The entire lineup was effectively a massive shake-up in how Intel designed and created its chips up until that point. Processor designs that had been touted as some of the best CPUs out there were wantonly abandone🐷d and thrown aside in search of a new design that would give༺ Team Blue an advantage over AMD's recent success with the subsequent 7000 series, particularly its X3D lineup. In essence, the first-generation Ultra series, the 100 line, was confined to laptops only as a hyper-efficient, low-power alternative to Arm and Qualcomm's Snapdragon line. It was a minor success and inevitably became the blueprint for the Core Ultra 200 range on desktop.

After seven months, the question then has to be, "Is Intel's Core Ultra 7 265K a good bargain today?", particularly given everything that went on. It's certainly seen price drops s🍰ince then, that's for sure (the Ultra 7 is now just $299/£239, down frꦰom its launch price of $400/£339), and both BIOS and Windows are now more mature, fully capable of taking advantage of Intel's new architecture. But given how poor that initial launch was, it's fair to say we're all still a little skeptical of Intel's redesign, and with good reason.

Specs & Features

If you’re someone who invested in an Intel motherboard and processor in the last three or four years, you might be asking why the brand chose to uproot its existing CPU socket for its latest generation. Well, by the end of 2023, Intel had kinda pushed its Performance/Efficient design to its limits. The style that was found in the 12th, 13th, and 14th gen chips. You could see it too; the 14th gen, itself really more of a refresh of the 13 series, the 14900K nothing more than a ramped-up 13900K, regularly ran at 100 degrees under load, no matter the cooling or the chip, pushing subsequent clock speeds all the way up to 6G𓃲Hz and above as a result. All in an attemptᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ to compete with AMD.

It wasn't without fault, however, and after numerous stability issues and motherboard manufacturer shenanigans came to light, in an effort to quell the (rightly justified) media and consumer uproar, Intel enforced a bevy of BIOS updates and microcode changes to reduce the amount of power being drawn by the chips. This quelled most of the issues, as it prevented the Raptor Lake products from permanently damaging themselves when in operation. That not only reduced temps (mildly) and increased stability, but it came at the cost of that top-tier launch performance, effectively invalidating most of those early reviews (my own included) and experiences in the process. In short, Intel was🧔 in the doghouse.

Then we got the Core Ultra lineup, and oh boy, the number of changes here was intense. We lost hyper-threading; Intel handed off the manufacturing to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and its 3nm process, it introduced an integrated NPU (neu♓ral processing unit used to accelerate AI calculations), and how it managed power delivery and clock speeds was wildly different compared to its predecessors. It's a chip that really should have been launched about 3-4 months later than it was, once the bugs had been ironed out, its BIOS had been developed, and Windows had been optimized for it. Sticking to re♛lease timelines and shareholder demands sometimes isn't the best play.

Although the CPU architec꧟ture has seen the biggest amount of change from a generational standpoint, the top-line specs aren't that radically different between the two generations. If you compare the 14700K to the Core Ultra 7 265K, they're impressively similar.

Both feature eight Perform🎃ance cores, and 12 Efficiency cores. Both have remarkably similar clock speeds (5.5 GHz for the Ultra 7 265K and 5.6 GHz for the 14700K), and both feature rather tight L3 cache sizing as well (or smart caching), with the 7 265K touting 30 MB versus the 14700K's 33 MB.

The biggest and most notable difference is that lack of hyper-threading or simultaneous multi-threading across the range. Something that for the longest time has been a staple of Intel's Performanc🤪e cores, even pre-dating the P/E split.the

In essence, you can think of hyperthreading like an arm. Each core is a mouth that needs feeding, and by default, it has one arm or thread that can grab that food from the relevant resources. What hyperthreading does is add an extra arm into the equation; it effectively simulates a virtual core to the operating system. Although it doesn't necessarily eq🌠uate to a direct doubling of performance, it generally ensures that the physical core, or mouth, can continually be fed with instructions rather than sitting there idly, waiting for that next resource or instruction to come to it.

It does, however, require more power to operate like that, and the Core Ultra architecture is designed first and foremost around efficiency and reduced latency above all else. On the surface, that looks incredibly bad, as the 14700K touts a whopping 28 threads, ve🍃rsus the Ultra 7's meager 20, but not all is as it first appears. Certai𒆙nly, in regard to performance.

Launch pricing between the two remained fairly consistent as well, despite inflationary pressures (or because of), with the 14700K sitting pretty at $410 / £400 back in October of 2023 and the 265K arriving at $400 / £340 in October 2024. There's a catch there, though, and that's the socket. Namely, if you want one of the latest Core Ultra line♒s, you i𓆉nevitably have to invest in a new motherboard as well, as it is only compatible with LGA 1851 sockets, not the older LGA 1700 sockets common across the 12th, 13th, and 14th gen chips.

Intel really has struggled to shift these CPUs since th🅺eir launch, though, and the debut RRP prices have fallen dramatically as a result, as it tries to encourage consumers away from its 14th-gen lineup onto the newer chips. You can currently pick up an Ultra 7 265K (at time of writing) for a staggeringly low $299 or £239, whereas the 14700K is only available at $336 or £297, as it approaches 💝end of life.

Performance

So then, the good news is🐼 I've spent the last few weeks re-benchmarking and testing as many modern CPUs as I can get my hands on in a fairly hefty testbed, including the Core Ultra 7 265K. The situation for Intel and this new lineup, certainly since I first used it back in October, has improved dramatically. Although there are some caveats to that sta🌠tement.

As for rendering performance, ꦓCinebench multi-core and single-core scores are far, far, far better than they were way back when. I still have the results from when I initially tested the Core Ultra 9 in Cinebench 2024, and that was cꩲlocking in numbers of 98 points in the single-core and 2,252 in multi-core. Comparatively, the Ultra 7 265K today managed 1,938 points in multi-core and 128 in the single-core test. Albeit with four fewer cores and a 200 MHz drop in clock speed. Not too shabby.

Compared to last gen, those numbers are admittedly less impressive, however. The 14700K managed 124 points in single-core and 1,834 in multi-core. That's a 3% improvement on single-core and 6% on multi-core, which is less than stellar. General clock speed was far lower too, with the 14700K tapping out at 5,586 MHz and the Ultra 7 at exactly 5,500MHz. Although it's worth noting that clock speed alone (particularly when transitioning architectures and manufacturing size) often ♛isn't a good indicator of performance. Plus, the Ultra 7 doesn't have hyperthreading either, so performance per thread here is kinda through the roof in a lot of ways.

In Blender, however, the results were far less impressive, with the 147💫00K winning out by two points in theܫ CPU test and 33 points in the GPU test utilizing Junkyard.

And then we get to gaming, and oh boy, is there a lot to cover here. For my gaming tests, I ran a total of three different mainstream high-end titles across the three key resolutions: 1080p, 1440p, and 4K, on the Ultra preset with a few tweaks here and there. The games being, Total War: Warhammer 3 with the Mirror of Madness benchmark, Cyberpunk 2077 with DLSS "Qu🍬ality" and MFG x2 enabled, a♔nd Final Fantasy XIV's Dawntrail benchmark with FSR enabled.

Traditionally, the higher the frame rate, the more CPU-bound the🅘 game becomes as it has to process more frames that the graphics 🐻card generates, and as such, 1080p generally tends to be where you'll find the greatest difference in CPU performance. If you're big into esports titles or high-fps games like that and game in a competitive environment, then a good CPU can make or break your championship runs.

The bad news is that the Core Ultra 7 kinda underperformed at that resolution coꦅmpared to its predecessor. In fact, even the Core i5-14600K outperformed it here, under the same conditions. On average across all three titles at 1080p, the Ultra 7 landed a total average of 157.14 fps, the 14700K 162.42, and the Core i5-14600K 160 exactly. Final Fantasy in particular suffered under the Core Ultra line more so than Total War or Cyberpunk, and that's a real issue, given how old these chips are.

Still, if I'm honest, although it is objectively "worse" than those two chips, it's only by a relatively small margin, 3% to be exact. The likelihood of that being noticeable in-game to absolutely everyone is going to be slim, particularly at lower frame rates. Where this will be more pronounced, however, is for those dabbling in games at the 200-300 fps range. If you've got one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors out there and can handle and generate those kinds of numbers, plus esports titles are on the horizon for you, you'ꦜre going to want to steer clear.

What is mo🌺re noticeable, though, is just how much more efficient the Ultra 7 is. Side-by-side with the 14700K, we're talking about a drop in power draw of anywhere between 60 to 95 W, dependent on the workload. Equally, average temperatures are ridiculously low by comparison. In-game, this chip happily sits around the 50-degree mark versus 60-70 for the 14700K, and similarly, under computational load, those temp drops were 15 or 16 degrees lower as well. It's ♏seriously efficient, and although power draw isn't often a deal breaker when looking at CPUs these days, those lower temps do help out a ton when it comes to maintaining higher clock speeds for longer in rendering tasks, especially compared to the thermal control of the Raptor Lake chips.

I'd also be remiss for not mentioning AMDౠ here; both its X3D chips and standard X line produce some phe꧟nomenal competition right now. The 9900X in particular goes toe-to-toe with the Core Ultra 7 across the gaming spectrum, beating it on average frame rates everywhere but at 4K. It does require a bit more juice, and temps are around 10 °C higher, but that's a tantalizing alternative if you're fed up with Intel.

Should you buy the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K?

This is inevitably a tricky question to answer. On the surface, in isolation, the Core Ultra 7 265K is a good chip. It just is. With that price drop, access to a better chipset with more connectivity, lower power draw and temperatures, plus comparable performance to last gen in-game and out, it's well worth considering for your next 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC. Co🅷mpared to the likes of the Core Ultra 9, that price drop makes it incredi🌼bly tantalizing.

Still, if you're after finding a chip that represents the best bang for the buck both for gaming and computational work, nothing, and I mean nothing, beats the Intel Core i5-14600K right now. Per fr💝ame-generated and score produced in Cinebench, it absolutely annihilates the competition on both sides of the aisle, particularly as you can grab it for just $200 or £191. It's perfect for those dabbling in creative pursuits on the side and focusing predominantly on gaming - especially if you're on a budget.

Monstrous little i5s aside, the Core Ultra 7 has come a long way since its inception, and if you are looking for a modern-day CPU, it's a comfortab🌳le pick. It's perhaps not the best, but a lot better than when it launched. Realistically, though, I'd highly recommend waiting for Intel's 300 series (which, at a guess, will likely launch in October of 2025). Wit꧂h that, we should see a far more refined variant on the Ultra line, hopefully one that's had the remaining bugs ironed out, with higher clock speeds, and if we're lucky, hyper-threading thrown back into the mix as well.

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I think we were all itching for something ๊more when the 9000 series finally arrived with us in August of last year. Intel was on the back foot, scrambling to resolve its Raptor Lake stability issues, and AMD had time and time again proven to us that its Zen architecture was second to none. Certainly over the last seven years, its dramatic IPC advancements and serious improvements in gaming performance and efficiency have had Intel on the ropes every single time. It was like the blue team was constantly scrambling to keep up and, in its haste, had let in one too many bugs in the process.

In fact, it's that architectural dominance, the introduction of chiplets, and scalable designs that are the reason so many Zen chips grace those 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming lists out there, because, time and time again, they've consistently delivered, with massive improvements on the lineup year on year. That is, until ꦉthese wee beauties here.

Behind the scenes

The 9000 series, compared to its 7000 kindred, is unabashedly rather underwhelming. Sure, there are some AI advancements and latency improvements, and yes, AMD has significantly rebuilt the branch predictors and bumped up the heftiness of those information ports and reorder buffers. And yes, that has led to improvements in more complex, deeper workloads, but for the vast majority of us, that's just technical jargon and hardware that doesn't particularly bolster the🦩 applications that we most commonly use.

For standard gaming, for rendering, and for streaming, the effect these tweaks and twists, and turns have had is, well, minor to say the least. More suited for high-end data crunching and server work rather than the humble gamer. And you can understand why, as these 9000 series chips are entirely based on that new Zen 5 architecture, and to be blunt, it's an architectural design whose scope encompasses far more than just your standard run-of-the-mill home-grown 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC. AMD is aggressively targeting the server market right now, as that's where the big money is, and so designing its latest chips to leverage that is a matter of urge✱ncy.

And then, of course, once th🥂e dust had settled and AMD's full product stack finally hit the shelves, Intel launched the carnage that was the Core Ultra 200 series, and all hell ensued. AMD was a dull upgrade on the 7th generation chips, sure, but at least it wasn't a downgrade compared to the previous platform, something only Intel had managed to achieve at that point.

Still, times have changed, and well over half a year later, Intel's Core Ultra 200 series is finally starting to come together. Combined with some seriously aggressive price drops and the more fervent arrival of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD's newest X3D lineup, it got me thinking. Are these X s🌠eries chips still worth the while? Can this 12-core chip still run with the pack, or is it just too 🍒darn expensive for its own good?

Specs & Features

If I'm honest, compared to the Ryzen 9 7900X, the 9900X is, well, quite dull. If﷽ you were playing Top Trumps with these things, you'd be hard-pressed to spot the difference. Both feature the same 12 cores, the same 24 threads, both come with 64 MB of L3 cache, and both tout a 5.6 GHz clock speed. From a pꦫure hardcore performance perspective, the numerical advantages are basically nonexistent.

Effectively, the way A🍬MD's Ryzen processors work is that they are modular by design. Each CPU has a number of "core complexes" on it that house the cores in question, and AMD can add or subtract them from each chip design, increasing or decreasing the total number of cores on the uniꦏt. The problem is that these complexes need to talk to each other and transfer information between themselves. This is done thanks to what AMD calls its "Infinity Fabric".

Unlike Intel's approach to year-on-year multiplication, though, there are no additional cores or threads here, and AMD seems content maxing out those♏ chiplet designs at 6-8 cores per core complex die. At least for the time being.

That's not to say everything is the same, mind you; AMD has reworked those finer details to im𓄧prove latency betw🌺een the cache memory and the core complexes themselves, and that in turn has led to significant improvements in computational and rendering workloads (just don't expect that to carry over quite so readily to gaming).

Also, thanks to AMD shifting some of its manufacturing processes and adding a number of efficiency improvements with its new Zen 5 architecture, total power ൩draw has been cut down by 50W on the last gen, which is a serious win for both temperature management and your electricity bill.

As for pure I/O and compatibility, fortunately, the 9900X is still based on the AM5 soc🐲ket, compatible with any motherboard that supports that, and it continues to have DDR5 and expanded support for PCIe 5.0 as well. Unlike Inte🐈l's latest chips, which require a whole new board.

There's also an iGPU thrown in for good measure based on the RDNA2 architecture, although to be absolutely clear, that's not something I'd recommend you use for gaming (that's a crown entirely reserved for the likes of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Ryzen 7 8700G and 8600G, respectively).

The real Achilles’ heel, though, is the pricing. Particularly how the 9900X competes with both the previous gen and Intel's now operational Core Ultra series too. On the surface, it init𒊎ially looked like a good deal compared to the 7900X. At launch, it debuted at just $500 or £460 total, about $50 less than what the 7900X launched at. Since then, pricing has fallen further, and you can now pick one up for just shy of $380 or £390.

The only problem with that is what it's up against. Namely, Intel's Core Ultra 7 265K. Now, yes, Intel has been on the back foot, and it has taken its sweet time getting the Core Ultra 200 series fully operational, but recent price shuffles on its lineup have made the Ultra 7 in particular ridiculously aggressive in comparison. ❀In fact, you can pick one of those up right now for $80 or £160 less than the 9900X, and that's a real problem for Team Red right there.

Performance

The metrics, though, they're kinda where you'd expect for a chip of this caliber. I've spent these last few weeks aggressively testing all of the CPUs I have at my disposal, across all manner of different benchmarks and workloads, on a consistent test bed. The Ryzen 9 9😼900X is also what I consider my primary CPU for testbeds in general as well, at least for the time beinꩵg. I use it both here and for a few other brands I write for, as it's a nice middle-of-the-road chip for testing graphics cards and SSDs as well, particularly when combined with any of the X870E boards out there.

The good news is that, pound for pound, the 9900X puts in a seriously strong showing against Intel. Particularly if you can pair it with one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best memory kits out there. Ideally, you're looking for a kit that's around the 6,400 MT/s mark to better take advantag꧒e of that Infinity Fabric scaling.

Infinity Fabr🐭ic is effectively a PCIe-like interconnect woven between the core complexes. The unique thing about it is that its speed is directly tied to your RAM speed up to a certain point. So the faster your memory kit, the better the performance of your CPU. That said, it is very much a case of diminishing returns, and past a certain point, you'll no longer see improvements. That's why it's pivotal as a Ryzen user that your memory profile is always enabled in your motherboard BIOS.

We're not talking a huge amoun🌄t of performance, no, it's not double or anything insane like that (DDR5 defaults to 4,800 MT/s after all) but it's enough to have a significant impact both in-game and in computational workloads. In some cases, it can bring improvements upwards of 10% or more. With that, I'm actually using a🐼 64GB kit of Team Group T-Create at 6,000 MT/s, as it features both Intel XMP and AMD EXPO profiles, to keep timings tight and consistent across both platforms. You may see slightly better performance from a 6,400 - 7,000 MT/s kit and above.

RAM speeds aside, the 9900X did incredibly well in Cinebench 2024, putting in a stro💧ng showing of 1,767 in the multi-core test and 128 in single-core. Decent enough numbers, yet although the single core matched the Core Ultra 7, it did fall short somewhat on the multi-core, with a 9% difference between the two. Blender similarly saw a win when utilizing CPU only on Junkyard, by 7 samples, but again fell short when utilizing the graphics card. And then we get to the gaming…

So I test all the CPUs I get in with three separate titles at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K. The games in question are designed to stress the CPU as best they can, either through entity loading, simulation, or frame-generation management. I use Total War: Warhammer 3 with its Mirrors of Madness benchmark, Cyberpunk 2077 with DLSS on Quality and MFG onꦜ x2, and Final Fantasy XIV Dawntrail with FSR enabled as well. All on the Ultra preset.

Because 1080p typically produces higher frame rates, you usually see larger performance jumps between chips, as they become the bottleneck for the graphics card at those higher frame-rate levels. That might not sound that important to the average Joe, but if you're a competitive esports player dabbling in the 200-300 fps range, and you've got a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming monitor that can support it, it can be a big deal.

So, 1080p, then, is really interesting. The 9900X absolꦿutely tanked in Total War compared to t꧋he Core Ultra 7, landing an abysmally poor 96.5 fps (admittedly better than the Ryzen 7 7700X, which only managed 89.9). Compare that to the Core Ultra 7, and it managed 109.8 fps. That's a 12% drop in comparable performance. Jump over to Final Fantasy, though, and the tables turn with Intel falling foul and AMD clawing back a win, with an 8% bump in average frame rates.

Why that's fa🗹scinating is that these differences dissipate at different resolutions. At 1440p, that Total War delta fades into nothi🧜ng, yet AMD still has the edge over Intel in Final Fantasy with a 10fps difference on average frame rate. Jump up to 4K, and it's almost level pegging across all three titles with both chips, and if you take the averages across all three resolutions and average those, the two chips basically end up identical.

As for the old T&Ps, that too provided an interesting mixed bag of results. AMD's 9900X was marginall🐎y more efficient in heavy computational workloads than the Core Ultra 7 was, with 316W of draw iღn Cinebench versus 330W and 302W in Blender versus 315W for the Ultra 7. Temperatures ranged from 2 to 8 °C higher here as well, despite the lower power draw, but nothing too crazy to make me worry.

In-game, however, once more the coin flipped the other way, and AMD drew significantly more power than its Intel counterpart. Even at 4K, when CPU load should be diminished, there was a 25W difference in draw between the tဣwo. At a guess, I suspect that's down to AMD's idle🃏 states being significantly more hungry than Intel's.

Should you buy the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X?

Straight up answer here? Probably not. The issue right now is that it's just far too expensive for the improvements it gives you over the previous version of this processor. At $380, 9 months on, it's just not a tantalizing proposition. If you want pure gaming performance and are keen to stick with AMD, then you'll go for something like the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Ryzen 7 7800X3D or its modern counterpart. If you want to go with pure multi-core grunt and something that's equally as gifted in gaming but for $80 less than, you'd go with Intel's Core Ultra 7 265K. If you want the absolute best bang for the buck, then Intel's last-generation Core i5-14600K is a far💝 better pick across the board, no matter what.

That puts the Ryzen 9 9900X in a tricky position. On the surface, it's a well-balanced, nicely configured, new-generation chip that's efficient, decently optimized, and just works, particularly if you've got the supporting motherboard and RAM already. Yet, the sad reality is, even compared to AMD's ꧟own product stack with the likes of its X3D chips and more, it's just kinda dull. It doesn't stand out, and that's a real problem. When the CPU market is so heated right now, going for literally anything else will inevitably net you a better deal, and that ain't good.

How we tested the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X

Like all of the CPUs that I get in for review, I tested the 9900X in its own dedicated testbed with hardware that could be utilized across all of the other chips to eliminate any variables. Not onl🌠y did I utilize a wide range of benchmarks and tests with the 9900X, mixing gaming and rendering, I also use this predominantly as my permanent test-bed CPU when benchmarking both SSDs and graph✨ics cards as well, giving me an incredibly deep understanding of how it operates in Windows.

Additionally, throughout testing, I monitor average and maximum temperatures in each load segment and maximum power draw too. I also u༒tilize a generated index that I create that averages performance out per dollar spent at its current pricing at the time of review.

For more on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:ho𓂃w we test gam♔ing PCs and components, check out our full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

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The GPU market may seem like a pretty clear-cut race between Nvidia and AMD, but in truth, there are loads of horses to bet on. There's also Intel's products, there's the board partners like MSI, Asus, PNY, and Zotac, who make their own versions of each GPU and retail them for their own prices. If you're looking for a real two-horse race, you only need to look as far as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming.

Looking at Steam's hardware survey each month, you'll see a clear divide between Intel and AMD, and Intel is still way out in front. For years it's been the go-to brand that everyone knows best and aspires to get for their 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PCs. AMD has always looked to entice budget builders, but its recent strides to engineer for content creators, gamers, and enthusiasts are starꦿting to land them in good stead - the X3D processors it creates are swiftly becoming the most popular choices for all of those categorജies.

All the while, Intel hasn't had the best time of it of late. Its 13th and 14th generations of desktop processors had a major PR crisis last year as the Raptor Lake products faced widespread reports of instabi🅷lity. Its much-anticipated Arr♓ow Lake, Intel Core Ultra desktop CPUs also launched late in 2024, but their gaming results have really underperformed for gamers in reviews. They're also more expensive than AMD's offerings, and thanks to a n❀ew naming scheme, they're terrifically confusing.

Topping all of that off, Intel has now moved onto a new motherboard socket, and given the company's track record, that means no more support for anyone who bought a 12th, 13th, or 14th generation processor and wants to be able to upgrade without rebuilding from scratch on a brand new motherboard. This can prove costly, and for the sorts of performance improvements Intel is demonstrating with Arrow Lake, it doesn't exa💮ctly s🐻eem worth it, does it?

There are conversations to be had about the lifespan of a gaming PC these days, and I'm not sure a syste🉐m with an Alder൩ Lake chip from 2021 has any right to be dubbed as "old".

The difference in that respect is night and day between Intel and AMD. I bought my first gaming PC in 2020 and it used a Ryzen 3000 CPU. That generation plugs into an AM4 CPU socket which first launched in 2016, and AMD is still ꦑsupporting it with new, compatible processors through its extended Ryzen 5000 Series products. That's nearly a decade of support for people who don't want to upgrade to a new system, and while I'd argue that's maybe a little long in the tooth for any PC that's used for gaming on a regular basis, it's unmatched good-faith for AMD's consumers.

The Ryzen 9000 Series plugs into the AM5 socket that's been used by the Ryzen 7000 and 8000G families. This was AMD's first DDR5-compatible motherboard socket, and thanks to now three full generations of processors, there's already an amazing upgrade path for anyone who adopts this motherboard. What's more, AMD has already committed to supporting the AM5 platform through 2027 at least, so anyone who has built a PC in the last five years won't need to think about a new system agaiꦡn until well into the future.

This has been a particularly difficult generation to get consumers to buy into, from the perspective of AMD and Intel. The arrival of DDR5 RAM has called for new motherboards for all, but the prices of that memory combined with a new motherboard and CPU is a tidy sum for most gamers who already poured a lot of money into their DDR4 systems, let alone the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards. So for Intel to switch motherboard socket🐈s in 2024, demanding yet another new motherboard is doi𓆉ng nothing but fueling AMD's momentum.

Admittedly, I haven't goneꦰ hands-on with any of the new Intel Core Ultra processors yet, but it's hard to recommend the idea of a new motherboard and CPU solely for Intel's benefit. If I were building a PC today, be it a budget, entry-level machine, or an enthusiast-grade powerhouse, I'd be building with AMD.

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If you upgrade to Intel's 14th Generation flagship CPU at Newegg right now, you can ge♏t a free 1TB Corsair SSD, alongside codes for Civilization VII and Assassin's Creed Sh💜adows all thrown in for no extra cost. The CPU isn't even at full price - , it's $150 under its MSRP. With both games and the SSD equating to $205 in value, that's a pretty fantastic haul for any gamer.

Whether you've been looking to upgrade to one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming f𒉰or a while, or you've been searching for a decent storage deal, you have to admit that this is a bundle that's well worth considering. With this deal, you've got the foundation for a new 50 Series gaming PC.

Should you buy the Intel Core i9-14900K?

Sadly, I'm yet to test out the Intel Core i9-14900K, although based on our experience with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i9-13900K from the preꦫvious generation, it's worth investing in. If you had your ear to the ground last year, you may have heard all about Intel's Raptor Lake volatility issues, but these aren't really worth worrying about now since motherboard BIOS patches and an extended war༺ranty have cleared up a lot of the problems.

With the power of modern gaming processors inside the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs, most people don't actually need to go for i9 or Ryzen 9 chips anymore. The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Ryzen 5 8600G, for example, is more than capable of offering ﷺplayable 4K frame rates, and it's massivel꧅y cheaper than Intel's flagships. That said, opting for a lesser processor won't give you the kinds of bundles found above.

Of course, the other alternatives to the 14th Gen i9 are e💖ither an Arrow Lake equivalent (which isn't very suited to gaming, so it seems), or an AMD X3D model, which might be the move for anyone looking for the last word in processing power.

As much as we can dance around it, the extras in this bundle are something else. The SSD will give you speeds that are fairly standard for a Gen 4 NVMe drive, and a 5,000MB/s read speed is still blazing fast whether you use it as your main drive or as a secondary one on your motherboard. I haven't tested the exact model found in this bundle, but the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Corsair MP600 Elite is one of my favorite SSDs from the ꦆl𓆏ast few years.

And then we have two of 2025's most anticipated games to think about. If you're at all excited about 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Civilization VII or 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Assassin's Creed Shadows, I won't need to tell you that they'll be icing on the cake for two great component upgra✃des. Just make sure you've got a decent cooler set up for your new processor!

Don't forget that the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards are seeing new contenders right now, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases will be vital upgrades too.

The Ryzen 8000G family arrived early in 2024, and people immediately looked to the Ryzen 7 8700G because it was the first chip to bear that name since the somewhat revolutionary Ryzen 7 7800X3D - still touted by many as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming. Stripped of that chip’s 3D V-cache technology though, this version isn’t ne🐬cessarily trying to be “better” at gaming, because it takes a slightly different approach.

The ethos of this CPU is to provide people with enough integrated graphics power that they no longer need a💯 separate graphics card in order to own a gaming PC. Of course, we here at GamesRadar+ don’t really believe that, because although you can get by with just a CPU if you’re playing non-demanding games at 1080p, a graphics card is really going to be the sword that knights your rig with its “gaming” status. So, is the Ryzen 7 8700G still worth considering as a performance leap over the Ryzen 5 from this generation, or should you look to AMD’s other options instead?

Specs & Features

A few onlookers weren’t too happy with the specs sheet of this processor when it was first revealed, particularly because there are a few side-by-sides with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Ryzen 5 8600G that don’t exactly warrant its price increase. For example, both processors use the same 16MB L3 cac✤he, and the Ryzen 5 actually has a slightly faster Base Clock speed of 4.3GHz. Admittedly, the Boost Clock speed of the 8700G is faster in a head-to-head♌, so it’s not all bad. Still, if I were paying more for a Ryzen 7 model, I’d want faster speeds in both categories.

Of course, the internal graphics are going to be a big draw for people with this processor, and with the AMD Ryzen 8700G rocking Radeon 760M graphics, 12 dedicated graphics cores, DirectX12 compatibility, and a graphics clock of 2900MHz, it’ll do as a stop-gap for anyone building one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs if they’re pulling parts together gradually and waiting for a graphics card. Again, let me stress that as games continue🐲 to get more demanding, a dedicated graphics card is going to become a necessity for you, but internal graphics processing power has come a long way, and AMD has been at the forefront of that for a while now.

The Ryzen 8000G family all feature Zen 4 architecture, the same as the Ryzen 7000 range, and as a result, they sit on the same AM5 CPU socket. It may 🐭please owners of previous AMD processors that this socket has converted to Intel’s design philosophy to make installation easier. The connecting pins of these CPUs are on the socket, meaning slotting a processor into place is a real breeze, and there’s less risk of you bricking it🀅 before your first boot-up.

