Acer Predator (Vega 56+Ryzen 2) Helios 500

Ideally the gaming laptop would have two slots, with a priority of as fast speed as possible for two sticks. They could also make a workstation version, with four slower slots. If they do announce something it will likely be at CES in two months. I wouldn't be surprised if we also saw an Alienware Area 51m V2 AMD variant. They already just released a desktop using that B550A chipset. It would also be weird if you could mix and match AMD / Intel CPU's with AMD / Nvidia GPU's. Probably the first time ever for a laptop if they end up doing that with the new 51m.

 

I hope there wont be an AMD Alienware, their new chassis got terrible cooling.
That Acer at least got proper cooling on it.
Its likely Acer might make a second edition of that laptop as 5700M is coming closer to reality.

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Because, of those 4 RAM slots, two that come with pre-installed RAM are right below the kb which require disassembly of the entire unit to reach (which is not a good idea for a unit that's brand new and still under warranty).

Also, instead of using 2600MhZ or 3000MhZ RAM, Acer used 2400MhZ with high latencies, which didn't exactly extract most performance out of Zen+.
Zen2 really needs 3000-3200MhZ RAM with low latencies to run at optimum... otherwise, using 2600MhZ for example would result in much lower performance (especially in games).

Furthermore, Zen 2 doesn't play too well with quad memory. What's the point in adding RAM slots when you cannot make the most use of them in regards to performance and only increase the RAM quantity (there needs to be a viable implementation here that works properly).
AM4 is intricately limited to dual-channel. So, there's no point in wasting resources by adding more RAM slots.

Besides, in Helios 500, if you tried populating all 4 RAM slots, the memory speed would 'default' to 2400MhZ (though this is mostly due to how Acer set up the BIOS).
They crippled the machine unnecessarily from the get go... I'd rather they learn from those mistakes.
If they want to give it 4 RAM slots, they better put them all on the same (easily accessible) side which doesn't require full disassembly, and don't cripple the RAM speeds if you populate all RAM slots.

The cooling however was superb... they shouldn't really change that (improve upon it further if possible yes).

 

This is not true at all and stop with these forum nonsenses about ram performance, you dont have any proof sorry and you spreading what you read on forums. I TESTED on my own with 32gb of ram and 48gb (and 64gb on the way in few weeks, its not a priority, i want to populated with all dual rank rams and check the difference) and i can tell you, in cb r15 benchmark is not slower but better by 1 point, in games is not worse but is the same performance on 1080p high-ultra settings (or better). And ryzen dont have problems with 4 dimm rams, but with higher clocked rams because they are not stable at all or even wont go past 2400mhz even on desktop mobos, its a difference, and you cant overclock ram that much and you can forget about ram timings too.

And my ram (which comes with predator) runs on cl13-14-13-30, problem solved

Ram speed is not a limit with this laptop, but is a GPU. Most of the games gpu bottleneck a cpu!

Its not a proof, i will test by myself soon.


Look my CPU score
https://www.3dmark.com/compare/spy/9326735/spy/8885339#

 

The video in question shows 2700x (not 2700) and the RAM was operating at 3200MhZ.
Furthermore, the motherboard in the video was X470 with latest bios (at the time of filming).

You cannot possibly assert that same conditions (and results) would apply to Helios 500 where it was confirmed by others (and independent testing) that RAM speed automatically drops to 2400MhZ when people populated all 4 slots with RAM (something which was reported by users in this forum) even if you put higher speed RAM into the unit.

Also, other testing demonstrated that higher RAM speeds DO affect gaming performance and that Ryzen (especially Zen1 and Zen+) can be affected by such low speeds.

In quad channel, the RAM speed may not drop too much or at all on a desktop motherboard (especially X470 with a latest bios), but what about Helios 500 with cut down BIOS which seemed to have been castrated for all intense and purposes and usually has 2700 CPU to work with?

Also, your 3d Mark score tells me nothing as (again), it compares 2700X cpu with more RAM (how on Earth did you get 49GB RAM?) and a better SSD.
Increasing RAM in itself can provide a slight increase in performance (about 2.6% your score shows) just because Windows has more RAM to use... or it could also have something to do with the fact your Helios 500 has a 1TB Samsung EVO SSD drive in it (whereas most others come with 256GB).

Compared to your month earlier results, you're only getting 2.6% increase in performance.. that's nowhere near 10% performance uplift which should be seen with higher clocked memory such as 3200MhZ for example - but we won't know because your RAM is operating most likely at 2400 Mhz and therefore, the results are within a margin of error (aka not significant enough to warrant any mentioning).

