Intel announced its new eighth-generation H-series processors today, and the first company to announce a PC that uses them is Acer. While it doesn"t use the fancy new Core i9, Acer"s refreshed Nitro 5 gaming laptop comes in Core i5+ and Core i7+ flavors.
While Acer did boast that there will be models with a Core i7 that will be detailed at a later date, the only two models that were confirmed today include the Core i5-8400H. The Core i5 is quad-core, whereas the i7 will be hexa-core. Both processors are hyperthreaded, meaning that they have eight and 12 threads, respectively.
They also come with Optane memory, hence the new Core i7+ name. This is meant to provide faster response time and storage.
"Acer is excited to be among the first to offer the new Intel Core i7+ processors with our new Nitro 5 gaming notebook," said Jerry Hou, General Manager, Consumer Notebooks, IT Products Business, Acer. "The new Nitro 5 provides exceptional performance at an accessible price point which exceeds the needs of most casual gamers, and also professional users that need to power through their tasks on the go."
As far as graphics go, you"ll get an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050Ti, which is really made for the casual gamer. If you"re looking to go higher end than that, you"ll want to look into Acer"s Predator series, which is for the more dedicated gamer.
Other than the new processors, not much has changed from the last generation of the Nitro 5. It comes with a 15.6-inch 1080p display, USB Type-C, HDMI 2.0, and more.
The Nitro 5 will arrive in May, starting at $749 USD in North America and €799 in EMEA regions. That will get you the Core i5-8300H, GeForce GTX 1050 GPU, 8GB RAM, and 1TB HDD. For $849.99 USD, you"ll get the same processor, GTX 1050Ti graphics, 8GB of RAM, and a 256GB SSD. As mentioned earlier, Core i7 configurations will be detailed at a later date.