Up from 6 cores and 12 threads on the 8600G, the Ryzen 7 8700G sports 8 cores and 16 threads. As usual for AMD, this isn’t anywhere near the equivalent Intel processor in comparison. The Intel Core i7-14700K is next on my list of processors to test, and since it’s the direct competitor to this chip in terms of generational tiers, it may surprise you to know that it rocks 20 cores and 28 threads. Even compared to the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i7-13700K, the Ryzen 7 8700G looks a bit behind the time🔯s, with that chip utili💫zing a similar 16 cores but 24 threads to support them.

All of that said, the Ryzen 7 8700G comes in cheaper than the Intel competition, especially now that the Ryzen 9000 family has hit the 🐽shelves. At launch, this chip would set you back $329 / £270, but it can frequently be found discounted in 2025, with a at the time of writing, and a

For that money, you get your expected DDR5 compatibility, and if you’re planning on pairing it with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, you’ll have all the AMD EXPO abilities you could want to play around with clock speeds and RA🍃M timings. Also in the box is a chunky CPU fan, which is a nice addition considering a lot of desktop processors refuse to launch with them these days.

Performance

Besides a brief initial test, I put the Ryzen 7 8700G’s integrated graphics power to one side for this review. I was able to launch and play simple games with very few demands like The Red Strings Club, but wavering into deeper territory I struggled. I couldn’t launch STRAFTAT 1v1, for example, and while using integrated graphics I felt the PC slow𒁃 down more generally, so your mileage may vary here. Regardless my main interest in this CPU is in whether or not it’s capable of offering decent performance when paired with a GPU, and whether or not it gives enough of a gaming boost compared to the more affordable Ryzen 5 8600G.

For that reason, I decided to stick to the exac𝄹t same set of benchmarking games as I did for the Ryzen 5. I would usually perform the same formal benchmarks with a few different games thrown in for good measure, but I was curious to see how both processors would compare directly, especially running gaming tasks at 4K.

Before getting to the gaming stage though, I have a quick caveat to address. Although I do all my CPU testing these days with RAM set to 6,000MHz, I couldn't get this processor to post above the advertised 5,200MHz recommended speed from AMD. This was despite having the same RAM set to 6,000MHz during my Ryzen 5 review, which is a bit strange. I’m unsure whether this is our AMD testing motherboard being quirky, or a fault of the CPU, but nonetheless, it’s something to be wary of if you end up choosing this processor෴.

To get the CPU warmed up before jumping into gaming benchmarks, I ran it through Cinebench and Blender’s assault courses. To tell the truth, having not been too pleased with the Ryzen performance in these benchmarks in either the Ryzen 5 8600G or the Ryzen 7 7800X3D housed in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Maingear Zero Ruby, I didn’t have high expectations. With the scores the 8700G produced though, I 🧜was pleasantly surprised. Yes, they were tested in different systems, but the Maingear Zero Ruby’s processor (3D V-cache and all) scored a Single Core Cinebench result of 1829 pts. The 8700G showed on-par Single Core performance with 1821 pts.

I’m used to the Cinebench tests making chips audibly sweat, with fans kicking up to high heaven, but in both the Single and Multicore benchmarks for the Ryzen 7 8700G, it didn’t peak above 73 degrees, which is cooler than its smaller sibling Ryzen 5 - and that’s while using the same cooler. In fact, this chip needs to be commended for its temperature control, because there wasn’t a stress test I threw at it where it went above 73°C, with ambient temperatures being as low as in the 20s, and average gaming temperatures sticking around the 40-50°C mark. Could this extra cooling performance be down to the different thermal pastes applied? Potentially, but the fact this processor is capable of staying so cool compared to Intel’s equivalents is a massܫive boon.

Next, it was tim🍰e for some gaming tests, and since I discovered in my Ryzen 5 review that unexpected 4K performance was the name of the game, this Ryzen 7 was going to be throw🌳n through the same wringer.

As you may expect from the spec comparison, this chip performed very similarly to the Ryzen 5 in these benchmarks, likely due to the exact same L3 cache and slower base clock. What’s interesting is that the Ryzen 7 ran cooler, and had a much lower percentage of use than the Ryꦦzen 5, but both produced almost identical frame rates. The 7 8700G of course had higher power demands, as you may expect from a higher-tier product.

These weren’t the only games I tested in though, and before you go thinking that there’s literally no benefit in buying this CPU, let me tell you about where 4K gaming results were improved. Planet Zoo, for example, running the exact same scenario as in my Ryzen 5 review, came out with a rock solid 4K 60fps result. With the Ryzen 5, I got 59fps but wasn’t what I’d call steady. It needed some settings dialed down in order to achieve the 60fps 💞“playable” mark. Yes, this Ryzen 7 was only a slight improvement, but it did make a fairly tricky city builder run very smo🐠othly indeed.

Homeworld 3 was a similar story. The R👍yzen 5 scored 45fps in its benchmark with every setting set to its highest, and although I had to scale back a few settings to really get it up to 60fps, the Ryzen 7 had a 10fps boost out of the gate, scoring 56fps at the highest settings.

And finally, it was time to put the Ryzen 7 to the test in some less-optimized gaming scenarios. Cities Skylines has some incredibly demanding fan-made scenarios, and if I were shopping for a new CPU these days knowing I was going to point it at these types of game෴s, I’d want an idea of how they’d be handled. Keep in mind that the following results aren’t as formalized as the benchmarks in Total War, since they’re an average taken from playing rather than a standard benchmarking test.

There are slight improvements over the Ryzen 5 here, particularly in the percentage used, and how stable the frame rates were while playing. Still, the story of the numbers here shows that there really isn’t as much of a performance gain for this Ryzen 7 when it comes to gaming. Single-core performance, content creation tasks, and staying cool under pressure are going to be big benefits for some users, but if anything, this review just goes to show how good the Ryz✃en 5 ꧑8600G is for its price.

Should you buy the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G?

For its lack of gaming performance boosts over its Ryzen 5 sibling, there are still reasons I’d recommend the Ryzen 7 8700G. First of all, if you’re building a gaming PC and you can’t get a graphics card right away, or you’re mainly building a PC for work and you’re only planning on playing so🎀me cozy games every once in a while, this might be enough for you until you want some upgrades. If you plan to branch out above 1080p though, maybe don’t set your expectations too high.

If you like the look of the Ryzen 5 8600G but do more content creation, this Ryzen 7 gives you the extra headroom I felt the Ryzen 5 from this generation was missing. Keep in mind, too, that this went toe-to-toe with the Ryzen 7 7800X3D in Cinebench and Blender, so there's😼 some really decent performance to have here without spending extra money on a 3D V-Cache option.

Overall, you do get a solid Ryzen 7 processor from the 8000G family, although to sound like a broken record, the majority of gamers will get by just fine without spending the extr❀a money on it. If you don’t tend to play many city builders or RTS games, save your money and opt for the Ryzen 5. The 8700G feels more like a slightly souped-up version of that processor with more of a focus on single-core performance and integrated graphics. I’ll let you be the judge of which one would suit you better, although with either you’ll be saving money versus ꧂Intel.

How I tested the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G

After installing the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G inside our AMD testing PC, I put it through ou💝r usual gauntlet of demanding CPU benchmarks. This includes ind𒁏ustry-standard software like Cinebench and Blender, as well as city building and RTS games that processors need to simulate a lot of moving parts.

I used HWinfo to keep a c𒀰lose eye on voltages and temperatures and tracked average frame rates and percentages of use through Windows Game Bar and MSI afterburner. I compared my experience closely to my tests of the Ryzen 5 8600G since thಞe two are part of the same family and were reviewed using the exact same testing process.

The rest of the comౠponents used in this test were as follows:

• CPU Cooler: Asus ROG Strix LC III 360 ARGB
• CPU thermal paste applied: Prolima Tech PK3 Nano Aluminum High-Grade Thermal Compound
• Chassis: Fractal Meshify 2 RGB
• Number of fans: 3 intakes, 4 extractors, 1 radiator
• GPU: AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE
• RAM: XPG Lancer Blade DDR5 RGB
• Motherboard: ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero
• PSU: Corsair RMx Shift Series RM850x ARX PS

For more on how we test, check out the full澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询: GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

There's more where that came from. Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best computer speakers, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PC.

This impacted some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming, including Intel’s flagship 14th Gen ones, and mainly the higher-end 13th Gen chips. Luckily, warranties have now been amended so that any consumer impacted 🐬by the faults can claim a new processor that won’t suffer the same issues. Motherboard manufacturers have rolled out fixes in the form of BIOS updates, which will ensure the problems don’t spread to chips that haven’t been affected thus far. 

But even so, this doesn’t fill consumers with a huge vote of confidence - especially with AMD’s al༒te𝓀rnatives usually costing less. With that in mind, we’re asking if it’s safe to buy these otherwise excellent gaming processors again. To understand fully, I think it’s important to give you a full rundown of the problems themselves. 

Instabilities, explained 

So what was causing these strange instability issues in the first place? Well, inside the澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询: best gaming PCs, you have a processor that essentially acts as your computer’s brain. Each core ofꦛ that brain takes a certain amount of volts to operate, and they request that specific voltage through a microcode algorithm it uses to communicate with the motherboard. When the CPU is under load, these voltages can go up, and usually, when they’re not working so hard, they’re less demanding. This requested level is known as the operating voltage, and it’s somethin💖g we monitor whenever we test the latest CPUs. 

It turns out that Intel’s Raptor Lake processors had a fault in their microcode algorithm that saw them request elevated oper🌃ating voltages from the motherboard. That can cause instability because t♑oo high a voltage can wear chips like these out with time. The brand said this in its community forum:

“Our analysis of returned processors confirms that the elevated operating voltage is stemming from a microcode algorithm resulting in incor🦹rect voltage requests to th🅰e processor.”

Hopefully, with my 🍃explanation above, that very tech-bro statement can actually make sense to you.

In the same way that overclocking can be dangerous for your PC parts if done haphazardly, CPUs demanding too much voltage for themselves can do the same. Essentially, Intel🎃’s CPUs were overvolting themselves, and that can cause the slew of random issues gamers started reporting earlier in the year. The annoying part is that there’s no way to amend things for prᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚocessors that are already impacted, so you can understand why people were frustrated.

The fixes

Unfortunately, for its products that were already proving volatile, Intel couldn’t fix the issues. I𒈔f your CPU has started acting up, which you’ll be able to monitor through your preferred software, you’ll need to go with one of the following fixes🐬.

Intel has now amended the microcode algorithm on its 1♍3th and 14th generation products going forward, so that new ones sold from this point onward won’t suffer the same issues. Fortunately, it’s also extended the warranty period for boxed CPUs. If you bought your processor separately, reaching out to Intel Customer Support is your best bet to claim a new model. 

If you bought a gaming rig with the CPU already installed, you should reach out to your system’s manufacturer, who should be able to help due to this warranty as 🌳well. Foไr the full warranty details, check out . 

Intel has worked with motherboard manufacturers too, and has provided 𒆙a microcode patch that will block elevated voltage requests from new processors. You should check your motherboard’s firmware and support page to see if a BIOS update has been rolled out that you can benefit from.

So, what now?

So, with that all laid out, should you buy Inte♏l’s 13th or 14th gen chips? For now, we’d cautiously say yes. We’ve deliberately waited for the dust to settle on the BIOS update fixes and the warranty claims before writing this because we wanted to see how the solutions would be received. 

In my opinion, it seems like these processors are safe to buy again, because even if you manage to get one that acts up, the extended warranty will cover you, and in all likelihood, your motherboard’s latest BIOS will prevent the issue if you haven’🐠t run into it yet.

We would, however, take this opportunity to recommend getting yourself a decent cooler, and looking into some decent CPU monitoring software. Even the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i5-13600K I use in my personal machine can run a little hot with just an air cooler, and Intel’s latest processors have a reputation for running hot. Keeping a CPU cool, whether it’s for gaming or content creation, is one of the best ways to care for it over time. Granted, I chose that riskier air-cooling route because it’s in an ITX case with limited room, but our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:13900K review shows that Raptor Lake products used in combination෴ 🐠with the right cooler can be manageable. 

If yo🤪u do choose to go for a new Intel chip, the best course of action for anyone who’s paranoid about these issues persisting is to monitor your voltages closely. Undervolting might help you, but keeping an eye on things with programs like HWiNFO, NZXT CAM, MSI Afterburner, or your motherboard’s own software, can give you a solid picture of your chip’s health.

For more on PC parts, check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases. 

The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming are a pretty demanding upgrade at the moment because, for anyone who hasn’t made the jump to a DDR5-compatible system, it 𝕴can mean a whole new motherboard and memory too. For that reason, you want peace of mind that whicheve🐻r one you commit to will be worth the money and will be able to harness the power of other new-gen components.

Like I’ll argue in a lot of my CPU coverage, a lot of people might be surprised to learn that the latest generations of processors from Intel and AMD are so powerful🍌 that a flagship or even a Ryzen 7/i7 really isn’t necessary for the majority of 🌞us. I’ve known that for a while, and yet AMD’s Ryzen 5, which released at the start of 2024, still managed to surprise me. At launch, it had an MSRP of $229 / £218, but it’s easily found for $180 / £180 at the time of writing. For that reason, it may actually be the best value 4K processor out there.

Specs and Features 

If you compare AMD’s latest CPUs with the raw specs of Intel’s equivalents, you might be a bit puzzled at how the two compete. On paper, Intel gives people way more horsepower to gallop with. The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i5-13600K, which currently holds our top spot on the desktop CPU ladder, has a surprising 14 cores and 20 threads compared to the respective💫 6 and 12 off𝔉ered up here. 

In truth, that made me skeptical about how this processor would keep up with demands inside one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs, but it shouldn’t have. The truth is, as impressive as Intel’s copious amounts of cores and threads are, you very rarely put them all to use. I struggle to give that processor demanding tasks that utilize more than 20%🅰 of its capabilities, and that’s while streaming, gaming in 4K, having other apps open, and generally trying my best to push it off balance.

AMD’s Zen 4 architecture is so fast that it can produce some amazing results,🐷 even without those extra cores and threads. That can be seen by the Ryzen 5 8600G’s 4.3GHz base clock speed, which trounces the 13th Gen i5’s 3.5GHz.

AMD’s 16MB L3 cache is admittedly smaller than Intel’s 24MB alternative, but Team Red’s version of this quick-access library never seemed to let me down whe🗹n gaming, and I have to admit that surprised me.

I think the most notable difference in real terms when it comes to these architectural schools of thought is that AMD’s chip as a whole runs so much cooler, and more efficiently than Intel’s. Modern Intel chips are known to run hot, even if our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:13th Gen Intel Core i9 review found that a strong enough AIO cooler can keep anything cool. For this review, I was testing with a solid AIO from Asus, but I was still astounded at how calm the processor stayed und🍃er pressure. If I can manage to keep a 13th Gen i5 cooled with just air inside my small for🦩m factor PC, this thing would be such a viable option for that sort of build.

