Can Acer Aspire One Replace Apple Macbook Pro for Traveling?

I miss the day having the 12″ Powerbook G4. It is a perfect notebook computer for traveling. Since Apple switches over to Intel architecture, I do not have much size choice for professional Mac notebook. I bought a 15″ Intel based Macbook Pro last year and carry it around for all my trips. If you are using DSLR, you might know how painful to carry the 15″ MBP along with the luggage plus the camera gears. To be worse, my camera equipments (Canon 1D Mark III plus some lenses and tripod) can be easy added up to over 10 pounds!!!

Apple releases the unibody 13″ Macbook, which has more power than the 12″ Powerbook G4 in the old days. However, I have bought a 15″ MBP already and I do not have budget to get the additional 13″ Macbook. At the end of last year, I bought a 8.9″ Acer Aspire One and use it a lot while I’m on the go. Here are the list why the Acer Aspire One is better than the Macbook/MBP while traveling:

Weight

The 13″ Apple Macbook is 4.5lbs and the 15″ Apple Macbook Pro is 5.5lbs. On the other hand, the Acer Aspire One is a lot lighter than the MB or MBP, which is only around 2.2lbs without the battery. It is HALF of the weight of the 13″ MB!!!

Cost

You can get the Acer Aspire One for around US$300 online. You may want to grab the additional 6-cell battery for US$70 or 9-cell battery for US$90. On the other hard, the cheapest 13″ Apple Macbook is slight below US$1000 but any additional battery costs more than US$100. In addition, since the Aspire One is so cheap, I won’t feel too much if it got stolen while traveling.

Battery Life

This is the best part of having an Atom based notebook computer. With a 6-cell battery, the Acer Aspire One can last for 7 hours with Wifi and around 5.5 hours with USB 3G modem. I don’t have a 13″ Apple Macbook so I don’t have experience with it. The 15″ Apple Macbook Pro can last around 2.5 hrs with Wifi and around 1.5 hrs with USB 3G modem.

Of course, there are a lot of disadvantage using the Acer Aspire One over the Mac notebook:

Screen Size/Resolution

The Aspire One only has a 8.9″ LCD screen with only 1024×600 resolution. It is really TOO SMALL to do anything at all. Reading Google Reader in Firefox is a pain even in full screen mode. Doing slightly photo editing is almost impossible. I barely able to manage using it for blogging and checking emails.

Speed

The Intel Atom is good for average user doing simple daily tasks such as email checking and check out something quick on the web. It is also good enough for simple document editing. However, it is very slow to do anything else (at least for me).

Conclusion

I don’t want to get into the PC is better or Mac is better fame war. I love my 15″ MBP for photo editing and my 17″ MBP at work for writing software. I have a PowerMac Dual G5 at home as the multimedia hub. However, I just want to pick up the right tool for the task. I’m leaving to Lake Arrowhead this weekend for a 2-day short trip. I am going to leave my 15″ MBP at home and will bring the Acer Aspire One with a 6-cell and 9-cell batteries. I will give a review on the Acer Aspire One after this trip and see if I can use the similar setup for my business trip next month to Las Vegas.

Do you feel your Apple Macbook / Macbook Pro too heavy when traveling? What is your solution? Please leave some feedback here!