Dell’s XPS lineup has been one of the company’s most successful brands in the past years. It’s now synonymous with offerings that are both sleek, hardy and powerful. With a successful laptop lineup that comes with both looks and power, it comes as no surprise that the XPS is also one of Dell’s best desktop experiences.
Source: Dell
The new XPS desktop is packed with powerful insides. The desktop comes with the latest generation Intel Core desktop processors. You’ll be able to get builds with supporting up to the Core i9 processor. On the graphics front, it has builds with both AMD and NVIDIA options. The former with options up to the Radeon 6900XT and the latter with up to GeForce RTX3090. When it comes to RAM and storage the new XPS Desktop has 4 RAM slots with support for 128GB of RAM directly from Dell. You’ll also be able to kit out the desktop with up to 4TB of total storage.
The desktop is fully equipped when it comes to connectivity. It supports gigabit ethernet with Killer E3100G ethernet, WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2. In addition, it has a full array of ports with 7 USB Type-A ports, 2 USB Type-C ports, 1 display port and a 7.1 channel audio connector.
Redesigned for Upgradability
The New XPS Desktop is designed for upgradability. Dell has doubled down on their tool-less entry into the chassis. The side panel is easily removable which give direct access to the internal components of the desktop. You will also be able to remove and replace components as the need for more power arises.
Dell has also redesigned the chassis as a whole increasing its volume by about 43%. The new chassis is 24L compared to the smaller 19L of the previous version. This allows for better airflow and cooling. Doubling down on delivering better cooling, the new XPS desktop also comes with liquid cooling. Dell has also optimised the cooling with a more efficient cooling fluid and also better thermal technology. The XPS desktop is supposed to run 18% cooler and quieter than previous generations.
Pricing & Availability
The Dell XPS Desktop will be available globally this fall with Windows 11 preloaded. It will be available in Night Sky (Black) and Platinum Silver. Prices start at USD$919 (MYR3,819.61).
Source: Dell
In Malaysia, the Dell XPS Desktop will be available only in Night Sky with prices starting at MYR5,999.
There is a general problem when you get a thin-and-light PC. There are plenty of compromises with a lot of them. They are also generally expensive.
One of the compromises you must live with when you opt for a thin-and-light notebook PC is the lack of power. You usually can opt for a powerful enough processor that is clocked to reduce its power consumption. You do not get a dedicated GPU with the thin-and-light though.
You also do not get a lot of ports to come with the laptop. Just to keep the device thin, they must sacrifice on the practicality of full-sized I/O ports. The result is an ultra-thin laptop that you can carry around without breaking your back, but for it to be practical, you need to carry a separate dongle.
That is not the case with Acer’s brand-new Swift X though. It is powerful. It is also very practical. At the same time, Acer’s new notebook PC offers the experience of owning a larger formed thin-and-light.
Source: Acer
The Acer Swift X is powered by AMD’s latest Ryzen 7 5800U (up to) processor. While it is not an H-series processor, the Ryzen 7 5800U is still plenty powerful while remaining energy efficient for long lasting battery life. Alongside the powerful CPU is not a mere Vega integrated GPU though. It is an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti (up to) dedicated discrete GPU.
With up to 16GB of RAM, the Swift X is really a thin-and-light PC made for content creators. But power is just half the story. The Swift X must output some impressive colours too for content creators. Getting the job done is a 14-inch Full HD IPS panel that covers nearly 86% of the Swift X’s body. It boasts 300nits in brightness, which should be bright enough in most situations. The panel also covers 100% of the sRGB colour gamut. At the same time, Acer includes its BlueLightShield technology to protect your eyes in extended usage. There is even a fingerprint sensor for better security when you leave your laptop unattended with Windows Hello.
All of these does not come with too much weight penalty too. It is still a light notebook at 1.39kg. It is still thin too at 1.79cm. While it is not as thin as the regular ultrabooks you find in the market today, the Swift X does have full-sized I/O ports like an HDMI out port and two USB Type-A ports. All of that while keeping a 59W battery that offers up to 17-hours of continuous use time.
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
Source: Acer
The Acer Swift X will be available to purchase in Malaysia in two variants. It comes in an AMD Ryzen 7 or AMD Ryzen 5 CPU choices. Both variants will come with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3050 Ti still. The AMD Ryzen 5 variant of the Acer Swift X will set you back MYR 4,299 while the more expensive AMD Ryzen 7 variant will set you back MYR 4,999. The Acer Swift X is available from Acer’s authorised resellers, Shopee, Lazada, and Acer’s own online store 15th October 2021 onward. You can pre-order one for yourself starting now though. If you do order your unit between now to 20th of October 2021 on Acer’s Flagship Store on Shopee or Acer’s own eStore, you are entitled to purchase a Logitech MX Anywhere 3 wireless mouse at MYR 199 (about 50% off retail price).