Like Intel’s XMP technology, this processor comes armed with AMD EXPO, which allows your system to fully make the most of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming. Not only that, but EXPO feels particularly beefy - offering what seems like a more advanced suite of finetuning and overclocking options for your CPU as well 🌼as your memory.

Personally, I have very little interest in AI-enhanced PC parts, but this is one of the first desktop processors on the shelves with an integrated NPU inside it. In theory, this is supposed to speed up AI and machine learning applications, allowing your CPU and GPU to carry on concentrating on other demanding tasks. T𒊎his is great, but I don’t tend to use a lot of these applications and am broadly wary of giant corporations making AI their biggest priority all at once. It feels like an unregulated, yet extremely fast-growing technology, and we’re still trying to play catchup with how that equation worked out on social media platforms.

My hesitancy aside, I doubt an NPU is something an everyday gamer will benefit from, but at least AMD has a slightly cheaper option of this processor without the NPU for those like me, who h⭕ave no real interest.

Performance

When I first started testing this chip, I intended to test it at 1080p, since that’s how I benchmarked the 13600K. The two processors are more or less direct🌺 competitors, after all, and even if I do use my 13600K for 4K gaming, the majority of people probably don’t expect that of the 8600G. Regardless, I deci🌃ded to push the envelope out a little more. What if an under-$200 desktop processor could be the 4K performer that no one expected?

Of course, this meant running it through our usual tests, albeit at the highest resolution with maxed-out settings. Before I got stuck into gaming, I hit up Cineb𝄹ench and Blender, my two favorite industry-standard hamster wheels for CPUs. 

The results were as I expected. Because of the fewer 🍸cores and threads, and the lack of performance cores on the most recent Intel processors, benchmarking scores weren’t quite as solid as the 13600K. Cinebench’s multicore score came in at a high of 14,037pts, which isn’t exactly competitive with the 13600K’s mean score of 20,850 across three tests. The single core performance was a more entertaining contest though, with Intel’s i5 achieving 1930pts, and the 8600G scoring 1792pts. 

Blender was a similar story, with fewer samples per minute turned in, but much more manageable temperatures. It’s really up to you which of these will suit you more. Are you looking for something that will run cooler with less babysitting, or do you🃏 want the best performance possible fo🐈r things like content creation? There are wins to be had in both camps, depending on your rig and demands.

CPU-intensive games need to simulate loads of parameters all at once. RTS games and city-builders are a good example, so that’s what I stuck to here. As well as our Total War Warhammer 3 benchmarks and our favori🌳te demanding Cities: Skylines scenarios, I wanted to get a broader picture of this CPU’s gaming potential in 4K. For that reason, I messed around with Homeworld 3’s benchmarking tool, and speedran the opening scenario in Planet Zoo I originally beat just a few weeks ago. For a processor that’s already being replaced by 🌟a 9000 Series rival and only seems to be getting cheaper, I was very pleased with the results. 

If you do decide to open up our 13600K review and compare things side by side, just remember that we performed tests for Intel’s champion with an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Arc A770 as its GPU, running the games at 1080p. These tests were done with an AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE running at 4K, so this CPU has a bit of a leg-up inꩲ its comparison. 

As you can see, temperatures and voltages were extremely manageable, which says a lot about the efficiency of AMD’s Zen 4 architecture, but also the cooling prowess of Asus’s ROG Strix LC III 360 ARGB cooler. Frame rates, even with a hefty 16GB GPU, did come in under the coveted 60fps most gamers will be looking for. In fairness, these are tests done to simulate harder workloads, and I had the settings cranked up t🔜o full. I have no doubt that 4K60 gameplay would be more than possible with the right settings configured - even if you we☂re using a slightly less powerful graphics card.

Peak percentage numbers are notably higher across the board in these results than Intel’s option. That said, the Core voltages here are almost equal. I didn’t formally note down the wattages for each test in this review, but whenever I checked them, AMD’s were ♐lower.

Next up were the tests in Cities: Skylines, one of the most popular city-builders out there. While there’s no dedicated benchmarking tool in this game, I like to load up three highly demanding fan-made scenarios and♐ play around while jotting down some stats. The following was what I found from the 8600G:

These results were a lot more playable, even with settings dialed all the wa🅘y up. Especially impressive here was the peak percentage of use, since these numbers were more or less on par with the 13600K. 

The last tests were Homeworld 3 and Planet Zoo. When I first launched the Homeworld benchmark, there were some obvious stutters - these quickly subsided though, and while 8% of the CPU was utilize🔥d, I did get a score of 45fps. This wasn’t enough for me though, so I played around with some settings, tried a few more times, and I was able to get that coveted 4K60 frame rate I was wanting. 

Planet Zoo was even more of a feather in this processor’s cap. As I zoomed over the skies of my first park, I saw that an encouraging peak percentage♛ of 4% was on screen - but the average frame rate was just shy of the mark at 59fps with maxed settings. Again, not a total disaster, since dialing even one setting down would geꩵt it over the “playable” line.

 Should you buy the AMD Ryzen 5 8600G?

Deciding between this processor and the 13600K (our favorite CPU for gaming ✃overall) is no easy task. In terms ofꦯ raw performance, Intel’s chip is better, but for efficiency, cooling, and price, this is a tough contender to beat. In my opinion, it’ll really come down to you, and your personal preferences. I’d argue that content creators can benefit from the extra headroom Intel’s spec sheet gives you, but most gamers can absolutely get by with this chip in their machines. 

I was so pleasantly surprised by the 8600G’s ability to game in 4K - especially since it came so close to the 4K60 mark when settings were fully raised. I’d be willing to bet that most🦩 gamers looking to buy it wouldn’t necessarily be demanding that much from it, but the headroom to know it's possible makes it especially tempting. 

Finally, I can’t ignore that price, nor AMD’s🍸 long-term commitment to its CPU architecture. Its 2016 motherboard socket is still being supported with new releases, so if you do choose to join Team Red, you’ve potentia💦lly got years of upgrading left before getting a new motherboard. Plus, if you’re like me and have no interest in that AI-tilted NPU, you can get the 8500G for even cheaper.

How I tested the AMD Ryzen 5 8600G 

I put the AMD Ryzen 5 8600G inside GamesRadar+’s latest testing PC to examine how it performed. I ran it through our usual ringer of tests and benchmarks, using HWiNFO to monitor its temperatures, voltages🥂, percentages, and more. 

The re🐻st of the rig we tested alongside this processor was made up of the following compoꦕnents: 

• CPU Cooler: Asus ROG Strix LC III 360 ARGB
• CPU thermal paste applied: Noctua NT-H1 Thermal Paste
• Chassis: Fractal Meshify 2 RGB
• Number of fans: 3 intakes, 4 extractors, 1 radiator
• GPU: AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE
• RAM: XPG Lancer Blade DDR5 RGB
• Motherboard: ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero
• PSU: Corsair RMx Shift Series RM850x ARX PSU

For more on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming PCs and their components, check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

You might want to check out our thoughts on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSDs for gaming. 

My favorite one to recommend to the majorಞity of gamers is the i5-13600K, which I use in my own build I put together last summer. It isn’t quite at its lowest-ever price, but you can grab it at right now, down from an ori🍸ginal MSRP of $329. 

When I put together our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i5-13600K review, it hammered home to me that an i7 or i9 CPU is overkill for the majority of gamers today. This CPU is a little monster that rocks 14 cores and 20 threads, which is more than enough for even the busiest of modern 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PCs. 

The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming can be expensive, especially if you opt for the latest generations. Luckily, the 14th Generation (Raptor Lake Refresh) options have now been available for a while, so the 13th Generation is starting to offer more bang for 𓄧buck with each passing day. 

Should you buy the Intel Core i5-13600K? 

I put my CPU through a fair amount. When I’m not working with it, I’m playing games in 4K, I’m live streaming, I’m video editing, I’m recording footage for a YouTube video - things that you’d typically think an i7 or Ryzen 7 processor would be needed for. My dear reader, I’m here to tell you that if you haven’t upgraded your CPU in a few generations, mo🐽dern i5 CPUs are all you really need now. 

You’d find fewer cores and threads in an 11th G✱en i9 than you do in this i5. In fact, this thing has better specs than the 12th Gen i7-12700K, which rocks 12 cores and 20 threads.

There’s nothing I throw at this processor that it doesn’t handle with ease. Granted, when I’m video editing with ൩4K files, it can run a little hot, but I do have it placed inside an ITX chassis with nothing but airflow to cool it down. Even when I was benchmarking it for review purposes, the thing that made it sweat the most was RTS games running at 4K Ultra settings - and even then, it was still producing somewhat playable frame rates. 

Unless you’re big into heavier genres and you want fully optimal settings, this CPU can handle pretty much everything without pushing beyond 7% ofꦛ its𓄧 processing power. Yes, you read that right. Again, you might be pushing it to uncomfortable temperatures if you really want to test it, but you’re not going to run into problems with the 13600K in more realistic scenarios.

If you’re a professional content creator who wants the extra headroom for streaming off of one PC, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i7-13700K might be better suited or, on the AMD side, a CPU with an X3D cache. To be clear, ♕this i5 is capable of it, but with even more cores, threads, and a bigger cache to play with, the i7 will give you more peace of mind. What’s more, while playing a game on your PC simultaneously, you’re likely to keep your frames a bit higher (depending on your GPU). Still, this is a very powerful CPU for ga🦹ming and content creation, and one that I’d recommend to anyone trying to put together a new DDR5 system.

 Pulling together more components for a PC build? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases. 

Just like Nvidia and AMD’s 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics card contenders, Intel’s first GPU line-up released the final quarter of 2022. The Arc A770 arrived on October 11, but it took a while for the entire range of discrete and dedicated options to make it outside of China. Not to mention a range of driver issues originally caused a ruckus for players, with issues plagued 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC perfo🌠rmance for early adopters. Thankfully, cards are now both widely available and feature pretty robust drivers due to ongoing support, and that might be why we’re finally hearing whispers about a successive generation.

According to a report by , “industry circles” say that Intel Arc Battlemage graphics cards will land “before Black Friday.” That may sound a little vague considering the big sale takes place just after Thanksgiving, but it’s perhaps a nod that the line-up will emerge either early November or even late October. Opting for the latter would create somewhat of a launch pattern since Alchemist launched at the same time of year, and we know that GPU makers l𒁃ove sticking with a release date rhythm. 

The report backs up its Battlemage release date claim by stating that Intel wantsไ to “take advantage of the strong sales season,” which makes sense given that many players hold off on buying parts until the big event. It’d also give the company a nice excuse to discount Alchemist cards and clear up stock, as last year’s bonanza slashed the range to record low prices. 

That said, Intel is once again potentially releasing its next gen GPUs dangerously close to the launch date of RTX 5000 cards, with rumours also pointing towards late 2024. I’d argue doing so is somewhat of a gamble, as the blue team’s offering could be drowned out by flagship noise generated by the ridiculous capabilities of something like an RTX 5090. On the flip side, Nvidia isn’t always great at having entry-level and mid-ra🅘nge options available early on in a generation, meaning Intel could convince some PC gamers on ♚a budget to switch allegiances using shiny new cards.

Naturally, it’s worth taking these rumors with a grain of salt, especially since Intel hasn’t disclosed an official next gen release dat🌺e. Funnily enough, Intel also apparently isn’t done with Alchemist yet, as the company just announced six new GPUs at . Since we’re talking about models for embedded systems, it’s safe to say you won’t be using one to run Steam games, but newcomers like the 7xxE range do offer up AI capabilities.

Should you wait for Intel Arc Battlemage graphics cards? 

With rumors of new Intel graphics cards brewing, those of you eyeing up cards like the Arc A770 are likely wondering if you should hold off. After all, we’re only four months into 2024, and waiting it out would effectively mean either using older parts or postponing any new build plans you may have. With that in mind, whether you should wait fully depe𒐪nds on whether you’d rather wait and see if your money will gain you new features and more performance compared to current models, with the latter being pretty much a given. 

Of course, the fact that the new rumors point towards GPUs arriving before 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Black Friday graphics card deals kick off is🍰 also worth keeping in mind. Even if you do wait, you’ll end up shopping for a new card at an optimal time of year. It’s hard to tell whether A770 and A750 stock will still be around to actually receive a discount, but if models are still available, they might end up cheaper than ever. Simply put, if you end up deciding that Battlemage cards aren’t worth the discount, their predecesso✱rs might be worth picking up based on price alone. 

In any case, if you’re not desperately in need of a graphics card right now, holding off until the end of the year will be beneficial. Intel’s range already offers up pretty respectable levels of performance for the money, but it does fಌeel like November is going to be the golden month to pick up anything Intel GP𝔍U related.

Looking for a rig that's ready to go? Swing by the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PC and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop for complete builds. Alternatively, check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Steam Deck dock and turn Valve's handheld into a desktop hybrid.

If you wander over to Amazon right now, you’ll find that the Intel Core i5-12400F is down , thanks to a 34% discount. If you happen to be in the UK, you’ll be able to grab an even better deal, as a chonky 43% discount has slashed the chip to . That’s pretty respectable when you consider the fact that the newest equivalent, the i5-14400F, is going , and while that is undeniably one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming right now, the comparative 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC experience might not be as different ღas you’d think. 

As I’ve already touched on, I’ve spent quite a bit of time with the Intel Core i5-12400F, and it’s a surprisingly capable chip considering it’s not high-end. Arguably, you don't necessarily need a powerhouse processor for specifically playing games, especially in adventures that aren’t particularly CPU intensive. Your mileage can va💟ry depending on genre, but from experience, you won’t experience dramatic fps differences using🍸 an older Alder Lake chip compared to a newer Raptor Lake model. 

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UK:

Should you buy the Intel Core i5-12400F? 

If you’re the type of player who likes to watch fps counters while you game, you’ll naturally feel inclined to pick up a top-end CPU. In the same vein, those of you who would rather splash out on DDR5 RAM will also be looking at fresh new parts with compatibility with the latest standards, which is completely understandable since that’s all ꧅part of the fun for enthusiasts.

That said, if you’re simply looking to put together a decent ri🌊g and save some change in the process, CPUs like the Intel Core i5-12400F are going to matter. Most of your Steam library is going to be happy so long as it has access to a fairly recent chipset, and a 12th Gen option like this is still absolutely considered new-ish in my book.

I mean, it's no slouch either, as it boasts a 4.40GHz boost clock, meaning general use will feel pretty snappy. If you’re serious about balancing specs and performance, you’re not going to pair the i5-12400F with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090, even if I did personally commit that sin and noticed zero b﷽ottl🧸enecking across my usual benchmark outings.

Simply put, the Intel Core i5-12400F is still a winner when it comes to entry-level and mid-range PC builds, and for under $140 (and just over £100 in the UK), this chip is going to do everyt♐hing you need it to and 𒐪then some. 

