More Acer Ferrari laptops: the 1005WTMi and 5005WLHi

We never really expected Acer's Ferrari lineup of notebooks to sell all that well, but once again we've been proven wrong, as the company has apparently sold enough of these overpriced machines to warrant spec bumps for both the 1000 and 5000 series. First up is the revamped 12.1-inch 1005WTMi, which packs a pretty decent feature set for a 3.6-pound ultraportable, including a 2.0GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 processor, ATI Mobility Radeon X1150 graphics with 512MB of VRAM, a full 2GB of DDR2 RAM, 160GB worth of HDD capacity, and of course, Bluetooth 2.0 and three-flavor WiFi standard. As for the 15.4-inch, WSXGA+ 5005WLHi (pictured), you're getting the same CPU, RAM, and HDD configurations as the 1005, but video is handled by a 256MB ATI X1600 chipset; the real draw, though, is the new HD DVD drive, which is backed by an HDMI port for outputting those high-def vids to a bigger screen. No word yet on pricing or availability, though if past Ferrari-themed laptops have taught us anything, you'll be paying a pretty penny for that carbon fiber case and snazzy galloping horse logo. Keep reading to check out the 1005, but really, once you've seen one of these notebooks you've basically seen them all...

Read- 1005WTMi [Via MobileWhack]
Read- 5005WLHi [Via MobileWhack]

[ElectroGeek @ Sep 11th 2006 2:44PM]

I didn't see the pricing in this post. Does anyone know what these things are going for? I would imagine quite a bit of they're licensed by Ferrari! Thanks.

[Thor @ Sep 11th 2006 3:11PM]

I cant understand why a "high-quality" or rather exlusive company like ferrari would associate with a low-quality crap company like Acer..

[James Jenkins @ Sep 11th 2006 3:32PM]

Because their smart...

[Raider @ Sep 11th 2006 3:51PM]

Make it Core 2 Duo... and I would get one. I like eye-candy computers. Especially different from what I have, a MacBook Pro.

[J @ Sep 11th 2006 5:08PM]

I always thought that these seemed overpriced until I actually used on at last year's Gartner Symposium in Orlando. It was a beautiful machine. It may be overpriced purely on specs, but the style is certainly worth something.

[Deathwish238 @ Sep 11th 2006 5:38PM]

I have an Acer Ferrari 4006WLMi. I've been relatively happy with it. I paid $2200 to buy it from CompUSA which isn't a bad in store price. Is it overpriced? Yes. I'ld say it's about as overpriced as a Sony product is...about 10-20% imo. Also, the carbon fiber look is quite nice. The overall build is very solid, easily comparable to an IBM or Sony laptop.

As for Acer, they're a hit or miss brand. Some of their products(usually their higher end site) are excellent while some of their stuff isn't so hot.

If I could, I'ld get a new Ferrari 5000...the increase in video performance alone warrants getting it.

[Zach Marshall @ Sep 11th 2006 11:21PM]

ehhhh.... I actually had been dead-set on buying one of these for school, until the last time I went to Starbucks. Among all of the iBooks and MacBooks there was one lonely man sitting at a table with one of these, and I must say I was highly dissapointed. In person, they look very "plastic" and cheap. Granted, now that I look back, the pics don't even make it look much better. It's still just... meh.

I'm thinkin of being set on Sony's ultraportable! yay? or nay? Possibly a MacBook if apple gets their shit together.

[nikster @ Sep 12th 2006 12:36AM]

Sonys are beautiful, good quality but if something goes wrong you are treated to the standard "it's your fault" Sony service. Quite horrible.

I agree with the above poster, in my experience with 3 Acers (a totally statistically relevant sample, I know), the two top end machines were 1A excellent, no problems whatsoever, and the low end machine with really good specs for very little money was a complete lemon. I bought another Acer - TM8204 - after that because the service was excellent even for the lemon.

The Ferrari is pretty much the same machine as the TM8204 except with AMD processors. Because AMD is a Ferrari sponsor, so that's the theme for these.

And please don't give me any HD disk drives until the boring and senseless standards-wars are over. I won't pay for that. Though I think HD DVD is going to win simply because no one is better at introducing failed standards than Sony.

[tracey @ Feb 28th 2007 8:49AM]

I bought an Acer Ferrari 1005 in December 2006. Excellent piece of kit, and loved it. Until Jan 2007 the firewire port stopped working (for a firewire DVD drive, it is very important to me). Called Acer and arranged for it to be returned, and as i was doing that, noticed casing on inside at bottom left of screen was cracked, so got them to sort that too. Got laptop back after 2 weeks and problems fixed, but then would not charge by power supply. tried another power supply and same problem. sent back to Acer again, and still waiting for part - now almost beginning of march, and no idea when it will be back. So 5 weeks after first fault found, and still no joy. Also no 2 friends with same problem getting acer laptops repaired. Poor service, and although helpful, staff are limited to what they can tell you/help with. Maybe i just got a lemon :o(