Acer Predator Helios Neo 16 Gaming Laptop 13th Gen Intel Core i9 Processor (16 GB/1 TB SSD/Windows 11 Home/NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060) PHN16-71, (16″) WUXGA Display

Few Imp points
Though marked at 140 GPU TGP it will not reach the max (this is the issue with rtx 40 series for 4060 and 4070 might get resolved in the future(hopefully)
Battery backup seems to be ok for a gaming laptop
Display is good (getting 2k display is very good at this range)

I upgraded from a ryzen 3 2200u laptop from 2018 so this CPU is almost 10 times faster in multicore benchmarks as compared to my last laptop. My basic work flow involves lots of CAD and FEM based applications which requires lots of CPU power specially multi-core performance as all these apps are hyper-threaded. Came today and working great so far. Will outline my observations based on different aspects of this laptop.
CPU:- Its fast. very fast. The geekbench 6 scores are almost within 95-97% of M2 Pro CPU in Macbook Pro 2022 which costs about 2 lakhs.
Display:- Very good. big screen helps a lot in design based works. its is also not reflective.
heat:- It has only gotten a bit warm but not overly hot in my use cases. I am not going to play games on it so cant comment on that.
Webcam:- Totally disappointed. In the amazon advert it was showing FHD camera but its a 720p crap. The quality is really bad. also no slider to close it.
battery:- Well i had kept my expectation at a minimum as I bought it as a portable desktop replacement (I have a dual CPU 44 core, 256 GB ram workstation in office already) when i travel. I expected it to last 2-2.5 hours only but to my surprise even with this heavy configuration its giving me 4-5 hours of battery while doing moderate task(setting up the laptop, installing multiple applications). I feel it can give 6-7 hours on very light workload which is way more than I expected.
What i liked the most:- Lots of connectivity options including 3 USB A ports and 2 thunderbolt 4 ports and 1 Full size HDMI port, RJ45 and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. This laptop is simply functional.
What I didn’t like:- Very bad quality webcam. Speakers are not that impressive but i mostly use headphones so not much of an issue.

Will update after a month of uses.

Update:- After 3-4 days of general uses there are some observations
Battery:- Was curious and hence run various battery tests to see how it actually performs.
Case 1:- Prime Video movie at best quality at 30% brightness(which is actually quiet good for indoor uses) and speakers at 25% volume battery came down from 79 to 60 hence it can play up to 5 hours of video streaming over wifi.
Case 2:- Turned off wifi and blutooth and run a 1 hour 1080P 2.5 GB local video clip at the same settings as in last case. battery was down from 84 to just 74. that means it could easily play up to 9 hours of offline video. that is really amazing considering the screen size and CPU. way more than what i expected when i decided to go intel instead of AMD. I was confused between this and HP omen 16 (6800h and 3070ti) which was slightly cheaper at 115000 Rs during the sale. I am so glad i went for this one as i don’t play games and for my current workloads it is such a snappy system.
In general workloads with wifi on browsing it lasts on average 5 – 6 hours. I dont charge it beyond 85 unless i have to work on heavy modelling works where heavy cpu power is needed. wish there was a switch to turn off battery charging at 85 like in some laptops in this price range.

edit:- it does have a battery limiter option inside acer care app. it even works when laptop is off to limit the charge at 80%.

edit after 2 weeks.- Laptop was freezing sometimes totally with only mouse working. Looked online and found out that this problem was occurring with all 40 series NVIDIA GPU based laptops. with the latest driver update on 30 May the problem is gone. Also comparing this side by side to my old laptop the importance of a high refresh rate screen becomes apparent. It just feels a lot smoother.

The lighting in the keyboard is a very good good feature. I realised once I started using it. I can now work with lights off in the room without disturbing anyone.
Second advantage is the battery life. 5-6 hours back up is sufficient for any one session. I put on charge once I put it down to sleep. 80-90% charging is enough.
We can choose performance mode in predator settings. The boom mode has heavy fan rotation 6500 rpm, air coming out from 4 vents at the sides and back. Very cool. but obviously when in boost mode, it creates wind noise. The start sound is also very cool. Enjoying using it since I bought it 15 days ago.

I was researching for about an year and when the 40 series laptops started coming in, i knew this was a beast and went ahead and bought it. I bought it for under 1 lakh with exchange and card discounts.

Pros :
1. Processor is 13500HX which beats 12th gen i9. Future proof and can handle all the tasks with ease. Writing this review after a month of usage

2. GPU RTX 4050 : it is getting better with each driver updates and is able to outperform other 3070 ti laptops. Plus with DLSS 3 it gives you more than 165 fps in most games which support it which is in fact the future of all games. Ive seen reviews with raw performance and i dont know why do you not use a feature if you have been given that is DLSS 3. Also as the GPU is full 140w tgp hence will get better over time with updates.

3. Memory : it has 16gb DDR5 ram and SSD read speed is around 7000 which i did not expect, its on par with samsung SSDs.

4. Screen : the screen is 16 inch WUXGA which is good and also has the best colours 100% sRGB.

Thermals are great and the screen can be lifted with one finger. Also the keypad has a nice feel along with a big touchpad. Battery is also great for a gaming laptop, around 4-5 hours of usage if you are not gaming

Cons :

1. The back of the laptop is a fingerprint magnet, though you could clean it with a microfiber cloth.

2. The fans get loud if you run on turbo mode and yes it feels like it’s raining outside, that level of sound. But thats what keeps the thermals always below 80. I run on performance mode which is a balance of fan and the usage. 4050 isnt anyway running full wattage now so we dont need to run it for getting more performance right now but would help in future.

Overall i feel good about the purchase and will update the review if i face any issues, none so far in a month. Acer predator series is underrated and should take the market this year with the great pricing.