Acer Predator Helios 500 Review: A Powerful Gaming Laptop

iTechGuides is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Learn more

Acer Predator Helios 500: At First Glance

In recent times Acer has been one of the major pacesetters in the world of gaming laptops with their Acer Predator Helios series. Release after release, the Acer Predator Helios lineup has shown improvement and growth.

Thus, in 2021 Acer decided to come up with a gaming laptop that will stand out amongst all others. Hence, it came up with the Acer Predator Helios 500.

The Acer Predator Helios 500 is an impressive gaming laptop built with high-end specifications. As expected of a laptop that made such a respectable achievement, it does not come cheap.

Can the performance of this laptop justify its price tag? Read on to find out.

Acer Predator Helios 500: Design, Dimension, and Weight

In terms of design, the Acer Predator Helios 500 is a complete blend of bold and stunning. This laptop features a matte black chassis all around.

Following that, the interior deck, edges, and base are all made of rock-solid plastic material. However, the lid of the laptop is made of metal.

Focusing more on the lid, Acer replaced the Predator branding that we mostly see on Predator laptops, with a more subtle Predator logo. This predator logo has an outline of blue color which adds a little bit of elegance to the laptop’s lid.

Moving on to the interior, like most gaming laptops, the Acer Predator Helios 500 has its own fair share of backlighting. From the Predator logos to the power button, keyboard, and touchpad, this laptop comes fully lit.

Thankfully, Acer has even given you control over the backlight. Hence, you can disable the backlights, adjust the brightness or customize the lighting from the Predator Sense app.

That said, the laptop features a massive 17.3-inch display with a resolution of 4K UHD (3840 x 2160). Thanks to the 4K resolution, display contents will be very sharp and crisp.

In addition to having an impressive resolution, the display also has an IPS panel.

An IPS panel is a display technology that enables vivid displays and wide viewing angles. Thus, with this display, the Acer Predator Helios 500 offers you a comfortable viewing experience even when you view it from acute angles.

Still, on the display, it is surrounded by slim bezels on all sides. On the bottom bezel, you will find a small backlit Predator logo.

Meanwhile, you will find an HD webcam neatly placed on the top bezel. The HD webcam seems adequate enough for video calls.

However, the camera falls short in terms of taking pictures as it delivers blurry images.

Moving on to the laptop’s deck, the Acer Predator Helios 500 featured a full-sized chiclet-style keyboard. This keyboard has its keys colored in matte black with white lettering atop.

The keyboard also has stunning RGB backlighting which gives the Acer Predator Helios 500 a strong gaming identity. Overall, this keyboard offers a great and comfortable typing experience due to its soft keys and decent spacing.

Furthermore, with matte finishing on the arm-rest and around the keyboard, the laptop does an excellent job at repelling smudges and scratches. Hence, you don’t have to worry about scratches and smudges while using this laptop.

Moving on, seated below the keyboard area is the laptop’s touchpad. This touchpad comes with a pair of dedicated click buttons.

For more gaming signatures, the touchpad is also surrounded by RGB lights. However, the touchpad is quite small.

In my opinion, a wider touchpad would have been more suitable.

Nevertheless, the touchpad is highly responsive and smooth. More impressively, it supports multitouch gestures.

Speaking of multitouch gestures, you can perform a two-finger swipe to scroll, pinch-to-zoom, and three-finger tap.

That said, for connectivity, the Acer Predator Helios 500 offers an excellent port selection around its sides. Precisely, this laptop offers a USB Type-A port, 2 USB Type-C ports on the right side.

Still, on the right side, you also get an HDMI port and a Thunderbolt 4 port. Meanwhile, on the left side of the laptop, you will find an Ethernet port and 2 USB Type-A ports.

That is not all, though, you still get an audio jack and a mini display port on the right side of Acer Predator Helios 500.

Measuring 400 x 319.2 x 35.30 mm (W x D x H) and weighing 3900 g, the Acer Predator Helios 500 is indeed a heavy and large laptop. Hence, it is certainly not a laptop you can just throw into your backpack and carry around.

Furthermore, when compared with the laptops in its category, the Acer Predator Helios 500 weighs more. For example, it is heavier than the Acer Predator Helios 300.

Specifically, Acer Predator Helios 300 measures 363.2 x 254 x 22.8 mm (W x D x H) and weighs 2499.2 g.