Gaming is expensive, let us all face that fact for a moment. We, techENT, are gamers and we love to game. We also love new gaming gear and hardware. We loved it when AMD launched their new Ryzen 5000 series processors and took over as the king of gaming processors. We loved NVIDIA’s new very powerful GPUs in the form of their next generation GeForce RTX 30 series Ampere architecture. What we talk less about though is the cost of gaming.
While all the new stuffs are great and amazing, we always forget that these powerful hardware come at a price. With the global chip shortage issue, prices become even more exaggerated. An example of this would be the prices of an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 GPU in the market these days at around MYR 5,000 a piece. You can buy a new pre-built PC for that kind of money. If you have not checked out Acer’s Predator Orion 3000 for that matter, that pre-built is a steal at MYR 6,899 compared to building your own system at this time.
With prices and availability of GPUs soaring as high as MYR 16,000 these days, building a ‘budget’ gaming rig may not be so pocket friendly after all. There is a solution, however. What if you cut out the most expensive part of your PC build? What if you exclude a GPU in your gaming build?
Now we hear questions like; “but is the GPU not the most important part of a gaming build?”, and “how are we to game without a GPU? Are you nuts?”. Hear us out. You can still build your PC with a GPU, just not with a huge GPU that is hanging from your PCIe slot. It is a GPU that is also integrated with your CPU, and APU (Accelerated Processing Unit, if you must know).
Source: AMD
AMD has just released their next generation Ryzen 5000 G-series processors announced earlier this year in COMPUTEX, AMD Ryzen Zen 3 architecture processors with integrated Radeon VEGA graphics built into the CPU itself. That also means that you technically can solely rely on the AMD Ryzen chip for graphical requirements. In practical terms, you do not strictly need a separate GPU to get your PC to boot and run properly.
The AMD Ryzen 5000 G-series APUs comes in two flavours too. You can either choose between an AMD Ryzen 5 5600G or an AMD Ryzen 7 5700G. Of course, the AMD Ryzen 7 5700G would be the more powerful of the two packing more cores than the Ryzen 5. Both of them comes with AMD’s Radeon graphics power integrated within the chip as well.
AMD Ryzen 7 5700G
Source: AMD
The new AMD Ryzen 5700G with Zen 3 architecture comes with 8 cores and 16 threads, pretty much similar to its non-G-series counterpart, the Ryzen 7 5800X. Like its more premium counterpart, it also clocks at 3.8GHz at its base. There are differences between the two though. It only boosts up to 4.6GHz, compared to 4.7Ghz, for example. The APU is also built to draw less power at 65W compared to 105W. It also packs an extra 8 Radeon Compute Units (CU) that clocks at 2.0GHz, which is amazing if you think about it. It draws less power than the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X powerhouse, but it also packs its own graphics processing ability.
AMD Ryzen 5 5600G
Source: AMD
At a more budget conscious range is the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G. It still packs a lot of power though from its 6 cores and 12 threads. It is also clocked a little higher than its Ryzen 5 5600X counterpart, at least on its base clock at 3.9GHz compared to 3.7GHz. It tops out at 4.4GHz though instead of the 4.6GHz of its CPU counterpart. With an additional 7 Radeon CU, the AMD Ryzen 5600G APU also only draws up to 65W in power, which is quite an amazing feat too in its own rights.
Full HD Gaming
Source: AMD
Of course, integrated graphics (IGP), you might need to adjust your expectations in gaming performances. If you are on a tight budget, you most likely will not be getting one of those 1440p displays with 165Hz refresh rate. You probably will be looking at Full HD displays that goes to 144Hz at the maximum. You would be happy to find that AMD’s Ryzen 5000 G-series APUs are more than capable at running modern titles at more than 100 fps in some cases. Games like League of Legends and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) easily goes over 100fps in Full HD (low) settings with the APU. At the same time, you do want to tamper with your settings a little to accommodate to the relatively less powerful integrated GPU.
Prices and Availability
The good news in all this is that this is also even more budget friendly than its X-series counterparts. The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G is retailing at MYR 1,239, while the AMD Ryzen 7 5700G retails for MYR 1,639. The AMD Ryzen 5000 G-series is now available from AMD’s local retail partners nationwide and on AMD’s own online store.
When AMD launches their RDNA 2 GPUs earlier this year, the PC building and gamer community was thrilled. We expected great things from AMD and they delivered in GPUs that could compete with the best its competitors can offer at more reasonable prices. There was still a problem though, after the launch.
It was not about stock shortages and the chip shortage. It was more about the price category that AMD launched the RDNA 2 cards in. It was in the high-end portion of the market. While it was understandable, the GPUs were a little out of reach for most of the gaming community.
Source: AMD
If you look into Steam’s trends too, the most popular category in gaming PCs is not in the high-end market. A lot of them still work with NVIDIA’s GeForce GTX 1060 GPUs. A lot of those GPUs also power displays at 1080p Full HD resolution. The most popular resolution in PC gaming then, is still 1080p Full HD.
For the purpose of powering Full HD displays, the AMD Radeon RX 6800 and RX 6900 cards are a little overpowered, and a little overpriced. AMD understands this, of course. That is why you get the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT.