Looking for more parts? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming. If you'd prefer a machine that's ready to go, swing by the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PC builds for a selection of high-end systems. 

The Intel Arc A770 is arguably one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics card options right now in terms of value, but the Alchemist line-up sticks to entry level. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as the scene is pretty top heavy when it comes to mid-range and high end GPUs, especially with new gen Nvidia shenanigans. However, Intel clearly has a battleplan, and if things go right, we may eventually end up with an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 challenger, or at least a pre𒀰mium 4K contender that boasts better value for money.

Intel Fellow Tom Peter🦋sen provided an idea of what the company is cooking up in terms of graphics cards during a sit down chat with at CES 2024. Touching on the next generation of GPUs, the ex Nvidia director says that “30% of our engineers are working on Battlemage,” but clarifies that those efforts are focusing on software. That’s down to the🏅 fact that, according to Petersen, “the hardware group is on the next thing.” 

Naturally, Petersen reiterates that he can’t properly delve into Battlemage, or the so-called “next thing” up Intel’s graphics sleeve. Still, if things stay on track, it should mean we’ll also see the company’s Celestial architecture show up in the not so distant future. The fact that Battlemage is already at the silicon stage, and the team is apparently working on the driver side of things, is also a promising sign, as it means the company will potentially avoid the teething problems 💎experienced the first time around with Alchemist. 

As for the current roadmap, previous leaks by suggest that Battlemage could start to roll out in Q2 2024, starting with the beefier cards. Tꦏhat’s not to say we’ll end up with anything that can take on the RTX 4090 this year, as the next cards will seemingly tap out at 225W. That said, if Celestial is set to show up at the start of 2025, we may end up with something with even more ♑oomph, providing the company with access to the premium GPU ring.

So, why am I so excited? Well, Intel has established a track record for setting competitive MSRPs and offering as much “bang for buck” as possible. At the moment, that’s not going to matter to those of you looking to boost fps as high as possible at 4K, but that might all change if an alternative to premium AMD and Nvidia GPUs arrives for much less. We’re already seeing both parties gear up for that scenario, as you can now grab an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 Super for l🍌ess than the original card, and AMD has made sure to cover all its mid-range bases wit𓆉h Radeon RX 7800 and RX 7700 options. 

Simply put, things could ge🥂t real interesting in 2024 if everything pans out ꦉfor Intel, and I’m keen to see what the company can achieve.

In Association with ROG Ally

Looking for a pre-assembled rig? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PC builds for a collection of powerhouse systems. Alternatively, take a peek at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptops and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming handhelds for machines you can take on the go.

No, you read that correctly - the Ryzen 5000 Series that was released in 2020 is getting four new entries. The Ryzen 7 5700X3D,🙈 AMD Ryzen 7 5700, AMD Ryzen 5 5600GT, and AMD Ryzen 5 5500GT will all launch toward the end of this month and will sport Zen 3 architecture.

It's sort of like if Intel went back to its 11th Gen family (which doesn't use its current architecture) and𝓀 decided to give it an update with four new processors. 

This decision is... weird. On one hand, I love the fact that AMD is allowing people who splashed out on one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs in the chaotic pandemic era to net some upgrades without completely changing their rig from the motherboard upౠ. Folks in 2020 paid a hell of a lot for their components, and since multiple generational updates have come out in the proceeding years, those buyers must feel a🦋 sting. 

More than that, I do slightly despise the fact that for so many PC gamers, an upgrade to the latest and greatest parts is all too often locked behind new motherboard architecture. Simply put, it means they'll have to fork out on a completely new set of components that, quite honestly, won't give them🐈 the perfꦗormance boost that their sometimes obscene price tags should give them.

On the other hand, though, this isn't exactly a great move for current buyers. Older motherboards that use the 5000 series architecture aren't compatible with DDR5 RAM, future GPUs with PCIe Gen 5 support, or indeed Gen 5 SSDs. So, in buying one of these updated 5000 Series chips you're not exactly futureproofing yourself. It's a bit like if a cul-de-sac got one more house built at the bottom of it. There's now more to the street you live on, but it&🔜apos;s still ultimately a dead-end. 

I suppose to assess true value, we need ♐to ꦗlook at some specs.

Luckily, these are all reasonably priced - and they'd have to be. The Ryzen 5000 processors have stayed on our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming list becausℱe of their extreme value for money. If you've been looking for a budget CPU since 2020, that wave of AMD chips has been the one to call.

But even then, these new e♏ntries don't make a whole lot of sense. The new Ryzen 7 57000X3D almost matches up with an Intel Core i5-12600K, but that Intel chip gives you access to DDR5 and two more cores. For its sins, the 12600K is often found around the same $250 asking price, and the same goes for an AMD Ryz🍃en 7 7700, which is usually around the $300 mark. So again, why would you shoot yourself in the foot with a purchase of the new 5000 Series options?

Is AMD simply taking a jab at Intel here so that they both technically have three generations🐷 of desktop processors on the g💜o at the same time?

Well, there is always the argument that these chips will be targeted at the people who already have compatible AMD systems and have no interest in moving to a DDR5-compatible machine yet. These new 5000 Series chips are built with Zen 3 architecture and fit into an AM4 motherboard socket. Depending on how old your PC is, this could bring an unexpected upgrade to a machine that previously seemed dead in the water. Imagine having a Ryzen 5 3500 CPU with Vega Graphics (which I used to use on a daily basis), and learning that there are now four brand new CPUs coming out that will provide you with a genuine upgrade. You wouldn't need to buy a whole new PC after all. 

For that reason, this is a generous and quite brilliant move by AMD. This is the sort of move that breeds brand loyalty - something that Intel has fallen shﷺort of in recent years. 

While upgrading to one of these four CPUs could offer some real value, it must be said that desktop CPUs do drop in price pretty quickly when new generation🍬s arrive. The new Ryzen 8000 Series CPUs are worth getting excited about, but they use the same motherboard slot as the 7000 Series, so those 2022 chips will likely come down to much more reasonable prices in no time at all. Is a new 5000 Series chip really worth committing to when DDR5 and Ryzen 7000 CPUs are getting cheaper by the day?

If you were to ask me how to upgrade an older rig from 2020 without changing motherboards, I'd say that your CPU is likely fine as it is - the biggest quality-of-life update will probably come from buying one of the newest, and one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards. Maybe for people putting together a new build from scratch, thes🍷e refreshed CPUs might offer the best value for money, but even to those people, I'd recommend waiting for updated architecture to drop to your price range, because at least then you're giving yourself a bit more future-proofing.

All in all, it's great to see a celebration of the Ryzen 5000 Series. While AMD tries to see just how long it can keep its longevity going, I will applaud support for an aging motherboard socket. Without support for the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming though, I'm left questioning how long they'll be viable. While a certain subset of gamers might be happy with a small budget-buy upgrade, if they're going to spend money on components, I'd always recommend thinking as long-term as possibl♔e.

In Association with ROG Ally

For more, check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best computer speakers, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitor.

Dubbed "Raptor Lake Refresh" fo✱r a number of months now, this new wave of CPUs will use the same socket as 12th and 13th-generation chips and will be headed up by the Intel Core i9-14900K. The new f൩lagship features 24 cores and 32 threads and is capable of reaching 6 GHz out of the box. 

These new Central Processing Units will be available from October 17 onward at retail outlets and partner sites. At the time of w🎉ritinꦏg, I don't have access to pricing information for each new SKU, but when we learn this, I'll update you.

Besides the new i9, the 14th Generation is made up of six new unlocked processors at launch, and Intel has emphasized that they have been designed to be 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:the best CPUs for gaming on the market. 

The Intel Core i7-14700K will feature 20 cores and 28 threads, which gives it a boost of four more E-Cores (efficiency cores) thaꦫn the Intel Core i7-13700K, which GamesRadar+ reviewed fairly recently. 

Intel's Extreme Tuning Utility now includes a new AI-assist feature for certain Raptor Lake Refresh chips, which will let folks have access to AI-guided one-click overclocking if they have a compatible processor in their 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC.

It is important to note that the new processors won't feature the recently revealed Meteor Lake architecture, since that's currently reserved for a new wave of mobile CPUs. Instead, this generation will use the Hybrid Architect🧸ure that combines the use of Performance cores and the aforementioned E-Cores. As the "Refresh" in Raptor Lake Refresh might suggest, this is the architecture found in both 12th and 13th Generations.

According to Intel, 14th Gen proc🐽essors can offer up to a 23% boost in gaming performance compared to "leading competitor processors" (I wonder who th✤at could be referring to). Supposedly, this is mainly due to a new feature called "Intel Application Optimization" (APO) that improves the efficiency of thread dedication and scheduling.

The press release we received does state in its small print that this 23% boost figure was measured from FPS recordedꦅ in Starfield while using the brand new i9 compared to a Ryzen 7950X3D.

It's unclear how many of these extra features the new i5 CPUs will get, though. The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Core i5-13600K didn't have acc🥂ess to Intel's Turbo Max 3.0 Like the i7 or 9, fo🅘r example.

In more practical terms, the 14th Generation Intel procꩵessors support Wi-Fi 6/6E, Bluetooth 5.3, Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, and Thunderbolt 4 and 5.

Some of you may note that this news hasn't adopted 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel's new branding it announced a few months back. This new "Ultra" naming convention that drops the "i" lettering will be reserved for Meteor Lake, and presumably new generatio❀ns that aren't a "refresh". 

Why I'm excited about Raptor Lake Refresh

In all honesty, I'm not even that excited for a new generation of CPUs. We've only just gotten around to reviewing the flagship 13th Gen processors, and frankly, they're absurdly powerful as it is. A 20-something percent boost is always going to be tantalizing for the enthusiasts who need to run the ♔top specs, don't get me wrong, but the main reason I'm actually excited is because of the impact this will have on 12th and 13th Generation models.

I review the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming as well as CPUꦰs, and as someone who has been waiting for DDR5 to become the dominant force for a good while now, I can't help but get a sense this is 🃏a big step toward making that happen. 

A big argument for people not upgrading to a DDR5 system is that it requires a new motherboard, a new CPU, and finally the new RAM. Since a combination of all three that are compatible with Gen 5 speeds have a tendency t🦹o add up to a small fortune, it's very exciting that we'll get a third generation of Intel CPU that can all make use of the same motherboard socket. 

With 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Black Friday CPU deals coming up, I'm actually getting fairly excited about what might be on offer. With the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Prime Day PC deals that we saw just a week ago showing that 13th G🎃en prebuilt gaming PCs, and of course, the processors themselves are starting to get more affordable, I was already pretty hopeful about discounts this November. 

Now, with a brand new wave of flagships, the prices of Intel's Alder Lake and Raptor Lake SKUs can relax, and suddenly, more of you will be able to make꧒ the leap to newer PC specs without it costing you an arm a൩nd leg. 

Of course, a motherboard, a processor, and RAM might still be a fairly chonky investment, but even if you assemble these parts over time, they'll now set you back way less than they did six months a🐲go. 

For more PC content, take a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PC, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases.

The i7-13700K is coming up on its first birthday, but its price has remained pretty stubborn. With Black Friday on the horizon and a refreshed set of Intel CPUs set to arrive soon though, we can only hope that Intel's current 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming start to get cheaper. After all, AMD managed to scoop up so mꦿuch of the market by pricing things more fairly, along with finding some excellent performance. 

A new i7 that's rumored to gain about a 3-5% performance boost will no doubt drive the price of the curren𝔉t model down, but what if the performance boost is more substantial? And what if Intel embraces the undercutting strategy and chooses to make its next chips m♔ore affordable? Intel's new Meteor Lake architecture for mobile processors seems to point to a bold new direction for the brand, so it isn't impossible that a newer model makes this little i7 feel redundant.

For circa $400 /£390, a 13700K might not be a tempting prospect if you're looking to upgrade from an older-generation mid-ranger. If you're finally getting around to a DDR5 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC, or you're comparing prices with AMD, this poor i7 - as powerful as it is - isn't the belle of the ball. When you then take into account how great a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:13th Gen i5 is for cᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚheaper, it's aꩲctually quite difficult to know who to recommend a 13700K to at the moment. 

That feels like a bizarre thing to say, because this CPU is a total powerhouℱse.

Specs and Features

I won't dwell on the aesthetics of the 13th Gen i7, because there j💃ust isn't much to talk about. The handy gold triangle is in the bottom left corner to assist you with installation, and the appropriate socket for this chip is the LGA1700. That means ifജ you're coming from any of the 12th Gen chips, you're not going to need a new motherboard, but anything older, and you'll need to search for the beginnings of a new rig. 

The 13700K has 16 cores - o꧅nly two more than the i5. These are made up of 8 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores. In terms of threads running through these cores, you have 24 - four more than the i5. 

If you're not clued up on what those things actually are (which is totally fine, the world of CPU architecture is very capable of making brains itch), I'll use my go-to analogy. Picture a factory with 16 workers manning 24 conveyor belts of products going in and out. If the workers are cores and their conveyors threads, it essentially means those workers have so many routes to ship out their newly made products and it's highly, highly unlikely that🐻 any of those conve🍰yor belts are going to get jammed up. Even if one does, there are 23 others to use.

I think the performance boosts below should be the main factor you use to decide, but it's worth noting that for the almost $100 price bump from the i5, you're only getting 🅠two more cores and four more threads here. To me, that isn't too much extra headroom for the money, but then again the latest i5 is a little beast.

One thing this i7 has gotten a lot of praise for is its ability to cater to both DDR4 and DDR5, so even if you don't have the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming on the market, this CPU is still going to be viable to you. Another bonus is that you'll also get a fancy 13th Gen feature called Turbo Max 3.0, which ident💙ifies your processor's more efficဣient cores and goes to them first when you're giving it lots to deal with.

The 13700K does have integrated graphics, which you can tell by the slightly confusing serial numbers Intel uses. 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查🌄询:Iಌntel does have a new naming convention we're bound to start using later in the year, but for older chips, if you see a "K" at the end of the serial number, it has integrated graphics and an unlocked multiplier for overclocking. If you go for a cheaper version with a "KF" at the end of it, you won't get any integrated graphics, although you will get the multiplier. I haven't tested the integrated graphics on board here, but if it's heavy PC gaming you plan to do, we'd always recommend one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards anyway.

Performance

The 13th Gen i7 is now our testing rig's processor after we upgraded from the 12th Gen i7. That means I've been using it for RAM testing for the last few months, as well as benchmarking for the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSDs for gaming and days of general work on it. As you might expect, I haven't rღun into any trouble while using it.

I mean what I said in my review of the 13th Gen i5 - for the majority of people these days, an i7 or an i9 is overdoing it. Even if you have 40 Chrome tabs open while you work, you're running a VPN, doing content creation, and have music playing in the bac𒉰kground, an i5 can handle all of that without losing its breath. As you can imagine, the extra allowance of cores and threads you have in the i7 gives you that bit of extra headroom, but in my eyes, the i7 didn't feel any faster than the i5 during general work and productivity. 

