Design
Although the Tablet PC genre is less than a year old, Acer has already reworked its version, with largely positive results: the TravelMate C111TCi remains a great-looking, black-and-silver hybrid. On the downside, it has gained weight and size and lost its smart-card reader, and it now comes with a single battery -- not the pair that accompanied the previous model. This lone battery conked out 11 minutes past the two-hour mark in our tests, a disappointing score.
At first glance, the TravelMate C111TCi model roughly matches its predecessor, although at 25.7cm wide by 21.6cm deep by 2.5-3cm high, it's slightly bigger in all dimensions. Weighing in at 1.45kg, the TravelMate C111TCi is heavier than NEC's Versa LitePad slate design, but smaller than Toshiba's Portégé 3505, a convertible with a larger screen. The TravelMate C111TCi's AC adapter weighs a clunky 425g, making for a 1.87kg travel weight.
With a twist-and-fold-over screen, the TravelMate C111TCi quickly converts from a keyboard-based notebook to a touch-screen tablet. While the 10.4in. screen can't compare with the 12.1in. displays that adorn many of its competitors, it's enough for doodling away a long flight, scribbling through a meeting and Web browsing. After a week of use, we found that the screen was more resistant to fingerprints and dust than the earlier model's, but it's just as easily overwhelmed by glare if tilted at the wrong angle. With a curved keyboard, typing takes a little practice and patience to get used to. Still, the 18.1mm keys, which have a generous 2.4mm of depth, are just big enough, and the small touchpad accurately places the cursor -- there's no pointing stick.
As far as writing on the screen goes, the TravelMate C111TCi remains a study in stylus frustration. It comes with a disappointingly small and thin pen that fits into a slot at the top of the screen. The system includes a larger, more comfortable pen, too, but there's no place to stash it and the eraser doesn't work with all drawing applications.
The single speaker to the left of the touchpad sounds clear until it is cranked up, when it takes on the tinny quality of an AM radio station. Unfortunately, the speaker is covered when the screen is folded flat and, hence, sounds muffled.
Features
For such a small convertible tablet, the TravelMate C111TCi squeezes in an amazing range of big-notebook features. The jewel in the crown is Intel's 1GHz ultra-low-voltage Pentium M processor, which can run rings around the original TravelMate C100’s 800MHz Mobile Pentium III-M CPU. But despite the low-powered Pentium M, the TravelMate C111TCi still runs hot and only provides just over two hours of battery life. Although the system came with 512MB of 266MHz SDRAM memory, it can hold up to a whopping 2GB of memory, which is more than enough to handle even the toughest applications.
A good variety of ports, most of which are protected by flexible rubber covers, live along the tablet's edges. In addition to a pair of USB 2.0 ports, the TravelMate C111TCi comes with connections for FireWire, audio and an external monitor. You'll also find ports for infrared, Ethernet and a 56Kbps modem, as well as a single PC Card slot -- or you can get even more ports with the optional port replicator. With its Intel 2100 PRO/Wireless Wi-Fi module, the system achieves Centrino status. For your data storage needs, the TravelMate C111TCi includes an external combo CD-RW/DVD drive, which connects via the FireWire port and requires its own power supply.
Software is the TravelMate C111TCi's strong suit. This tablet comes with Windows XP Tablet Edition and a helpful Notebook Manager utility, which consolidates configuration and basic settings. Also included are trial versions of Norton AntiVirus 5.0 and Alias SketchBook Pro, as well as Corel's Grafigo for collaboration and FranklinCovey's TabletPlanner. The icing on the cake is the two e-book-viewers: Microsoft Reader and Zinio Reader.
Performance & battery life
Although we couldn’t get the mainstream application-based Business Winstone 2001 to complete, the TravelMate C111TCi’s high-end Content Creation Winstone 2002 score of 26.3 is an improvement over first-generation Tablet PCs. With a 1GHz processor and 512MB of RAM, this tablet should be able to handle most productivity applications with no trouble.
Unfortunately, this tablet’s battery life lets it down somewhat. Although it has an ultra-low-voltage Pentium M processor, the TravelMate C111TCi’s 14.8V, 1,800mAh battery limits it to just over 2 hours’ life.
Service & support
The TravelMate C111TCi comes with a standard one-year collect and return warranty, plus a one-year international traveller’s warranty. You'll need to pay extra to extend it to a full three-year policy, and even more (100 euros) to provide additional screen protection. You can call in with a problem on the company's support line for the duration of the warranty or send email to a technician. Telephone support for out-of-warranty products is available between 8am and 6pm Monday to Friday at 50p a minute.
Acer's Web site is second to none when it comes to providing documentation and online help. Online, there are FAQs, start-up tips and manuals, as well as downloads of the latest drivers and software updates. Also, the printed manual is thorough and easy to understand.
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