The last Predator generation with GTX 9xx GPU was a great hit and this was the laptop which proved that Acer can build one of the best gaming notebooks on the market. Several months after that we were in New York where the Taiwanese company announced Predator 17X (detailed review) – the ultimate gaming beast with a desktop GTX 980 under the hood and industry leading cooling system. The only drawback was the price (it costs around $2300) but we know that if we want cutting-edge, we have to prepare our wallets. Anyway, 17X turned out to be short-lived because NVIDIA hurried with its GTX 10xx series. And as you may guess…it’s a big deal.
The even better news – the GTX 10xx’s notebook versions are very close to their desktop siblings in terms of raw performance. The leap from GTX 9xx to 10xx is huge and that makes the gap between GTX 9xxM and their successors even bigger. Although we were recommending 17X as a good choice, now the game has changed, in a big way. The latest Predator 15 (G9-593) with GTX 1070 will wipe the floor with its bigger and (not much) older brother, and moreover – its price will be lower.
In addition to the GTX 1070, Predator 15 (G9-593) is also equipped with a high-end Core i7-6700HQ processor, up to 64GB RAM, M.2 NVMe, HDMI 2.0 and G-Sync IPS display with up to 4K resolution. What more could gamers want?
You can check the current price of Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) here: http://amzn.to/2ccAYet
Contents
What’s in the box?
Design and construction
Disassembly, maintenance and upgrade options
Display quality
PWM (Screen flickering)
Buy our profiles
Sound
Specs Sheet
Software
Battery
CPU – Intel Core i7-6700HQ
Storage speeds
GPU – NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070
Gaming Tests
Temperatures and Comfort
Verdict
What’s in the box?
In addition to the notebook, its box also contains a powerful charger (Chicony A12-230P1A) which delivers 230W (19.5V, 11.8A), and the traditional FrostCore fan. The latter can be swapped for the DVD optical drive which you probably won’t need (like ever). It will be interesting to see if (and how much) the FrostCore module can reduce the internal temperatures during high load. We’ll check that a bit further in the review.
Design and construction
G9-593’s predecessor, Acer Predator 15 G9-591 (there was a minor upgrade named G9-592) had almost the same design as the latest model that we’re looking at today. If you’re in front of the two laptops, chances are you won’t find any difference. Actually, the most notable one is on the back side – the main exhaust vents have been massively redesigned and now are much more aggressive.
Except for the rear side, the G9-593 looks pretty much the same as its predecessor and that’s not bad at all – both of them have awesome looking and functional design.
The keyboard is “Island Style” (chiclet) with long key travel, distinct feedback, three backlight color zones and large area – 15.5 x 15.5 mm (0.61” x 0.61”). The arrow keys have enough empty space around them so you can comfortably play racing games if you don’t have a wheel.
Just the first row, where the F1-F12 keys are, is narrower – 10.0 x 13.00 mm (0.39” x 0.51”), but you won’t need it much, since there are 5 special function keys which will do anything of your choice (you can assign their duties in the Predator Sense software), and moreover – every one of them could run up to 3 different actions, depending on its color. You can switch the colors with the upper left “P” key. For example, by default the first group (Red) activates the following: “Always use discrete graphics”, “Disable sticky keys”, “Maximum fan speed”, “Multimedia Mode Settings”, and “Game Bar”.
The power button is in the center, above the keyboard and it’s backlit by a red LED light when the computer is working.
The trackpad features a special button which disables it to prevent accidental touches while typing. There is enough area for easy interaction with gestures (~70cm2; 105 x 66 mm) and a red glowing edge. The left and right buttons are dedicated and just below the trackpad.
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) has a 2.1 audio system with two front facing speakers and a subwoofer on its bottom. Speaking of the base of the notebook, it makes a good impression that Acer’s designers have made efforts to make it good looking even though we don’t turn our laptops around every day. Despite the big air vents, one little detail grabs our attention – the notebook sports two tiny outputs for its DustDefender system.
