We’ve seen the smallest of the Nitro 5 models in its (inhuman) flesh, and there’s a lot to like despite its role as an affordable machine. Definitely, that Acer trumpets that the better cooling technology of the Nitro 5 will help it work more efficiently than competitors that have the same prices. It also looks better than previous generations of Max-Q laptops, which always sacrifice some of their design, thriving in favor of better thermal. The keyboard is, in our experience, a bit resilient for fast competition, but that’s what peripherals are for.
I do not like, but I think the single USB-C port on the chassis is a bit stingy, given how fast we adopt the standard. There are many people who may not have the disposable cash to upgrade their peripherals, but it would have been nice to have one on both sides. Apart from that, the sacrifices and compromises here are sufficiently (for now) well hidden that you may not realize that you are using a (nice) cheap game notebook. We will certainly not know it until we can set up the finished version for a real stress test, but for now, the Nitro 5 makes a good first impression.
At the same time, Acer is updating the Aspire 7 (and 5) with new AMD chip options, with the top model getting a Ryzen 5000 series chip and up to a GTX 1650 GPU. Of course, you will be able to order up to 32 GB of RAM, a 1 TB SSD and WiFi 6 as options on this machine, as well as user-controllable fan speed. The mid-range Aspire 5, meanwhile, gets a (not yet specified) 5000-series chip paired to AMD’s Radeon RX 640 GPU, up to 24 GB of RAM and withers a 1TB SSD or 2TB HDD.
Acer’s Nitro 5 will be available in North America in February in 15.6 and 17.3-inch versions, with the base models at $ 750 and $ 850 respectively. Of course, the price will skyrocket as soon as you start parts with the above top system add, which will set you back $ 2,299. The Aspire 7 and 5 meanwhile arrive in March, with the base models for $ 750 for the 7 and $ 550 for the 5.