Looking to get a jump on all of the announcements that will come out of Computex next week, Acer today sent word that it has updated two of its laptop lines with speedier CPUs from AMD's second-generation Ryzen mobile family, which they surely hope will compete for the title of best CPU for gaming.
They include the Nitro 5 and Swift 3, the former intended for gamers and the latter a thin and light for business. Starting with the Nitro 5 (as shown above), it is now powered by up to a Ryzen 7 3750H processor. That is a 4-core/8-thread processor with a 2.3GHz base clock and 4GHz boost clock.
The Ryzen 7 3750H also brings to the table integrated Vega 10 graphics clocked at 1.4GHz, though the Nitro 5 sticks to the script of the previous version by offloading graphics chores to a faster Radeon 560X GPU. That essentially means graphics performance will be the same, though for games that need additional CPU muscle, there could be some small gains here. For reference, the previous model ran on a Ryzen 5 2500U CPU, which is also a 4-core/8-thread part but with slower clocks (2GHz base, 3.6GHz boost).
To be clear, the Ryzen 7 3750H is based on AMD's current generation 12nm Zen+ CPU architecture, even though it's labeled as a 3000 series part. That's confusing because AMD's upcoming Ryzen 3000 series desktop CPUs are based on its next-gen 7nm Zen 2 CPU architecture.
In any event, the rest of this laptop looks unchanged from its predecessor. As before, it has a 15.6-inch Full HD 1080p IPS display, Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac) connectivity, and a dual exhaust port with "CoolBoost" technology (increases fan speed by 10 percent, which Acer says can cool the CPU and GPU up to 9 percent better, compared to auto mode.
Acer also updated its 14-inch (1920x1080) Swift 3 laptop line, which now come with up to a Ryzen 3 3700U processor. That is also a 4-core/8-thread part, clocked at 2.3GHz to 4GHz. Unlike the Nitro 5, however, the base model leans on the chip's integrated Vega 10 graphics. Higher end configurations get an upgrade to a discrete Radeon 540X GPU.
The main difference between the 3700U and the 3750H is the power envelope. For the business-oriented Swift 3, the 3700U has a 15W TDP, compared to 35W on the 3750H in the Nitro 5. That should translate to better battery life, though we have spent any hands-on time with either model.
Acer has not announced pricing for either laptop. For reference, the previous generation Nitro 5 started at $669.99, and the Swift 3 at $699.99. Both will be on display at Computex, and are expected to be available shortly after.
