Customer Ratings & Reviews

The Acer Predator Helios 300 is a beast; physically it's imposing at 15.6", it's thick, heavy, and angular. "Laptop" is definitely a misnomer here - the machine is heavy, thanks in large part to the cooling system embedded throughout - there's no doubt it cools well, but you do not want that heat venting onto you (and the vents are perfectly positioned to char your knees and anything else adjacent). The power port is clunky and the power brick is indeed a brick. Trust me that you need a desk. On standard settings without being plugged in, you will get decent performance and battery life, but nowhere near all-day performance if you're planning on doubling this up as a school or work computer. One short session of gaming (1hrish) will zap your battery life significantly. The other big drawback of multitasking this particular machine is the 16gb of RAM. Ideally, if you were going to make this a video or graphics production machine, you'd want 32gb. You must be plugged in to access some of the more amazing performance settings which bring out the best in most modern games. I had a hard time finding the edges with most of games I frequent; the response time was fast and loading times were practically nonexistent, the FHD 165Hz screen left very little to be desired, it's crisp and clear and bright. All of the most useful ports on the laptop are located on the back (power, USB-C, and HDMI) indicating to me that this is meant to be used primarily as a desktop. In that regard it performs exceptionally well, the base is stable, it doesn't shift, it vents well sideways and backward, and you can even hardwire in to your network if you need to (though this one is located on the left side). The ONE downside to having all of these ports on the back: if you want to stow the computer, it's harder to do so on its side because of the placement and thickness of the power cord. It's also not powered through USB-C, so the power brick becomes a harder-to-replace-on-the-go object. The keypad is a great addition without cannibalizing the rest of the keys on the customizable RGB-backlit keyboard. WASD are even specially lit and the trackpad is responsive enough (though serious gamers will want an external kit to round this laptop out). The built-in sound is fine for casual play, though with full fans running you'll want those noise cancelling headphones on to have a fully immersive experience... even though it's dts audio it is very, very limited in terms of quiet sounds. Gaming laptops almost always invariably have some sort of annoying startup sound you have to shut off in bios, this one is no different. Do that FIRST. From there the Acer Predator gaming software actually gives you some pretty cool information (how fast the fans are running, how your CPU and GPU are running, etc). There's even a turbo button when you're plugged in to automatically go to max settings. All in all, this is a great gaming computer; a laptop it is not, though it is portable if you so desire.

Worst computer I have ever owned. Slow and constantly has issues. Purchased a few weeks ago and it seems to get worse as time goes by.

Wouldn’t turn on after 2 weeks of use. Thank goodness for best buy return policy. I got my money back and got rid of this junk laptop.

Visibly poor build quality and trackpad non working out of the box. Updating drivers didn't help get trackpad functioning. Returned.

Amazing gaming laptop, perfect price-performance, after waiting to get a gaming laptop from my parents for 3 years, I finally got this in my hands and it instantly ripped through any game that would usually crash my old i3 laptop, I tried a few games like roblox, minecraft dungeons, and people playground and all performed a lot above my expectation, and I had to cap the fps at 165 to prevent visual tearing, which happens when fps is higher than refresh rate, and 0 hiccups, good job acer, keep it up

This gaming PC is blazing fast and can handle any game I've played so far at at least high settings. It even handled playing Halo Infinite hooked up to a 4k HDR 65" tv at high settings (couldn't quite do any higher setttings on this big of a screen). I know a solid state drive is old news to most folks at this point, but after years of console gaming with extreme load times, quickly booting up a game or reloading after dying in a game is still so refreshing and keeps me engaged in games I love. The RGB keyboard is lovely and the screen is high resolution and a perfect size for gaming on the go or in random rooms around my house. The screen is plenty bright for playing in brighter rooms, and there is little to no glare. The built in speakers are surprisingly good. Whenever I'm gaming without headphones, I can still hear sounds and dialog with no issue. The negatives are the size of the laptop and the noise of the fan. The laptop is thick, heavy, and bulky. It seems a bit outdated in terms of size when compared to other laptops with similar specs. Thankfully I'm not going to carry this around a lot. The fan is also really loud, even louder than some consoles I've had and louder than another gaming PC from a year ago that I have with similar specs. I would say the battery life is not great, but if you're planning on long term gaming sessions, you're going to plug in anyway.

Ive had for almost 3 years now and its been great, well suited for programming and gaming even nowadays

Predator worked great for over 2 years with heavy heavy use. Started freezing, sent into geek squad and they were unable to repair (motherboard fault) and replaced it for me. Great computer but get the protection plan just in case.

Excellent for gaming. My kid is loving it. I've had it for a few weeks and had 0 problems.

Great product performance is better than expected.

Best bang for the buck, bought an opened box but works really well and no issue.

Great laptop. My first gaming laptop, replaced my old Aspire 7745. Was looking for a economical gaming laptop for a blend of work and play. I'm very happy that I spent the additional and chose the Helios over the Nitro. Packaged up very securely for shipping. I couldn't find the 17.3" screen with the i7, but the 15.6" frame makes the laptop much more portable for the slightly smaller screen size.

THIS ALMOST MADE IT A YEAR BEFORE IT DIED ON ME. WAS A GREAT LAPTOP UNTIL THEN THOUGH

i was looking for a laptop that was able to run high games, I was recommended this one and it does its job well. The only downside is that the startup sound is so loud.

I was going to purchase this Laptop, then I saw the "Keyboard" and completely changed my mind on purchasing this Laptop.

i got it for one day i forgot to take out the plastic cover over the fans and i heard it was makeing a nose sound like a train and then sparks come out and gets on fire and burns down my house