# Best Affordable Gaming Laptop: Acer 5740g - Core i5, HD 5650, 500 GB HDD



## borax12 (Jul 11, 2010)

Hello friends..i bought this laptop a week ago from noida ....(Jumbo electronics to be specific).....and here is my review on the model
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specs*

Acer Aspire 5740G-434G50Mn
434G50Mn means:
43 stands for Core i5 430 2.27GHz 3MB cache
4G stands for 4GB DDR3 1066MHz 
50 stands for 500GB 5400 rpm drive (Hitachi in my case)
M stands for Multi drive- meaning DVD-R/RW/RAM 
n stands for Draft N Wi-Fi card 

The rest of relevant specs:
Mobility Radeon HD5650 1GB DDR3 (core 550MHz, memory 750MHz)
15,6" 16:9 LED backlit, 1366x768 LCD 
6 cell Li-ion battery, 4400mAh
Wi-Fi Card Atheros AR5B93 (two antennas but capable of 300mbit/s)
LAN card 10/100/1000 Broadcom NetLink BCM57780
Realtek HD Audio ALC272

Its running on Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit(OEM VERSION WITH BLOATWARE INSTALLED)

the BIOS is OEM only phoenix version....thats has no frequency/voltage control options...so no tweaking or overclocking in the factory state.....you will have to flash the BIOS..for that...with a new BIOS version

Mobility Radeon HD5650 is the same exact card as HD5730- the only difference is that 5730 is factory overclocked. As this card has very low TDP(thermal design power....) and 5740G has good cooling system ,overclocking is something you must do if you play games.
AMD GPU clock Tools is used for that(link not provided)

one important note for everyone buying this lappy.....this laptop has poor battery life of 1-1.5 hr on extreme use(like playing hd videos on longer runs or playing high quality games) and if u are gaming on this laptop or playing hd videos while the unit is connected to the AC source ie its being charged...the unit does heat up a little bit.....but again if u are using it good cool conditions(like my room does not have good ventilation and airflow, so naturally my conditions were different ...but then i guess it would be okay)..it would work fine.
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GPU overclocking(credit to notebookreview)*
How much can you overclock the hd 5650 depends on your particular unit but all 5740Gs so far had no problems with achieving stock clocks of 5730 meaning 650MHz core and 800MHz memory.
Some people have better memory chips and can achieve memory freqs of up to 1100MHz. Mine runs fine at 900MHz but gives artifacts at 950MHz.
As for core mine is perfectly stable at 670MHz in gaming as well as in stress tests.
All tests provided below have been performed with GPU set at 670MHz core and 900MHz memory. I will not test with default clocks- it's waste of time and GPU potential.
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benchmarks*

All tests performed with Catalyst 10.3 Beta with default settings under Win 7 Home Premium 64bit and 670/900 GPU clocks

3DMark06 1280x768, default settings-8365
Crysis 1280x720, all details set to HIGH, 64bit, DX10, 30fps

Call Of Pripyat Benchmark Tessellation is OFF by default also in DX11 test.
-during day time (in game) avg fps -41

GTA IV
Custom settings
1366x768,
Texture quality: HIGH
Reflection resolution: MEDIUM
Water quality: HIGH
Shadow quality: OFF
Texture filter quality: LOW
View distance: 24, Detail distance:36, Vehicle density:22
Shadow density:0 (dynamic shadows are disabled- only static are on- just like in console versions)
Definition: ON, Vsync: ON

Game banchmark: 38fps

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CPU and GPU temperature*(credit to notebookreview again)

FurMark test 670MHz core and 900MHz memory
max temperature 71*C

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HDD Benchmark*
HD Tune 4.01
Average speed: 63,3MB/s
Good speed especially for a 5400rpm drive.