 

Ryzen can do fine with 2667MT/s as long as the timings are CL14 or lower if possible CL12.
https://community.amd.com/community...emory-oc-showdown-frequency-vs-memory-timings

I have seen someone compare really tight memory timing on Ryzen from 2400MT/s all the way up to 3466 but I cannot remember if it was an article or a video.
CL12 timing even at 2400 was very close to CL16 3200MT/s which is very respectable.

 

You really dont get it? You cant get any faster ram than kingston hyperx impact 2400mhz cl14 (its faster than any 2666mhz ram on market for laptops) which is compatibile with this laptop and works almost without issues. Even if Acer update the bios with higher clocked rams someday, and if you want to upgrade to 3000mhz+ which kingston is probaly the only option because predator works well only with JEDEC/PnP standard, you wont get any noticeable profit in performance because timings are much worse (for example kingston 2666mhz works with cl15-17-17 and its not even close to 2400 mhz cl14-14-14). Comparision: 2400mhz cl14-14-14, 2800mhz cl16-16-16, 3200mhz cl18-18-18 are identical in terms of performance. This is a laptop and not desktop which have superior rams and XMP/intel rams wont work or you wont get advertised speed! And you dont know what is meaning of my uploaded video and 3dmark CPU test. Its not about better performance, i just show you that you not know what are you talking about (you said its pointless to have more than 2 dimms in ryzen because you read on forums about desktop version with much better rams), performance is the same (and not worse) if you have 2 or 4 dimm slots used and Acer Predator works the same with 2 or 4 rams!. And here is maybe someone who needs 64gb or (or 4 slots) for work, predator is more than gaming laptop, its productivity tool with good gpu and cpu for that.

 

That all depends on if you can tune the memory, which we dont know would happen if the BIOS is unlocked.

Otherwise I am getting higher speed ram with the best possible timings, then tuning from there.

 

Im planning to upgrade the memory of my laptop and also repaste it. Any recomendations on vrm thermal pads? Also is it worth it to upgrade to 2700x?

 

Gelid for sure, good performance and cheaper than Fujipoly.
As for CPU I am guessing you got the Ryzen 5,if all you do is gaming the gains would be negligible except in maybe one or two games that actually use 8 cores.
But for anything other than gaming it could be worth it but buy second hand in that case unless you get it for a good price.

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2700x could be useful if you do any heavy work on your computer - another user here tested to working and pulling up to 105W just like it would in a desktop. I would personally keep all original parts if I did an upgrade, so they could be swapped back in if RMA was needed to Acer. Technically the only "consumer upgrade" parts are the HDD, SSD, and back RAM slots. My guess is they would deny warranty if it were shipped to them with upgraded elsewhere.

For ram get something that can do CL14 @ 2400MT/s or better. It needs to be in the JEDEC timing tables, this machine doesn't support XMP. Ram upgrades work best if you completely remove the motherboard and replace the stock sticks on the backside. I took the machine apart a few times and found that the best slots to use if you only have two sticks is the backside, nearest the processor socket, and on the front in the high socket. I have photos if it helps. These are the sockets that are identified as A2 / B2 in HWinfo64, and allow the best timings of the HyperX 2666 (operating at 2400) that I used.

I will also note that the wifi can be upgraded as well, so if you want something like Intel AX200 it is easy to access while repasting. Be sure to get some Kapton tape when you order paste and pads. It can be useful to have when doing upgrades like this.

 

Aphacool and Fujipoly have the one of the best thermal pads
https://www.alphacool.com/search/index/sSearch/Alphacool+Ice+Thermal+Pad?p=1


For paste and for vrms i use thermal grizzly with 2700x on my predator:
https://www.thermal-grizzly.com/produkte/6-minus-pad
https://www.thermal-grizzly.com/produkte/2-kryonaut

If you already overclocked 2700 then is not worth it. If you want run cpu on stock then you get some gains, it runs im my case betwen 3800-3900mhz in gaming with coolboost enbled and auto settings in predatorsense. Its even more energy efficient because is better binned than 2700 when you compare with the same clock. My answer is. Depends!

If you have 2600, then answer is yes!

 

I am aware that tight RAM timings can provide similar results as higher clocked RAM with looser timings, but, here's the problem: laptop RAM manufacturers don't make RAM with tight timings (in fact, most laptop RAM comes with with very loose timings which don't come close to desktop at all), and if you do manage to find such RAM (which is rare), you will pay a premium for it.
As far as I can tell, there is no SO-DIMM DDR4 16GB single stick RAM with CL12. CL14 yes, but CL12? Nope... not even close (at least, not in UK).

To top it off, Helios 500 BIOS is locked.
We cannot ensure that even if people populate all 4 RAM slots with tight timings (if they find them) that the RAM will actually run like that.

 

Thanks for the reply guys. Waiting for black friday deals.

 

Case in point the best I could get for my AW 13 R3 which does NOT support XMP is HyperX kit 2666Mhz @ CL15 and also I have no control over memory OC as well.

 

Thanks for the reply, In your tests, whats the best timing did you got for your Kingston HyperX 2400 Ram? On Amazon website it says 2400 mhz 14-14-14. Can that go lower? This RAM discussion is interesting.

 

Yes you can go lower, but is risky to do with ryzen master. I already do this with dual rank ram (2400mhz 2x16gb) and single rank ram (2x8gb) but i had few nasty blue screens. And for each custom timing you need to test it for whole 6-10h in memtest or prime95 to be completly stable.

 

Was looking for a DTR to replace my aging Dell Precision M6700 and ran across the AMD version of the H500 by chance.

I like the specs I am seeing, but I use Linux quite a bit and after seeing some of the comments early on in this thread, don't know if I should really consider this laptop.

Without Preadator Sense on Linux, does a person have any fan control other than what might be from the BIOS? Also, how stable is it on Linux? Much crashing or driver issues?

Have around a $2k budget, but really like the AMD specs for my work software (Autocad Civil 3d and Revit), plus I want to learn Blender.

Any input would be appreciated.

 

Ubuntu 18.04 ran ok for me. The amdgpu drivers will have the same issue related to the screen being unusable when waking from S3 sleep. In theory hibernation would work fine same as it does in Windows.

The default fan curves are actually pretty nice. The machine has such an overbuilt cooling system that it just doesn't get very hot or loud. It wouldn't be hard to make a notebook fancontrol profile for it however. I would use Windows to create it so you can watch EC registers with RWeverything as you change fan speeds in PredatorSense.

The touchpad can operate in two modes. "Basic" which is PS/2 with limited gesture support (but probably more compatible and reliable) and "Advanced" which turns it into an I2C device where it shows up as a precision touchpad in Windows. It is possible to disable secure boot if you set an Administrator password in the bios.

If you have any specific questions feel free to ask.

 

Thank you for the info.

I normally run Linux Mint as my primary distro in a 2-partition root/home setup, plus a third partition for testing other distros. Been trying to get familiar with Manjaro right now.

With what you posted, that gives me confidence about buying this laptop as my new primary system. Now just to price out more memory and larger hard drives.

 

Linux does run fine, but I would not suggest using it as a primary system. As you may have heard, Acer support isn't great and if the motherboard randomly dies you are looking at a 3-4 week repair time if they even have the part available.

Have you considered a Precision 7740 or Clevo N970TF? I have used both of those machines and they run Linux great.

 

It is funny, I was actually considering the Eluktronics N970TF for its specs, especially after watching Bob of All Trades' review and updates on its hardware capabilities.

Maybe that is the route I will end up taking. Just wish it had a bit bigger battery, but since it is removable from the outside, I will just get a spare or two.

 

The battery life on the Predator Helios 500 AMD is not great. Maybe 1.5 - 2 hours with light usage. The N970TF can do better. With the RTX2070 disabled and tuning like undervolting and other tweaks, you could get twice that. The Precision 7740 can do even better as the non-desktop CPU and chipset can be tuned further, along with having the larger 97Wh battery.

 

I have looked at both the Dell 7740, and also the Lenovo Thinkpad P53 workstation.

15.68in 1920x1080 500nit matte screen, i9850H, Quadro RTX3000 with 6Gb Vram, 3 NVME slots, 92 Watt/Hr battery.

Just have justify the roughly $1,964 price to my wife. And that isn't counting the 32Gb RAM from New Egg (Lenovo's factory RAM prices are nearly as bad as Dell's). Though she did say at least it was cheaper than my M6700 when new. That ran me right at $3,400 back in 2013.

My work is what I bought if for mainly. Don't game a whole lot outside the Command and Conquer series, some World of Tanks, and a few older games.

 

Lenovo definitely had some nice sales this weekend! I hope it works out well for you. I would not be surprised if you could get battery life of over 8 hours with that configuration.

 

ThinkPads definitely have the best battery life but they only achieve that by throttling the hardware so you get worse performance on battery however in my opinion its a trade of.
At the end of the day there no such thing as good performance and good battery life, there is only either of the two or in the middle.

