Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD Laptop Review

Do you want to buy the Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD?

Before buying a laptop everyone wants to collect accurate information about that laptop. Because for some people buying a new laptop is a big thing and for some people, it is not. But both types of people want to buy a perfect laptop that fulfills their needs. So, how do you know if a particular laptop is suitable for you or not? Yeah! Obviously checking a review of that laptop.

So, here we gave our honest Review of the Acer Predator Helios 500 based on research and experience. You will find authentic information and after reading this article finally, you will be able to decide whether this laptop is suitable for you or not. We discussed this laptop here thoroughly; from design and built to performance.

Read the article completely without missing any part. OK let’s get started.

Specs & Review of Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD Laptop

Acer Predator Helios 500

Technical Specifications

pros and cons

Acer Predator Helios 500 Review

Acer is the most famous brand of laptop. They manufacture powerful and durable laptops for all types of budgets. The Predator series of Acer brought the revolution in the laptop world. This series is one of the best powerful series of laptops in the world. 5 years back the predator called the world’s most powerful laptop. It is a powerful machine with multiple features that boosts your usability experience. Currently, we are reviewing here the Acer Predator Helios 500 (PH517-61-R0GX).

Also, check our article about the best 144hz laptops which will be really helpful for you in finding a good gaming laptop.

Display

Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD has an extremely bright and colorful display with 1920 x 1080p resolution. Furthermore, the laptop contains 17.3 inches IPS panel and also 144Hz refresh rate. This is a good thing because we barely see a good display at this price with a gaming laptop and this laptop has that. A good display means the color’s accuracy, decent brightness, and ideal refresh rate. Acer’s main target with this laptop is gamers so, you will get pretty decent gaming performance and experience. Most gamers want a big screen for gaming with a PC and in a laptop case, they attach an external display. But in this case, you will not find any issue with this laptop. Because this laptop not only has a big screen but exceptional graphics and image quality.

The thousands of LEDs backlights are used by mini LED technology to light up the display. In addition to this, there are 4,608 LEDs which are separated into 512 zones. Moreover, for your information, Apple uses the mini LED technology for their Macbooks and iPad pros because it provides better High Dynamic Range (HDR) and better brightness of the display.

The screen comes up with 300nits brightness, 92% sRGB, and 76% Adobe RGB. Moreover, if you want more enhanced display performance a 4k resolution option is available with the Acer Predator Helios 500 but that is a different model and you required a huge budget.

While playing games a lot of people face screen tearing which is common. This is because of the misalignment of the display refresh rate and the refresh rate of content. But thanks to AMD FreeSync by activating this issue will be sorted out. The AMD FreeSync technology supports fluctuating frame rates and stops tearing and stumbling. If your laptop has Nvidia’s GPU you can use the Nvidia G-Sync.

Design & Built

Its base or chassis color is black and has a noticeable finishing of blue color. For some users, the blue color is very impressive but for others, it is not the standard of gaming. Other than that the Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD is the standard of gaming for which it aims. On the top level, Acer’s Predator and Dell’s Alienware are strong competitors, especially design-wise. But this model of Helios 500 AMD 17 lies in the affordable category.

This bumpy design has good cuts with plastic built on the other hand we get the metallic body with the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S & Razer Blade 15 which are its competitors. Acer should go with an Aluminum frame body material in this price range, here with the plastic body it does not stand on merit. Because whenever we decide to buy a laptop above the $1,000 margin we have a lot of expectations, especially regarding the design; like we want the Aluminum body frame. But still, the plastic body of this laptop feels good and looks durable.

With a big and thicker size, it is also a heavy laptop that weighs around 8.82 pounds. PH517-61-R0GX is a gaming laptop so, these things we commonly saw in a gaming laptop which is not a big deal. The Dell Alienware 17 R5 which is similar to this laptop in design specs weighs around 10 pounds. And it has the AeroBlade 3D fan cooling system.

The Acer Predator Helios 500 AMD 17 is a good option to replace the older laptop.

Keyboard & Touchpad

For gamers or any type of user, the keypad or touchpad are two essential components. A good keypad is a promise on this laptop. The Keypad is ultra smooth and has multiple functionalities that enhance your usability experience. The WASD are very important keys for gamers and this laptop is for gamers. That’s why Acer builds the WASD keys in an authentic way and with optimization to enhance the gaming experience. WASD keys are different in colors and build with the Magforce, Racing, and Swappable features. You can gradually increase the pressure on WASD keys which will give you price control over them.

Moreover, by default, the keyboard has a blue haze backlight but there are also keys backlighting you can customize with the PredatorSense lighting software. The RGB color palette allows you to select a color according to your choice from the 16.8 million options. The trackpad color is also blue haze.

