Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) review – reduce, reuse, recycle

Without a doubt, the human race is the biggest pollutant our planet has ever seen. If we want to offer the Earth as we know it even the slightest chance of remaining as welcoming as it is, we have to change. And it has to happen right now. Acer has prepared one of the most drastic changes in the laptop world in this aspect. It is called the Aspire Vero, and this time, satisfying the user is not in the first place.

Its philosophy is for maximum efficiency of the products used for building the device. This way, the company doesn’t only try to eliminate its damage to the planet, but they also aim to win some environment-conscious customers. Thankfully, the target group is getting bigger by the minute.

But before we talk more about the various Earth-friendly methods Acer has used, we want to share some of the specs you get to work with. First and foremost, you get quite a capable package with up to the Core i7-1195G7. Although this comes amid the CES 2022 event, where Intel released their latest Alder Lake chips, the Tiger Lake family is pretty powerful itself, and the aforementioned CPU is the best ULV Intel processor, you can currently find on the market.

In addition, the specs include Wi-Fi 6 support, an optional fingerprint reader, and a Full HD IPS panel.

So let’s pop the box open, and see what we get inside.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/acer-aspire-vero/

Contents

Specs Sheet

What’s in the box?

Acer supplies this notebook with a bunch of environmentally informative paperwork. The inside of the box state that the entire packaging is either recycled or repurposed, with the ink being made of soy, thus meaning it is biodegradable. Also, the 65W charging adapter is sleeved in a cardboard package, instead of the plastic foil used for most devices out there. Not in the last place, there is a pack of stickers, so you can show off your “Green” views to other people.

Design and construction

As you can see, the design of this machine reveals an interesting speckle pattern. And yes, the reason for that is the use of up to 30% post-consumer recycled plastic. According to Acer, this also saves about 21% of CO2 emissions. Ultimately, the result is a rather rough finish, with no unnecessary stuff going on, that feels solid. Well, feeling solid is different than rather being such. We saw quite a flex in both the lid and the base, which is not something you really want. On the other hand, the laptop weighs 1.80 kg and has a profile of 17.9mm – this is in check with what is expected for a 15-inch laptop in 2022.

On the bright side, the lid can be opened with a single hand. This reveals a matte display with quite sizable bezels all around. And for those conference calls, you get an HD Web camera up top. In addition to that, the backside of the base is being gently lifted from the ground when you open the lid.

Moving to the base, we see no stickers. Instead, there are a couple of embossments on either side of the palm-rest area. The keyboard itself feels comfortable for typing with its decent key travel, clicky feedback, and NumPad section. Thankfully, the unit is backlit, but we see some deck flex.

Further below, there is a rather large glass-shod touchpad. It sports a fingerprint reader in its top-left corner. To our surprise, this doesn’t impede the touch sensitivity of that area of the touchpad, which is quite a relief.

Now, let’s take a look at what happens on the bottom of the device. There, you will see the speaker cutouts and the huge ventilation grill. Well, apparently, Acer didn’t throw the stickers away, as they are placed on the bottom panel. On the other hand, the hot air escapes through a pretty large vent in between the lid and the base.

Ports

On the left side of the laptop, there is the power plug, a LAN port, an HDMI connector, two USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) ports, and a USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 1) port. Then, on the right, you get a Kensington lock slot, a USB Type-A 2.0 port, and an audio jack.

Disassembly, upgrade options and maintenance

To get inside of this notebook, you need to undo a total of 11 Phillips-head screws. After you do that, pry the bottom panel with a plastic tool and remove it from the chassis.

This device is equipped with a 53Wh battery pack. It lasts for 9 hours of Web browsing, or about 7 hours and 30 minutes of watching videos. Also, it is pretty easy to remove with only two Phillips-head screws holding it in place.

When it comes to memory, there are either 4 or 8GB of DDR4 RAM soldered to the motherboard, with one SODIMM slot for further expansion. Storage-wise, you get only one M.2 PCIe x4 slot.

Thankfully, it looks like the processor is properly cooled with two heat pipes connecting to a large heat sink. Lastly, two fans blow the heat away from the device.