But of course, we aren't just reviewing this processor as something for general work. Gaming efficiency will be the top priority for most of you reading, so let me put this simply: the 13700K is an excellent CPU for gaming, and you're not going to run into any bottlenecks with this in your rig, even if you're running an RTX 4090 or 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7900XTX. But as you'll hear meඣ repeat throughout this review, the same goes for a 13600K.

Hell, my colleague Phil has been running a 12th Gen i5 for a while now, even when testing the 4090, 𒀰the 4080, and every other GPU they can get their hands on. You just aren't going to run into performance troubles with a modern i5, which almost spits in the face of the more noti🌱ceable boosts you'll see from this i7 in the tables below. 

Our go-to testing games for CPUs are things that will give them lots of simulation work to keep track of. Games like Cities Skylines and Total War Warhammer 3 do just that, so here are some performance stats with those games running at 1080p, ultra settings. Our GPU here is our testing rig's RTX 3050. While the GPU we used in the i5 tests (澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Acer's Predator Intel Arc A770) had a much beefier 16GB of VRAM, the more powerful processor had a little le✨ss help☂ here with 8GB. 

In Total War, we used the ga🦩me's included 💯benchmarking tests, and with Cities Skylines we tracked metrics in some of the most heavily populated community scenarios. 

Comparing these to our benchmarks with the 13600K, you will be able to notice some wins for the i7. Keep in mind though, that these CPUs were tested in different rigs, so our figures won't give you a direct comparison. Regardless, it's plain to see that there are consistently higher numbers with the i7. I'll let you decide 💖if they're high enough to warrant nearly an extra $100 on your purchase, however. The biggest leaps here come fr🌟om Total War's benchmarking frame rates, with the i7 and RTX 3050 combo scoring consistently higher numbers, particularly with the Mirrors of Madness test.

What's quite surprising to me is that the i5 was hotter than the i7 during these in-game tests, reaching a maximum peak of 61 degrees across both games. This could be due to the AIO cooler we have in our testing PC completely outgunning the airflꦫow of my Corsair 2000D Airflow RGB chassis - this is likely given my build is a small-form-factor one. Particularly when it comes to voltages, the i7 is noticeably higher across the board, with the i5's peak voltage reading under 1.29, and the i7 comfortably sitting over the 1.30 mark. 

Something I think bolsters my argument that the i5 is better 🦄value is the percentage of CPU usage during these tests. Yes, the ♈i5 did reach a peak of 12% use when running Total War's campaign benchmark, which is trounced by the i7's peak of 5% in the same test. Personally, I think both processors are ridiculous in this regard - Total War's benchmarks are designed to make components sweat, and for either to not go above 15% shows you just what type of technology we're dealing with here. 

I would like to add though, that a peak of 12% is still utterly ludicrous. Yes, a peak of 5% is♌ better (there's no denying that) but again, is 12% usage really going to convince you to spend that extra money?

With industry-standard benchmarking, the story is much the same, although my god I hope you're ready for i9 temperatures. When I reviewed the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Acer Predator Orion 7000 (2023), I was shocked to see the unlocked i9 reach actual boiling point so often. I accepted it though, because it was an i9. Smash cut to benchmarking this 13700K, and I was gobsmacked to see our testing rig not able to keep its tempꦺeratures down. 

For these, forget what I said about the i5's temperatures during in-game tests. The 13600K didn't break 90°C in these, but the i7 was pushing 100°C consistently. Now, you're hardly ever going to find games or content creation tasks that will put your CPU under as much pressure as Cinebench and Blender, and with an ambient temperature of around 40°C, I wouldn't say it's anything to worry about. On the other hand, if efficiency is a priority for you and you don't want a component upgrade contributing to higher energy☂ bills, it's yet another reason to pull the trigger on the i5 instead. 

Should you buy the Intel Core i7 13700K?

Overall, performance from the 13th Gen Intel Core i7 is excellent. If you can put up with higher voltages and have both the build and the coolers to manage its temperatures, you're going to be fine. In gaming, you're getting a CPU that's capable of playing anything contemporary here, and you aren't ever going to need 𓆉to worry about bottlenecks with other components, particularly high-end GPUs. 

Here's the catch: you can apply all of th⛎ose statements to the i5-13600K, still get a top-notch CPU for your desktop, and spend less money. There's extra headroom to be had with the i7, but do you really need it? More importantly, is t𒉰he extra headroom worth the money?

I started this review off by saying I wasn't sure who to recommend the i7-13700K to, but to finish, let me flip that statement on its head. This is a processor that's easy to recommend to anyone because it's brilliant, but I think anyone considering it should think really carefully about whether or not they'll actually need it. 

If you're a streamer, content creator, 3D artist, or anyone else who needs that extra headroom for efficiency, creativity, or work, then sure - go for the i7. If you're a gamer looking for something to carry you through t✱he next 3 to 5 years of new titles, an i5 is all🎐 you'll need.

How we tested the 13th Gen Intel Core i7-13700K

The 13th Gen Intel Core i7 has been our testing꧟ rig's CPU for the past few months. It's carried me through plenty of RAM and SSD testi🍒ng in that time and has been used in plenty of gaming and productivity sessions.

For this review, I used Cinebench, Blender, and ICUE software to take industry-standard benchmarking figures and record metrics for evaluation. In terms of gไaming, I used Total War Warhammer III's benchmarking tests, as well as some of the most strenuous scenarios made by the Cities Skylines community. I've also tested this CPU's clock speeds by doing RAM tests with it, playing around with XMP profiles, and mostly running at 6000MHz and above.

For more on the ways we test the latest PC components, take a look at our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Hardware Policy.

For more on gaming PC hardware, check out our thoughts on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PCs, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best computer speakers.

The list of issues includes disruption to the way the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:graphics card's fans operate, causing them to whir up in a pulsing rhythm every few seconds. For many, this only seems to be fixable by setting a higher manu𒀰al percentage value on the fan outputs, frustrating many owners into more noise and✃ higher power usage.

This issue seems to be caused by an inability of Acer's fans to operate at lower percentages. One said, "The fan curve from Predator Bifrost starts at 20% since this card doesn&ﷺapos;t have a low power mode, when the step in the fan curve is below 30%, the fan will go to 0%, for this to stop, you need to set a custom fan curve or a fixed one with a value above 30%💦."

Although a made by Acer A770 users suggested ꧒using DDU software to revert the driver🏅 back to an older version, some are finding the frustrating fan behavior persists after this.

From the looks of that ticket, the issue seems to be fairly widespread, with one Intel engineer in the thread saying "This issue is one of 🅺the top priorities for our dev teams, they are working on this as we speak. We understand the frustration this causes, but rest assured we share and push all your comments to our dev teams."

Folks with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Acer Predator 🌄BiFrost Intel Arc A770 (myself included) have also reported problems when trying to export or render video. In many cases, this causes an entire 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC to freeze, or in better cases, a much slower expo🌱rt process.

Although unconfirmed, it would appear these issues are the result of a new Firmware update being lumped into the driver update - something you couldn't opt out of if you were an A770 user who just wanted the latest drivers for playing 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Starfield. 

, who cited fan and video rendering issues, wrote: "I am severely pissed about the fact that I couldn't opt out of the FIRMWARE update. I only wꦫanted a driver update. Is anyone at Intel going to buy me a new functioning card since the firmware ruined it and I can't work anymore?"

To add to the frustrations, one Intel Customer Support Technician has replied to a forum thread asking users to "Please note that, since you have an Acer Bifrost card, you should check with your manufacturer and using the drive🔯r and firmware updates provided by them to avoid potential installation incompatibilities."

Despite this customer support technician detailing the slight differences in driver software between manufacturers, one disgruntled user added that "ACER has one driver listed and that is over 6 months old. Users should be applying Intel ARC drivers൲ as recommended."

Late last week, Bethesda also that the flagship Intel graphics card doesn't meet 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Starfield's system requiremen🎐ts, despite being over three years younger than the minimum recommended boards for the game from both Nvidia and AMD. As it turns out, these issues may not have anything to do with your hardware choices, as some players online have discovered is๊sues with Starfield optimization on PC.

Starfield performance woes haven't plagued the game's launch, but they do seem to be fairly widespread, with - no matter their hardware 🐽specs.

Both Intel and Acer are yet to put out an official statement about the A770's firmware update causing issues, although it has been spotted across multiple forums that a fix is supposedly in the works. If you're currently suffering from similar ꦫissues with your Intel Arc A770, you can add your thoughts to the forum threads linked above.

Want more PC components for playing Starfield? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming.

I’m hesitant to call the Nvidia GTX 1660 one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards around, but its price makes it a top option for budget 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC builders. That said, I🍌’d be careful when shopping around for one on Amazon, as while you can snag one , most of the cheaper options are by brands I’ve never heard of. Don’t get me wrong, Asus, MSI🤪, and Zotax will also hook you up, but pricing is what makes the apparent shift towards the GTX card in 2023 quite interesting.

According to Steam Hardware Survey results for , the number of GTX 1660 GPU users on the platform j🥃umped by 1.82%. That might not sound like much, but even under 2% of the service’s 120 million monthly users is a pretty big figure. Not to mention that increases across every other popular graphics card failed to see usage increases above 1%, with the Steam Deck Van Gogh APU coming in second. 

It’s needless to say that the Nvidia GTX 1660 is one of the cheapest graphics cards still on the market, and it’s still capable of a lot today. However, the new PC games are more demanding than ever, and you won’t find the card on many system requirements lists in 2023. Not to mention it lacks any sort of AI upscaling support, and while you might not like 𒈔the fact, features like Nvidia DLSS are a godsend if you’re trying t🐎o run new releases on entry-level hardware. 

Of course, Nvidia would also prefer you to opt for something with DLSS compatibility, and the RTX 4060 is designed to be the GPU you'd upgrade to if you've still got a GTX 1660. At the moment, it feels like players aren't wandering down that path when it's time to change GPUs, and tha🍌t could be a bad sign for the entry-level Lovelace card. 

Should you buy a GTX 1660 in 2023?

I'm hesitaꩵnt to advise against buying a GTX 1660 in 2023 outright, but I'd strongly suggest taking prices across the board into consideration. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying I think you pay $100 more for an RTX 3060, and while you can get an RTX 4060 for $299, it’𒈔s still a lot to spend on a budget build. Price is undeniably a strong reason to still pick up a GTX 1660, but if it were me building a cheap rig in 2023, I’d consider an Intel Arc graphics card instead.

For $219.99, you can grab an with 8GB VRAM on Amazon, and it should fare better at running upcoming games like Starfield. The blue team’s debut card initially suffered from quirky drivers ♓at launch, but the Alchemist has gone from strength to strength since it arrived last year. Sure, it’s still $50 more expensive than the cheapest GTX 1660 cards, but there’s a chance you’ll find yourself itching to upgrade♌ again in the near future if you opt for the 2019 card.

Before any entry-level players reach for their pitchforks, I’m not trying to dunk on the GTX 1660, nor am I saying it’s a bad GPU. I guess if anything, I’m trying to highlight the price differences between the four year old card and newer options out there, as there isn’t as much of a gap as you’d think. If you’re able to get one chea💦p enough, and can avoid questionable unknown brands or cards that have had a hard life, then by all means pick one up. Otherwise, I’d encourage you to consider newer options, especially if they’ve got what it takes to survive in the minimum requirements trenches in 2023. 

Looking for a prebuild? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PCs and pick up an Aurora rig. Alternatively, check out our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop picks that'll help you take your Steam library on the go. 

Over at Amazon, you can grab the Intel Core i5-12400F , thanks to a nifty 27% discount. You can also save an additional $7 using an on-page coupon, so you’ll actually be able to grab the 12th gen 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming CPU for $142.99. For the money, you’ll get a six-core processor with clocks speeds up to 4.4Ghz, and I can say first hand that it pairs nicely with even the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 without much bottlenecking. Not that you’ll be forking out for the flagship 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:graphics card if you’re building a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC on a budget, but it’s definitely a processor that can rise to the challe🌳nge.

Just so we’re clear, I’m not saying you should necessarily buy this i5 CPU over newer options, especially if you have the spare cash. The chip featured in my friend and colleague Duncan’s 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:13th Gen Intel i5-13600K review will provide you with better specs and performanꦫce, but it does come in at $329. So, if you’re looking to keep costs super low without compromising gami🅺ng performance, it’s worth considering the ever slightly older 12th gen chip instead. It even comes with a stock cooler, something that’ll save you spending extra pennies.

No matter what chip you decide to go for, I still think it’s worth questioning whether you need an i7 or i9 in your gaming PC. I’ve been using the Intel Core i5-12400F since its 2022 debut, and I’ve yet to encounter any issues relating to bottlenecking. I even managed to avoid any performance hiccups when reviewing the RTX 4090, which is a testament to the fact that many new games aren’t particularly CPU bound. If we're being sensible about pairing parts, it'd be wiser to use this chip with an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia RTX 4060,🌠 but there's nothing stopping you opting for a beefier card.

I’m sure some of you out there will have a different opinion on the matter, especially if you care about marginal frame rate differences, but if I was building a PC for a friend, I’d go with the cheap i5 chip over most options out there. I’ll be testing the Intel i9-13900 soon, ♔and I’ll be looking closely at whether it actually offers a substantial gaming performance hike over and above the i5-12400F, as it’s still the chip I use every day.

Prefer leaving the building to the experts? Check out our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PC picks for a selection of Aurora rigs. Alternatively, take a look at the澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询: best gaming laptop options and take your Steam library on the go.

I'm a little surprised that the i5 still isn't considered viable by a lot of folks for more demanding workloads, even if its value reputation has been growing in recent years. With the 13th generation, and to a certain extent, the last generation of Intel's chipsও, the i5 has become an absolute powerhouse. So much so, that I'm beginning to question who an i7 and i9 are actually for.

PC components are expensive, and with the 13th Gen i5 starting at around £289.99 / $300 just under a year after launch, a higher-tier processor than this would definitely be asking for a lot. Especially when you consider the generational overhaul a lot of modern components are demanding at present. DDR5 RAM, SSDs that are fast as hell, not to mention a bespoke graphics card and a motherboard that's compatible with it all. Together, that amounts to a small fortune, so why bother spending any more money on a higher-rank🌠ing CPU if the i5 can be everything you need?

My hope going into this review was that it could be the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming I'd need. It didn't disappoint.

Specs and features

There isn't much to report about the aesthetics of the 13600K. It's standard fare in the looks department compared to Intel's🌱 other chips and has the handy triangle on the bottom left corner to tell you which way up it needs to be seated on your motherboard.