Overall, the Acer Predator Helios 500 is heavier than some of its counterparts. Nevertheless, its design is very stunning.

Therefore, I will rate this laptop a nine out of ten in this design section of the review.

Acer Predator Helios 500: Processor (CPU) Performance

For processing tasks, the Acer Predator Helios 500 uses an Intel core i9-11980HK processor. In terms of speed, this processor offers a base frequency of 3.30 GHz, and a maximum frequency of 5.0 GHz.

Furthermore, this Intel Core i9 processor is an 8 core processor with 24 MB cache memory. Not just that, this processor is an 11th generation high-end processor that is mostly used for gaming laptops.

Therefore, with this processor, the Acer Predator Helios 500 should be able to perform demanding tasks smoothly. Also, this laptop should be able to double up in performance due to its high clock speed of 5.0 GHz.

To validate the above statement, I will discuss the laptop’s processor performance in the Cinebench R23 benchmark test. If you’re inquisitive to know, the Cinebench R23 is a benchmark test that measures the processor performance of a computer by using its cores.

Therefore, this test is divided into two – single-core and multi-core. For better understanding, the single-core test evaluates the processor performance when only one of its cores is in use.

Meanwhile, the multicore test evaluates the processor performance when all of its cores are in use. Therefore, a high score in this test equates to better processor performance.

From the Cinebench R23 test the Acer Predator Helios 500 had a single-core score of 1564 points. Meanwhile, this laptop scored 13300 points in the multi-core test.

In comparison, the Aorus 17G YD scored 1497 points in the single-core test. For its multi-core test, the Aorus 17G YD earned 12862 points.

Moreover, it is worth noting that the Aorus 17G YD comes with a less powerful 11th generation Intel Core i7-11800H processor.

In conclusion, the Acer Predator Helios 500 processor was able to handle intensive operations with ease. In addition to that, the laptop performed better than the competitor I matched it against.

Therefore, I will rate the Acer Predator 500 a nine out of ten in this processor review section.

Acer Predator Helios 500: Memory (RAM) Performance

In terms of memory, the Acer Predator Helios 500 comes with 2 DDR4 SDRAM memory slots. For the memory capacity, this laptop ships with a standard memory capacity of 32 GB.

Although 32 GB RAM is remarkable already, this laptop still allows you to upgrade if there is a need for it. Hence, you can upgrade the RAM of this laptop to 64 GB.

However, in this review, we will look at the performance of an Acer Predator Helios 500 with 32 GB RAM.

With 32 GB of RAM, the Acer Predator Helios 500 should be able to open several Chrome tabs, as well as stream videos on YouTube without delays. Moreover, multitasking and tasks like video editing should be very swift on the laptop.

Having said that, let’s discuss the laptop’s RAM performance result on the PCMark 10 benchmark test. Wondering what this is?

Well, the PCMark 10 is a benchmark test that measures the RAM performance of a computer.

Furthermore, the higher the score on this test, the better the performance of the computer. Thus, based on the test result, the Acer Predator Helios 500 scored 7748 points.

In comparison, this laptop performed better than some of its close competitors. One of such competitors is the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S17 which scored 7245 points.

In summary, the Acer Predator Helios 500 offers good performance in the benchmark test. It is also very proficient at multitasking.

Therefore, the laptop deserves a rating of nine in this RAM performance review section.

Acer Predator Helios 500: Storage Options and Performance

For storage, Acer Predator Helios 500 comes with up to 2 TB SSD storage. Sadly, the laptop does not offer an SD card slot which would have allowed users to expand the storage.

Nevertheless, the 2 TB SSD is enough storage space. Hence, you are less likely to need an upgrade or run out of space to store your files and games.

Furthermore, in terms of transfer speed, SSD storage is the fastest and most efficient. Therefore, the laptop’s 2 TB SSD should be able to duplicate 5.01 GB of files in just 3 seconds at a rate of 1,700 MBps.

To further back up the above statement, I will briefly highlight the laptop’s performance on the CrystalDiskmark test. To help you understand, I will briefly explain what the CrystalDiskmark test is.

It is a benchmark test that measures the read and writes speed of a computer’s storage drive.

If you’re wondering, the read speed simply means how quickly a computer’s storage drive opens a file. Meanwhile, the write speed denotes how quickly it saves a file.

