is much more than just a product segment,” said Jim Wong, president of Acer. “It’s a new trend that will become the mainstream for mobile PCs, and customers will see the unique features gradually extended across Acer’s notebook family.”

Always Connected

Both ultrabooks utilise Acer Green Instant On technology, which offers instant-resume times of just 1.5 seconds, while Acer Always Connect technology allows users to retrieve multimedia and data files remotely from devices such as tablets and smartphones.

These technologies form part of Acer’s new cloud computing service, AcerCloud, which will be bundled with all Acer PCs from the first quarter of 2012. Users will be able retrieve files at any time over a Wi-Fi connection, even when their main PC is on standby or hibernating, with data stored and transferred securely via strong encryption and authentication.

AcerCloud will be compatible all Android devices, with support for Windows –based devices in the pipeline. However, there was no word on iOS functionality.

Acer has been a champion of intel-powered ultrabooks and has predicted that once the prices of the devices decrease, they will be the major growth driver of the PC industry. In October last year, Acer began selling an ultrabook which cost less than $1,000 (£640) and Wong has admitted he expects the computers to decrease in price by around 20 percent in 2012.