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It's why I just have 2 laptops, performance at home and battery life while away.

 

Well, doesn't every laptop throttle when on battery?

I don't expect performance when on battery, I want it to sip it as little as possible.

If I need serious performance, that is when I start hunting a wall jack down, which can be a challenge at times on a job site.

 

As far as I know, very few laptops throttle as much as Lenovos do which explains their better battery life, Clevos will definitely just do full power regardless whether it is on battery or not.


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The Predator Helios 500 AMD does throttle on battery as well. CBR20 is only ~2000 on battery compared to 3500 when plugged in.

 

Ironically most Intel mobile garbage throttle down to such speeds from sheer temperature issues.
P53 and P73 will easily do 8 hours on a battery charge though with careful use, hard time getting that with a desktop chip, even Ryzen APU will hit their limit at that much.
I had mine do 10 hours with no WiFi and minimum brightness though you just need to fine tune it still give throttles, YouTube 1080p and 60fps actually lags on low power mode on my thinkpad LOL

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Well, if I go with the P53, the only time it would be on battery is say during a meeting or seminar where all I am doing is taking notes, or doing some quick sketching in Autodesk Form-It for a client. Will keep it on a dock most other time.

Wish Lenovo had a real dock like my old M6700. Not real impressed with the whole USB-C dock that is the "standard" now. Much prefer a true docking station for using a system at the office as a workstation if need be.

 

The other reason I like the Helios 500 is simply because it is AMD-based.

May wait till later in January after CES to see if Acer or even another manufacturer brings out a 3000 series based laptop as an update for the H500. Pair that with a Radeon Pro class chip, and that would be a true beast of a workststion.

 

I'd like Zen 2 3700x along with the 12 core option... plus Navi of course (preferably in MXM format, but that's unlikely - at least well binned like the Vega 56) and of course sensible placement of RAM slots.
If they go with 4 RAM slots, we need them all in an easily accessible place (not the back end where its impossible to reach without full disassembly) and of course preferably unlocked BIOS that hadn't been castrated.

 

I haven't seen 4 sodimm slots on the same side in umm, never now that I think about it.

 

Alienware 51m does. Although it would be even better if it only had two slots, focusing on supporting faster RAM. On the PH500AMD the best slots to use are actually one on each side of the motherboard!

 

How irritating.

Though I would likely be opening it up anyways since I am used to that kind of thing, anecdotal though.

 

It's why I said I'd prefer Acer either put all 4 RAM slots on the same (easily accessible) side of the mobo for the Zen2 version, or just scrap 4 dimm slots and focus on putting just 2 on the same side.
What is also irritating that the factory pre-installed RAM on Helios 500 was on the hard to access side.
Great cooling, but extremely poor judgement in regards to RAM slots.

Plus, OEM's like Acer aren't well known for putting high speed RAM with low latencies into laptops, and Zen 2 requires about 3000-3200 MhZ with low latencies to achieve full performance - plus we know so-dimms aren't very big on being designed with low latencies.
It is possible that Acer will 'learn from its mistakes' but to be honest, they had ample time by now to release fully updated BIOS which supports Zen 2 among other things, so I'm not exactly sure what to expect of the revision if they do make it (plus the fact it was a limited production model - sigh).
Despite the questionable RAM choices, Acer did design an overall great machine with amazing cooling.

 

It would be mental for MSI, Alienware and Clevo to continue using Intel desktop CPU at this point in their machines.
If they do not release a single laptop next year with desktop AMD CPU then we know who pays their pockets not to do so.
Also RX 5700M is coming out next year so that will definitely make its way into at least a few machines.

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Why can't Acer, MSI, and the other big names do like Clevo does with their keyboards, and just have a couple magnets, or even just a screw or two from the backside holding the keyboards in place? Then having components (memory, hard drives) under the keyboards would be an non-issue.

The whole 3 dozen plastic clips that will snap the second time they are flexed is why the current keyboard constructions rather suck.

I know it is "cheaper", but for what they charge for these systems, a dollar or two added cost is a pittance.

 

They do it to discourage taking the machines apart also its a good way to tell if the machine has been tampered with when its under warranty.
Sadly its a practise that has been going on for decades in the computer industry.

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The PH500AMD keyboard screws into the top case. The motherboard does have to be removed to swap it. It is nice in the fact that it has a consistent zero-flex keyboard.

What really annoys me about Acer is that they don't provide the service manual to users. Dell / HP / Lenovo does this. They do exist because every now and then screenshots of excerpts get posted over at the Acer community forums...