Display quality

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) in our configuration is equipped with a Full HD IPS panel with a model number AUO B156HAN02.1 (AUO0C9C). Its diagonal is 15.6″ (39.62 cm), and the resolution is 1920 х 1080 pixels. The screen ratio is 16:9, and we are looking at a pixel density of – 142 ppi, and a pitch of 0.18 х 0.18 mm. The screen turns into Retina when viewed at distance equal to or greater than 60cm (24″) (from this distance one’s eye stops differentiating the separate pixels, and it is normal for looking at a laptop).

Viewing angles are excellent. We offer images at 45° to evaluate image quality.

Also, a video with locked focus and exposure.

The measured maximum brightness of 278 nits in the middle of the screen and 271 nits as an average for the whole area, with a maximum deviation of 8%. The Correlated Color Temperature on a white screen is 6440K – almost matching the sRGB standard of 6500K.

In the illustration below you can see how the display performs from a uniformity perspective. In other words, the leakage of light from the light source.

Values of dE2000 over 4.0 should not occur, and this parameter is one of the first you should check if you intend to use the laptop for color-sensitive work. The contrast ratio is good – 1210:1.

To make sure we are on the same page, we would like to give you a little introduction to the sRGB color gamut and the Adobe RGB. To start, there’s the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Diagram that represents the visible specter of colors by the human eye, giving you a better perception of the color gamut coverage and the color accuracy.

Inside the black triangle, you will see the standard color gamut (sRGB) that is being used by millions of people on HDTV and the web. As for the Adobe RGB, this is used in professional cameras, monitors, etc for printing. Basically, colors inside the black triangle are used by everyone and this is the essential part of the color quality and color accuracy of a mainstream notebook.

Still, we’ve included other color spaces like the famous DCI-P3 standard used by movie studios, as well as the digital UHD Rec.2020 standard. Rec.2020, however, is still a thing of the future and it’s difficult for today’s displays to cover that well. We’ve also included the so-called Michael Pointer gamut, or Pointer’s gamut, which represents the colors that naturally occur around us every day.

The yellow dotted line shows Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51)’s color gamut coverage.

Its display covers 51% of the sRGB/ITU-R BT.709 (web/HDTV standard) in CIE1976.

Our “Design and Gaming” profile delivers optimal color temperature (6500K) at 140 cd/m2 luminance and sRGB gamma mode.

We tested the accuracy of the display with 24 commonly used colors like light and dark human skin, blue sky, green grass, orange, etc. You can check out the results at factory condition and also, with the “Design and Gaming” profile.

Below you can compare the scores of Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) with the default settings (left), and with the “Gaming and Web design” profile (right).

The next figure shows how well the display is able to reproduce really dark parts of an image, which is essential when watching movies or playing games in low ambient light.

The left side of the image represents the display with stock settings, while the right one is with the “Gaming and Web Design” profile activated. On the horizontal axis, you will find the grayscale, and on the vertical axis – the luminance of the display. On the two graphs below you can easily check for yourself how your display handles the darkest nuances but keep in mind that this also depends on the settings of your current display, the calibration, the viewing angle, and the surrounding light conditions.

Response time (Gaming capabilities)

We test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “black-to-white” and “white-to-black” method from 10% to 90% and vice versa.

We recorded Fall Time + Rise Time = 33 ms.

After that, we test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “Gray-to-Gray” method from 50% White to 80% White and vice versa between 10% and 90% of the amplitude.

PWM (Screen flickering)

Pulse-width modulation (PWM) is an easy way to control monitor brightness. When you lower the brightness, the light intensity of the backlight is not lowered, but instead turned off and on by the electronics with a frequency indistinguishable to the human eye. In these light impulses, the light/no-light time ratio varies, while brightness remains unchanged, which is harmful to your eyes. You can read more about that in our dedicated article on PWM.

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51)’s display doesn’t use PWM to adjust its brightness levels at any point. This makes it comfortable for use during long work periods, without harming your eyes in this aspect.

Blue light emissions

Installing our Health-Guard profile not only eliminates PWM but also reduces the harmful Blue Light emissions while keeping the colors of the screen perceptually accurate. If you’re not familiar with the Blue light, the TL;DR version is – emissions that negatively affect your eyes, skin, and your whole body. You can find more information about that in our dedicated article on Blue Light.

Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) configurations with 15.6″ FHD IPS AUO B156HAN02.1 (AUO0C9C).

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

Sound

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51)’s speakers produce a sound of decent quality. Its low tones have some deviations from clarity, while the mids and highs are clear.