On the left, Predator 15 has two USB 3.0 ports, two audio jacks for a microphone and headphones, memory card reader and the optical drive / FrostCore. On the other side we have three more USB ports, one of which is USB 3.1, while the second has a “Power-off charging” feature which lets you charge your mobile devices even when the notebook is turned off. We also have full sized HDMI and DisplayPort, RJ-45 (Ethernet) and Kensington lock slot. Good news – the notebook doesn’t have air vents on the right side so your right hand (holding the mouse) won’t feel the hell even after hours of gaming.
We can also say only good things about the materials used – Predator 15 is rock solid and its lid structure includes 40% fiberglass, making the layer 1.8 mm thick. We have already told you that fiberglass is used as a main material for elevator spools which hold their steel wire ropes. Mechanics choose glass fiber because it doesn’t rust and has great durability. This is how the material compares against Aluminum and PC+ABS+Talc, which are widely used in today’s laptops.
Oh, here’s a drawback (fitness maniacs could skip that part)…Predator 15 weighs 3742 g (8.25 lbs)! And yes, this is a 15-inch notebook. Also, it’s 38.3 mm (1.51”) thick at its backside and 37.6 mm (1.48”) at the front side. It should really impress us in the temperature tests so that we could overlook this.
Let’s see what we have on the inside…
Disassembly, maintenance and upgrade options
Disassembling the Predator 15 is a relatively easy task – check out the video below or read our detailed instructions article.
Storage upgrade options – 2.5-inch HDD, M.2 slot
Our Predator 15 came with one 2.5″ HDD and one M.2 NVMe SSD. You also have an additional free M.2 slot. The taken one is “M” key, size 2280. The free one is “B” key, 22110.
Slot
Unit
Upgrade price
M.2 slot (1)
Toshiba THNSN5256GPU7, 256GB (NVMe, 2280, M key)
Upgrade options
M.2 slot (2)
Free (NVMe, 22110, B key)
Upgrade options
2.5-inch HDD/SSD
Hitachi Seagate HTS721010A9E630 (1TB, 7200 RPM, 32MB cache)
Upgrade options
RAM
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) has four RAM slots – two below the service lid and two below the motherboard. The latter are taken by 2x 16GB DDDR3 memory, so you can easily upgrade the Predator to 64GB RAM.
Slot
Unit
Upgrade price
Slot 1
16GB DDR4 Kingston ACR24D4S7D8MB
Upgrade options
Slot 2
16GB DDR4 Kingston ACR24D4S7D8MB
Upgrade options
Slot 3
Free
Upgrade options
Slot 4
Free
Upgrade options
Other components
Our Predator 15 configuration came with Hon Hai T77H643.01 Wi-Fi module and a user-replaceable battery rated at 88Wh (6000 mAh). The latter weighs 425 g (0.94 lbs).
Display quality
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593)’s display features an IPS matte touch panel with Full HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) resolution in a 15.6-inch diagonal, made by LG Philips, LP156WF6-SPP1 model. It has a pixel density of 142 PPI with 0.18 x 0.18 mm pixel pitch. SPP1 can be found in the updated version of the old Predator 15 (G9-591) – G9-592.
Predator 15’s display supports G-Sync for fluent gaming without tearing. In case you’re not familiar with G-Sync, check out this article:
What is NVIDIA’s G-Sync and does it really make a difference?
The screen can be considered as “Retina” when viewed from a distance equal to or greater than 60 cm – that’s the distance above which human with “standard” 20/20 vision will stop distinguishing the individual pixels.
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) has comfortable viewing angles. Here you can see how the screen looks like when viewed from 45°.
The maximum brightness of the panel is 343 cd/m2 and 316 cd/m2 is the average value across the surface. The maximum deviation is 12%. We also measured the color temperature which is 7500K at max brightness and white screen. This is a bit colder than the typical sRGB 6500K and colors may appear slightly blue-ish. The contrast ratio is 1000:1.
The maximum color deviation dE 2000 (compared to the center of the screen at 100% RGB and 100% brightness) is 3.2. Values over 4.0 are undesirable. This is a very important characteristic if you intend to work with colors.
Color reproduction
To make sure we are on the same page, we would like to give you a little introduction of the sRGB color gamut and the Adobe RGB. Starting with the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Diagram that represents the visible specter of colors by the human eye giving you a better perception of the color gamut coverage and the color accuracy.
