Acer Predator Helios 3D 15 SpatialLabs Edition - Review
Gaming laptops have certainly become more popular over the last decade, and this is certainly due to the rapid growth in technological advancements that allow us to cram more powerful components into smaller spaces such as smartphones and of course, laptops. The gaming industry has also broadened its market and expanded its reach over the past ten years and this has seen a lot of new people take up the hobby, people that have never owned a desktop PC in their lives and stick with the weapon of choice that they are used to, a laptop.
There is no denying that more and more people are choosing the versatility of a gaming laptop these days over a bulky desktop, despite having to pay a considerable premium to reach the same type of performance as a desktop can. Acer are considered to be one of the more reputable brands when it comes to both desktops and laptops, and they are looking to dominate the gaming laptop corner of the market with their Nitro and Predator series of devices. The Acer Predator Helios 3D 15 SpatialLabs Edition is one of the more premium devices in their range and thanks to Acer I was able to put the device through its paces for a few weeks and share my thoughts.
Design and build quality
The first thing you will notice about the device when you pull it out of the box is its weight, the device itself weighs in at a shade under 3kg and measures at 35.94 x 28.08 x 2.79cm. This is a chunky boy and that’s before the massive 330W power brick comes into the equation, which unfortunately I could not get an accurate weight for but its size is roughly 18.5 x 8.5 x 3.5cm. The weight and size of both the laptop and the power brick certainly hurt its portability but it is also understandable once you understand what lies under the hood of this beast. The laptop is built from a combination of metal and plastic and the quality is very impressive, the device feels very solid, though given its weight I wouldn’t want to test out the build quality by dropping it on the floor, in saying that though I would be more worried about the floor surviving more than the device itself.
The design and styling at least for a gaming laptop is restrained and more professional looking than other gaming laptops. It doesn’t scream GAMER right in your face, which in my opinion is a good thing, once you turn the device on though it screams GAMER loudly and proudly, more on that later. The centrepiece of the unit is its large 15.6” display which sports thin bezels at its sides with a thicker bezel at the top which also houses the eye tracking sensors and webcams needed for the laptops 3D features, and a thick bezel at the bottom which is also emblazoned boldly with an Acer Predator logo. Below the display you will find a large keyboard complete with numpad and a decently sized trackpad. The bottom of the laptop features a bunch of cooling vents and also large rubber feet to keep the device elevated higher than the surface you are using it on for more effective cooling. The Acer Predator Helios 15 SpatialLabs edition is definitely not the type of laptop you want to use in bed and have sitting on top of a blanket, this bad boy needs air and lots of it to keep it cool. As far as inputs go the left side of the unit features a LAN port, a USB 3 port, a Micro SD slot and a headphone jack. The back of the laptop has 2 USB C ports which support video alt mode and power delivery, a HDMI connector and this is also where the power jack plugs in, not many laptops have the power jack at the back, but I am a big fan of it, especially when it comes to cable management. The right side of the unit features another two USB 3 ports, so there is certainly a lot of options here when it comes to connectivity.
Hardware
The hardware inside the Acer Predator Helios 3D 15 SpatialLabs edition reads like a smorgasbord of everything you would want when it comes to gaming performance, especially in a portable unit. From the moment you turn this laptop on and boot it up you know you are dealing with some serious power as the startup sound plays out like a futuristic spaceship launching into the stratosphere and RGB lighting spews forth from both the keyboard and back of the unit, this is where no mistake can be made, this beast is built for gaming. The laptop features an Intel 13th Generation Core i9 13900HX processor and 32GB of DDR5 5600 MHz RAM and its no slouch in the graphics department either as it also sports an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 with 12GB GDDR6 VRAM, storage is covered by a 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD.
One of the more puzzling decisions relating to the device is the choice of screen, it features a 15.6” display capable of 4k resolution with 350 nits maximum brightness but the refresh rate of the panel is a lowly 60Hz. I really don’t understand why this choice was made when this is a premium gaming laptop with a price tag to match, 60Hz is considered bare minimum for gaming these days with most gamers turning their nose up at any refresh rate lower than 144Hz. I really think it is absolutely baffling as to why the screen has such a low refresh rate, especially because the screen itself is one of the most clear, bright and vivid displays I have ever had the pleasure of viewing as far as laptops are concerned. The issue with the low refresh rate can be bypassed by plugging the laptop into a monitor but that kind of negates the point of paying the premium for a portable device.
The laptops speakers are suitably loud and clear even at higher volumes but lack bass, they are perfectly fine for watching movies or YouTube but I wouldn’t recommend them for extended gaming sessions, most gamers worth their salt use headphones though so I doubt speakers will be high on the list of features that people who are considering purchasing this laptop will be worried about.
The display comes with a pretty big trick up its sleeve though, and that is the SpatialLabs 3D integration, whether you find the feature actually useful is solely up to you, but I certainly had a bunch of fun playing around with it. What is SpatialLabs 3D though, I hear you ask? It is a special software and hardware solution that allows you to view things such as games and movies in 3D without wearing 3D glasses, remember the Nintendo 3DS? It’s kind of like that. I didn’t have much success getting 3D movies to play on the unit and from what I have read on various places on the internet people seem to have varying degrees of success getting the system to work with movies but I wasn’t too concerned with this as its not what I would use the function for in the first place, I would mainly use it for its gaming capabilities. As of writing this article the SpatialLabs software supports 139 games including some big names such as Baldurs Gate 3, Days Gone, Tiny Tinas Wonderland and many others, with more being added in the future. I tried both Days Gone and Tiny Tinas Wonderland with the software and both games performed well without having to change any settings whatsoever, just run the game and BLAM! You are gaming in 3D without the need for glasses, the one downside to doing this though is that the game will not render in 4K and the resolution will drop to 1080p, despite of this I still found it to be a unique and enjoyable experience. The SpatialLabs software is pretty bare bones though and lacks polish especially when it comes to the video viewing component so hopefully this can be rectified with future updates. Whether you see the SpatialLabs 3D capability as a unique party trick or something that you can see yourself using often will be the deciding point on whether you find it value for money.
