Acer R7 Review: Something Different
by Jarred Walton on August 15, 2013 12:45 AM ESTTaken as a whole, I definitely agree that Acer has stepped out of their comfort zone and tried to do something fundamentally different than what most laptops have been doing for years. This is a laptop that seems to be designed to bring the touchscreen into the foreground, and it generally succeeds at doing that. The problem is that I don’t think touchscreens work all that well for Windows 8 or Windows 8.1 – not until you are able to completely leave behind Windows desktop apps does a touchscreen become better than a touchpad. In fact, even simple things like word processing and working with spreadsheets benefit from having a touchpad versus a touchscreen.
Windows Desktop: Not a great place for a touchscreen
Try resizing cells for example in Excel using a touchscreen; I can’t get it to work. Well, I actually can, but it involves: long-press (on column header), column width, then guess a number... or go into the menus and on the Home section find Format->AutoFit Column Height/Width, or something similar. Basically, it's definitely not easier than using a mouse or touchpad to accomplish the same task. Selecting text in pretty much any application is also difficult – oh, you can do it with a touchscreen, but it’s far easier to do with the touchpad or a mouse, especially if you only want to select part of a word or sentence. I think the problem with selecting text using a touchscreen is that your finger is obscuring what you’re selecting; I have similar problems selecting text on Android tablets and my iPod Touch. A mouse or touchpad – or even a stylus – simply works better for this type of interaction.
Perhaps Windows just needs a paradigm shift in order to make some of these things work properly with a touchscreen, but at the same time they need to continue to cater to people who want to use a mouse or a touchpad. This is one of my biggest issues with Windows 8 – it tried to meet the needs of both tablet and notebook/desktop users, and in the process I think it came up short in both areas. I can get around most of the complaints I have with the notebook experience, simply by installing a Start Screen alternative and using it like Windows 7, but when I do that I just have to wonder: why did Microsoft even waste so much time and energy creating the Start Screen? Call me old-fashioned, but I’m perfectly happy with the Start Menu. Windows 8 has some other cool features, but none of them require the Start Screen (e.g. faster boot times and potentially improved battery life are part of the kernel, not the Windows 8 interface).
Windows 8 Start Screen: Built for touchscreens, lacking in apps
Getting back to the Acer R7, in many ways I feel like it was built to try and make use of Windows 8 features that aren’t actually all that useful. Acer did a reasonably good job on most areas, but it’s the whole operating system and software ecosystem that needs to change before touchscreens can become truly useful in Windows. Android and iOS have the advantage of starting from scratch with no legacy applications to worry about; Windows doesn’t have that luxury, and trying to shoehorn features into the OS isn’t helping. Acer has rethought a lot of our preconceptions about Windows notebooks, and kudos to them for trying something new and different. I’m certain there are going to be a subset of users that actually really enjoy using the Acer R7, but for me running the current release of Windows 8, this design revolution comes up a bit short – much like Windows 8 itself.
If Windows 8 works so well with a touchscreen, then a touchpad wouldn't be necessary. Clearly Acer wasn't willing to omit the touchpad entirely, so they shifted the keyboard forward and moved the touchpad back, which ends up being a poor design decision in so many ways as both typing and using the touchpad become far less than ideal. So why did Acer do it this way with the R7 instead of going whole hog and eliminate the touchpad entirely? I think the answer is in the above commentary: Windows desktop applications just don't work all that well with touchscreens, at least not to the point where you can totally omit the touchpad. Well, that and the fingerprints; even if the touchscreen interface worked ideally with every application out there, I at least would be unhappy about the amount of smudging regularly found on my display.
Obviously, this is just one man's opinion on the subject, but if you scour the web you'll find many others with a similar take on Windows 8. There are people that like the new interface, though, so for those users something like the Acer R7 might fare better. But it's still a very big, very heavy hybrid, which again is going to limit the mass appeal.
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Wrapping up with some positive thoughts, again I have to state that this is probably the best built Acer laptop I’ve ever encountered. Perhaps that’s also part of the reason why it feels so heavy – the metal is definitely thicker than you’ll find on a lot of budget laptops. The sound quality is good as well, with speakers that provide a nice listening experience. The best part about this laptop though: the display. It’s not that the display is perfect by any means, but I’m happy to see a decent quality 1080p panel in a $1000 laptop from Acer. The panel is from AU Optronics and it uses their AHVA (Advanced Hyper-Viewing Angle) technology, which is basically their take on IPS. Colors are good, viewing angles are good, and while it’s not going to displace the MacBook Pro Retina by any stretch of the imagination, it won’t make you want to scratch your eyes out and you can run at its native 1080p resolution without squinting.