Inside the black triangle, you will see the standard color gamut (sRGB) that has been used by millions of people in HDTV and on the web. As for the Adobe RGB, this is used by professional cameras, monitors and etc. for printing. Basically, colors inside the black triangle are used by everyone and this is the essential part of the color quality and color accuracy of a mainstream notebook.
Still, we’ve included other color spaces like the famous DCI-P3 standard used by movie studios and the digital UHD Rec.2020 standard. Rec.2020, however, is still a thing of the future and it’s hard to be covered by today’s displays. We’ve also included the so-called Michael Pointer gamut, or Pointer’s gamut, which represents the colors that naturally occur around us every day.
The yellow dotted line shows the Predator 15’s coverage. The screen can represent 89% of sRGB/ITU-R BT.709 (web/HDTV standard) in CIE1976. In other words, it can show almost all colors used in Internet and HDTV. Good result.
Below you will see practically the same image but with color circles representing the reference colors and white circles being the result. You can see main and additional colors with 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% saturation inside the sRGB gamut before and after calibration.
You can also compare the results with and without the Office & Web Design profile, which can be bought here.
The profile is created at 140cd/m2 luminance, target illuminant white point 6500K (D65) and sRGB gamut.
We tested the accuracy of the display with 24 commonly used colors such as light and dark human skin, blue sky, green grass, orange etc. You can check out the results at factory condition and also, with the Office & Web Design profile.
The Office & Web Design profile offers much better DeltaE – 2.4, although even that isn’t an excellent result.
The next figure shows how well the display is able to reproduce really dark parts of an image, which is essential when watching movies or playing games at low ambient light.
The left side of the image represents the display with stock settings while the right one is with an activated Gaming & Movie Nights profile. On the horizontal axis, you will find the grayscale and on the vertical axis the luminance of the display. With the two graphs below you can easily check for yourself and see how your display handles the darkest nuances, but keep in mind that this also depends on the settings of your current display, the calibration, the viewing angle and the surrounding light conditions.
GL502 doesn’t show the dark areas well and as you can see the difference between 1% and 4% white is very subtle. Our Gaming & Movie Nights profile greatly improves that.
Gaming capabilities (Response time)
We test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “black-to-white” and “white-to-black” method from 10% to 90% and vice versa.
We recorded Fall Time + Rise Time = 18.0 ms. An excellent result for an IPS screen and while the TN matrix, for example, is much faster, you won’t see any difference or unwanted lag.
PWM (Screen flickering)
Pulse Width modulation (PWM) is an easy way to control monitor brightness. When you lower the brightness, the light intensity of the backlight is not lowered, but instead turned off and on by the electronics with a frequency indistinguishable by the human eye. In these light impulses the light/no-light time ratio varies, while brightness remains unchanged, which is harmful to your eyes. You can read more about that in our specialized article on PWM.
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) uses Pulse-Width Modulation for all brightness levels below 100% but at a very high frequency – 20 000 Hz, which greatly reduces the negative impact. Nevertheless, the Health-Guard profile eliminates it and that’s not the only advantage…
Blue light emissions
The installation of our Health-Guard profile not just eliminates PWM but also reduces the harmful Blue Light emissions while keeping the colors of the screen perceptually accurate. If you’re not familiar with the Blue light, the TL;DR version is – emissions that affect negatively your eyes, skin and your whole body. You can find more information about that in our specialized article on Blue Light.
You can see the levels of emitted blue light on the spectral power distribution (SDP).
Conclusion
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) has a very good screen and that is something normal having in mind that we’re testing a high-end machine. It has excellent brightness, contrast and viewing angles. However, it uses PWM for all brightness levels and it has an unwanted high color temperature. Both of these problems can be easily solved by installing the Health-Guard profile. The resolution is Full HD and we consider it as optimal for a 17-inch screen.
The “Office and Web Design” profile successfully reduces the DeltaE to a good level and “Gaming and Movie Nights” could be very handy at low ambient light when you want to see better the near-black areas. You can take an advantage of them by purchasing them for a modest price, which will also support our laboratory.
