The Predator Triton 500 SE is Acer’s “tip of the spear” high-performance laptop within the 15-16 inch market and is basically an even bigger, higher-speed model of the Triton 300 SE (2021) we not too long ago reviewed.
The Predator Triton 500 SE is a comparatively skinny & mild laptop designed to supply excellent “absolute efficiency” and elevated mobility. But, you might additionally use it as a desktop alternative. It’s extra highly effective than most desktop computer systems available on the market, particularly in its GeForce RTX 3080 incarnation.
Predator Triton 500 SE Specs Highlights
The particular unit we’re testing is the Acer Predator Triton 500 SE mannequin PT516-51s-92CB, with an Intel Core i9-11900H CPU, 2x16GB RAM, an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, and 1TB of SSD storage put in as two 512GB in RAID0 configuration. This configuration sells for about $2699.99 (by way of Greatest Purchase) as configured.
That mentioned, the laptop is designed to be expanded much more and will settle for 4TB of SSD (2x 2TB) and 64GB of RAM (2x 32GB SODIMM). This flexibility hints that Artistic customers ought to take note of this laptop as a result of “pure gaming” doesn’t sometimes require that a lot reminiscence and disk assets.
Industrial Design
Though that is technically a “Gaming” laptop, the design language shouldn’t be over-the-top “gaming” Within the sense that it’s not an RGB rainbow that screams, “I’m a hardcore gamer.” The design is barely aggressive but in addition discrete sufficient to slot in a company boardroom whereas doubtlessly excelling at Artistic duties along with working the most recent video games.
The Predator Triton 300 SE makes use of the identical design language as the five hundred SE, which makes plenty of sense. You discover the identical brushed metallic “cross-hatching” design on the show cowl, and the cooling airflow goes from the aspect (consumption) to the again (exhaust) with out counting on the underside for air consumption, which is excellent.
The laptop is comparatively skinny (19.8 mm) in relation to its efficiency and weighs 5.29 Lbs, however understand that the Triton 500 SE is a 16-inch laptop. Our Efficiency/Lbs numbers will shed extra mild on that later. The 230W Energy Brick is large and heavy, however that’s very regular for this sort of computing energy.
Keyboard and Trackpad
The important thing journey is a bit shallow, and I’d estimate it to round ~1mm, so it’s not MacBook-shallow, however a lot shallower than 1.3mm, which is what you discover on many massive laptops. It won’t be my favourite keyboard, however I feel it’s okay, and I don’t anticipate individuals to complain. Should you write quite a bit, you would possibly need to strive it in a Greatest Purchase retailer.
The keys are backlit with a 3-zones RGB lighting system, so it’s not “per-key” RGB. I’m not that choosy with the lighting configuration, however in case you’re used to having per-key colour schemes, you need to be conscious of this.
The trackpad floor is made from glass and subsequently feels super-smooth. It’s clicky if you press it, and I like the way it works. On the higher left of the trackpad, there’s a fingerprint sensor that appears a bit old-school however performs its operate with no hitch.
Ports
There are plenty of ports on this laptop, and for its dimension, it’s not very stunning. As a desktop alternative, most individuals would in all probability have sufficient ports, and in case you’re semi-mobile, I’d suggest Thunderbolt docks since there are a few TB4 ports right here.
In a pinch, you may cost your laptop by way of TB4 at as much as 100W – not fairly the complete energy, however sufficient to get by. The presence of a full-size SD Card (7.0) reader is one other signal that Artistic customers are one of many goal audiences of the Predator Triton 500 SE. Should you movie in 4K, you’ll respect the switch pace.
Upgradability
Regardless of being skinny, this laptop can be upgradeable the place it issues. The RAM and SSD slots usually are not super-easy to entry (it’s a must to take away the motherboard), however it’s doable, and you might push the RAM to 64GB (2×32) and the SSD storage to 4TB (2×2 PCIe 4.0), and do that at a decrease value in case you wait till it is advisable to.
Portability
For people who wish to play at their associates’ place, the portability of this gaming laptop is unbelievable. It packs plenty of efficiency for its weight and can make transportation a lot simpler, particularly in case you use public transportation (+backpack).
Sound high quality
The sound high quality is evident, and the DTS-X Extremely spatialization is nice. Nonetheless, the bottom-firing audio system usually are not as highly effective because the top-firing ones, and that clean house on the left+proper of the keyboard might be prime actual property for extra highly effective audio system.
Avid gamers would possibly want headphones for optimum encompass sound, however I really feel like this laptop may benefit from a greater speaker setup for motion pictures.
16-inch WXGA Show (2560×1600)
I used to be agreeably stunned by the excessive 500 NITs brightness as a result of many gaming laptop designs assume that players will use their computer systems in a dimly lit room. This laptop’s glorious colour accuracy (100% sRGB) can be very welcome and never at all times a given within the gaming laptop market. The 3ms latency could be very low and quick sufficient for our show’s 165Hz most refresh charge.
