Design

While the Aspire E5 is affordable, you couldn't tell that by its case. Even though its lid and base are black and plastic,

a clothlike texture provides a great feel. This treatment also prevents fingerprints.

Display and Audio

While I watched the trailer for American Ultra, the Aspire E15's (1336 x 768) HD screen was both bright and sharp.

From the vibrant blues and whites in a nightclub to the oranges and yellows in the fire-filled, on-screen text, this Acer

shows that you can get a solid screen at an affordable price.

The keyboard on the Aspire E5 is good for a budget laptop, but the keys were slightly too tall

for my taste. (Its keysKeyboard, Touchpad and Webcam

have 1.6mm of travel, which is better than the typical 1.5mm.) Still, on the 10fastfingers typing test, I clicked my way

to 75 words per minute with 97 percent accuracy, which is better than my desktop average (65 wpm).

Performance

Powered by a 1.7-GHz Intel Core i3-4005U processor with 4GB RAM, the Aspire E5 easily handled having 10 tabs (which

included a Google document, Twitter, Facebook, email, and both streaming video and music) open in Chrome with the

Camera app open and a full-system scan running. However, the when I added another 10 tabs -- simulating the activity

I put my laptop through every day -- the system slowed noticeably.