Acer V Nitro (VN7-791G) Quick Review

A lot of people typically associate Acer with making budget, low-quality laptops. And in the past, they may have been right. But with this new Nitro series of laptops, Acer has upped their game, and I must say I’m rather impressed.

This model used for this review is the VN7-791G-77HR (Black Edition). It was purchased from Costco (!) in Canada for $1,379 CAD (after TAXES, it cost me $1,560 CAD). Yay Costco and yay taxes.

Quick Specs
Intel Core i7-4710HQ CPU
nVidia GTX 860M GPU with 2GB of VRAM
16GB DDR3 RAM
1TB hybrid HDD
17.3” LG IPS 1920*1080 display (matte)
Windows 8.1

Full specs can be found here.

Notebookcheck's review will provide pictures and detailed test results.


Body/Design
The overall look is somewhat reminiscent of the Lenovo Y50: sleek, black, with a red-backlit keyboard. The back of the display is textured, and does a good job of repelling fingerprints and smudges. The rest of the laptop, however, is a magnet for oily smudges, due to the soft-touch plastic finish.

It is very thin, and decently light for a 17” machine. While it won’t win any design awards, those looking for a slim, sexy laptop should be pleased. No premium materials here, mostly just plastic. But it gets the job done.

I’m not a fan of port placement, however. Almost all of them are on the right side, with just two USB 2.0 ports on the left side. I don’t know why laptop manufacturers do this. Seeing as the majority of people are right-handed, it would make much more sense to put the DVD drive and 2 USB ports on the right side of the laptop, and everything else on the left side, or the back. It really is a simple, basic design element. I mean really - the ethernet, HDMI and USB 3.0 ports are all right next to my mouse hand. Very, very poor design choice. The HDMI isn’t a big deal, as if I’m outputting the signal to an external monitor, I’ve probably put the laptop further away from me. But the ethernet and USB ports can and will get in the way.

Also, upgrading this thing is even worse than the Lenovo Y50. You can do a quick web search to see several (mostly German) videos showing a tear-down, but you have to remove the keyboard and top plate to change the HDD. If you want to access the RAM and M.2 SSD slots, you need to remove the motherboard entirely. Despite being a 17” machine, you only get one SATA and one M.2 slot. So you can fit, at most, two hard drives in here. So yeah, a big miss on providing for easy upgrades. Clevo still reigns supreme in that department.

Certain reviewers have mentioned poor wireless signal strength, and a tear-down apparently showed the reason to be bad antenna placement (the antennas are apparently at the back base of the laptop, rather than being in the top two corners of the screen). I haven’t experienced any issues, but I’m usually close to my router, so take that with a grain of salt.


Display
The screen is very nice, especially after having toyed around with the Lenovo Y50’s disaster of a screen (the non-touch FHD model). This is a decent LG IPS panel, and the brightness, colours and viewing angles are all quite good (though not the best I’ve ever seen). My panel’s hardware ID is LGD0469 (which is apparently the same panel used in the Lenovo Y70, the LG LP173WF4-SPF1). You will get a bit of colour-shifting when moving around, but nothing nearly as bad as you would get on an average TN panel used for most laptops. Overall, I’m quite pleased with this screen. Anybody who doesn’t understand the benefit of a good IPS panel over a TN panel simply needs to play some games with dark colour palettes - a TN panel, due to poor vertical viewing angles, simply cannot capture the subtle, darker elements.


Keyboard/trackpad
The keyboard is ok. The arrow keys are quite small, and I don’t like the material used for the keys (they are somewhat slick, and attract smudges and fingerprints). I really wish companies would make the keys out of the same material desktop keyboards use - they’re smudge resistant. I didn’t have much trouble typing, and didn’t notice any missed keystrokes. I also prefer keyboards like the Lenovo Y50’s, where the keys are curved, as opposed to the rather flat keys on the Nitro. The backlight also only has two settings - on or off.

The trackpad is subpar, and having both mouse buttons integrated doesn’t help much. When trying to right-click, you’ll often end up moving the mouse. The material used for the trackpad also makes it somewhat harder to glide your fingers across it, and multi-touch scrolling is hit-and-miss. Overall the keyboard is ok, but the trackpad will really make you want to use a mouse at all times.


Noise and temperatures
Overall, I’m rather pleased with the Nitro’s performance in this area. It is virtually silent when idle/under low load. When playing games, the fans speed up, but it never becomes too bothersome. Temperatures while idle or under low load are not really noticeable when laying your hands on the keyboard. However, when gaming, you’ll definitely feel the increased warmth around the middle/right side of the keyboard. The palm rests remain relatively cool, as does the trackpad. Overall, the dual-fan setup does a good job of exhausting the hot air out the back. The laptop surface itself never got uncomfortably hot.

After playing Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age 2 for a few hours, I recorded the following MAX temps (the ambient room temperature was 20C):
CPU: 83C
GPU: 71C

Using a cooling pad didn’t seem to produce significantly better results (I was playing on a hard, smooth surface). So unless you’re setting the laptop down on a table cloth or some other softer surface, a cooling pad isn’t really necessary (though it’s never a bad idea).

Also, unlike the Lenovo Y50, the Nitro achieved these temps without turning off TurboBoost on the CPU. All in all, the Nitro does a good job keeping itself cool, especially given how thin it is.


Performance
Here are the results from 3DMARK
Fire Strike:3696
Sky Diver: 12034
Cloud Gate: 16129
Ice Storm: 109315


Speakers
The speakers are actually quite good. This isn’t a big deal, and I’d much rather companies take whatever budget they had for speakers and spend it on a better display panel, but it is still nice to have a machine with a good display AND decent speakers. Again, any gamer worth his salt with plug in a good pair of headphones. Oh, this machine also has a combo jack (much like the Lenovo Y50). I’m not sure why, as being a 17” machine there was plenty of space to put a mic and a headphone jack. Oh well, you can either get an adapter or buy a headset with a combo jack. Your choice.


Conclusion
Overall, this is a nice laptop. It has a good design (barring very bad port placement), a nice screen, remains cool and quiet, and provides some good sound from the built-in speakers. Its performance is also exactly what you’d expect given its specs.

Unfortunately, a poor trackpad, smudge-prone body, poor port placement and difficulty in upgrading the components detract from the overall appeal. Also, certain people have complained about poor WiFi signal strength. In addition, you have limited configuration options, unlike Clevo laptops, which let you build your machine pretty much any way you want. And lest I forget - holy bloatware Batman. You’ll spend a decent amount of time uninstalling crap.

At this price range (around $1,400 CAD), the 17” Nitro has some competition from Clevo-based offerings and the Lenovo Y70, as well as MSI. They mostly have the same basic configuration, and performance is similar (based on benchmarks and reviews). My experience with the Lenovo range is such that I would pick the Nitro before any Lenovo Y-series machine. While the Nitro is much sexier than the Clevo’s at this price range, the easy upgrade and maintenance of Clevo laptops can make up for it.

In summary, if you’re looking for a capable gaming machine and design/looks matter to you, the 17” Black Edition Nitro is a solid buy at this price range. If, however, looks aren’t as important to you as easy maintenance and the ability to build a machine to your specifications, you’re probably better off looking at a Clevo.

 

well, I do have the almost same mchine (but with the 128GB SS on top) and do agree with your review. what I would like to add, concerning the maintainability (because of the need to clean the fans) is Acers idea with the Dustdefender technology. It remains to be seen, hwo well this will work, but the 791G has it. basically, the fans will revert the airstream from time to time to try and blow the dust back out of the cooling system. in theory, this should greatly reduce the need to open the laptop and clean the cooling system manually.