Here is another downfall regarding build quality because Acer uses here a plastic body touchpad instead of a glassy body. But it is acceptable in quality and performance, the gestures and click bars work well although it is not the largest in size which is available right now. The touch detection also looks decent here.

Memory and Storage

The Acer Predator Helios 500 AMD 17 model currently we are reviewing has the 16GB of RAM. But you can maximum add the 64GB of RAM. The RAM is DDR4 with 2666 MHz speed. This is enough for any task to handle as most of the performance sector is based on the CPU and GPU. But still, you have multiple options of RAM to choose from.

On the storage side, there are also multiple options and slots available to install. Mostly, it this laptop comes with 256GB SSD. You can go up further in storage options as it depends upon your budget and workload. The SSD which is installed on this laptop is fast and pretty good in read/write operations.

Performance

The Helios 500 is excellent in performance areas as it can handle any type of heavy task without any lag. The AMD Ryzen 7 is installed on the board of this laptop. Which is a 16 threads processor with a base clock speed of 3.7Ghz and a maximum turbo speed of 4.3Ghz. It is a desktop-level processor which will not disappoint you. Everything will work like a fly on this laptop.

Moreover, the 8GB AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 GPU is integrated with this laptop which is almost similar in performance to Nvidia GTX 1070 GPU. The GPU is powerful any task related to graphics will work fine here on this laptop like video rendering, gaming, designing, and creating.

When we talk about video rendering as most gamers want laptops for not only gaming but also streaming; this laptop is pretty good at that. It can render a premier pro video faster than the core i7 + GTX1070 and core i9 + GTX 1070. As every component of this laptop is of AMD so, collectively it performs well.

Also, in the GeekBench scores, it is above the i9 and i7 which is around 23300. Multitasking, also will not leave you alone. The Ryzen 7 is good at managing temperature and if something is left that AeroBlade 3D will fulfill it.

Gaming

Good gaming performance is the main target of this laptop and we think it is successful in that. What is a good gaming laptop? obviously which has the better display, powerful, CPU, Powerful GPU, good audio, and connectivity. All these things this laptop has so, you will not find any problem in this regard. If you want a good gaming laptop under $500 you can check our best cheap gaming laptops under $500 blog.

Taking about the frames of gaming at 1080p/ultra on the Radeon Vega 56 you can see below the list of different games with frame rates.

• Black OPS 4 – 121fps
• Overwatch – 148fps
• Fortnite – 117
• Doom – 158
• Witcher – 65

Now you have an idea of games and their graphics you can choose perfectly according to your need.

Audio

Good audio is mandatory for good gaming performance and the Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD has that. Moreover, you have a maximum of 78db max speakers volume. On most Acer laptops you can get good speakers quality. Acer brought multiple audio features with this laptop like custom tuning, maximization, and enhancement. You can adjust the sound quality according to your taste with these features.

However, the bass is not very good in sound and the sound is also a little brittle. But compare to the price it is acceptable and if this laptop is affordable for you then you can afford good headphones too or speakers.

When you switch on this laptop with a louder volume message appears that – Predator has Arrived.

Connectivity

In connectivity, there are multiple options available with this laptop for ports and wireless communication. When we talk about the ports options following ports are available.

• 3 x USB 3.0 Type-A ports
• 1 x Headphone/Microphone
• 1 x Kensington lock slot
• 2 x USB Type-C 3.1/Thunderbolt 3
• 1 x Ethernet port
• 1 x HDMI
• 1 x USB Type-C port

As it is bigger in size, it has many port options & almost all ports are available with this laptop. But the SD-card slot is missing here with this laptop that we commonly see with laptops nowadays. But wireless and USB communication solve this problem. The laptop is equipped with 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 5.0 wireless options.

Battery

Although, the Acer advertises the much more battery life which it actually provides. It is the most serious problem of this laptop as it can only give 2 hours and 46mins of battery life. Which is far below the similar Dell Alienware 17 R5 that provides 3 hours and 58 mins of battery life. But if you are a portable user and you carry this laptop to different places then this laptop is not for you as it is larger in size and heavy in weight. But for the user who is stuck to his desk battery is not a problem as it supports faster charging.

Conclusion

Acer Predator Helios 500 17 AMD is a powerful laptop as the multithreaded processor is good for managing heavy tasks. Moreover, the other factors also perform well and especially in the gaming department. You can consider this laptop as it gives value for your money. The battery is a serious issue but you are getting many other features that you should not ignore. If you still want to buy then go and check Amazon and other sites it is still available.