We start with the numbers first, of course. The Radeon RX 6600 XT packs 32 RDNA 2 compute units, 8 less than the RX 6700 XT. Instead of 12GB, it has 8GB of GDDR6 RAM. It is clocked a little higher than the RX 6700 XT though at a base clock of 2,359 MHz with boost speeds at up to 2,589 MHz. Of course, less cores and smaller RAM size also means lower power draw at 160W compared to 230W of the RX 6700 XT.
Source: AMD
The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT is made for budget conscious users. With less total required power, your power supply unit (PSU) can be of a smaller and less powerful variant too, a 550W PSU should be enough in this case. At US$ 379 (MYR 1,603*) it is also a lot more friendly to the wallet.
The Radeon RX 6600 XT is built to take on high-framerate Full HD 1080p gaming. At the same times, different games can be a little demanding. AMD’s FideltyFX technology that comes with the RX 6600 XT should allow games to be upscaled to Full HD resolution to deliver the best experience when gaming with more demanding modern titles. With DirectX 12 Ultimate support too, games should look stunning on your Full HD displays.
Of course, it also comes with AMD’s Smart Access memory technology to allow your AMD Ryzen processors access to the ample memory of the GPU for even better gaming performance. There is also AMD’s Radeon Anti—Lag technology on-board, which means you get even better response times from your keyboard and mouse, and even controllers which gives you the extra edge in games like Call of Duty: Warzone.
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
Source: AMD
The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT will be available from AMD’s various board partners. You should start seeing units of the new GPU hitting shelves starting August 11th, 2021. Pre-built systems from OEMs and System Integrators are also expected to include the Radeon RX 6600 XT builds August 2021 onward. As mentioned, prices start from US$ 379 (MYR 1,603*) but will vary from one board partner to the other. More information on the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT can be found on AMD’s website.
* Approximately based on exchange rate of US$ 1 = MYR 4.23 on xe.com as of 30/07/2021
Like any other good PC brand out there, Acer is one that houses several brands to serve different market segments. Acer houses, of course, Acer itself to sell computers for the general market, the lifestyle people and general office use. It also houses ConceptD, a new concept brand to serve the content creator or the creative industry with super quiet, super powerful, and super industrial computing solutions. Then there is Predator, the skunkworks, as we call it; that serves the gaming industry with souped up machines that looked like they could take you to the moon.
What we are reviewing here is nothing like a Predator machine, at least not in terms of concept or branding perspective. That is because it is not a Predator machine. It is an Acer machine but made for gaming anyway under the Nitro name. Oh yes, Acer has the Nitro namesake for its entry-level gaming line-up of products.
The Acer Nitro 5 has been Acer’s staple entry-level gaming laptop since they launched it a few years ago. In the market, the Acer Nitro 5 was also regarded as one of the best value-for-money machines you can get for gaming and content production. While it does not feature the most powerful components, it was plenty powerful for gaming as long as you do not expect Ultra graphics settings in games.
Here is the thing though, 2021 is a little different for Acer. It is also a different year for AMD. AMD is finally in a leading position in high-performance computing solutions after many years. They have made ultra-powerful CPUs that is loved by both the gaming and creator market. Acer decided that the powerful AMD processors should find a home in the Nitro 5 series and the Acer Nitro 5 for 2021 is born. Is it any good though? Should you buy it? We find out.
Design
The Acer Nitro 5’s shell in 2021 does still resemble the old Nitro 5. The angles are all in the same places, and the vents are largely similar in size and placements. Its dimensions did not change too much too.
Of course, there are some key visual differences between the older model and the new 2021 variant in terms of design. For one, the brushed aluminium look of the display shell is no more. It is now a semi-gloss finish. The power tappers running on both depths of the display shell is also gone. The glossy blacked out Acer logo remains from the previous generation Acer Nitro 5 though.
Instead, on the shell is now a Predator-esque lines that stems out from the bottom of the display shell. We would not call it a power bulge, maybe power lines. Instead of the regular red Nitro branding plate is now the same semi-gloss black finish as the display shell, while the Nitro print is red in colour, true to the Nitro theme colour.
While the keyboard is largely similar to the older Nitro 5, there is now proper RGB on the keyboard. We admit, it is not a per-key RGB, it is a four-zone RGB. Still, any RGB is good. Other than that though, the interior of Acer’s latest “entry-level” gaming laptop has remained very similar to before with the thin bezels and the semi-gloss black plate on the keyboard side.
The vents are also laid out differently now on the Acer Nitro 5. The have moved most of the I/O expansion slots further south of the device to make room for side exhaust vents on both sides. The rear vent however is not a single large vent anymore that stretches the width of the notebook. It is now split in two smaller vents with a quite a large red plate in the middle. It now looks a little bit like a mid-engine supercar, to be honest, especially with the charging port at the back too. We quite like the look, to be fair.