The socket all of the 13th Gen Raptor Lake Intel CPUs work with is the LGA1700, which means it's the same as 12th Gen processors. The jury's still out on whether 14th Gen CPUs, which are supposﷺedly arriving in a few months, will also use this socket. I, for one, hope they will.

One of the biggest barriers to entry for a lot of people I talk to, whether they're interested in buying one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs or upgrading their own rigs, is having a motherboard that's compatible with the latest parts. With three recent generations using one socket, we'd hopefully see some increased value across the board, and more peop🎐le trading up to the latest and greatest. On another note, it'll be interesting to see what more can be tapped out of this chipset when the "Raptor Lake Refresh" wave arrives.

The 13600K has 14 cores - 6 performance, and 8 efficiency (a lot more than people would typically expect of i5 processors)🥂, and 20 threads. For those that may be unaware of what these things actually mean, picture this processor as a factory with 14 workers manning some conveyor belts going in and out. This particular factory has🌃 20 conveyor belts, which the factory workers can use to spread out their workload so nothing gets backed up and the whole operation runs like clockwork. 

The 13th Gen i5 has that aforementioned Raptor Lake architecture and will work with DDR5 and Gen 5 SSDs, so long as you have a motherboard that's compatible. One thing you are missing out on compared to an i7 or i9, is that you don't have Raptor Lake's Turbo Max 3.0, a clever feature that identifies your particular processor's most efficient cores and prioritizes them for faster speed. To be honest, though, this isn't exactly something I noticed after having hands-on time with at least one 🎉of each CPU from this generation.

In terms of raw specs, the 13600K is perhaps the closest on paper to the 12th Gen Intel Core i7-12700K, which I happen to have a lot of hands-on time with since it was our testing rig's processor of choice until very recently. Compared to that proces🌌sor, the 13600K has a slightly faster boost clock, and more cores, but is othe🀅rwise virtually identical. In terms of feel during general PC usage, this processor actually feels more efficient and tends to run cooler, perhaps because it's slightly less power-hungry. 

Maybe most importantly, the 13600K is cheaper than a 12th Gen i7, despite being newer. The i5-13600K means you get the unlocked multiplier for overclocking from the "K". If you go for the lightly cheaper 13600KF model, you get the same multiplier, but no integrated graphics, so make sure you have one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards if that's the one you go for.

Performance

I've put this CPU to the test in my own personal build for the past three to four weeks, and it hasn't once let me down. In that time, I've used it for working from home, which often means having a minimum of 15 tabs open at any one time, as well as a VPN, and a few other applications running all the while. Besides that, I've done some benchmarking and gaming too, and despite all reports that 13th gen processors run hot, I've had mine in a small-form-factor build in 🦩a Corsair 2000D Airflow RGB chassis, and its temperatures have been super-manageable.

In my spare time, I do a lot of content creation for YouTube, as well as some live streaming. Coming from an older AMD Ryzen 5 3400G CPU in my previous build, live streaming is absolutely where I feel the biggest difference with the 13600K. Where streams may have struggled before, and I had to be very cutthroat about the number of programs I had open while live, the 13th Gen i5 feels like it isn't even sweating. Playing games on the same PC as I was streaming definitely didn't seem like a sustainable practice, but it's now more than possible. I'm yet to test the i5's prowess when it comes to video editing, but given how it trounced playing city-building games while I was streaming, I have no doubts it will smash any video editing demands I have for it. Particularly because it's paired in my build with 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Sabrent's Rocket DDR5 RAM, which is up there with the very 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming on the market.

Then, of course, there's gaming, and this is where I think the 13th Gen i5 will win over a lot of hearts. For testing processors like this one, we'll be taking typically CPU-intensive titles and seeing how they get on. Total War: Warhammer 3, Cities Skylines, as well as other City Building/RTS games, are a great test, since they require a CPU to keep track of a lot of moving parts in the game at any one time, be 🍸it hundreds of little citizens, or full-blown Warhammer armies tearing one another to shreds with magic and physics all running rꦍampant. 

I ran Total War's three included benchmarks and loaded up the most populated community scenarios in Cities Skylines I could find. I then traꦦcked frame rates, temperatures, total CPU power, and Core voltages, as well as quoted percentages of CPU usage. You can see the results below.

I also turned this CPU at one of my go-to testing games, HUNT: Showdown, to see how it compared to my playtesting with the 12th Gen i7. I managed to play at 4K with mid settings enabled and hit 60-80FPS more than comfortably, and the CPU only sat between 65°C and 75°C. Granted, this was while using an Acer Predator Bifrost Intel Arc A770 OC with 16GB of VRAM, but even so, I haven't seen those frame rates with the 12700K outside of testing the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RX 7900 XT, and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 4070 Ti.

Lastly, I got oddly glued to Timberborn when testing the 13th Gen i5, another City Builder that's less demanding than Total War and Cities. I asked the CPU to simulate my small community of beavers as their district grew around them and was very pleasantly surprised at the results. Using a quoted 5% of the CPU, I was hitting 120FPS🍎 on and off stream at higher resolutions, with the temperature sitting comfortably in the 65°C range.

Industry-standard benchmarking tests were a similar story, with Cinebench and Blender pulling the hottest temperatures out of the 13600K I'd see👍n, all the while achieving some really decent results.

One thing I do want to touch on is that when it comes to wattage, voltages, and temperatures, these numbers might seem high 🐬for a mid-ranger. That said, the 13600K manages to get similar performance to last-gen's i7 and isn't as power-hungry.

For the most part, temperatures here are very manageable - I'm not using a radiator, AIO, or water cooler. Airflow alone keeps the ambient temperatures of the 13600K to an acceptable 40-50°C. In terms of ambient power, the CPU pulls through a core voltage of 0.728v, and an overall wattage of 10.6W. These things aren't nearly as extreme as an i7 or i9 - the latter literally reached boiling point when I tested it in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Acer Predator Orion 7000 (2023), so that's worth bearing in mind.

Overall, I'm so satisfied with the 13th Gen Intel Core i5-13600K. No matter what I require of it, it's always up for the task. Given the price poi✨nts of Raptor Lake's CPU range, the strong performance of this CPU makes me question who on earth actually needs an i7 or i9.

Should you buy the Intel Core i5-13600K?

For the majority of people, the 13th Gen Intel i5-13600K is all you'll need. An i5 may be a "mid-range" processor, but in this day and age, I think we need to re-assess what that actually means. The fact this thing is, on paper, a 12th Gen i7, and feels to me from extensive use of both like the better CPU overall says a lot. Not to menti🍸🦩on, it's cheaper.

Don't get me wrong, the 13th Gen i7 and i9 will no doubt give you better performance when pairing with the highest-end GPUs like the RTX 4090, and when trying to get the most out of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors. But for the majority of people that aren't running those expensive bits of kit, I'd recommend seriously thinking about what you'll need from a CPU before writing off an i5. PC components are expensive, and there really ﷽is no point in buying a more expensive brain for your computer when the i5 is powerful enough to give you what you want.

I doubt that many people will go quite as hard on their CPUs as I do. Hardware testing, content creation, and 4K gaming will put any chipset to the test. If you do one of those things, let alone all three, the i5-13600K won't let you down. Outside of looking at the AMD s🧸ide, this is one of theജ best CPUs for gaming you'll find. 

How we tested the Intel Core i5-13600K

I put the 13th Gen Intel Core i5-13600K to the test in my own PC for almost a month leading up to this review. During that time I used it for work, content creation, live streaming, and gaming on almost a daily ba🍰sis. I paired it with a Noctua NH-L9i-17xx Low-Profile Cooler, Noctua NT-H1 Thermal Paste, and supported it with 3 intakes chassis fans, and 2 extractors. The chassis used for this review was the Corsair 2000D Airflow RGB, the GPU was an Acer Predator Bifrost Intel Arc A770 OC, and the RAM was 32B of Sabrent Rocket DDR5. The motherboard pulling all these components together is an ASUS ROG Strix Z790-i. 

For industry-standard benchmarking tests, I used rendering tests from free and open-source Blender, as well as Cinebench. In terms of gaming, I tested how it handled games like Cities Skylines, and Total War Warhammer 3 which are known for being CPU-intensive. In the same vein, I played lots of Timberborn, as well as HUNT: Showdown. Where possible, I compared my experience with this CPU's performance to my time with the 12th Gen Intel 🦹Core i7-12700K, my old AMD Ryzen 5 3400G, and the 13th Gen Intel Core i9 that was inside the Acer Predator Orion 7000 I reviewed recently. 

To track numbers for all these things, I predominantly used Armoury Crate since I'm working on an Asus mot▨herboard, but compared figures to ones found in iCUE and Predator Bifrost's software. 

To read more about the ways we test the latest PC components here at GamesRadar+, have a read of our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:hardware policy.

For more PC content, check out our thoughts on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PCs, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best computer speakers.

🦂This configuration packs an Intel i7-12700K processor (the previous generation but still more than capable of keeping up with you), a 1TB SSD, 16GB DDR5 RAM, and a super speedy 360Hz display. That's excellent value - especially when you consider we&aܫpos;ve only ever seen this rig drop cheaper during a particularly speedy flash sale at Amazon earlier in the year. 

This is a must-see for anyone looking to max🐻imise style as well as power, especially if you're a competitive player who will make the most of those blistering screen speeds. 

The Razer Blade 15 doesn't take part in 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming laptop deals too often, but when it does it's often snapped up by those keeping tabs on its prices. This is the most recent 15.6-inch 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Razer laptop, and it carries that brand pedigree pro🍒udly. We still love that matte black minimalist chassis design, and the high build quality and subtle aesthetic means it's a machine for use on the go aꦯnd at home. 

Even though we tested a 4K device for our own review, we've since had a brief encounter with the 1080p model and were still impressed by the screen quality. Razer produces some of the best displays in the market and that's true even when you're prioritizing speed over resolution. Dropping ou♛r UHD model down to 1080p, we were able to consistently enjoy 60+fps across our benchmark tests as well. That was with an RTX 3080 Ti at the helm, but the configuration above will still prove powerful enough for the vast majority of players. 

More of today's best Razer Blade gaming laptop deals

If you're after more 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap Razer laptops, you'll find all the web's latest prices comp☂ared just below. Our price checking technology scours all the top retailers every half hour, bringing you the latest discounts. 

Of course, we're also rounding up the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware laptops and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Asus gaming laptops if you're after another flavor - or check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs for something more permanent. 

Look, we’re not going to pretend that Intel is tearing up the track in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics card race, nor does it have a proper new-gen AMD or Nvidia contender. Yet, Arc GPUs are slowly developing into a go-to option for budget builders and entry-level enthusiasts alike. That arguably matters more than raw 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC performance and AI trickery amid a cost of living crisis, as at the end of the day, if an A750 can run games at 1080p an🤡d costs less, it’s going to cater to the majority of Steam players out there.

Coming in at 22K Yen (around $159) the new comes armed with a cut-down versioꦆn of Intel’s ACM-G10 GPU, featuring 28 Xe cores and 8GB GDDR6 memory (). It’s also an overlocked card, with a slight tune-up to 2.2GHz helping it pick up the pace.

Of course, there is another talking point in regard to this new Arc card, as Kuroutoshikou has a blue board and a blue connector. Yes, I did write that to the tune of that weird song with the creepy CGI, which I guess means the choice will at least grab some attention o꧃ver alternatives.

Sticking with the limited edition theme we’ve witnessed with Alchemist since its arriv🧸al, Kuroutoshikou is set to produce a smaller number of units. It’s worth noting that this card is also on sale in Japan, and it likely won’t get a release in the US or the UK. Nevertheless, more Arc graphics cards are a good sign, one that should help Intel establish ground ahead of its new Battlemage series. Who knows, if the company plays its "cards" right, it could flank Nvidia at an opportune time with a high-end contender that packs a punch.

 Should you buy an Intel Arc graphics card? 

Intel Arc graphics cards are all about bang for buck, and you can pick up a partner model A770 with 16GB GDDR6 RAM normally for under $350 (the Li๊mited Edition model was recently discontinued). That’s not bad considering the recently released RTX 4060 ♉costs $299 and only comes with 8GB memory, but Nvidia does have better drivers and fancier AI upscaling features like DLSS 3 on its s༒ide. 

Still, Arc cards are developing like fine wine, and while report🔯s of optimization issues with older games originally made the rounds, performance is on the up. So, if you’re in the market for a cheap GPU that packs decent specs, it’s worth considering Intel’s budget gladiator. We’ll be putting Acer’s Predator BiFrost Intel Arc A770 OC card to the test in an upcoming review, so watch this space for benchmarks and impressions.

Before you go, I’ve included somꦕe of the best Arc graphics card deals out there at the moment below, so fe🔯el free to have a browse. 

Looking for a complete build? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware gaming PCs with GPUs already inside. Alternatively, have a peek at our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop picks for a collection of portable powerhouses.

In this generation of slightly more expensive gaming laptops, this ratio is still working in the Alienware M16's favor. However, some quality-of-life concerns are still rearing their heads as well. These chunky builds won't suit everyone, but they often provide the mid-range with plenty of performance for the cash. I spend weeks testing top-shelf configurations in my quest to find the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop. Considering the previous generation 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware M15 R7 was my go-to pick for most players who don't want to break the bank, though, I was more conservative in my spec for this generation. I took the RTX 4060 / Intel i7-13700HX out for a spin over the course of three weeks, to see just how this baseline spec compares against the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware laptops on the market. 

Design

The Alienware M16 doesn't do much to change Dell's classic aesthetic. This is still a square-ish machine with a chunkier feel. That means it doesn't stand out quite as much in its thickness when compared with the gaming laptops of 2023. We're seeing more and more machines moving away from a particularly slimline build to accommodate those new-generation components, and in this landscape, the M16 feels almost thin... almost. It's a slight trick of the eye, though, because this 🐲is still a hefty machine. When the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 weighs in at 2.5kg, the Alienware's 3.25kg heft is certainly something to consider if you're after a♔ portable machine.

The rest of the design is firmly within the Alienware M-Series' repertoire. The centered keyboard, embossed '16' on the back, and additional space towards the rear have been seen time and time again. In 2023, these design elements are starting to feel tired. If it wasn't for that 16-inch display and physical marker on the lid, this cꦺould be any Alienware M laptop from the last four years. It's still an impressive aesthetic, pairing cool grey tones with flashy RGB and a relatively slimline profile, but it would be interesting to see Alienware playing with its look a little in future iterations.

There's nothing broken about that design, you're still getting the vibrant RGB elements around the main port section at the back, classic alien head branding, and hexagonal grills running along the top. It's all still as solid and durable as ever, with a matte coating that promises to keep things soft to the touch but equally res༺istant to fingerprints. No, you're still not getting the luxurious aluminum and ma𝐆gnesium alloy of the X-Series, but this is still an aluminum build. 