Drivers

All of the drivers and utilities for this notebook can be found here: https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support-product/9126?b=1

Battery

Now, we conduct the battery tests with Windows Better performance setting turned on, screen brightness adjusted to 120 nits, and all other programs turned off except for the one we are testing the notebook with. This device is equipped with a 53Wh battery pack that lasts for 9 hours of Web browsing, or 7 hours and a half of video playback.

CPU options

As of the moment of writing this review, we were able to find this laptop paired with either a Core i5-1155G7 or a Core i7-1195G7.

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) CPU variants

Here you can see an approximate comparison between the CPUs that can be found in the Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) models on the market. This way you can decide for yourself which Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) model is the best bang for your buck.

Note: The chart shows the cheapest different CPU configurations so you should check what the other specifications of these laptops are by clicking on the laptop’s name / CPU.

GPU options

And in terms of graphics, you can rely on the integrated Iris Xe Graphics G7 with 80 or 96 EUs respectively.

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) GPU variants

Here you can see an approximate comparison between the GPUs that can be found in the Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) models on the market. This way you can decide for yourself which Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51) model is the best bang for your buck.

Note: The chart shows the cheapest different GPU configurations so you should check what the other specifications of these laptops are by clicking on the laptop’s name / GPU.

Gaming tests

CS:GO	HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)	HD 1080p, Medium (Check settings)	HD 1080p, MAX (Check settings)
Average FPS	83 fps	61 fps	28 fps

DOTA 2	HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)	HD 1080p, Normal (Check settings)	HD 1080p, High (Check settings)
Average FPS	90 fps	57 fps	35 fps

Temperatures and comfort

Max CPU load

In this test we use 100% on the CPU cores, monitoring their frequencies and chip temperature. The first column shows a computer’s reaction to a short load (2-10 seconds), the second column simulates a serious task (between 15 and 30 seconds), and the third column is a good indicator of how good the laptop is for long loads such as video rendering.

Average core frequency (base frequency + X); CPU temp.

Intel Core i7-1195G7 (15W TDP)	0:02 – 0:10 sec	0:15 – 0:30 sec	10:00 – 15:00 min
Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51)	3.93 GHz (B+36%) @ 77°C	3.58 GHz (B+23%) @ 77°C	3.10 GHz (B+7%) @ 68°C

Apparently, the dual-heat pipe cooling solution here happens to do miracles, as the Core i7-1195G7 doesn’t drop below 3.10 GHz during the entire test. Moreover, the temperatures are really respectable as well.

Comfort during full load

And while both fans are clearly audible, they can’t be considered too loud. In addition to that, the external temperature sits below 40°C, which is pretty good as well.

Verdict

What is the best thing about this machine? Well, we bet you know the answer to that question! Yes, it’s the philosophy behind it. In a world, where some manufacturers remove the charging bricks from their phone’s packaging and then sell them separately, we need real actions. The Aspire Vero is built out of 30% post-consumer recycled plastics, while its packaging is up to 100% recycled.

We hope that sets some standards and examples for the competition. But one thing is sure, Acer needs to work on the build quality for the next generation. This one has too much flex in both the lid and the base, which is not very trust-inspiring.

On the other hand, it comes with a preinstalled Windows 11 copy, and the Core i7-1195G7 works at very high clocks, even during long loads. This is possible thanks to the cooling solution, which comprises two heat pipes, and two fans.

Acer Aspire Vero (AV15-51)’s IPS panel has a Full HD resolution, comfortable viewing angles, and a good contrast ratio. Moreover, its backlight doesn’t flicker at any brightness level, which makes the device comfortable in this aspect. Unfortunately, though, it covers only half of the colors found on the Web.

On the other hand, you are treated to a fingerprint reader, which works more than fine. Also, it doesn’t impede the touch sensitivity of the touchpad in the area it’s located.

Here, the port selection is decent both inside and out, as you get the possibility to upgrade both the memory and the storage down the line. Unfortunately, though, there is no place for an SD card reader here.

We also have to say that the battery life here is not great. Indeed, you will be able to get through 9 hours of Web browsing, or 7 hours and a half of video playback, but we feel that this environment-conscious product should be more efficient.

As an end note, we would like to praise Acer’s efforts towards the planet both in terms of carbon footprint, and plastic recycling. And if they sort the build quality issue by reinforcing the structure of the base, and the lid, this would be one solid device.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/acer-aspire-vero/