Acer is one of those laptop manufacturers that often strives too hard to stand out. Think of the Predator Triton 900, a wild machine with a 360-degree rotating screen that seemed almost useless to me. Earlier this month, Acer also announced plans to bring its SpatiaLabs glasses-free 3D technology to gaming laptops. Ambitious changes are nice and all, but these days I’m more interested in notebooks that are subtle about their gaming skills. And after testing the Predator Triton 500 SE over the past week, I’ve learned that Acer can do pretty well.
Gallery: Acer Predator Triton 500 SE | 12 photos
Gallery: Acer Predator Triton 500 SE | 12 photos
The Triton 500 SE includes all the power you’d want from a large gaming notebook, in a sleek metal frame that wouldn’t look out of place in an office or conference room. There is little need for flashy LEDs (except for the backlight of the keyboard, which you can always turn off) or another nasty case. He is ready to get down to work. And of course, it’s not the only subtle gaming notebook out there, but competitors like the Razer Blade cost more than Triton’s $ 2,300 starting price.
Pros
- Magnificent and smooth 16-inch screen
- 12th generation fast CPUs and NVIDIA GPUs
- Refined design
- Great performance
- Easy overclocking
- Many ports
Cons
- I could use a better keyboard
- The trackpad is rigid
- Small format speakers
What sets the Triton 500 SE apart from your typical productivity laptop, aside from the powerful hardware, is its glorious 16-inch screen. It has a 16:10 aspect ratio, making it slightly higher than typical widescreen displays and more useful for handling documents. Our review unit ships with the 240 Hz WQXGA model (which runs at 2,560 by 1,600 pixels) which, in my book, is the ideal balance between sharpness and soft, silky soda. There’s no HDR support, but at least it offers a relatively high brightness of 500 nights, as well as full coverage of the DCI-P3 range. And while the screen is one of the main reasons the Triton weighs 5.3 pounds, this is even better than most 17-inch gaming laptops (the Razer Blade 17 weighs 5.5 pounds).
Intel’s 12th-generation processors and the latest GPUs in NVIDIA’s RTX 30 series power this glorious display, down to the RTX 3080 Ti. The drive we received includes this GPU, as well as Intel’s high-end Core i9 12900H, 32GB of LPDDR5 RAM, and a 1TB fast NVMe SSD. To be honest, it was this setup that inspired me to review the Triton 500 SE in the first place. I was wondering, can this simple laptop really satisfy gamers? It turns out that yes.
Halo Infinite, for example, achieved a solid 85fps at Triton’s native resolution with ultra graphics settings. Although I missed the HDR and expansive view I got used to on the Alienware QD-OLED ultra-wide monitor, I was amazed at how immersive the game was on a 16-inch screen. You can thank the highest aspect ratio of 16:10; at times it seemed to me as if I was about to dive headfirst into Halo Infinite maps. (This could also be a signal that I need to make my desktop a little more ergonomic for laptops.) The 240 Hz screen also glowed as I lowered the game’s graphics settings to achieve higher frame rates. I’m still not completely sold with such a high refresh rate, but it’s nice to see laptop makers pushing for a smoother, more realistic game.
Gearheads will likely appreciate the Triton 500 SE’s built-in overclocking capabilities. Acer’s software makes it easy to adjust the clock speed and thermal profiles. Personally, though, I was glad to have a simple “Turbo” button on my keyboard. It even increases the fans and automatically overclock the system. At Halo Infinite and all the benchmarks I ran, it typically resulted in an 8 to 10 percent performance boost. The big downside? It’s so loud you probably wouldn’t want to use it without headphones.
Devindra Hardawar / Engadget
Even without overclocking, the Triton 500 SE annihilated all the benchmarks we threw at it, delivering performance mostly the same as the Razer Blade 15. There were a few cases where the Razer advanced, as in the PCMark 10 and Geekbench 5 computational test (which mainly emphasizes the GPU). But in others, including the Cinebench R23 and 3DMark’s Port Royal ray tracing benchmark, the Triton had a major lead. This is partly due to the fact that our review unit has a slightly faster 12th generation processor. Press this Turbo switch and the Triton numbers will increase even more.