Hardware
The Acer Nitro 5 2021 is a very different beast compared to the ones that came before. We would not call the Nitro 5 that we have at hand “entry-level” anymore. There is no other way to put it, it is a high-end gaming PC, on paper at least.
Specifications
Acer Nitro 5 (2021)
As Tested
Processor (clock)
AMD Ryzen 7 5800H (Octa-Core@3.2~4.4GHz)
GPU
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070
Display(s)
15.6-inch IPS (2560 x 1440 QHD) Narrow Bezel
Memory
512GB NVMe PCIe Gen 3 SSD 16GB DDR4 RAM (8GB x 2)
Networking and Connections (I/O)
1 x USB 3.1 Type-C 3 x USB 3.2 Type-A 1 x 3.5mm AUX 1 x HDMI 2.1 1 x Ethernet Port Killer WiFi Bluetooth 5.0
Operating System
Windows 10 Home (64-bit)
Miscellaneous
2.30kg All-metal body 720p webcam
Features
This Nitro 5 is also one of the most feature packed in its line-up’s history. There is quite a lot to talk about with the Nitro 5 starting with the decision to move the charging port and only the charging port to the back of the device. But there is also a new RGB keyboard on the Nitro 5 now, which is a sign of changing times and a new era in gaming. The Nitro 5 now looks more premium than any other “entry-level” gaming laptops out there.
Charging From the Rear
Instead of the usual placement of the regular laptop at the furthermost possible part of a notebook’s side, the Nitro 5 moved its proprietary charging port completely to the rear of the device. We saw Lenovo making the first move to put charging ports at the back of the device, and we are pretty much fans of the idea.
We do have a little complain on the backplate that houses the charging port though. The plate is so large that it covers nearly half the back of the device which could be used for more cooling vents. If the plate had to be this large, we would also prefer some expansion slots to occupy the rear of the notebook.
We also had a problem with the charging port in the New Nitro 5 when we first unpacked it and was going to get it to boot. The charger plug is a sort of a “two-stage” plug. You have to line it up with the charging port, and then slide it in. Usually, that is job done. It is not in this case, you have to push it into the charging port until the charger goes deeper in with a noticeable ‘click’. This, we do not like. What is wrong with using magnets to secure the charger?
4-Zone RGB Keyboard – Finally
The 2021 version of the Acer Nitro 5 houses a 4-zone programmable RGB keyboard. While it is a fresh change to the keyboard, the keyboard is physically the same keyboard you find on the previous Nitro 5 though. It feels the same, it types the same, it works the same so we are not going to talk about that.
Because it is 4-zone RGB though, you cannot program the keys to do a ripple effect from the Nitro Sense software bundled in the Acer Nitro 5. You can set four different colours on the four different RGB quadrants on the notebook with Nitro Sense to make it look a little more unique. We prefer the rainbow wave effect though, cos that makes the notebook look like it has per-key RGB.
Nitro Sense – Not Quite Predator Sense
The Nitro Sense is very much a stripped down, red toned version of Predator Sense. There is no Predator ‘Turbo’ function on the Nitro 5’s Nitro Sense. That also means that you do not get to overclock your CPU or GPU. Might as well anyway, the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H (as tested) is a locked unit which also means you cannot really overclock the CPU. We would still appreciate some overclocking capabilities on the GPU though.
Instead, what you get are fan speed and RGB control app. Of course, you can monitor your system temperatures as well from the app. Just keep in mind that because the air intake is at the bottom of the notebook, your thermals could be greatly improved if you could just lift the Nitro 5 a little bit.
Via the app though, you can customise or maximise your fan speed depending on the apps you launch. You could tie the settings to Adobe Premiere Pro for example, to max out your fan speed when the app launches to keep the Nitro 5 from thermal throttling when you start rendering videos. You can also automatically throttle the fan speed when you launch certain games too if you want.
In terms of RGB, there is obviously a limited number of things that you can do with 4-zone lighting instead of per-key lighting. You cannot set individual colours to each key for example. You cannot even set ripple effects or rain drop effects on the keyboard with 4-zone RGB. Still, a programmable RGB is always a welcome addition to the Nitro 5.
Performance
We mentioned earlier that the Acer Nitro 5 is not what we would consider entry-level on paper. On paper, this is a damn good gaming PC. The Nitro 5 with AMD’s Ryzen 7 5800H is really “entry-level” only by name.
The Productivity and Creativity Stuff
The keyboard on the Nitro 5 is pretty much the same Keyboard you get from before. It also feels pretty much like any other keyboard that you get from Acer’s Predator gaming laptops. Then again, keyboard technology on notebook PCs have not changed or progressed all that much.
Key travel is expectedly shallow, like any regular laptop keyboard you would be used to. Still, it is not an uncomfortable keyboard to use. While key travels are short, there is enough travel in the keyboard that typing feels a little more natural.
The keys bottom out with a soft touch too. It does not feel like you are hitting your fingers against a solid block when you type out long emails or essays with the Nitro 5. There is also enough tactile feedback to each key press to help with precision and speed once you get used to the keyboard.
