Acer Predator Triton 300 SE PT314 review: Liquid metal cooling for a 14-inch laptop

[Redaktion]

The Predator Triton 300 SE joins the small but elite group of high-performance 14-inch gaming laptops consisting of the Razer Blade 14, Asus Zephyrus G14, and Alienware x14. The Acer model has its advantages, but they're not enough to stand out from the crowd.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Acer-Predator-Triton-300-SE-PT314-review-Liquid-metal-cooling-for-a-14-inch-laptop.665206.0.html

[Daithi]

Was really hoping for a home run with this laptop. I like the styling way more than the G14 and it has the option of DLSS the the Nvidia GPU. It's also a more achievable price point than the Razer/Alienware.

Any chance you will have a review of the Lenovo Slim 7 Pro X (6800HS, 3050) or Slim 7i Pro X (12700H, 3050) this month (before Black Friday)? Was hoping to pick up a new laptop on sale.

[PJPeter]

So glad to finally see the review of this laptop here, thank you!

I usually have a rule that I never buy or recommend a laptop unless I've checked out the Notebookcheck review, but this was the exception for me. I actually own the previous model 300SE (2021 w/FHD 144Hz) - I think a lot of the Acer statements about the technology between generations may refer to that model rather than the 15.6" 300 model from 2020 that was last reviewed here.

So I've had mine for over 11 months now and can share some findings.

I picked mine because of price/performance - I was able to pick it up at Costco Canada for effectively $1349 CAD+tax early last December. The competition was all significantly more expensive than that (typically double the price or more). 

Same RTX3060 between the two models, the 2021 model had a firmware upgrade that brought it from 75W to 90W. I did extensive testing myself and despite the weaker CPU my Firestrike Graphics score was 18 291 vs 18,737 in your review.

I like that the CPU in my 300SE is less power hungry - I find that it helps keep things cool since it appears the performance per watt is pretty much the same across the different CPU models, just that the newer ones have the capability of eating up more power and producing more heat per second along a fairly straight line.

I would never use Turbo mode in practice - it is ear meltingly loud. It's basically Acer giving users the option to set the fans to absolute maximum rotations if they really want to - not a practical option at all for day to day use imho. I wouldn't have considered it to be a "standard" option and recorded that as such - though I know you did it because the overclock it brings allowed the system to reach the baseline 3060 performance level - but it feels like it takes away more than it gives. I've previously tested a Asus ROG Zephyrus G GA502 previously and I returned it the next day because it was just too damn loud in regular usage (and trying to run a benchmark in 'Silent' would BSOD consistently) - 'Turbo' mode for the ASUS was locked at 40db but even without it set, it spiked up way too loud and annoyingly when benching it. The 300SE has been much, much better in that regard.

So I guess I'd just say that, in practice - this laptop is quite compteitive in the noise department when compared to other slim gaming laptops - and better than most - depending how you choose to use it.

I tested with TimeSpy rather than Firestrike - For Graphics: 6 770 on Quiet Mode vs 7 051 on Auto vs 7 564 on Turbo (and ~3400 on battery).

I ran 8 loops of each, averaged out the temps from HWInfo and tracked the noise with a db meter. My findings were that with Quiet mode, I had approx 93% performance of Auto, while being 10db quieter (ie. logarithmically 10x less noisy!) and slightly cooler - and completely stable.

Considering that, I decided at that point to always game on quiet mode, for the noise, temps and longevity of the system.

I'm surprised the 2022 model doesn't support USB PD - I had read reviews that the 2021 didn't and when I initially tried a 60W cable/adapter it didn't do anything. But when I hooked up a 100W PD Cord/adapter, it worked great - unless I'm gaming, I basically just use that to power and charge my machine.

And gaming on battery is actually quite reasonable and stable - and I did that quite often when I first got the machine. I compared vs. a Swift X w/RTX3050 and got equivalent scores "away from mains" which I'm fine with - it helps extend the battery life (the 300SE would average about 48W overall battery drain (negative charge rate) while running TimeSpy).

My best tip if you have this laptop is to set whatever you want in PredatorSense then close it - don't just minimize it. If you do that (and clean up any other bloatware starting automatically) the fans will often entirely stop spinning when under light usage/browsing and stay stopped consistently - even in Auto mode (or on battery, where modes aren't switchable) for a silent experience.

It's too bad we can't undervolt the CPU anymore post Meltdown/Spectre, but I did undervolt the GPU via modifying the curve in Afterburner and that's helped keep things cooler while providing the same performance.

Thanks again!

[RobertJasiek]

Thank you, too, for your thoughtful report!