BMW gets in on the laptop action with Acer
Bandwagons are for jumping on, and this one's carrying laptop computers branded by automakers. Ferrari's was among the first, then Lamborghini jumped on board, and more recently we've seen Koenigsegg and Maybach follow suit. Not to be left out, reports are surfacing that BMW has teamed up with Acer to offer its own range of branded notebook computers.
The partnership seems to be an odd choice, since Acer produces laptops for Ferrari and sponsors their racing team. Reports suggest, however, that the BMW computers will be slotted in below their Ferrari counterparts and sell at lower price points. Based on Acer's Aspire series, the BMW versions will feature extra design features, for which Acer insists the customer will pay no premium.
Buyers will have the choice of Intel Santa Rosa or AMD processors and an optional HD-DVD drive, and the laptops will come complete with all the bells and whistles including 17-inch widescreens, WiFi, surround sound, and HDMI. Instead of offering one or two different models, the information points to a whole range of BMW-Acers that could include as many as 40 different model configurations.
[Source: Engadget]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mike 4:30PM (5/07/2007)
Don't Ferrari and Lambo have Acer lappy's too?
I don't really get why this is cool too people...
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iQuack 9:03PM (5/07/2007)
So, look at it this way: You go to an auto showroom and there are many different car styles. But when you open their hoods, you see that there's the same old Studebaker Champion engine in every one of them!
Unless you get a Mac, all you have is a nifty plastic box with the same OS to annoy you;-).
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ryan_318i 12:38PM (5/08/2007)
Why is "the ultimate driving machine" putting their name on the ultimate crappy machine the PC.
If BMW wants to compliment their rep. for style and quality then the only choice for me would be a Mac.
Come on BMW! You can do it!
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Alpha 4:20PM (5/08/2007)
Mike: Acer makes the Ferrari line(I own a Ferrari 4005). Asus makes the Lamborghini which is a direct competitor to the Ferrari.
If mac's were cars they'd have one wheel and travel on 5% of the roads. Let the bubble of Steve continue I guess.
BTW Asus makes most of apples laptops cut the middle man.
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Michael (TheAcerGuy) 3:52AM (5/10/2007)
Hi guys,
Just wanted to add my $0.02 on this.
BMW (cars) wasn't actually involved in this project at all. More importantly, the new Aspire notebooks are exactly that: Aspires. There is no agreement with BMW to co-brand notebooks also because, as you have correctly pointed out, Acer's already doing great things with Ferrari.
The BMW connection comes from a subsidiary of design subsidiary of BMW AG called BMW DesignworksUSA to produce a design concept called "Gemstone".
As I wrote in my blog:
The Gemstone Concept (Aspire) and ProFile design (TravelMate) is a joint effort between BMW Group DesignworksUSA and Acer. These are the guys behind industrial design icons such as the new Mini, BMW cars (obviously) and countless high-technology devices from world-class brands such as Nokia, Motorola and Magellan. Go and check out their site.
Love the banner at the top though. You could make a mint selling a car sticker like that to Acer junkies ;-)
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TKA 12:01PM (5/19/2007)
Such a mistake. We have had nothing but trouble with Acers, but they've remained because the higher-ups only look at the purchase price. They're cheap, very cheap. But there's a reason for it: they're cheap. Finally, recently, we are now tendering for a replacement brand, from someone else. At long, bloody, last.
eg: right now, at this very moment, we have a 20" Acer display connected to an Acer desktop, with an Acer driver installed... and the damn thing doesn't work. (The irony is, connected to a Mac, it works okay. Not great, because they're low quality panels with bad viewing angles and terrible color matching, but it works.)
eg: statistically speaking, every single one of our Acer desktops, throughout their three year lifespan, has had a hard drive fail once... per year.
Acers are big pieces of junk. Avoid, avoid, AVOID.
Is that really what BMW (any part, any agent, any subsidiary) wants to associate themselves with? Shoddy, disposable rubbish?
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TKA 12:47PM (5/21/2007)
"If mac's were cars they'd have one wheel and travel on 5% of the roads. Let the bubble of Steve continue I guess."
In comparison to Vista coming to a dead stop every mile to ask if you want to keep the vehicle moving, and still getting a hole in the fuel tank, punctured tires and requiring an oil change every 10 miles?
What 5% are you talking about? Macs run thousands and thousands of applications. In a very large proportion of cases, it's simply a matter of the Mac having 4 choices instead of 15 for the exact same product, or in certain cases, Macs not needing the product at all (ie: the entire malware protection category of software). And a good chunk of those Windows apps are just rubbish. Some bozo's school project in Visual Basic. How many web browsers do you need that just embed the IE renderer and offer nothing else? There's at least 20 of them - how many do you use? And boot up Windows (or don't, run CrossOver instead) directly on your Mac for the rare time you need something that's Windows only.
I do everything on my Mac that you do, with the exception of scanning it for viruses, obsessing over my firewall setings, hunting for malware and worrying about security holes.
I support Windows and Macs all day long. How many hours have you clocked up in front of a Mac? You might want to actually use one before you open your mouth and pretend to be an expert.
BTW, Macs have multi-button mouses, so you lose points for that too.
Yawn.
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