How to disable the annoying beep on power cord disconnection-Acer Aspire 5740G Owners Lounge - Page 82

coming to the review of the hardware- the system is rated a 5.9 overall by windows rating in the OS-with 6.7 points to graphics...(well this is actually a quite good score)

and the processor is given a 6...so overall a good gaming system(as u can see in the benchmark results)

the synaptics powered touchpad is avg...not so great but still ok to use...the mutitouch on the pad is fun to use-swipe your fingers to change covers in itunes....(provided u have the latest synaptics driver) and pinch and stretch to zoom in and enlarge the icon size in the desktop is also fun for few uses...but gets irritating after using it for sometime...becoz the stretching of vector based icons and again resizing them to a smaller size makes the icon arrangement and alignment wrong....it gets all messed up..

dolby 2,pro logic....the sytem speakers have got everything u require form a high quality speaker sytem....but its true that the system speakers are very mediocre......not great but still decent enough to listen to....the bass levels fail miserably and the not enough pump and loudeness makes a bad impression of the speakers.... 
but the headphones experience  kinda like truly makes up for it.....its excellent

u do have an ati hdmi port on the device so u can also attach this lappy to a hd screen via the hdmi to experience computing on a larger dimension....

now to the ports and accessories....
u have 4 usb ports(2.0)
one hdmi
one ethernet
keningston lock
3.5mm audio jack
microphone port
audio line in
(the laptop also has a built in microphone)
crystal clear(acer trademark) good quality webcam...(its actually good)
this laptop has also got bluetooth so thats again an added advantage

u also get a very good quality acer carry case...(really very good i must say)

now to the keyboard experience....this laptop has a very good keybaord feel to it...the keys are a little bit raised and well spaced..too....only qualm with the keys is that the top line row of keys, thats is ,the function keys row...which also houses the oddly placed home,end,page dwn.and page up keys ...are very fragile...My delete keys just came out after use of 3 days so...thats like a negative point ..otherwise the keys have good clickety feel to them...another thing to note is u wont be getting a regular sized enter/return key...so thats another point to note.......and theres ample space to rest your palm or hands on, while typing....

a point to note here is that underneath the left side of the arm rest is the hdd(i guess so)...which really gets hot while playing games for quite a while(long duratin) while the unit is being charged....so thus becomes  pint of rritant...specially if u are playing games such as assassin creed 2 or cod mw 2..which requires u to use the w,a,s,d keys and also requires you to keep the palm on the arm rest on left side...so again...that depends on how hot your laptop gets while u are playing which further depends on the kind of surface  u are keeping the laptop on(for the airflow to be maximum u need the air grills  on the back side to ventilate air properly) and the kind of environment u are using the laptop in.(a/c rooms always help  ) )..

the laptop,s backside has a very neat layout of the battery covers...hdd bay...to change the hdd if required.....and ram slot opening...to change the ram if required...

now coming to the overall review....its great laptop with all features u expect from a high end laptop....and performance that compares to the expensive offerings of other brands and manufacturers....and the price which u cannot believe....its just 43K...ie 43000....INR so ..beleive me..if u can accept some 'not so irritating' issues of this laptop....its a STEAL at this price...
and ACER being an international brand...u get this great service reputation and international travelers warranty too....so go ahead all u gamers who cant shell out their kidneys to own a decent gaming machine .....here is the perfect laptop for you...and yes  please bear with the traditional acer gloss blue gemstone design of this laptop....its not fancy or zingy...but certainly looks decent.....

bye for now....


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## verticalspin (Aug 2, 2010)

i loved ur review n hope u could help me......
can i use the laptop(actually ne laptop) for atleast 4-5hrs every day(with power cord connected) n will there be any heating issues as such........???


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## notebookshopper (Sep 14, 2010)

Hi 
Great review.Thanks for proving information.This is really helpful to me .


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## almosthandsome (Feb 24, 2011)

hi ! nice description of ur laptop ! 
i have an Acer model 5742G , i wanna try to OC the i3 370m , can u give me some advices on how to do it ? i allrdy OC the ATI HD 5470
How can i flash the bios , and where i can get the new version of the BIOS ?


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## vamsi_krishna (Feb 24, 2011)

GTA 4.. 38FPS on a laptop. Not bad.


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## pauldmps (Feb 24, 2011)

Please mention the price for which you bought the laptop.

I will buy a laptop (about 3-4 months from now) & already checked out the Lenovo Y560 (i3, 4GB, 500GB, 1GB HD 5730) which is selling for about 46k at Flipkart. I wanted to compare this model to your model & check which is more VFM.


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## R2K (Feb 24, 2011)

Where are the pics ?


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## furious_gamer (Feb 25, 2011)

guys, he is not active here for past few months. And you are digging old thread...


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