The keyboard is generously sized and one of the of the best keyboards I have ever used when it comes to a laptop, just keep in mind it feels springy in nature so if that’s not your thing then you might not like it as much as me, the trackpad is also great and very responsive. The unit is also adequately equipped with multiple connectivity options such as a LAN port, headphone jack, micro SD card slot, three USB 3 ports of the type A variety, two USB 3 ports of the type C variety, and a HDMI connector for connecting to a display.
Performance
As you would expect from a laptop crammed full of some of the latest and greatest hardware the unit performs remarkably well not only in benchmark tests such as 3D Mark Steel Nomad and Cinebench but it pretty much eats every game thrown at it for breakfast. The device also manages to stay surprisingly cool under full load with the GPU averaging around 75 degrees and the CPU around 85 degrees which is pretty impressive for a laptop, of course the downside to this is that the unit will sound like you are standing at the centre of the main runway at Tullamarine airport during an airshow because of the noise of the fans that are actively trying to cool the unit, this is not much of a problem if you game with headphones on like I do but if you plan to use the laptop in a public place then you might get some weird looks. You can tune the fans through the included PredatorSense app but keep in mind if you lower the cooling then your performance may suffer from thermal throttling.
If you want extreme performance then it is going to require a lot of power and while the Predator is equipped with a beefy 90 Watt hour battery, nothing short of a nuclear power plant will keep this beast running for more than a few hours at a time, thankfully the 330W power brick will charge the laptop back up to 100% in just over an hour to get you back up and running as quickly as possible. Realistically you will get about an hour or so life out of the battery playing games at full performance level and around 3 and a half hours browsing the web with some light video watching, you can use the PredatorSense software to tweak settings and get more life out of the battery but this will come at the cost of performance and for how much more life you will get is ultimately not worth it. Even though this is a laptop and one of its main selling points is its portability the reality of the situation is that hardware this powerful requires a lot of power to run it, so don’t forget to take your massive charging brick with you before you leave home! If battery longevity is more important to you than pure performance then you might want to look at one of the other gaming laptops in Acers range, especially if you plan on being away from a power socket for extended periods of time.
3D Mark Steel Nomad: 3903
Cinebench GPU : 15677
Cinebench CPU (Multi Core): 1496
Cinebench CPU (Single Core): 101
Heaven Benchmark : 2977
Software
The Acer Predator Helios 15 comes pre-loaded with Microsoft Windows 11 which is great, until you realise that the version loaded onto the laptop is unfortunately also infested with a lot of bloatware. This type of practice is really puzzling when it comes to performance based devices such as a gaming laptop, the majority of gamers are pretty tech savvy at least to the point of being able to choose which software they would prefer to have installed on their device, give your customers the choice of what they want to install Acer, don’t force it down their throats, especially on a device that costs well over $7000. The name McCafee is enough to send most tech savvy gamers running away screaming loudly, possibly even into oncoming traffic all just to avoid dealing with the multiple pop ups and advertisements that adorn the screen just from having the software installed, yet here it is, on a gaming laptop, in the year 2024….c’mon Acer…read the room, know your audience. It is not only McAfee wither there are several other bloatware apps installed by default on the laptop that will send pop ups to your screen on a consistent basis. I would highly recommend doing a full reinstall of Windows if you purchase this laptop, not just so you don’t have to deal with the pop ups you will most likely also notice some good performance games and get some extra battery life simply from not having the bloatware running in the background. The only preinstalled software that was useful was the SpatialLabs software for the 3D functionality and the Acer PredatorSense software that provides heaps of functionality in regard to changing power settings and tailoring things such as the RGB lighting to your own personal preferences.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that the Acer Predator Helios 3D 15 SpatialLabs edition is a mouthful to say, I highly recommend Acer adopt a new naming system for simplicities sake, there is also no doubt that it is an absolute beast of a machine and is currently one of the most powerful gaming laptops on the market, at $7,599 AUD you would expect nothing less, especially considering you could buy two desktop PCs with roughly the same specs for the same price. Lamborghinis cost a lot of money and deliver a lot of performance, so does the Acer Predator Helios 15, if you like performance then it will cost you! The main things holding me back from giving me a glowing recommendation of the laptop other than the massive price tag is the fact that the screen is only 60Hz which is practically a criminal mistake in a performance gaming laptop and also the fact that the device comes loaded with bloatware, something that should never ever be installed on a device costing over $7,000. Performance is great, it does what it says on the tin, but the price tag on the tin is also rather high, especially when compared to desktop PCs of similar or even greater power, I guess it just depends on how important portability is to you.
The Pros
Performs extremely well both in benchmarks and with any game I threw at it
Keyboard is spacious and great to type on
Screen is one of the most bright and vivid I have had the pleasure of using on a laptop
Laptop remains cool even after extended usage
SpatialLabs 3D functionality is more than a gimmick and impressive when it comes to gaming
The Cons
The size and weight of the device and the power brick, and limited battery life severely hurt the portability of the device.
Screen is only 60Mhz, at this price point this simply doesn’t cut it
Windows install is full of bloatware which quite frankly is offensive for a laptop costing more than $7000