PCMark 10
3DMark (TimeSpy Extreme)
Geekbench 5
ATTO (higher reads / writes)
Acer Predator Triton 500 SE (2022, Intel i9-12900H, NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti)
6,779
4,887
1,736 / 11,382
6.4 GB / s / 4.9 GB / s
Razer Blade 15 (2022, Intel i7-12800H, NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti)
7,085
4,798
1,795 / 9,529
4.32 GB / s / 6.45 GB / s
ASUS Zephyrus G14 (2022, AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS, Radeon RX 6800S)
7,170
3,821
1,543 / 9,839
3.5 GB / s / 4 GB / s
ASUS Zephyrus G15 (AMD Ryzen 9 5900HS, NVIDIA RTX 3080 Max-Q)
6,881
4,530
1,426 / 7,267
3.3 GB / s / 2.85 GB / s
NVIDIA’s Advanced Optimus feature, which cleverly swaps the Triton GPU between integrated and unobtrusive graphics, also worked perfectly during my testing. I didn’t see any performance bottlenecks coming up with older Optimus machines, where unobtrusive GPUs had to be squeezed through integrated graphics. There is also a MUX switch that allows you to manually switch between the two GPUs without rebooting the entire system.
After benchmarking and playing several games for a few hours, the Triton 500 SE stayed relatively cool. The CPU typically hovered around 78 degrees Celsius under load, while the GPU reached 83 degrees Celsius. It never felt hot to the touch, though it’s worth noting that I was trying it out in my cold basement. Fan noise was what you’d expect from Triton’s default performance settings: audible, but not as irritating as starting them all the way with the Turbo button.
Devindra Hardawar / Engadget
But even though Acer got the right cooling and overall performance, it’s a shame that some of the Triton 500 SE’s hardware slowed it down. The keyboard is fine for gaming, but I’d like more comments for long typing sessions. And while I appreciated the large, smooth trackpad, the actual click mechanism felt stiff: it was especially bad for recording right clicks. I’m also not a fan of having a fingerprint sensor right on the trackpad, as it often interposes while sliding. Just plug this sensor into the power button, or set up a Windows Hello! I’d also like to see Acer include more than a couple of stereo speakers, mostly because Razer, Dell, and others are incorporating many more drivers into their laptops.
Battery life is another disappointment, though I guess we’ve gotten used to it on powerful gaming laptops. The Triton 500 SE lasted five hours and twenty-five minutes at our benchmark, which is to play HD video. That’s 17 minutes less than the Razer Blade 15. During my regular workday, it usually lasted about five hours before I needed a recharge. Unfortunately, this is typical of large-screen gaming laptops. You never want to be too far from a plug.
Still, I imagine most people would like to keep their workstations connected for the best performance. Acer also included all the ports you would need to turn it into a true workstation, including two USB 3.2 Type A connections, two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, HDMI, Ethernet, and an SD card slot. And thankfully, Acer hasn’t gotten rid of the headphone jack, something most laptop makers are doing these days.
The Acer Predator Triton 500 SE starts at $ 2,300, which is $ 200 less than the Razer Blade 15 with 12th-generation Intel chips and $ 400 less than the newer Blade 17. Be prepared to pay $ 3,000 if you want all the hardware in our review unit (even cheaper than comparable Razer and other machines). But if you can live with last year’s 11th generation Intel chips, you can also find older Triton 500 SE models for $ 2,000 or less. However, we recommend doing whatever it takes to get a 12th generation chip, as the performance difference is huge.
Devindra Hardawar / Engadget
In any case, the Triton 500 SE shows that Acer is doing more than just chasing gaming tricks. After being known for producing cheap and unsophisticated laptops for years, it’s nice to see that Acer can make a refined gaming laptop without any unnecessary.
All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, regardless of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn you an affiliate commission.