Hey, how's it going Dave 2D here, This is the 2018 Helios 300. The previous version, the
2017 Helios 300 was one of the best if not the best valued gaming laptop from last year
it had a bunch of great features for a really good price point and they've updated a bunch of things particularly the things that I'd
Had issues with last year and they've made a significantly revamped product
So the big three changes are the screen, the CPU, as well as the thermal design. So the exterior casing hasn't changed at all
It's still running this black and red color scheme
It looks almost a little dated to me
Like a lot of the newer generation laptops are going with a more muted look as well as a less angular design
This has that whole predator DNA going on
It looks pretty aggressive and it looks really gamer kind of over the top gamer
But it still looks decent if you're into this look, I personally don't love it
But that's just a personal preference. One thing that this doesn't have is a Thunderbolt 3 port
It has a USB C support just like the previous generation
But once again, it doesn't support Thunderbolt 3, the rest of the port selection is good and they're well positioned just no Thunderbolt 3,
So if you want to connect up an external GPU, you can't do it
The internals are just as difficult to get into this year as it was last year
You have to be careful not to snap the tabs when you're opening it up
Especially on the back part once you're in though you have access to the Wi-Fi card
But they were to give you a great one your two RAM slots and the two drive bays
You also have access to the fans. Now the fans have been upgraded this year
These are actually running metal fins, which is actually something I don't see very often in gaming laptops
It's these thin metal blades that actually help quite a bit with the airflow
The battery and the speakers weren't great in the 2017 model. I don't think they've changed on this year. It's 48 watt hour battery
You're getting around 4 hours of battery life. Not a very long time
You will have to bring a charger with you, and the speakers also remain quite mediocre
They give pretty loud, not a lot of bass, but they sound kind of flat now in 2017
I don't care too much about these speakers
but in 2018 a lot of the mid and even entry level gaming laptops have
Really decent speakers and these ones fall a little bit short.
Inside they have a brand new screen. I think it's actually the most surprising and best feature of this laptop
It's a 144 Hertz screen on a reason we priced gaming laptop. It's fast. It's bright. It's reasonably color accurate. It's actually really cool
They're able to use a screen like this at this price point and I actually think that this particular
Gaming laptop is going to have an effect on the entire industry
because almost every other gaming laptop at this price point is
Sticking a 60 Hertz screen onto those devices and this product just sticks out as being the most
Visually enticing and visually attractive gaming experience
for the people that are unfamiliar with gaming refresh rates the difference between a 60 Hertz screen and a
144 or even a 120 Hertz screen is massive
everything looks just so much more fluid on a high refresh screen and I'm not gonna say that if you purchase one of these screens
You're gonna instantly become a better gamer
It's not that it's just the gaming experience is a lot better and I think it'll help you achieve better results
You're essentially seeing double the number of frames versus a 60 Hertz screen. So it's just a better experience
The keyboard and the trackpad haven't changed from the previous generation. I didn't love either of them the keyboards decent
It's got relatively soft stroke, but the layout is good
The only thing a little bit weird of the layout is the shift key, again
They haven't changed that it's just right beside the up arrow and depending on how you type you might hit that
Accidentally, but decent keyboard overall the trackpad the buttons are a little bit stiff, but it's using Windows precision drivers
So it's got good gestures and tracking. Performance on this device is great
Now this model is running a GTX 1060 and is comboed with the six core
i7 and it delivers really respectable frame rates for most gaming titles out there
If you're playing something heavier, you obviously have to drop your visual quality to keep up the frame rates
But it's a good combination
You won't be able to max out the 144 Hertz screen on most games at Ultra
But you can for a lot of games, especially
Competitive games on high. Now the thermal performance on this laptop is improved this year
Not that it was terrible last or anything, but it is better
There's no throttling and the temperatures are a little bit lower fan noise is also very respectable. Nothing too loud
Even on Max and you also get fan control through predator sense. One last thing to note
There's a special edition of the Helios 300 that's gonna be available later. It comes in white and gold no changes internally
It's just an aesthetic change. So overall the Helios 300 is once again a
Fantastic value for gaming laptops. It's amazing that they're able to stick a 144 Hertz screen into this kind of price point
It's a really good screen. Now if you're fixated on that screen like if you're interested in this device
Exclusively because of that screen understand that there are ways to stick high refresh screens on to other devices
It's more do yourself route cost like 100, maybe 150 dollars
But if you want something out of the factory you want just that
You know the whole experience right out of the box, you don't want to mess around with installing high refresh screens into cheaper devices
I seriously think this is the best value for this kind of device. Okay.
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