The Acer Aspire One D250 is an extremely portable machine. Not only is it one of the thinnest netbooks we've seen but, for a system boasting a 10.1-inch screen, it's also very light. Weighing just 1kg, this a great netbook for frequent travellers.

As we've come to expect from the Aspire One line, the 10.1-inch screen is good and the 1024 x 600-pixel resolution screen is detailed enough for intricate documents. The shiny Super-TFT coating isn't too distracting but, while colour reproduction is good, it lacks vibrancy. The screen folds back on itself nearly 180 degrees, however, meaning you can always get a comfortable viewing angle.

The sizeable keyboard is comfortable to use and, while the typing experience isn't quite as fluid as that found on some rival netbooks, it's more than satisfactory. The touchpad is small but equally usable.

The chassis is built of matt-black plastic and is solid enough to withstand the rigours of life on the road. A dedicated hotkey activates the netbook's Bluetooth adapter, so it's easy to synchronise the machine with Bluetooth-enabled devices.

Average battery

As with most netbooks on the market, this machine ships with an Intel Atom processor; in this case, an N280 chip, which offers less power consumption over the older N270. Unfortunately, this isn't reflected in the machine's battery life, which clocks in at a lowly 142-minutes. A 160GB hard drive provides plenty of space for your music and movies, alongside your work files and folders.

Connectivity is standard netbook fare, with 802.11g Wi-Fi providing good wireless access to the internet, and a 10/100 Ethernet connection for fixed networking. A 5-in-1 memory card reader provides compatibility for a broad variety of flash storage card formats. Three USB ports allow easy connectivity for peripherals, and a VGA-out allows you to connect the netbook to an external analogue monitor.

The Acer Aspire One D250 is a very capable netbook. It boasts the portability - certainly in terms of weight - of much smaller machines, which makes it suitable for those frequently on the road.

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