Pavel Chyikin

The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 is a gaming laptop with RTX 30 series graphics card and AMD processor. The model received a rather modest case, but it is immediately clear that the laptop belongs to the gaming segment. Below we found out just how good the laptop really is. Read also: Lenovo Legion 5 Pro review: The powerful duo of AMD and NVIDIA Positioning and price The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 (NH.QBREU.006) costs $2045. Based on the current situation in the hardware market, it's not what you'd call budget-friendly, but can be easily classified as "affordable." Design The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 has an ascetic (for the gaming segment) design with wide enough bezels around the display and chopped corners. The model has a black case made of smooth matte plastic with red inserts at the back. Such material easily collects dust and fingerprints. The laptop boasts good build quality, the lid opens with one hand to 150 degrees. The hinges are strong, and if you press the keyboard harder in the middle, the case sag a little. There are more noticeable bends when you press the lid in the closed state. The laptop interfaces are located on the left and right sides, near the additional cooling holes. The power supply connector is at the back. Please note that the plug must be inserted all the way with a click, otherwise you will think that the power supply does not work. This is not the first laptop with this issue, so I can't blame Acer here. Just be aware of the situation. The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 did not receive a card reader, but it has a gigabit RJ-45, USB Type-C (USB 3.2 Gen 2) and three USB Type-A (2×USB 3.2 Gen 1, 1×USB 3.2 Gen 2). There is only one video output - HDMI. Acer didn't forget about the 3.5 mm audio jack. The model also supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5. Display The laptop is equipped with a matte 15.6-inch IPS Full HD screen with a refresh rate of 144 Hz. AdobeRGB color space coverage is 43.2%. sRGB rates are 61.9% and DCI-P3 is 44.2%. The display has good viewing angles and readability in the sun, but mediocre contrast and coverage of sRGB. In even stronger lighting it becomes difficult to see anything. However, in real use, it most likely won't be a problem. The screen is bright and rich in colors. Although all we got is Full HD resolution, the maximum graphics settings in games make up for it in some way. A 0.9 MP webcam is installed at the top of the display. The picture is mediocre, but it is enough for video calls with colleagues or classmates. Read also: ASUS ROG Phone 5 Review: King of the Hill Keyboard and touchpad The keyboard with zone-adjustable RGB lighting looks neat. It is easy to type, the keys are located at an average distance from each other. The buttons on the NumPad are narrowed to save space, but hitting them is as easy as the main ones. WASD game keys and arrows are highlighted in white along the contour. The touchpad is smooth and flat, shifted to the left. Fingers slide on it effortlessly, the sensitivity is excellent, as well as the work of the built-in buttons. Performance Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 is equipped with an 8-core AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor with a base frequency of 3.2 GHz and a maximum of 4.4 GHz. The maximum TDP is 45 W. The 16 GB of RAM. Basically, two bars of 8 GB DDR4-3200 MHz. However, RAM timings are increased, so it would be better to replace them with something speedier to achieve maximum speed. Built-in memory is the 512 GB NVMe SSD M.2 2280 from Western Digital. The video card here is 256-bit Nvidia RTX 3070 with 8 GB of GDDR6 and TGP 100 W video memory. It is based on an 8-nanometer GPU GA104-770-A1. It has 5120 CUDA cores, 160 texture blocks, 40 RT cores and 160 tensor cores. Radeon Vega 8 performs the role of a integrated graphics card. See below for various performance, endurance and cooling tests. In general, we can say that the laptop is quite cold, so it does not overheat even under heavy loads. However, you have to pay for this with loud fans, which almost completely muffle the built-in speakers, so it is better to play with headphones and not at night if you do not live by yourself. When Auto mode is enabled, the sound of the blades becomes quieter, and this has almost no effect on performance and cooling. This allows the Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 to easily cope with modern games and run them at maximum ray tracing graphics settings (where available). So in Cyberpunk 2077, you can use the "ultra" ray tracing settings. The game ran on average at 50-60 frames per second. In Call of Duty Cold War, the average fps was 105-110 with periodic increases to 128-135 fps. Sometimes I recorded drawdowns of up to 90-95 frames per second. Experience of use With such a price tag and hardware, I would like a more stylish design. After all, if you do not know about the RTX 3070 inside, you might think that the Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 is a budget option for the 1650 Ti. The build quality is lacking, matte plastic collects fingers and dust a lot. Compared to my budget-friendly ASUS ROG Strix G531GT, the new Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 heats up noticeably less. You can easily put it on your knees without the risk of burning yourself. However, additional cooling holes on the sides blow hot air on the right hand with the mouse. I also didn't like the location of the connectors on the sides. At least it's not convenient for my needs. I often connect my laptop to the monitor, so in this case the wires stick out on the side, they interfere and make the workplace look untidy. But if you do not plan to connect this model anywhere or do it rarely, it doesn't really matter. Software The Nitro 5 AN515-45 works with NitroSense branded software. The program is neat. Here you can adjust the keyboard backlight and sound parameters, select power and cooling modes, check driver updates, etc. Speakers The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 has stereo speakers installed on the sides of the case. They aren't very loud and the cooling system drowns them almost completely at maximum speed. The sound is clean. True, there are no basses, but that's to be expected. There are more than enough for listening to background music, movies and videos on YouTube. Battery life The Nitro 5 AN515-45 gaming laptop is equipped with a 57 Wh battery. The power supply here is 180 W. When surfing the Internet and watching videos with RGB backlight enabled, the charge lasts for a maximum of four to five hours. Turning off the backlight will give you another hour and a half. The PCMark Battery Test office benchmark test showed a modest 1 hour 29 minutes. The battery is perhaps the weakest side of the laptop. Verdict The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-45 is a powerful gaming laptop on AMD with a nice bright display, even if it's Full HD (I would like to see QHD). But the increased frame rate of 144 Hz will appeal to fans of shooters and MOBAs. The build quality is fine, but it looks cheap. The laptop has a good cooling system that allows it to work at maximum capabilities for a long time. The fans are, of course, loud, so it is better to play in headphones, and speakers lack bass and volume. The laptop is equipped with Nvidia RTX 3070 graphics with ray tracing support. In the next couple of years, this model will run games at maximum settings with all the bells and whistles. All thanks to the Full HD screen. Subscribe to our accounts: Google News Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube