Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55) – Top 5 Pros and Cons

The 15-inch Nitro 5 is currently our favorite budget gaming notebook. However, we totally understand that people want larger gaming machines and thankfully Acer thinks that the Nitro 5 can do some damage among the 17-inch crowd, bringing a great QHD display, Alder Lake, and Ampere into the mix. This is a combination not only for gamers but content creators as well, as you’ll find out below.

Today we present you with LaptopMedia’s top 5 picks about the Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55).

Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55): Full Specs / In-depth Review


4 reasons to BUY the Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55)

1. Upgradeability

Since this is a more budget option and because Ader Lake allows it, the Nitro 5 uses DDR4 RAM, but we don’t mind it, since as of right now, there isn’t a large difference between DDR4 and DDR5. You can access it through two SODIMM slots. Storage is upgradeable through two M.2 PCIe x4 slots, both of which support Gen 4 drives.

Here is our teardown video, where we show how to access both the RAM and SSD slots.


2. Display quality

We treated ourselves to a QHD IPS display with a 165Hz refresh rate, which is the right choice for the 17.3-inch Nitro 5. The panel provides a detailed image and a high pixel density. The display has excellent viewing angles, a peak brightness of 320 nits, and a high 1160:1 contrast ratio. It’s ripe for Creator work, covering 100% of the sRGB gamut and 99% of the DCI-P3 gamut.

The color accuracy is a bit off, but our Design and Gaming profile puts it in place, with a dE value of 2.0. Here are our test results with the stock settings (left) and with the profile applied (right).


Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each individual display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55) configurations with 17.3″ Quad HD IPS BOE NE173QHM-NY6 (BOE0A13).

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

Naast het ontvangen van efficiënte en gezondheidsvriendelijke profielen, steunt u door het kopen van LaptopMedia's producten ook de ontwikkeling van onze laboratoria, waar wij apparaten testen om de meest objectieve beoordelingen mogelijk te maken.

Office Work

Office Work moet vooral worden gebruikt door gebruikers die de meeste tijd besteden aan het bekijken van stukken tekst, tabellen of gewoon surfen. Dit profiel is gericht op het leveren van een betere helderheid en duidelijkheid door het behouden van een vlakke gammacurve (2.20), native kleurtemperatuur en perceptueel accurate kleuren.

Ontwerp en spel

Dit profiel is gericht op ontwerpers die beroepsmatig met kleuren werken, en ook voor games en films. Design and Gaming brengt beeldschermen tot het uiterste en maakt ze zo nauwkeurig mogelijk in de sRGB IEC61966-2-1 standaard voor Web en HDTV, bij witpunt D65.

Health-Guard

Health-Guard elimineert de schadelijke Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) en vermindert het negatieve Blauwe Licht dat onze ogen en ons lichaam aantast. Omdat het op maat is gemaakt voor elk paneel, slaagt het erin de kleuren perceptueel nauwkeurig te houden. Health-Guard simuleert papier zodat de druk op de ogen sterk wordt verminderd.

Krijg alle 3 de profielen met 33% korting


3. Input devices

With large notebooks, the keyboards are generally great, due to a slightly thicker body and more surface area to work with. The Nitro 5’s unit has long key travel and clicky feedback, along with highlighted WASD and Arrow keys. The NumPad is present as well. While the touchpad is a bit smaller than we’d like, it still has a very smooth cover, and the accuracy and responsiveness are amazing.


4. I/O

The port selection heavily benefits from the larger body, with three USB Type-A 3.2 ports, two 10Gb ports, and one 5Gb port. There’s also a Thunderbolt 4 port, an HDMI 2.1 port, an Ethernet port, and a 3.5 mm audio jack.


1 reason NOT to buy the Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55)

1. Thermal management

The cooling setup is pretty decent, with a total of five heat pipes, with two shared between the CPU and Graphics, an extra two for the GPU, and one more for the processor. There are several heat spreaders over the GPU memory and VRMs.


Max CPU load

Intel Core i7-12700H (45W TDP)0:02 – 0:10 sec0:15 – 0:30 sec10:00 – 15:00 min
Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55)2.22 GHz @ 3.27 GHz @ 83°C @ 115W3.43 GHz @ 2.71 GHz @ 82°C @ 100W1.58 GHz @ 3.27 GHz @ 93°C @ 95W

The laptop has an unorthodox way of work, clocking the E-cores as high as possible while letting the P-cores rest, which isn’t ideal when you want to perform. It also increases the temps significantly, with the Core i7-12700H running at 93°C at the end of the test.

Real-life Gaming

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 TiGPU frequency/ Core temp (after 2 min)GPU frequency/ Core temp (after 30 min)GPU frequency/ Core temp (Max Fan)
Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55)1663 MHz @ 73°C @ 149W1655 MHz @ 74°C @ 149W
ASUS ROG Strix SCAR 15 G533 (2022)1631 MHz @ 80°C @ 149W1614 MHz @ 81°C @ 149W
Acer Predator Helios 300 (PH317-56)1637 MHz @ 70°C @ 149W1628 MHz @ 72°C @ 149W1646 MHz @ 67°C @ 150W
MSI Stealth GS66 (12Ux)1277 MHz @ 71°C @ 92W1250 MHz @ 75°C @ 91W1314 MHz @ 64°C @ 92W
Acer Predator Triton 500 SE (PT516-52s)1270 MHz @ 87°C @ 115W1200 MHz @ 87°C @ 105W1320 MHz @ 87°C @ 113W

On the other hand, the graphics perform even better than the ROG Strix SCAR 15, a laptop twice as expensive as the Nitro. The GPU runs cooler while having the same wattage and slightly higher clock speeds.

Gaming comfort

External temperatures are fantastic, with the base reaching only 39°C. The fans are quite loud, but that’s the price that you pay for the performance.


All Acer Nitro 5 (AN517-55) configurations:

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