You would be more interested in its work performance though, in its horsepower in editing videos and even photos. With a spec like the Nitro 5 that we have here, browsing the internet is really a breeze; nothing to shout about or even criticize there. At some point we have more than 40 tabs open on Mozilla FireFox, three Microsoft Word instances open, Adobe Acrobat with about 3 tabs open at the same time as well, and the Nitro 5 has not even broken a sweat.
We use a lot of Adobe Creative Suite apps in our line of work too. We heavily rely on Adobe Premiere Pro, Audition, Acrobat, Photoshop, and even Lightroom for most of our day-to-day operations. Obviously, the most taxing app of all in our selection of apps is Adobe Premiere Pro.
On that end, it took the Acer Nitro 5 xx minutes to render a 1:30 minute video. The video was shot in 4K resolution and was rendered directly to H.VEC 264 MPEG-4 format in Full HD resolution with AAC format audio. Video rendering is AMD’s territory anyway, we expected the Nitro 5 to do well here.
Scrubbing through the 4K footage feels smooth too without too much trouble. Smooth and quick scrubbing also means accelerated workflow and less downtime. The downside here is that you have less excuses for not completing your video projects on time now.
Gaming
A gaming PC is built to game though, and game we did. We played titles like GTA V, Horizon Zero Dawn, Two Point Hospital, Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, Evil Genius 2, and A Way Out with the Nitro 5. We let the games decide the best resolution for each game when we first ran the game, and later crank the graphics settings all the way up.
You can expect most modern games to run on either ‘high’ or ‘ultra’ settings on the Acer Nitro 5. Remember we are running the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3070 variant, far from an entry-level spec sheet this. In that case, ‘high’ and ultra’ graphics on certain games are quite expected.
With Horizon Zero Dawn, the game defaults to Full HD in resolution for some reason. Although, graphics settings are set to ‘Ultra’ by default. Once we set the resolution to the correct size at 1440p, the game ran at about 70fps consistently without dropping a beat. Two Point hospital defaults to ‘high’ resolution and at times scored as low as 28fps. Once you zoom down into the littler details though you get about 50-60fps easily.
With GTA V, we expect graphics to run at up to ‘Ultra’ by default. By default, you do not get ‘Ultra’ settings from GTA V. In fact, even fps is limited to 60 fps by default. We corrected that to project at 165Hz and you automatically free up some horsepower from the Nitro 5 to get up to 100fps at times. Of course, not every setting on default was at ‘Very High’ or ‘Ultra’, Most of them were just below the highest settings available though, so it is just a single toggle away. Once we turned all of that up with MSAA off, we still got about 90fps. With MSAA is a little different though. We could turn it up to 4X without losing too much performance in terms of FPS. Once we get it to its max settings though, fps dropped to as low as 53fps at times and remains at about 65-70fps most of the time.
With these games, you are not really hitting the 165Hz of the QHD display at all though, which is a little bit of a waste. If you want to hit 165fps to fully take advantage of the 165Hz refresh rate though, you can play Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) and easily hit that much frames in a second.
Still, the Acer Nitro 5 is a formidable gaming PC that can hold itself against the sea of gaming PCs you find in the market currently. In fact, we do think it can hold itself against its more premium cousins in the Predator family. We believe that it could even outperform some of them in similar spec sheet with an Intel processor in fact.
Battery Life
The Nitro 5 lasted nearly 2.5 hours with its display on full brightness and power mode set to high-performance. We were using the Acer Nitro 5 for web browsing, typing a Word document (this review, in fact), and listening to some music (50% volume) at the same time. There were also a few browser tabs that was open at the same time on Mozilla Firefox.
We have to point out that we still could get GTA V running at about 30fps while on battery on its default settings. While it was our own careless mistake in forgetting to plug the charger in, this is also an indication that you should never game on battery. Still, we were quite impressed.
Putting the Acer Nitro 5 in battery saving mode via Windows turns the brightness down a little and limits background applications like OneDrive auto-sync. It does extend your battery life to 2 hours 45 minutes hours though. In that case, you might want to consider leaving your Acer Nitro 5 on battery saving mode to extend its battery life for the long meetings.
You may also use Nitro Sense to sip battery life with even smaller straws too. Putting the Nitro 5 on power saving mode on Nitro Sense decreases the brightness of the display even further and limits power draw by both the GPU and CPU. Plenty of times then, the GPU is not used at all for regular operations like web browsing, document editing, and even emails. In that case you can push the battery life of the Acer Nitro 5 from 2.5 hours to a little over 3.5 hours in our use case.
We believe that if you skim on the music playing part, turn the RGB on the keyboard off, and dim down the display all the way with both Nitro Sense and Windows on Power Saving mode, the Acer Nitro could go the distance and last over 4 hours. 4 hours in our books is usually more than what more gaming laptops could offer, even in the same conditions.