 

I got my refund and extra components back btw.
However, TemKnowHow apparently messed up with the components they returned.
They were supposed to only give back my 16GB 2400 MhZ DDR4 stick and 500 GB Crucial SSD drive.
Instead, they returned my 500 GB SSD, the 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD (both of these shipped with the laptop) with my files intact on it.

TeamKnowHow?
Maybe they should be renamed to TeamDoesn'tKnowHow.

If these are the guys 'fixing' computers in UK and they make a simple mistake like that, then its no wonder that laptops which undergo repairs here end up back in repairs shortly after due to shoddy work.

Sigh.

Mind you, I can live without the RAM stick I suppose, but I explained to them (twice) which components I installed and wanted back... instead, they stripped down both SSD's and the HDD instead of 1 SSD and 1 RAM stick.

 

It would indeed be mental for OEM's to continue using Intel desktop CPU's, but we know Intel gives them substantial amounts of money even now.

The good news is, MSI changed their tune somewhat after initially saying they won't be using Zen 2 hw. They used Zen+ APU with Navi mobile GPU (which is progress - of sorts - their RRP price is atrociously high for a system like that, but I suppose its a start).

Given how much the market changed to AMD's favour in regards to CPU sales alone, its possible this could make OEM's reconsider their stance on AMD builds and create more of them (with quality cooling and RAM implementation).

In regards to their design practices though... ugh.

 

AMD will never ever be able to feed the ODM’s with enough chips as it is. Even Intel struggle with that. Switch over on AMD would be a catastrophe for the ODMs

 

Nonsense.

I only need one good system.

 

No one said the OEM's need to forget about Intel and switch to AMD completely.
Its just that given Zen's popularity, more advanced security, equal or better performance/efficiency and lower price, OEM's would be rather nuts to choose building new hw exclusively with Intel in mind.

As for AMD not being able to feed OEM's enough chips... well, its mainly the 16c parts that are experiencing shortages at the moment, most other parts seem to be in stock as is.
Intel seems to be struggling much more with providing supply than AMD does.

 

Yeah, in fact the entire reason Lenovo used AMD in their ThinkPads T series was because Intel could not provide enough CPUs for them, and ThinkPads have been exclusive Intel laptops since 2000 apart from the E series but those are very different from rest.
I also find it hard to believe Acer has had a hard time selling the AMD variant of the Predator series gaming laptops as they practically sold out in a week in Scandinavia and Europe following.
Really sad with the low production numbers, AMD seems to have the unfortunate experience of because its cheap it finds its way into cheap laptops as a result.
It was even like this back in the day when Athlon was king.

What was the last AMD heavy gaming laptop before Ryzen? MSI GX60, using an APU coupled with 7970M rather sad affair.
Before that we only had a few Clevo with Athlon desktop CPUs.
AMD might be at fault for lackluster array of mobile chips at that time.
Today is different yet we only seen two heavy gaming laptops using AMD CPU.

Its very clear that either laptop companies are VERY lazy and does not want to design MOABs for AMD setup or they are paid by certain someone to maintain exclusivity.

Same is true for their GPUs, R9 M295 never saw good use other than in a Mac.
R9 M395 as well, M390 saw use in an obscure Alienware model as an option.
Rx 480M is quite good as a GPU in its day yet I can count on one hand how many laptops used it.

Intel has caused their own supply issues by forcing everyone to use their unsafe junk through their well documented Mafia practises.
Hopefully this will start to change next year.
Otherwise the laptop market might be a lost cause with their overheating CPUs and GPUs with badly designed cooling and overpriced market selection.
Prepare for Intel to use their long reaching Mafia hands to hurt nVidia sales in the laptop segment with their new GPUs which probably are not all that great.

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Despite weaker performance of bulldozer.
Uarch... AMD did have rather capable Apus back then which were quite good for general workloads and even gaming.

Problem was intel kept bribing OEMs back then and AMD lack of resources to do incentivise OEMs use their hw... And if they did, the OEMs usually messed up the configuration in cooling, display quality, ram and priced it unrealistically high.

 

Guys, for the Static noise after the display switches itself off... been reading something online about a similar issue on desktop GPU's, and someone suggested removing MSI Afterburner completely off the system (uninstalling it and deleting the registries associated with it) along with using DDU utility to clean install the drivers (stock first obviously, followed by express upgrade to latest ones).

Apparently, something doesn't mesh well between Afterburner and Wattman according to the poster who recommended it, and I was wondering if someone could test out that theory on their Helios 500.