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andrejg - Friday, August 16, 2013 - link
I think that you should divide Windows 8 criticism in two parts. One is metro and that one I can understand. The other one is the platform, kernel and everything beneath the UI, that is far better, faster, more optimized, smaller than any previous version of Windows.I did upgrade (in place over old install) my working horse (Core2duo E6400) to Windows 8 from windows 7, and it runs smoother and faster and it is an ancient HW. Also I run Windows 8 on my lattitude X2 with very slow Core 2 Duo SU9400 at 1,4Ghz and is much more fluid than Windows 7. I also upgraded my daughter's ancient HP with core2duo t5400 with 2Mb RAM and it shows...
So, i guess you'd also benefit from upgrading, and with maybe Classic shell installed one can hardly know, he's running also Metro. And I will not even go to the hyper-v capabilities of Windows 8...
JarredWalton - Friday, August 16, 2013 - link
I did mention in the article that the kernel improvements of Win8 are worthwhile and good, and it's mostly the mess that is Metro and Metro Apps (and the Store) that are my complaint.Braumin - Friday, August 16, 2013 - link
I'll throw this in here too. You, as a power user, don't like the Start Screen. That's great, lots of people as you said have the same complaint.I, as a power user, love the Start Screen. When I'm in the desktop, I find myself missing features that are only available on the Metro Side - mostly Contracts, which are freaking amazing.
However recently my grandparents needed a new computer. I took them shopping, and they bought an Asus all-in-one with a 23" touchscreen and Windows 8. Yes, it took a bit to teach them how to do things that they used to do in Windows XP, but they love the Start Screen. Everything they need is right there, and it's all pretty dead simple to use for someone who's not too computer savvy.
You may ask why they didn't just get a tablet, but they needed something that could do more.
snajk138 - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
How about you using the start button that's on every keyboard to start the search? And why would you need to look at the search bar when the cursor's there already? For me it is no different from Vista/7. I hit the start button on the keyboard, start to type what I'm looking for and get the results to the left or just hit enter when I've typed enough.If you're at all worried about efficiency you shouldn't be doing this kind of thing with a mouse anyway...
JarredWalton - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
That works great on a tablet too, doesn't it? How about this: type "Firewall" and see what you get. I can tell you of course: on Win7 if you hit Enter you get the advanced Firewall controls, which might not be what you wanted, but three items down is the normal Firewall option in the Control Panel. On Win8, do the same and you get "No apps match your search" (unless you have some non-standard app named Firewall...), so you arrow down twice to Settings (or click it in the top-right), and there's your Windows Firewall option. Which of course is a desktop mode window. Win 8.1 is supposed to improve this, sure, but it never should have been like this to begin with.themossie - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
yes! yes! yes! Making you go -back- to the top right.Efficiency is important... but usability is a must.
Braumin - Friday, August 16, 2013 - link
OK I just tried it. I hit Start, typed Firewall, and the first thing to come up was Windows Firewall.I'll agree that with Windows 8, they screwed up by changing the search into Files/Settings/Apps, but that's been corrected in Windows 8.1. I know this laptop you reviewed isn't on 8.1 yet, but I think you'll find that it corrects a lot of the issues with 8.
themossie - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
I just hit Ctrl+Esc :-) For power users, that's great. My relatives/friends don't use the start key at all, and my coworkers rarely do - most users don't use keyboard shortcuts AT ALL.On Windows 8 you often do need to look at the search bar. Why?
There are different kinds of search results (Files, Applications, Settings) below the search bar (Top Right/Middle)... and I often need to choose what to search.
ZeDestructor - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
Good point, but for me: On WinVista (or XP if you replaced the start menu with one of the numerous Vista start menu clones) and up:1. Hit (physical) start button and type first 3-4 letters blindly (oh look, I condensed 2 of you steps into a single, faster, more comfortable one! I'm gonna have myself one cookie :D)
2. Search results appear at top of start menu/screen
Note on 2: If you use a vertical-left taskbar layout in Win7, the results also appear at the top-left. It simply always appear at the top-left of the menu. Win8 having a fullscreen "start menu", it remains at the top left.
In addition, searching using few letters is so much easier since you have a ton of columns for programs to go side by side, and picking the correct one is easier because the hitboxes are about twice the size now (helps when your default sensitivity is 2400 dpi)
Over and above that, you can pin significantly more stuff to the start screen, which is useful for shortcuts you use once in a while, but not all the time.
althaz - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
Not a bad point (you must sit mighty close to your monitor though). I guess I never thought about it because I mostly use the windows key for launching the start screen (and the glance from right-hand-side search bar to left-hand-side results is how things are supposed to be designed, people's eyes are amazing at glancing to the left - you can see this in the design of a horde of things and is a key principle in modern design).