Netbook help!! :(

Lauren.J.U · January 24th, 2009, 03:19 PM

My boyfriend has recently got an 'Acer Aspire One Netbook' for Christmas, and is looking for an external CD/DVD drive.

I would like to know whether or not you can install PC games, watch DVD's etc. on this particular netbook,

and if you can, does anyone know of any external drives that are compatible with it??

Any help would be be really appriciated

Lauren
x

**GroundZero3** · January 24th, 2009, 04:22 PM

What kind of games are we talking about? Netbooks are designed to be for email/web browsing/etc that is why they are so small. The nebook is not designed to be a gamer laptop

KarmaKiller · January 24th, 2009, 04:25 PM

Hi, and welcome to TechIMO.
Any USB CD/DVD drive should work with no issues.
Newegg.com - External DVD Drive, External DVD Burner, External DVD-R, External CD Burner, External DVD+R, External CD Drive
^any of those should work.

Now gaming it probably won't do so good. That takes more CPU power, and more RAM, not to mention a decent video card. That is basically used for just a portable, light net surfing book.
They really aren't made to be a desktop replacement.
Now with that said, it can probably run older light weight games, but nothing like Call of Duty or anything like that.
Good luck, Hope I helped.

EDIT:
GZ is faster then me.

**ScottW** · January 24th, 2009, 04:25 PM

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Lauren.J.U · January 24th, 2009, 04:29 PM

Erm..... I think just basic PC games, like football manager and stuff??

It would be more watching DVDs and music more than anything, I just need to know whether gaming etc. was possible on that actual laptop.

thanks

**GroundZero3** · January 24th, 2009, 04:32 PM

Here are the pc requirements for the game

SEGA West

So no the netbook would not be a viable solution to play that game on it.

Lauren.J.U · January 24th, 2009, 04:33 PM

Ok, well thanks for that.

But, do you think it would be worth it to get an external drive anyway??

**GroundZero3** · January 24th, 2009, 04:35 PM

For watching DVDs? Sure but that kind of defeats the purpose of the laptop. It was built to be small and compact. Not to lug a bunch of peripherals around with it.

Lauren.J.U · January 24th, 2009, 04:37 PM

Yeah i know lol, but i was thinkin more for home use.

thanks for all your help

wambulance · January 24th, 2009, 05:13 PM

If you have a LAN at home you can use a shared CD/DVD drive from another system to install software. Here's a video showing how it's done;

YouTube - Acer Aspire One install from CD drive

If you do have a networked system at home, it makes no sense to get a USB drive, as this defeats the whole purpose of the Aspire One and you sacrifice portability. If you need an optical drive while traveling, it's best to just get a notebook. But for home use, you don't need to get a USB drive.

You can play lots of games on it. I've seen Counterstrike, wizardry 8, quake 3, lots of different games. You likely won't have much success with newer games like Fallout 3, Bioshock, and the like. But, there are literally thousands of PC games that were designed to run on systems that were far less powerful than these netbooks.