Acer’s new Predator Helios Neo gaming laptops offer RTX 5070 Ti GPUs and lots of ports

The (deep breath) Predator Helios Neo 16 AI and Predator Helios Neo 18 AI can be configured with up to Intel’s Core Ultra 9 275HX CPU and RTX 5070 Ti GPUs. They each feature a boatload of ports and will start at $1,899.99 for the 16-inch and $2,199.99 for the 18-inch. The 16 launches in the US in April (other countries in May), and the 18 launches in May (other countries in June).

Both laptops feature RGB logos on their lids, four-zone keyboard lighting, and up to 64GB of RAM and 2TB of storage. Also in the high-end configs is a 240Hz 2560 x 1600 OLED for the 16-inch model and 250Hz Mini LED of the same resolution for the 18-inch. Both sizes of laptop feature 90Wh batteries and Wi-Fi 6E support. Each model comes standard with enough ports to keep you free and clear of dongle town. There’s one Thunderbolt 4 port, one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2, three USB-A ports, one HDMI 2.1, a 3.5mm headphone / mic combo jack, and even an ethernet port. Oddly, for such large and thick laptops, they’ve got microSD card slots instead of full-size. That seems like the only thing “micro” about these laptops weighing as much as 7.28 pounds.

But the bigger thing to be aware of is that the RTX 5070 Ti GPUs, Core Ultra 9 CPUs, and OLED / Mini LED screens are all optional. At the starting configurations for both sizes you’re getting a more modest Core Ultra 7 255HX and RTX 5070. That doesn’t sound terrible, but the base-model displays are just 1920 x 1200.

We reached out to Acer about the cost of the higher-end Predator Helios Neo configurations, but did not hear back before publication.