2K Display and DTS: X Ultra
In our test unit, we got the best possible display for the Acer Nitro 5. We have here a Quad HD 1440p display at 2,560 x 1,440 resolution. It refreshes at 165Hz for a maximum of 165fps that would really help in competitive titles. The IPS display also covers up to 100% sRGB colour gamut. That would help plenty in colour grading use cases, or even photo editing. But that also means that the 2K display looks good in any gaming or movie situation. It is the perfect display for entertainment, and a far cry from the Acer Nitro 5 displays we are used to in the older generation devices.
The display is now something that we can enjoy and rely on for work and play. While it is a little on the small side for a 2K monitor, the 15.6-inch display is fully capable of what we want it to do. We could use the display to reliably colour grade and edit videos, and even photos when we need to. We could do them on-the-go if we really have to. The lockdown that was enforced because of the pandemic though did not allow us to take this Acer Nitro 5 to the streets; we would have loved to do so though.
The speakers are DTS:X Ultra speakers that you should be used to with Acer’s gaming line-up in the modern era. On the Acer Nitro 5, you only get two speakers that fires outward and downward at both sides of the laptop. That is also quite a standard arrangement with laptops these days. There is a while science on why manufacturers designed speakers this way, but we will get into that another time.
We do have to say that laptop speakers have come a long way though. On the Acer Nitro 5 at least, the speakers do sound great. Audio sounds clean and clear throughout its volume range. Of course, low frequencies could benefit from having a dedicated sub-woofer. The mid and high frequencies are excellent and clean though. That also means that you should be able to enjoy your movies with the built-in speakers. Unfortunately, we do suggest you get a decent pair of headphones for games though. While sound is good and clear, the fan noise can overwhelm the speakers (even at full chat) a little bit especially when it spools for gaming and video editing purposes.
The Acer Nitro 5 – Finally, a gaming Laptop You Can Be Proud Of
You pay MYR 6,399 for this piece of kit we test. You get a brilliant AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor and NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3070 to boot. The combination of these hardware alongside 16GB of RAM are in no way “entry-level”. It is a high-performance gaming machine that fits the bill when you need some power in LAN parties.
While prices are not to say in the budget-friendly range, MYR 6,399 is still less than most laptops boasting similar hardware in the current market. In some sense, you are getting a more powerful PC than plenty of gaming PCs of the same price in 2021. With all that considered, this is still the more budget-friendly version of a high-performance gaming laptop.
In 2021, the Acer Nitro 5 has matured into something else. It is not sitting at the bottom of the pile anymore. It can stand and sit alongside the greats in the industry, oddly enough. It sort of pushes the Acer Nitro brand into a brand that could stand on its own with AMD. Sadly, that is not the case because there are Intel based Acer Nitro 5 out there. This also brings another problem to Acer, what are they going to do when the Predator gaming products cannot compete at the same prices?
The question we set out to answer though is whether or not the Acer Nitro 5 with AMD’s Ryzen 7 5800H and NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3070 worth your money, whether or not you should buy it. Our answer is yes to both, but only if you have the budget to work with. While the Acer Nitro 5 for 2021 has been the most expensive Acer Nitro 5 of all that came before, the kind of power that is offered within the AMD variant of the Acer Nitro 5 is quite irresistible if you are in-need of a powerful laptop right now.
AMD has been on a roll with a multitude of releases and powerful innovations that are changing the landscape of the semiconductor industry. AMD is a company that has made its bets 5 years ago in high-performance computing and is now starting to see them come to fruition. With the announcement of their RDNA 2 platform and Zen architecture, they are delivering more performance to consumers for less power. These innovations continue to create waves in the industry with the company seeing its technologies adopted in gaming consoles to cars.
AMD’s recent announcements have proven that the company is making strides; not only in the consumer and gaming space but also in high-performance computing. The company has even announced their take on graphic supersampling with the FidelityFX Super Resolution. So, what’s next for AMD?
We’re sitting down with Paige Shi, Consumer Lead for Asia Pacific over at AMD to find out what’s happening at AMD and how the company is adapting to the new normal, how it has affected consumer behaviour and also what we can expect from the company in the future!
AMD announced a slew of items at their COMPUTEX 2021 keynote. One of the many things that they announced was the AMD Advantage Design framework. In this framework, AMD has outlined certain criteria which they believe will provide gamers with the best experience. One of the hallmark criteria is the utilisation of AMD’s Ryzen Mobile processors together with their newly announced Radeon RX6000M graphics processors. The new combination allows the new laptops to take advantage of smart access memory and smart shift among other optimisations that come with using a complete AMD setup.
ASUS is one of the first partners that are jumping on the AMD Advantage bandwagon with two new editions of its popular ROG Strix G line up. The new ROG Strix G15 and G17 come with AMD’s most powerful Ryzen 9 5900HX processor paired with the newly announced Radeon RX 6800M. The new GPU brings along with it AMD’s new RDNA 2 architecture which has been packing performance. It also brings AMD’s newly announced FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) which allows light to be simulated more realistically allowing for more immersive gaming.
