The Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 is a sleek and premium gaming laptop that looks as good as it performs. Available in black or white, the Triton 500’s aluminum build gives it a smooth, cool feel with a matte finish that feels great to touch. At just under 5 pounds (4.6 pounds), this 15″ gaming laptop is light enough to carry around without too much strain but still sturdy enough to withstand daily use and travel.
Contents
Display
The 15.6-inch display features a Full HD (1920 x 1080) resolution, which is pretty standard for this size laptop. The screen has an anti-glare matte finish, so it can be viewed from many different angles without being washed out by reflections or glare. Acer claims that the Triton 500’s screen has a contrast ratio of 1000:1 and 1 million:1 for brightness.
The colors are rich, with decent color accuracy and brightness levels measured at 322 nits according to our tests. That said, I didn’t notice any particularly outstanding viewing angles on this laptop’s panel; it doesn’t hold up quite as well as some other high-end gaming notebooks we’ve tested in this regard—but it still gets the job done well enough that you’ll want to play games on here instead of a smaller tablet or smartphone screen (although if you’re looking for something more portable than a 15-inch laptop then check out our list of best laptops under $500).
Keyboard and Touchpad
The keyboard has a good layout, with the function row above the number pad and dedicated Home, End, Page Up and Page Down keys. The power button is in the top-right corner of the keyboard, which I prefer to having it on top of the laptop. The arrow keys are small but have enough space between them to avoid accidentally pressing both up-arrows at once.
The backlight comes in red or white, but you can’t change brightness levels or turn it off entirely. It’s not particularly bright—I found myself leaving it on all day without noticing that there was any difference in brightness when I used red instead of white backlighting—but it’s useful for typing in dim lighting conditions like movie theaters (the Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 does not offer VGA).
The keyboard has a full 1¾” of travel—not bad for an ultrabook! When combined with a soft palm rest and keys that feel mushy under my fingers but don’t make much noise when pressed down (except for F6), this makes for comfortable typing experience overall even though I sometimes accidentally hit other keys because they’re so close together as a result of having so many rows crammed into such tight space on such small chassis.
Upgradeability
The RAM and SSD are easily accessible and can be upgraded by the end user. The RAM is not soldered to the motherboard, so it can be upgraded without much difficulty. However, this isn’t something we would recommend doing yourself. If you’re going to upgrade your laptop’s hardware, we suggest ordering it directly from Acer instead of attempting it yourself.
The SSD can also be upgraded after purchase but requires a bit more knowledge on your part than upgrading RAM does. If you’re interested in doing this upgrade at home, make sure that you have all of the necessary tools before starting or else damage may occur to either your laptop or components inside of it (and possibly even yourself).
Performance
The Triton 500 PT515-51 is powered by the Intel Core i7-9750H processor and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 GPU, providing excellent CPU and GPU performance for gaming, video editing, and other demanding workloads. It also has 64GB of DDR4 RAM which can be expanded to up to 512GB. This laptop performed well in our benchmarks with very few slowdowns even when running multiple programs at once (including a game). Along with its excellent CPU performance, we found that this laptop was able to handle most graphics-intensive tasks without slowing down—and its SSD helped keep things running smoothly overall.
The Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 has an SDD storage device that allows you to load games or applications quickly while also reducing wear on the hard drive itself. In addition, if you’re looking for additional storage space then there are two more M2 slots available under the keyboard where additional drives can be added as needed.
Memory: Upgradable memory slot for up to 512GB DDR4 2666MHz SODIMM RAM; four SO-DIMM slots total (two accessible)
Graphics and Gaming
The Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 is a powerful gaming laptop that’s been upgraded to include NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 graphics and an 8th Gen Intel Core i7 processor. The RTX 2080 delivers more than enough power to play today’s most demanding AAA titles at 60 frames per second (fps) or higher, while its dedicated GPU cooling system ensures smooth performance in the heat of battle. Its 144Hz display supports G-Sync for super-smooth gameplay, and it features ultra-fast 4K touchscreen capabilities for a truly immersive experience.
The Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 can handle running multiple programs at once without slowing down too much thanks to its 16GB DDR4 RAM, which means you’ll have plenty of RAM available for your favorite games and other applications. And with up to 1TB NVMe PCIe SSD storage capacity, you’ll have plenty of room for all your files as well!
Battery Life
Battery life is a little disappointing. In our battery benchmark, which loops an HD video at fixed brightness, the Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 lasted just 5 hours and 18 minutes. That’s a bit short of the 6 hours and 10 minutes that we got from its predecessor, Acer’s Predator 15 G9-793 (which had slightly weaker hardware).
It’s not terrible for an ultraportable gaming laptop, but it won’t last you through an entire flight or night at a hotel before needing to be plugged in again. One area where this laptop does excel is with its charging speed: It can charge up to 80 percent of its battery capacity in about 30 minutes thanks to Quick Charge 3 technology built into its charger (though you’ll need to buy the charger separately).
Webcam
The webcam is a 720p camera with a wide field of view, which means that it can capture more of the room than most webcams. The quality of the image is decent and there’s no pixellation or lag when moving through the camera’s field of view. It also has an IR sensor, so you can use it in low light settings such as bathrooms or kitchens.
Heat
The Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 has a 15.6” screen and weighs 6.7 pounds, making it one of the heaviest gaming laptops we reviewed. It gets warm when playing games but not hot enough to cause discomfort when playing for long periods of time or during intense gaming sessions.
The device gets warm on the bottom panel only, which is also where you’ll find the exhaust vents for all internal heat dissipation. If you’re getting an Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 (or any other gaming laptop), make sure that whatever surface you place it on can handle some extra heat from your laptop’s CPU and GPU. A soft cloth will protect your desk from scratches if there are any problems with this arrangement; otherwise, consider using something like a cooling pad instead of placing it directly on top of your desk or table without protection between it and whatever surface you put it onto!
If you plan on using your Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 while charging up its battery pack then don’t worry too much about overheating issues because even though both components get pretty hot at times they are designed well enough so as not interfere with each other too much during use–that being said if they do start causing problems then just use common sense before continuing any further: either stop playing video games until things cool down again or take breaks every hour or so until everything has cooled down enough again then restarting right away after such rest periods would be wise choices here.
Software and Warranty
Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 ships with Windows 10 Home installed. The laptop also comes with a 1-year limited hardware warranty, which can be extended to three years for an additional $59.
You can download all of the software that comes preinstalled on Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 from the Acer website or from Microsoft’s Windows Store. However, some of these apps are only available in English and some are only available in languages other than English (or both).
The Acer Predator Triton 500 PT515-51 delivers strong performance, a colorful screen and great speakers in an aluminum chassis
The 15.6-inch display has wide 178-degree viewing angles, which makes it easy to share with others (though you might want to refrain from doing so during game play). The IPS panel is also bright at 400 nits and offers good color accuracy for both gaming and everyday use.
You’ll find plenty of ports on either side of the laptop: two USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type A ports, one HDMI port (1/2), one mini DisplayPort 1/2 connector and one RJ45 Ethernet connector are all placed conveniently around the edge of the machine. You won’t have any trouble connecting it up to multiple monitors or external hard drives; however some cables will be difficult or impossible to plug into those ports because they’re so close together—this could be an issue if you need access while playing games on this system’s screen only (no additional monitors connected).