The excessive show high quality hints that non-gamers are additionally potential patrons of this highly effective laptop, and Acer may need performed it masterfully right here.
Our unit got here with an NVIDIA G-Sync sticker on the monitor, however understand that it’s as a result of solely GeForce RTX 3070 and 3080 SKUs options with G-Sync, in contrast to the sooner 3060 items. If you’d like G-Sync, just remember to’re getting a mannequin that helps it.
Acer additionally has an upcoming mini-LED show possibility with an insane 1250 NITs brightness that may be fairly superb to have in case you are in a brilliant atmosphere (film studios, outdoor).
And eventually, there’s additionally a 240Hz show possibility for these after absolutely the highest refresh charge, corresponding to aggressive gamers.
Now, some Artistic customers would possibly require 3K or 4K decision shows. For that, the Acer ConceptD collection is what they need to search for – or an exterior monitor.
Efficiency
The Intel Core i9-11900H CPU possibility paired with a 110W GeForce RTX 3080 makes this {hardware} platform extraordinarily attention-grabbing as some opponents would possibly max out with an i7-11800H as an alternative.
Curiously, each the “efficiency per Lbs” and the “efficiency per dollar-spent” are very excessive. You’re getting what you pay for, and also you’re getting plenty of efficiency for each pound you carry round. In actual fact, on a per-weight foundation, the Triton 500 SE performs higher than its lighter 300 SE cousin, however the 300 SE has higher graphics “per greenback.”
The comparability with the Lenovo ThinkPad P15 Gen2 reveals how cost-effective a gaming laptop will be in comparison with a full-on workstation. That mentioned, the P15’s RTX A5000 GPU has CAD-certified drivers and different enterprise options that aren’t really comparable. In the long run, these are completely totally different markets, however from a computing viewpoint, gaming laptops are very comparable.
PredatorSense is a preloaded Acer utility to watch and management this laptop’s cooling, efficiency modes, and gaming settings. I discover it fairly simple to make use of and observed that workstations usually lack such controls.
Like some other gaming laptop, the followers will get very noisy (61Db) in case you use the “Excessive” efficiency mode in Acer’s PredatorSense management panel. I’d use it in “Default” mode to get a 51 Db most noise degree and go away solely a small share of efficiency on the desk. The ten Decibels of extra noise solely decrease the temperature by just a few levels celsius.
When the laptop runs at most pace, it might get scorching, and that’s in all probability not if you need it in your lap. The middle of the keyboard space would possibly attain as excessive as ~48C, however the thermal controls will forestall it from rising greater than that.
The SSD storage efficiency is exceptional, and that’s because of the RAID0 configuration. The 1TB of our unit is 2x 512GB. RAID0 aggregates the bandwidth of each storage units right into a logical pushed, which explains what we see within the numbers.
Recreation loading or video output is perhaps positively impacted. And that’s a motive why the five hundred SE storage performs practically 2X higher than its 300 SE cousin within the “Artistic” benchmarks. This might translate into implausible productiveness positive factors.
Predator Triton 500 SE Battery Life
I anticipate most individuals to make use of this laptop as a desktop alternative, however since it’s skinny and comparatively mild, having a 99Wh battery capability and a 230W adapter is undoubtedly a plus.
This SKU has superior (NVIDIA) Optimus and auto-switches between built-in and discrete GPU relying on the utilization. That mentioned, I needed to manually change the LCD show from “default” to “Optimus” within the NVIDIA management panel.
The 4 hours and eighteen minutes of battery life within the battery check (productiveness apps, “finest battery” settings) are lower than what we anticipated for this check. It looks like Acer is utilizing a higher-performance battery profile even within the “finest battery mode”, however I hope this might be tuned in a future firmware replace.
The battery cost pace is comparatively gradual in comparison with the Triton 300 SE and different highly effective laptops such because the Lenovo ThinkPad P15 Gen2 workstation. This implies you may’t shortly “high off” the laptop and go, so if that’s a scenario you end up in usually, think about it. That mentioned, the five hundred SE cost pace could be very akin to mainstream laptops just like the ThinkPad X1 Carbon.
Conclusion
The Predator Triton 500 SE is actually the “tip of the spear” gaming laptop in Acer’s lineup, and this mannequin is especially quick, each for Gaming and Artistic purposes.
This twin polyvalence is an actual power for this laptop as many “Gaming-only” laptops won’t have such high-performance show or storage choices that Artistic customers have to do their finest work.
The wonderful expandability of storage (4TB) and RAM (64GB) capability might even improve its potential helpful lifespan or resale worth. A low max-RAM capability might be a bottleneck in case you take care of super-high decision content material (4K, 8K video modifying).
In conclusion, the Acer Predator Triton 500 SE is a terrific high-performance laptop with super computing energy for graphics purposes, backed by an environment friendly cooling system. It’s worthy of your consideration.
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