We admit, we were pretty stoked when we first saw the Acer Aspire One AOD250 running Android in dual-boot mode. What could possibly be bad about it? Fast start-up, Google apps… other good things that aren’t coming to mind at the moment… what could go wrong? Turns out, just about everything. See, the Aspire [...]]]>

We admit, we were pretty stoked when we first saw the Acer Aspire One AOD250 running Android in dual-boot mode. What could possibly be bad about it? Fast start-up, Google apps… other good things that aren’t coming to mind at the moment… what could go wrong? Turns out, just about everything. See, the Aspire One AOD250 has an unfortunate lack of Google blessing, so that means no Gmail, which is really Android’s killer app, and no Marketplace either — so no opportunity to track down a different killer app. You can use your Google account for hooking up with Gcal, Gtalk and Google Contacts, but your Gmail account gets set up as a webmail shortcut to the included Firefox app — which does an alright, slightly hacked-on job of augmenting the standard Android browser, including support for Flash. Unfortunately, with connection woes over WiFi and Ethernet (as seen on the video), there wasn’t much redeemable even there, and perhaps the best news about the device is that it can be fully booted to XP at any time by clicking on the corner of Android’s home screen. We still think there’s promise for Android on a netbook, but it’s going to need some serious TLC (also, Gmail) before it’s ready for prime time. Check out our video impressions after the break.

via Acer Aspire One AOD250 impressions: Android gone bad.