The laptops come with up to 32GB of high performance DDR4-3200 RAM and up to 1TB NVMe SSD memory. The Strix G Advantage edition also comes with an additional M.2 slot that allows users to add more memory should the need arise. Their performance is matched with ASUS’s implementation of Liquid Metal thermal compound and the new Intelligent Cooling. The cooling system allows for better airflow without the increased noise.
Like other Strix G laptops, the ROG Strix G Advantage Edition laptops come display options for any gamer. Users can choose from options with 300Hz refresh rate, WQHD resolution with high colour accuracy. To complete the package, it comes with twin Smart Amp speakers that fire sound directly from behind the keyboard. These speakers are Dolby Atmos certified and can produce 5.1.2 channel surround sound.
Pricing & Availability
The ASUS ROG Strix G Advantage edition will be making its way to the market in the third quarter of 2021. No pricing has been announced just yet.
ASUS has no plans at this time to bring the ROG Strix G Advantage edition to Malaysia.
Taiwan’s biggest tech exhibition is back for 2021 season, and it is a unique one. Last year COMPUTEX 2020 had to be cancelled because, if you remember correctly, the pandemic situation that is COVID-19 broke out earlier in 2020 and disrupted the entire world. This year, COMPUTEX 2021 is back but without physical presence. It is now fully online.
AMD has been a keen participant of COMPUTEX and they are not going to miss the 2021 season of COMPUTEX. They took the center stage of COMPUTEX this morning, well via YouTube, to launch their latest APUs and Mobile GPUs. They introduced the AMD Ryzen 5600G and AMD Ryzen 5700G APUs and AMD Radeon RX 6600M, AMD Radeon RX 6700M, and AMD Radeon RX 6800M mobile GPUs.
AMD Ryzen 5000G Series
Since the Zen 3 architecture with the AMD Ryzen 5000 series was introduced last year, one of the biggest requests from gamers and enthusiasts was a Zen 3 architecture APU (Accelerated Processing Unit). AMD has answered with the AMD Ryzen 5600G and AMD Ryzen 5700G. Now, you have a choice of building a modern system without a dedicated GPU.
First, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G. The 5600G is sort of the budget option for builders and gamers. It still features 6 CPU cores like the regular 5600X. Additionally the 5600G packs 7 Radeon VEGA GPU cores within the same die.
Of course, there are some trade-offs to be made with the integrated GPU cores. Boost clock goes up to 4.4 GHz only rather than 4.6GHz. The APU also only has 16MB in L3 cache compared to 32MB.
If you need a little bit more power for the long run, you want the AMD Ryzen 7 5700G. It is sort of comparable to the other Ryzen 7 that is built for desktops, the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X. Both has 8 Zen 3 architecture cores to boot. The 5700G though has 8 more cores than the 5800X in the form of Radeon VEGA graphics cores.
Again, with graphics cores integrated onto the processing die, there are some trade-offs to be made. The maximum boost clock on the 5700G is down to 4.6GHz, from 4.6GHz. The L3 cache is also halved at 16MB compared to 32MB. The benefit of having integrated GPU though would be a blessing to budget constrained builders.
AMD Radeon RX 6000M Series
At COMPUTEX 2021, AMD also introduces their new mobile based GPUs as well – the AMD Radeon RX 6600M, AMD Radeon RX 6700M, and AMD Radeon RX 6800M. If you are wondering what the equivalent competitor’s mobile GPUs are, those would be the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060, GeForce RTX 3070, and GeForce RTX 3080. Alongside the AMD Radeon RX 6000M series too, they introduced a sort of guideline of AMD’s version of the ultimate gaming laptop they call the “AMD Advantage”.
The AMD Radeon RX 6600M is the entry-level choice from the AMD Radeon for mobile GPU line-up. You get 28 compute units and 8GB of GDDR6 RAM with clock speeds at 2.1GHz. Going up from there is the Radeon RX 6700M with 36 compute units clocked at 2.3GHz and 10GB of GDDDR6 RAM. The top-of the line Radeon RX 6800M packs 40 compute units clocked at 2.3GHz with 12GB of RAM.
All of the Radeon RX 6000M mobile GPUs comes with RDNA 2 technology, of course. They also brought AMD’s Smart Access Memory, or resizable bar in more common terms to the mobile computing market with the introduction of the Radeon RX 6000M series. They also introduced the AMD Radeon Chill technology with the mobile GPUs alongside AMD FidelityFX for all AMD based system, even if they are running a non-AMD GPU platform.
AMD Radeon Chill
AMD Radeon Chill is a clever technology that is supposed to minimise a problem that has been plaguing gaming laptops forever. AMD says that it is a power-regulation technology that is supposed to extend the battery life of a gaming laptop without sacrificing too much performance. At the same time AMD’s SmartShift technology also regulates power power consumption and processing power between the CPU and GPU to always optimise gaming and productivity performance.
