Ferrari Speeds Into Netbook Race

Acer will release a Ferrari-branded netbook next month without the sports car price.

Taiwanese manufacturer Acer plans to release a Ferrari-branded netbook next month based on its Intel-powered Aspire One netbook. Acer revealed the device at a recent launch event held at Ferrari's Monza racetrack, and admitted that it won't cost consumers and Ferrari fanboys the hefty pricetag associated with the infamous sports cars: it will instead cost around $727 USD on October 22. Splashed with hot red and branding the familiar prancing horse badge dead center, this netbook should raise a few eyebrows both visually and performance-wise... for a netbook, that is.

Under the hood, the netbook sports decent horsepower for the price, its engine consisting of AMD's 1.2 GHz dual core Athlon X2 L310 processor--backed by the M780G chipset--and AMD's ATI Radeon HD 3200 GPU graphics chip. The Acer netbook also provides a generous 11.6-inch display offering 1366 x 768 pixel resolution, and ATI XGP technology for external graphics expansion. Along with a six-cell rechargable battery to keep this sporty netbook revved for hours, the Ferrari One comes installed with 2 GB of memory, a 250 GB hard drive, a multi-format memory card reader, Bluetooth, Draft-N Wi-Fi, and 3G connectivity.

According to ITProPortal, the upcoming Windows 7 OS will come pre-installed (Premium or Starter) in addition to Dolby Home Theater, and will feature other notable bells and whistles like a chiclet keyboard, multitouch mousepad, and a stylish textured palm rest branded with the infamous Ferrari crest mounted on the right. Unfortunately, fans will still have to put up with the Windows and AMD Vision stickers on the palm rest however, glaring at consumers like ugly bumper stickers mounted on the left.

Look for the Acer Ferrari One to race onto store shelves next month just in time for Microsoft's debut of Windows 7.