As it's already known with anyone I interact with, I am a BTS fan or Army. My bias is Suga, and my wrecker is V. I got into BTS in late 2015 as the girl I was talking to (we have been dating for 5 ½ years) introduced me to them. So when we heard that McDonalds and BTS were collabing, we marked the day on our calendar.
My focus and hunger weren’t for the nuggets, fries, and drink but the specialty sauces. The meal includes two sauces inspired by South Korea, and they are Sweet Chili and Cajun. Compared to the other collabs, this was the first to have a specialty item created and included. Travis Scott just added bacon and barbecue sauce to a Quarter Pounder, and J. Balvin took pickles off a Big Mac. BTS got two outstanding sauce packets.
The sauces are out of this world and are worth stockpiling if they do not become standard. The sweet chili has an excellent flavor combination that starts off sweet that slowly transitions to a nice heat. The Cajun sauce is a mustard based sauce that isn’t heavy on the mustard taste and allows the Cajun seasoning to come through. The best experience is combining the two sauces for a beautiful mixture of flavors that attacks the taste bud, with each one complementing and highlighting the chili and Cajun in each.
As an Army, we are accustomed to exclusive merchandise. BTS and McDonalds brought some of the most unique and boring products to their app Weverse. The shirts are pretty simplistic, and one of them is the same shirt the McDonalds staff are wearing or selling on eBay. The big draw to order the merch is to get a random photocard of the band or members exclusive to this promotion.
There is some criticism of the release. Many McDonalds in the US did not get the BTS meal packaging and used the regular ones. Some McDonalds staff have been selling items on eBay. Then people are trying to buy out all cases of the sauces to sell at a massive markup on eBay and FB marketplace.
Overall this is a very successful collaboration as the new sauces add a completely different and unique experience that the other meals didn’t. There isn’t a chicken nugget pillow like Travis Scott had, but I did score a Laptop Case and hopefully get a Suga Photocard.
Build Quality
The Predator Triton 500 is made mostly from aluminum and by elongating the keyboard deck, the weight is distributed in such a way that it’s 4.63 lbs feels more like 3 lbs. The chassis is made of a thin aluminum in mostly black that does attract fingerprints but it is not as peppered as other black laptops. I write mostly because this color of black does show as a deep blue in some lighting, and the hinge is absolutely a different shade than the lid. When you’re paying this kind of money, you should demand attention to detail. The display hinge is not as sturdy as I would expect. My two-year old Razer Blade has a stronger hinge and can stay open even just 1-inch from the keyboard deck, whereas the Predator will buckle within 3 inches.
The design is a classic clamshell without any fancy design choices, such as how Lenovo moved their ports to the rear and displaced the display hinge. Or how some ASUS laptops lift up from the surface its on upon opening the display from the keyboard. It’s unfortunate that Acer did not move at least some of the ports to the rear as that is a better user experience regarding cable management. This classic design feels refined on the Predator, by in large. Although, it’s not perfect. The AC power port is smack-dab in the middle of the left side of the laptop. That position is less flexible for users, but its certainly not a deal breaker. There is one other design choice I do not love: the front corners are not round – they are angled. There is nothing bad about this functionally. But, for me, its less attractive and I think will go out of style more quickly.
Port Selection
- HDMI
- Total Number of USB Ports 3
- USB Type-C
- USB Type-C port, supporting:
- USB 3.2 Gen 2 (up to 10 Gbps)
- DisplayPort over USB-C
- Thunderbolt 3
- USB charging 5 V; 3 A
- Thunderbolt
- Network (RJ-45)
Display
The Predator is equipped with a G-Sync compatible, IPS display measuring 15.6″ with a resolution of 1920 x 1080. I found colors to be well represented and the display is bright indoors. The buttery-smooth 300 Hz refresh is simply awesome. For non-gaming, I could not discern between 300 Hz and 144 Hz. Unless you are playing an older shooter and are competitive, you’re not going to take full advantage of the refresh rate. I think 144 Hz is plenty for most people – gamers and non-gamers alike.
Brief commentary: I think 120 Hz should be standard on all laptops now. Reverting to 60 Hz on business laptops is just brutal on the eyes!
Speakers
The speakers are not great. They are bottom-firing, meaning the speakers aim away from the user and bounce off whatever surface the laptop is on. For context, most gaming laptops are bottom-firing and most gaming laptops have subpar speaker quality. You will want to use a headset while gaming for this reason coupled with the loud fans.
Keyboard & Trackpad
For me, this keyboard really shines. The layout makes sense, mostly, and the keyboard feels softer than most. While crunching out a long typing experience, I made very few errors and the keyboard never interrupted my flow. This may be the best keyboard on any gaming laptop.
The trackpad is made of glass and feels great. I had no issues with Windows gestures or standard trackpad use. It is a little on the smaller side but still a step-up from gaming laptops of yesteryear.
Performance and Benchmarks
For a laptop equipped with a laptop-grade NVIDIA RTX 2080 Super, I expected more. The below benchmarks were captured using 3D Mark and a couple of modern, demanding games. In comparison with my 2018 Razer Blade 15 with a GTX 1070 Max Q, a 2-year old laptop, the results of the Predator are not impressive. In 2018, the Blade I purchased was $2599.99; the same price as this Predator Triton 500. In practical terms, the key difference in performance is about 15 FPS or 25%. That’s meaningful, but not enough to justify the loud fan noise.
The Triton 500 also includes a turbo button. Unfortunately, it does not have the impact anyone would desire. While playing Witcher 3, I tested out turbo mode and noticed the fan noise kicked up from 49.9db to 68.1db and I only picked up a couple more FPS. Yikes.
Synthetic Benchmarks
No overclocking.
- Port Royal: 4579
- Time Spy: 7175
Gaming Benchmarks
No overclocking. Games have been set to 1080p, high-settings.
- Far Cry 5: 105-115
- Witcher 3: 76 – 123
Hot or not
While the cooling fans are loud, they are going to work with positive results. Even after 60+ minutes of gaming, the keyboard deck was never hot. Nor was the upper intake by the display.
Battery life
The Predator lasted 1:21 in our battery stress test, which involves a YouTube stream on fullscreen, Chrome minimized with 4 tabs open, brightness set to medium, speakers at 20/100, and the battery settings set to “better battery life” in Windows.
Who its for
The Triton 500 may be a better fit with an RTX 2060 that would require less cooling and a lower price tag. I love the look and feel – the weight distribution makes for a very comfortable and more portable laptop than the similar-weight Razer Blade (2018+). Unfortunately, this particular model is not worth the price tag, even for a hardcore gamer.