Acer’s multi-brand strategy is paying off, with enthusiastic adoption of its eMachines brand among consumers and resellers right across the world. The eMachines product range, one of the world’s fastest-growing PC brands, was acquired by Acer Group in October 2007. The product range is marketed under its own brand in Africa and the rest of the world, in line with the Acer Group’s decision to adopt a multi-brand strategy.

eMachines products are officially sold and supported in South Africa, where they have received a warm reception from the market. Acer plans to expand coverage of the eMachines brand in the rest of Africa over time, but the products are already available in some countries from certain resellers.

Says Paul Fitchet sales manager at Acer Africa: “The eMachines product range is positioned as a full-featured, reliable, value range of notebooks, desktops and LCD monitors. The eMachines range has enjoyed enormous success in the US, South Africa and other parts of the world, because many consumers today are looking for practical yet affordable products in many segments of the market.”

Fitchet says that Acer Group implemented a multi-brand strategy after acquiring the Packard-Bell, Gateway and eMachines brands to ensure that each brand has a personality and product range suited to the needs of its unique customer base. The Acer brand has entrenched itself as the brand of choice for small business users, consumers who want the latest technologies and corporate users that need powerful and reliable solutions for their workforces.

By contrast, eMachines is positioned in the budget and value segment of the market place with highly affordable pricing. It is aimed at the pragmatic end-user that makes computer purchasing decisions based on convenience, reliability and affordability. The eMachines product range has sold in excess of five million units and is a well-established brand across the world.

Fitchet notes that although eMachines has its own brand identity, it is backed by Acer Africa’s extensive support infrastructure. It carries a warranty supported by Acer Group Services and can be serviced by in-country Acer Group service centres.

I’m fortunate enough to be involved in the industry so many of these are known to me, however when my friend asked what RAM was I had an ‘aha’ moment and thought why not spread the word and share what I know. Below are a few TLA’s (three letter acronyms) explained, we have tired to take the confusion out of a few ICT terms.

LCD – liquid crystal display this is simply a thin, flat panel that uses liquid crystal cells that change reflectivity in an applied electric field. It can be used to display text, images, and moving pictures. Its uses include monitors for computers, televisions, and instrument panels to mention just a few.

LED light-emitting diode, this one is a little harder to explain but here goes: – it is a semiconductor light source. WOW – and what is that??? This semiconductor or diode allows current/electricity to travel in one direction only. When a current/electricity is run through the diode it emits photons, “units” of light.

RAM Random-access memory is a type of computer information/data storage that provides much faster access than your Hard Disk Drive. It allows stored information to be accessed in any order (i.e., at random). Which, trust me, makes your life so much easier. You want to be able to access Facebook, your Outlook quickly, check figures in a spreadsheet while you write a letter to your client. RAM allows all of this to happen. So you can retrieve any piece of data constantly regardless of its physical location and whether or not it is related to the previous piece of data.

HDD Hard disk drive, by the book this means a computer device which stores digitally encoded data??? Hmm, ok so in other words, the mother load, the all important hub, and where everything you do on your computer gets translated into 0100011101010101 – computer speak.

GB Gigabyte, a unit of information used. It is important to know how many your computer has, because it will let you know what your computer’s storage capacity is and how fast and powerful your computer is. More GB is better. Remember RAM and HDD are different types of memory; both will have a GB capacity. You need more HDD than RAM.

CPU Central Processing Unit or the processor is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, and is the primary element carrying out the computer’s functions. Often in my frustration I blame my computer, when actually it is just following a command – your command. The processor reads the computer speak 0101010100001101001010, and translates into what you see on the screen.

App Application this is a program or group of programs designed for you – the end-user. Applications software (also called end-user programs) includes database programs, word processors, and spreadsheets. They provide many of the functions you use everyday.

Acer South Africa has released two new professional LCD monitors designed for intensive daily use in office environments – namely the B233H and the B243H displays.

Both of these screens – one of them a 23″ model and the other a 24″ model – are designed to be reliable and ergonomic solutions for office professionals and others who spend much of their day in front of a computer screen. The new models both offer a 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio and a high contrast ratio of 80,000:1.

Says Josef Chvala, product manager at Acer South Africa: “These advanced wide-screen displays render crisp details and brilliant colours thanks to the adaptive contrast management and superior brightness. With pivot and height adjustment, a full range of connectivity options (VGA, DVI, HDMI, USB Hub) and high picture quality, these LCD screens are true high-definition performers for today’s enterprise user.”

The 23″ B233H offers a grey-to-grey response time of about 5 ms and a screen resolution of 1920×1080 at 60Hz while the 24″ B243H offers a response time of 2ms and a screen resolution of 1920×1080 at 60Hz.

The B-series displays have a dark-grey bezel and a black base with flexible height adjustment of 110mm as well as tilt and swivel adjustment. With VGA, DVI with HDCP, HDMI and USB ports, B-series monitors provide a flexible selection of connectivity options.

They also use Acer Adaptive Contrast Management (ACM) to provide for stunning picture quality with dramatic improvement of gradation and detail, especially for dimmer and brighter scenes. The technology analyses every scene and adjusts the parameters frame by frame to enhance colour quality. ACM also allows the LCD monitor to use less power.