Acer Predator Helios 300 Core i7 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/128 GB SSD/Windows 10 Home/4 GB Graphics) G3-572 Gaming Laptop15.6 inch, Black, 2.7 kg

IPS panel with a matte finish which is always nice to have. It is sharp and colors look good thanks to the 81 percent sRGB color gamut coverage. Heat management is done thanks to two inbuilt fans. As soon as you turn on a heavy game or anything that requires higher performance, the dual fans speed up to cool the innards. Alternatively, you can control fan speeds manually thanks to the pre-installed Predator Sense app. The trackpad has a smooth surface and a red outline. It offers a decent size but the left and right clicks are a bit soft. The Windows gestures work good too and are very responsive. Acer has also added two easy access panels at the bottom to upgrade or replace the RAM or HDD.

Build and Design: The Helios 300 has a brushed aluminum panel atop a plastic frame which looks good as well as help keeping the flex to a minimum. The red plastic inserts may not have back-lighting, but they do look good and give it a distinctive look. Connectivity and ports: On the connectivity front, you get all the essentials a gaming laptop of this genre should have. Starting from the left we have a gigabit ethernet jack, USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-C port, HDMI out, USB 3.0 port and a SD card reader. The right side of the machine has the power port, two USB 2.0 ports and a microphone / headphone jack combo. Besides this you get Bluetooth as well as Qualcomm made gigabit WiFi adapter. While all this is good, we would have appreciated the laptop more if all three USB ports on the machine supported USB 3.0 standard, considering the price tag is 1 lakh plus. Display: The 15.6-inch IPS LCD panel on the machine is not super bright, but is just good enough to be viewed indoors. It is also anti-reflective, thanks to the matte display. Furthermore, the display is well calibrated out of the box, colors are accurate and has the right level of saturation. Keyboard and touchpad: The red backlighting adds the gaming quotient into the mix and is just bright enough to be visible under dim lighting. The touchpad on the other hand is quite good and simple to use. The touchpad tracks well, is precise and large enough to be used via a thumb. Performance: The laptop is powered by an Intel Core i7-7700HQ processor, has 8GB of DDR4 RAM and a powerful NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti GPU. For storage, you have a combination of a 1TB HDD from Toshiba and a 128GB SSD from Intel. All this combine to offer smooth 1080p gaming across all kinds of gaming titles in medium / high settings. If you find the power lacking, Acer has added minor tweak settings in the Predator Sense app. While this app only allows for CPU monitoring, it allows the user to overclock the GPU. You get two overclock presets - "faster" and "turbo", which can be put to effective use with the user controllable fan control settings. When it comes to gaming performance and numbers, graphic intensive games such as Battlefield 1 and Dishonored 2 run above 45fps at the highest settings. If you are into more casual games such DOTA 2 or Path of Exile, expect the frame rate counter hitting above 100fps consistently, even after long gaming day long gaming sessions. The cooling copes up with all this gaming well, but the laptop does get a little hot above the top row of keys. The laptop comes with a dual speaker system which is decent at best. It lacks a subwoofer, but at least the stereo audio quality is clear. However, what matter is the audio quality via headphones and that is quite good as the laptop supports Dolby Atmos. Battery life: The laptop manages to offer 4-5 hours of screen on-time on battery mode, depending on the kind of workload you have. Pros: Good performance for 1080p gaming, High gamer appeal in terms of looks and design, Good quality display in terms of colors, Slim and light weight for a gaming laptop. Cons: Display is on the dimmer side, key travel could have been better, heats up a bit under extended gaming periods, sound output is clear but could have been louder.

Predator is the name given to Acer's gaming notebooks. Helio 300 is the latest offering from the company and it offers specifications we have not seen from any other brand at this price. Special mention to the thermal design with dual AeroBlade fans-these are custom, ultrathin metal fans that enable better and quieter airflow to cool the massive heat-generating components inside. The Helios 300 impresses with its stylish and sturdy design-it has a brushed metal finish lid and palm rest. On top are red accents with the Predator logo engraved in silver. Overall, the Acer Predator Helios 300 is a winner in our books. It offers great performance, top-notch specifications, stylish design and saves you some money.