Buy our profiles
Since our profiles are tailored for each individual display model, this article and its respective profile package is meant for Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) configurations with 15.6″ LG Philips LP156WF6-SPP1 (FHD, 1920 × 1080) IPS, which can be found on Amazon: http://amzn.to/2ccAYet
*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 bg.laptopmedia@gmail.com.
Read more about the profiles HERE.
In addition to receiving efficient and health-friendly profiles, by buying LaptopMedia's products you also support the development of our labs, where we test devices in order to produce the most objective reviews possible.
Office work / Web design
If your field is office work or web design, or you just want your monitor's color set to be as accurate as possible for the Internet color space, this profile will prove to be useful.
$4.96
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Gaming or Movie nights
We developed this profile especially for occasions on which you spend a lot of time in front of your monitor with some games or watching movies – it will be easier for you to discern fine nuances in the dark.
$4.97
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Added to cart
Health-Guard
This profile reduces the negative impact of pulsation and the blue spectrum, securing your eyes and body. You still get a pitch-perfect color image, albeit slightly warmer.
$4.98
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Added to cart
$9.99
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Added to cart
Sound
Acer Predator 15 (G9-593) supports the Dolby Audio technology with Music, Movies and Games modes. The sound is relatively good but the tones aren’t clear enough in some low and high frequencies.
Specs Sheet
These technical specifications refer only to the particular device being tested in this review. Laptops from the same series could have different characteristics and features.
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CPU
Intel Core i7-6700HQ (4-core, 2.60-3.50 GHz, 6MB cache)
RAM
up to 64GB (4x 16384MB) – DDR4, 2133MHz
GPU
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980M (4GB GDDR5)
HDD/SSD
2x M.2 SSD + HDD
Display
15.6-inch Full HD IPS, matte + G-Sync
Optical Drive
DVD Writer (interchangeable with FrostCore)
Connectivity
LAN 10/100/1000 Mbps, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0
Other features
4x USB 3.0
1x USB 3.1 Type-C
LED keyboard backlight with different zones
HDMI 2.0
DisplayPort
RJ-45
SD card reader
3.5 mm jacks for microphone and headphones
5 programmable macro keys
2x built-in loudspeakers + subwoofer
Battery
88.8Wh / 6000 mAh
Weight
3742 g
Software
All Predator configurations ship with a pre-installed Windows 10. At the first start you’ll find the PredatorSense and Killer Network Manager apps.
With Predator Sense you can track the temperatures inside the notebook and the fans speed. You can also see the current CPU frequency but unlike the 17X version of Predator Sense, you can’t overclock your system with one click. The advanced options give you the choice of always using the discrete graphics, use maximum speed or disable sticky keys.
There is a hotkey profiles panel as well where you can assign actions to the glowing buttons above the keyboard. You can also assign macros. In the third tab you can control the four zone keyboard backlight.
Killer Network Manager gives you the ability to see which applications are hogging your wireless bandwidth, and automatically prioritizes sensitive application traffic for an online game, HD video, and high-quality audio. With Killer DoubleShot Pro, Predator 15 can use wired and wireless network connections simultaneously.
If you want to do a clean install of Windows 10, here you’ll find all the drivers and software you need:
http://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/drivers
Battery
Just as its predecessor, G9-593 has an 88.8Wh battery (6000 mAh), which we aren’t sure is enough to handle the GTX 1070 and 6700HQ for a long time. The major problem is that the notebook doesn’t take advantage of an integrated card so every application uses the GeForce one. As you can guess, that leads to serious power drain and it can’t help but reflect on the battery life.
Web Surfing
In order to simulate real-life conditions, we used our own script for automatic web browsing through over 70 websites.
The new Predator 15 (G9-593) got us just 276 minutes (4 hours and 36 minutes) which wouldn’t be a disappointing result some years ago but now it’s below most of its competitors. As a matter of fact, G9-593’s predecessor G9-591 got us 464 minutes of browsing time, which is 68% more. We know who’s to blame – as we said, the new Predator has gotten rid of the integrated Intel Graphics card and the pow