Ed Hewitt Yet another Tech & Gaming Blog!

Gaming on Acer Aspire Revo

The Aspire Revo is a well 'spec-ed' machine; decent Atom CPU, plenty of RAM and the brilliant nVidia ION chip. So you would think I should be able to play some modern-day games, so I did.

First up is a Diablo-like RPG called Torchlight. The game is designed to run on low spec computers (it has a 'Netbook Mode'), but can be up-scaled to very good graphics for more powerful computers. The game ran very well on the Revo, with the high graphics option.

Next, I wanted to push the Revo to its limits, and try an RTS. Company of Heroes was the candidate, a modern RTS which can push even the high-end computers to their limits. The game automatically selected medium to high graphics, thanks to the powerful ION chip. Frames per seconds (FPS) varied from 25 down to 5. Even when I lowered the graphic settings down, it was still same story. The game was very dependent of the CPU, and the Atom not up to the job of running a RTS.

My next games were both Source games. Counter Strike Source selected my graphic settings to high, and the game performed well, with fps between 30 to 60. Left 4 Dead was more of a challenge, its more modern game with alot of action on screen. It selected low graphics, and my fps ranged from 35 to 20. First Person Shooters are more suited on the Revo, since the CPU is required less.

I wasn't expecting it to work, but I gave BioShock ago. To my amazement, it played fine on high graphics, though I did turn the settings down to medium to get a better FPS. Again, a First-Person shooter which doesn't require alot from the CPU.

Fallout 3 is a demanding game, and did cause problems on the revo. It ran very well, with graphics at medium settings. However, the game was unstable on the revo, and crashed ofter. Likely to be the Atom slow things down.

QuakeLive was my final test, obviously it was no trouble on the Revo. Its just Quake 3, full graphics running at over 100fps!

There was no point testing out old games, since they will run after testing these demanding modern games. The Revo performed well, mainly thanks to ION chip. The Atom CPU is a let down in these tests, since it is not powerful enough to cope with these games, especially RTS. It does appear that if you have 'Net Top' with an ION chip, avoid RTS games.