AMD FidelityFX
At the same time, there is AMD FidelityFX technology that upscales your games from a lower resolution to a higher one. If it sounds familiar to another competitor technology, it is because they are basically the same things. But there is some good in upscaling contents, despite not getting all the high-definition detail. You get more performance out of your system at least. The best news is that it is coming to all AMD based systems. It even works on older non-AMD GPUs if you want it to.
AMD Advantage Design
AMD also introduced the AMD Advantage framework for gaming laptops fully based on the AMD processors. They introduced ASUS’ ROG Strix G15/G17 and HP Omen 15 alongside the announcement too.
AMD Advantage outlines the guidelines of what an AMD gaming laptop should work like. For example, the minimum requirement for an AMD Advantage certified laptop is featuring a display with at least 144Hz in refresh rate. Display has to be either an IPS or OLED display that can push above 300nits in brightness. They also are required to last more than 10 hours when you watch movies as well. To ensure smooth and fast operation, and AMD Advantage laptop has to have at least one NVMe PCIe Gen3 M.2 SSD. Of course, they have to pack an AMD Ryzen processor with an AMD Radeon RX GPU.
The first AMD Advantage Gaming laptops are expected to come as early as June 2021. For more information on AMD’s new APUs and mobile GPUs, you can head over to AMD’s website.
Acer’s Swift line up of laptops is known for being a hero of the thin and light segment. Many of the offerings have, so far, come under the 1.5kg mark when comes to weight and come with a pretty slim silhouette. However, users have always needed to make a choice between performance or portability. That changes with the new Acer Swift X which marries both portability and performance into a single, slim body.
The Swift X is the first of a new line up of laptops under the Swift line up. The new lineup will come equipped with discreet graphics solutions. The new lineup keeps on-the-go creatives in mind allowing them to carry a laptop that’s lighter than 1.5kg with the power to cater to the needs of their workflow.
Acer’s new Swift X is Packed with Power with Little Compromise
The new Swift X comes packed with AMD’s Ryzen 5000 series mobile processor complemented with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3050Ti laptop GPU. The setup should be able to handle some very heavy graphics and video workflows without problems. This is also coupled with up to 16GB of RAM and up to 2TB of SSD storage. The Switft X comes with a 14-inch IPS display with 300 nites brightness and a 16:9 aspect ratio. The display is also one of the most colour accurate on a Swift laptop with 100% coverage of the sRGB gamut. All of this is housed in a premium, metal chassis.
The power-packed Swift X doesn’t compromise on being thin and light either. It comes in at just under 1.4kg and a hair under 18mm thin. That said, the cooling on the laptop isn’t compromised. In fact, Acer has made design improvements to optimise the cooling efficiency of the laptop. The fan of the Swift X comes with fifty-nine 0.3mm blades to maximise airflow. This is paired with two D6 copper heat pipes for better heat dissipation. The lapotp also comes with what Acer is calling air inlet keyboard design which helps expel about 10% more heat than a regular laptop keyboard. The fans have also been augmented with a stereo ring for up to 10% better airflow.
Pricing & Availability
The Acer Swift X will be available starting in June in North America for USD$899.99 (MYR3,723.23), early summer in EMEA for EUR899 (MYR4,534.19) and in Q3 2021 in China starting at CNY6,499 (MYR4,221.27).
ASUS has been hard at work expanding the influence of the Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand. It’s done this with collaborations with the likes of DJ and producer, Alan Walker and even design firms such as ACRONYM. Their latest collaboration brings together the skateboarding and gaming worlds. The ROG Strix has gotten a makeover befitting 6-time overall and current reigning world skateboarding champion, Nyjah Huston.
Source: ASUS
The ROG Strix SCAR gets new design accents inspired by some of the signature items skateboarders are familiar with. The vent on the back of the Strix SCAR is framed with a metallic bars akin to the bars on the skate park. More importantly, the laptop’s new design takes Nyjah’s unique style and emblazons his insignia side by side the ROG logo. The skateboard inspired accents continue on the main body of the laptop with a grey and black color and customised keycaps that bring more of Nyjah’s signature style.
Like previous collaborations, the design flair isn’t just on the ROG Strix SCAR itself. The Nyjah-ROG collaboration starts from the packaging with an imposing skull and backed by two skateboards – Nyjah’s logo signature – with the letters R-O-G embossed across it. The taglines for both ROG and Nyjah are emblazoned on the packaging as well across the skull. These accents are only visible under UV light.
The ROG Strix SCAR 17 was the centrepiece of this collaboration. The new Strix SCAR 17 comes with an AMD Ryzen 5000 series processor which is complemented by the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 Series graphics processor. It also has a Full HD IPS display with a 360Hz refresh rate and 3ms response time – a first in a gaming laptop. The SCAR 17 is also one of the first laptops to come with liquid metal cooling and has optical-mechanical keys on its keyboard.
Pricing & Availability
Source: ASUS
While you may be dying to get your hands on the special edition of the Strix SCAR 17, the laptop is a one-of-a-kind created especially for the world champion skateboarder and will not be available commercially. However, you can get a piece of the collaboration with a special ROG x Nyjah Huston wallpaper and Instagram filter.