Furthermore, a high read and write speed (MBps) on the CrystalDiskmark test signifies a better storage performance.

For the results of the Acer Predator Helios 500, it had a sequential read speed of 1001 MBps.

Meanwhile, for sequential write speed, it achieved 484.1 MBps.

In comparison, the Acer Predator Helios 300 had a sequential read speed of 490.1 MBps and a sequential write speed of 136.1 MBps.

In conclusion, although the Acer Predator Helios 500 does not offer an SD card slot for storage expansion, its 2 TB SSD is enough to save files and games. Also, this laptop beat one of its competitors on a benchmark test.

Therefore, I will rate the Acer Predator Helios 500 a nine out of ten in this storage review section.

Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Support on Ko-Fi

Acer Predator Helios 500: Graphics Card Performance

The Acer Predator Helios 500 employs an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card. This graphics card offers a base frequency of 1100 MHz.

More excitingly, this NVIDIA graphics card can be boosted to a maximum frequency of 1710 MHz.

Furthermore, this NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 offers a dedicated VRAM of 16 GB GDDR6. “Dedicated” here means that the graphics card does not share the computer’s memory with the processor for graphics-based tasks.

To offer further explanation, a VRAM is a special type of RAM that stores image data precisely and facilitates graphic content on a laptop. The primary benefit of having a dedicated VRAM is that it provides you with a satisfying graphic performance.

Since this is a gaming laptop, the need for a good graphics card is necessary. Hence, it is safe to say that Acer did a nice job by employing the right GPU for this laptop.

For the performance check, let’s quickly discuss the laptop’s 3DMark 11 test results. Briefly, 3DMark 11 is a benchmark tool that is used to measure the gaming abilities of a computer’s GPU.

Therefore, the higher the score on this test, the better the gaming performance of the computer.

With that said, the Acer Predator Helios 500 scored 31401 points in the above test. In comparison, the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S17 scored 28939 points.

Meanwhile, it is important to know that the ASUS ROG Zephyrus also comes with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card.

In summary, the Acer predator Helios 500 employs a graphics card that performed above the average score for gaming laptops which is 28152 points. Also, this laptop exceeded one of its closest competitors on the benchmark test.

Thus, the laptop deserves a rating of nine in this graphics review section.

Acer Predator Helios 500: Battery Life and Performance

In terms of battery, the Acer Predator Helios 500 utilizes a 4-cell Lithium-Ion battery. Also, Acer claims that this battery can last up to 4 hours.

In my opinion, the battery life is rather too short compared to what other 17-inch full-size laptops offer these days. However, I must say that 4 hours is the average battery life expected of most gaming laptops.

However, to confirm Acer’s claim, let’s discuss the laptop’s battery performance while carrying out standard computing operations. With the screen’s brightness set at 180 nits, the laptop only lasted for 3 hours while multitasking.

Also, in a video playback test, the laptop only lasted for about 2 to 4 hours at the same 180 nits brightness. In comparison, the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S17 battery lasted for 7 hours in the same video playback test.

In conclusion, the Acer Predator Helios 500 underperformed in comparison with the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S17. However, it still performed within the 4 hours average battery run time for gaming laptops.

Therefore, I will rate the Acer Predator Helios 500 a seven out of ten in this battery review section.

Frequently Asked Questions

Conclusion

Overall, the Acer Predator Helios 500 is an impressive performance gaming laptop. Considering that it had just been released, it was able to trade blows with other high-end gaming laptops in its category.

Furthermore, the solid build quality and vivid 4K resolution display of this laptop are noteworthy. In addition to that, the powerful processor and GPU of this laptop are its main selling point over its competitors.

However, in terms of battery life, the laptop falls short. Hence, if you are looking for an all-day-long battery life laptop, this is not a laptop I will recommend.

Nonetheless, if you want a gaming laptop that is capable of playing modern titles, the Acer Predator Helios 500 is capable. However, you will have to leave it plugged in while you play.

I hope you found this Acer Predator Helios 500 review helpful. If you found the review helpful, we would love to hear from you.

Kindly spare two minutes to share your thoughts with our community using the comments form below.

Alternatively, simply respond to the “Was this page helpful” question below and provide us with your feedback.

Finally, for more laptop reviews, visit our Laptop Reviews page. You may also find our Laptop Specs page very helpful.

Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.