Are Acer Laptops just slow?

My dad recently bought a business laptop, it wasn't used for like 6 months, so he gave it to me. It's an Acer Aspire 5600. It has a Intel Centrino Dou Processor and has Windows XP Media Center 2005 and is Vista Capable. I believe it has 504 MB Memory. The only thing installed on it is a printer and Microsoft Office. Back to my question, this computer is just plain slow. I don't know what is wrong with it. If you go to play a CD on it, it skips and sounds awful. Even when you start up, the Windows start-up sound skips. Is Acer just a bad computer or is there something wrong with mine?

its probably somthing screwed up in the operating system .. it could also be a bad harddrive but i would try to reload windows fresh on it myself ..

Sounds like the computer maybe infected with spyware and virus's. Go here for help and some one will help you out. They did me wonders about a month ago on the family desktop.
http://www.cybertechhelp.com/forums/foru...

Acers are horrible. My sister has one and she's hated it from day one.
I would suggest a Sony Vaio. I have a desktop Vaio (not the computer I'm currently using). The one I have is old and out-dated, but years later, it still works better than my sisters new Acer, and consider that particular Vaio only has a 60 GB Hard Drive and 480 MB of RAM.
Really, the best computer you could get would be an unbranded customized one. That's what I'm using right now. Go to a place that does that and tell them what you need it to do and they'll build it to your specifications.

Acer loads buch of its software and often slow the system.
try upgrading ram or disabling unnecesary icons.

spyware also result of slow PC.

I agree with the spyware, my acer works wonderfully. I think there is just something wrong with yours. Try to downlaod Spybot and get rid of the virus. Spybot is an antispyware program that is recomended by microsoft so it is safe to trust. If that doesnt work, you could call Acer, the number is 1800-816-2297, or the website is www.acerpanam.com.