That extra size does pile onto one of Alienware's weakest points - portability. Even the Alienware M15 R7 felt too clunky to carry around on a daily basis, and the M16 doubles down on this. I struggled to even wedge it into a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:laptop backpack on my travels, and once it was in nothing el♌se was goin🎀g to fit safely.

Features

Unlike last year's edition, the M16 places its keyboard on a slightly recessed panel of the main chassis. While😼 the M15 R7 framed this deck with raised edges, everything is flat here. That gives the illusion of far more space to type and, when combined with the excellent spacing on this deck, makes for a particularly comfortable experience overall. Yes, it's still shifted slightly further down the main body (thanks to the hexagonal grills running along the top) than you might be used to, but everything still feels central and easily accessible here. 

The keyboard itself is nice and responsive, with a tactile res♛ponse despite the rubber dome construction. The M16 does also ship with a Cherry MX mechanical keyboard in more expensive configurations♎ if you're looking to boost the type feel, though. 

You've got a full suite of keys, though no number pad or dedicated media buttons. The latter is a slight disappointment, especially with this larger form factor. I wa♓s, however, pleased with the full-sized arrow and volume keys running down the right side. 

While the keyboard works hard to give you plenty of space, though, the trackpad is remarkably small. That's a symptom of this squished internal design, and the re﷽sult is a cramped pad placed so close to the edge of the main body it's almost impossible to use with precision or comfort when placed on a lap. Of course, the Alienware M16 has been developed for gaming, so you'll rarely use the trackpad outside of quick work sessions. However, many machines offer far greater versatility for th💜ose after a work / play hybrid machine. 

By contr🐻ast, the ports available to you remain dutifully bountiful. You're getting two speedy USB-C Gen 2 ports, as well as plenty of USB-As, an Ethernet, and a full SD card reader here. The latter options are becoming a rarity in modern gaming laptops, and fully open y𒁃ou up to all the connectivity you could ask for. 

Under the hood, you'll find four🤡 fans situated in an expansive vapor chamber all working to keep those temperatures down. As is tradition, you're still getting the same control over those fans as in previous iterations, with Quiet and Full Fan mode at each end of the performance spectrum. For the most part, everything works as expected here, and I was pleasantly surprised by the temperature output with everything hitting full whack. 

While the Alienware M15 R7 was among the loudest machines I've ever tested (even during everyday tasks sometimes), the M16 does its part to alleviate some of that auditory pressure. Yes, you can still toggle everything up to full RPM, but everyday play works well as standard settings. You'll still need a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming headset fo༒r full immersion, b🍌ut this by no means has the roar of the 15-incher before it. 

The display on my test unit is a QHD+ 16-inch IPS panel running at 165Hz, the cheapest panel available in the current lineup (you can also pick up an FHD+ 480Hz model, but Alienware doesn't offer this screen with the cheaper 512GB SSD option). There's no denying it, this is an impressive screen. No, it's not following the Mini LED trend of the day, but it still offers plenty of color contrast and a viewing angles. It's by no means as vibrant as some of the displays on the latest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus gaming laptops, but with this Dell engineering behind it it manages to punch slightly above other IPS QHD+ options out there. In everyday practice, the only s🌃acrifice I noticed was the drop in brightn🔯ess. 

Performance

This is my first time🤪 hands-on with a lower-rung RT⛎X 40-Series GPU, and I'm still impressed. Alienware's M-Series laptops have always held their own in the performance department, drawing as much as they can out of their components for a slick experience overall. That's still true in the new M16. 

The new release came surprisingly close to the performance of the higher-specced RTX 3070 Ti🔜 under the hood of the M15 R7 I tested last year. A Time Spy score of 10,139 just grazes the M15's 10,722 and in-game benchmarks exceed those of the previous generation.

Even with an RTX 4060 at the helm, the M16 was hitting well over 100fps in the vast majority of my 1080p and 1440p tests, across both High and Ultra settings. Hitman 3 was the only game to consistently drop below this threshoꦕld, with ray tracing and DLSS switched on it was hitting between 79 and 92fps. That's still commendable, considering the M15 dipped to 72fps in its lowest in-game benchmark (Metro Exodus) this time last year. 

At its baseli🍎ne spec, then, the Alienware M16 is still capable of running pretty much anything you can throw at it at speeds we would have killed for just a few years ago. 

Should you buy the Alienware M16?

The Alienware M-S𓄧eries has always been a solid go-to for performance that won't break the bank like some flagship devices. You&🃏apos;re getting excellent numbers and spending far less than $2,000. This is the cheapest 2023 device I've had my hands on so far, and it's still posting in-game benchmarks that can wrestle with the big guns. 

There's no doubt about it, though - this is a chunky build. Those graphics only have the room to perform at this level thanks to the extra space within the chassis, but that heft does limit what you can𝓀 physically do with the M16. I wouldn't recommend this machine to anyone 💞looking to travel with their rig, it's just too bulky and heavy. 

There are ꩲother drawbacks to that power-first approach, though. The larger footprint is paired with a cumbersome design. That additional space behind the screen itself has lingered a little too long, and the aesthetics are starting to feel a little worn out in 2023 as well. The lack of space underneath the keyboard and trackpad also means the M16♔ isn't going to fare well as a lap device.

If you're after a more streamlined, more portable device, I could not recommend the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 highly enough. However, those looking to preserve the larger screen size might be better off with the Asus ROG Strix 16 which weighs in at 2.5kg🌳 compared to the M16's 3.25kg. 

The M16 does hit a nice niche, though. If you're looking for a desktop-first device (with the opportunity to take it on the go should you need to), this is an excellent alternative to the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Razer Blade 18 and Alienware M18 at the top of the price spectrum.🌌 

How we tested the Alienware M16

I used the Alienware M16 for all my daily work and play over the course of three weeks, testing for some of that time alongside the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14. During this process, I used in-game benchmarking tools across Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, Rainbow Six Extraction, Returnal and Hitman 3, while also playing Alan Wake: Remastered and High on Life during everyday play. For more information on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming laptops, check out the full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy. 

Of course, we're also rounding up all the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Razer laptops and helping you find a discount with our full guides to the latest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware laptop deals and all the biggest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming laptop deals on the shelves right now as well. 

But, whether you're running a high-end machine like that, or even if you&ap😼os;re working with hardware a little less impressive, getting the most out of your CPU is paramount to performance. From the most simple to the most sophisticated, here are five ways to get the most out of your gaming laptop CPU. 

Play games with the charger plugged in 

Okay, so a really simple one to kick things off, but it really is the best place to start. It's not always possible to have your laptop plugged into a power supply at all times – after all,꧒ one obvious perk gaming laptops have over desktops is the fact you can more easily take them on the road – but whenever you can, you should. Anything that allows your CPU and GPU to work as freely as possible is worth doing, and relying on battery power often throttles performance, causing frame rate drops and unwelcome lag. Even if you're gaming on a 13th Gen Intel Core processors (HX Series) and GeForce RTX 4090 GPU, plugging in, switching on, and allowing your gaming laptop to work at its fullest and fastest is recommended on all occasions.  

Optimize power settings 

Since we're talking power, optimizing your power settings is important for the smoothest gaming experiences, and not all laptops are configured to play the most resource-hungry games by default. The good thing is, it's easy to check this out and adjust as required. It's worth noting that♚ changing your settings to High Performance will drain your battery faster, but it should boost your CPU performance. And, if you're following the step above whenever possible𝔍, this should be less of an issue. 

T🎉o optimize your performance settings you should: 

1. Hit the 'Start' button and go to 'Settings'
2. Hit the 'System' menu, and once there hit 'Power & sleep'
3. Under 'Related Settings' hit 'Additional power settings'
4. Hit 'High Performance' and confirm your new settings 

Beat the heat  

Overheating can be a nightmare for gaming laptops, and a sure-fire way to send frame rates plummeting, and cause lag to skyrocket. The first port of call here may sound simple, but by ensuring your laptop is always used on an even surface ensures its ven🌳ts remain clear of obstruction, thus allowing heat to escape as designed.♏ After that, you might consider manually adjusting your laptop's fan speed – setting your hardware's fan to maximum speed (rotations-per-minute, or RPM) will help keep your machine cool, even when playing the most demanding high-end games.  

Firing on all cores 

It's not always obvious why, but some games and/or applications fail to use the CPUs that power them to their fullest potential. Even if you're packing an octa-core processor, your game may decide it only wants to utilize some of those cores and not all – leaving you with poor performance at your end. You'll be pleased to know, though, that the workaround for this is straightforward. First, you'll want to fire up the game in question, and then press Ctrl Alt Delete to activate Windows Task Manager. Once there, locate and right-click on the game you're playing, select the 'Details' tab, hit 'Set Affinity', and select '' at the top of that lis🤪t to activate all of your CPU's processors. Go on, make the most of those eight cores and 16 threads, you and your CPU deserve it!    

Disable unnecessary background services 

A whole host of background services run on Windows laptops in default settings, many of whic𝓡h can be switched off as a means of boosting performance, in turn putting less strain on your RAM usage and CPU. Services such as 'Bluetooth Support Service', 'Downloaded Maps Manager', 'Internet Connection Sharing', 'Windows Biometric Service', and 'Windows Media Player Network Sharing⛄ Service', can all be toggled off, alongside many others. 

Disabling background servi🤪ces is easy – you should:

• Search "services" in the Windows search bar, and hit the 'Services' app
• Right click on the service you want to disable, and select 'Properties'
• Below where it says "Service status: Running", hit 'Stop' 
• Below that again, hit 'Apply' – move onto the next service and repeat all of the above 

Knowing your components will be a big help in figuring out how much you need to spend on a gaming laptop, because it’s so easy to overspend on power you don’t need, and a simple mistake to hamstring yourself with a machine that has bottlenecks. The good news is, PC jargon isn’t all that difficult to understand once you have a bit of a baseline on it all. Yes, all gaming hardware these days seems to have dreadful naming conventions that are designed to confuse you, but it’s not all doom and gloom. Buying one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptops doesn't need to feel daunting, so don't worry too mucꦅh.

Down below we’ve put together a simple list of gaming laptop terms that are bound to come up when you peruse the online s🍨helves. We’ve provided a brief, and hopefully, simple description of each one in order to arm you with the knowledge you need to make a buying decision. Don’t fear those capital letters, weird numbers, and daunting price tags - here are the important specs you should look out for when buying a gaming laptop.

CPU / Processor 

Let’s start with one of the most important laptop components since it can be one of the trickiest to understand. One of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming is a core processing unit, which is co﷽nsidered the brain of a computer. It’s the component that will allow you t♚o run apps, and multitask, and the money you spend on one will usually determine its speed. It’s the component that all the others will talk to in order to function properly. 

As a general rule, if you’re coming from a PC backg🥃round, shoot for a CPU one higher than what you would for a desktop. Since gaming laptops are smaller, the power drop-off is 💮a little more drastic - although with the latest 13th Gen Intel Core processors (HX Series), that's not so true.

GPU / Graphics card 

The GPU, or graphics processing unit, is traditionally called a video card, and that’s because it’s the part of the laptop that will power your video, graphics, and gaming tasks. For a gaming laptop, One of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards is typically the thing you need to concentrate the most on, since it will determine most of all how many frame🐽s per second you’ll get in your games, and at what resolutio🤪n.

Annoyingly, these are named f❀airly unhelpfully. Again, the higher the number, the more power you’ll get. With Nvidia, you’re looking at either the RTX 30 or 40 series these days, followed by the amount of power. So an RTX 4050 or 3060 will be a strong entry-level option, ﷽but an RTX 3090 or 4090 will be where the most power lies.

RAM / Memory 

Not to be confused with storage space, which we’ll come onto next - the memory/RAM of a gaming laptop is how much Random Access Memory it has. This is, in effect, a form of storage, but it’s lightning-fast storage where all of your multitasking processes are held while they aren’t being processed by a CPU. So, for example, if you’re the type of person that leaves 50 million tabs open on your computer at a time, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming is the thing that wiꦯll determine how quickly you can go fr💟om one to the other.

The latest RAM is DDR5, which can seriously bail out lesser machines if your laptop and CPU is compatible with it. DDR5 can reach speeds of about 5000MHz, and anything around or abov🎶e that number is crazy fast. For the latest games, either 16GB or 32GB is what you should be seeking out in a gaming laptop.

Storage 

Storage is the more typical type of memory. This will determine how many files, apps, games, and data your gaming laptop can hold. In today’s 🧸gaming laptops there are usually two choices, SSD and HDD. HDD is slower at accessing that data, but might be used for laptops with greater capacities like those with more than 2TB since it’s a bit cheaper.

澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:SSD for gaming is the faster type of storage that can access data quickly but might be a bit more expensive to buy in a laptop. If you can afford a gaming laptop with an SSD, we’d always recommend it since load times will be cut to zilch when playing the latest titles. Remember that you can always bolster a laptop's internal storage with one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best external hard drives.

Display 

Finally, a laptop has a display. These are a bit easier to understand since they’re usually dulled down to what size you need, b⛄ut it can be useful to know that there are different types of display panels, with IPS usually being the best all-rounder. It can also be helpful to know that these displays have refresh rates, which determine how many times that display can change down to the finest millisecond. The higher the Hz, the quicker the display and in all likelihood, the more frames your gaming laptop will be able to generate in a second.

For pointers on buying laptops without overspending, take a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best cheap gaming laptops, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RTX 3070 laptop deals, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RTX 3080 laptop deals.

A lot, however, will depend on what you want to use it fo💎r  - there's no point throwing big money at a specced-out monster machine and then playing retro stuff or less demanding indie titles all the time. Similarly, if you want to play all new releases at even a decent quality, let alone ultra settings, you probably aren't going to be able to skimp the budget. 

One thing you might want to consider looking for is an Intel inside. Specifically an Intel Core HX Processor. These are highly tuned CPUs designed to maximize power, efficiency, and performance when gaming. They feature up to 16 Hyper-Threaded cores, as well as things like PCI Express 5.0, RAID, and ECC memory support for high band🐭width, powerful processing. They can also support up to 128GB of RAM and four SSD M.2 slots. That's enou𝓰gh flexibility and horsepower for even the most demanding portable gaming setup. 

We can see how that 🍒might help, as well as all the other things you might need to consider, as w🧔e take a look at 10 things to know when choosing a gaming laptop

1. Think about the screen you actually need

There are going to be three main things to consider with a screen, and that's size, resolution and refresh rate. Size is the easiest to deal with because obviously bigger screens give you more to look at, but will affect weight, portability, battery life, and what sort of CPU and GPU you might need. The latter depends on what resolution you want to go for, with options from 1080p up to 4K, as well as refresh rates, which governs how fast a frame rate the screen can show. It's important to consider what you're going to be using your new baby for here, because oldꦺer or more indie leaning stuff will be fine with a lower resolution and FPS. While if you want to enjoy the latest releases then you'll need big numbers across the board.  

 2. Don't expect a huge battery life 

One thing you will have to get used to is that you're not going to get a lot of battery life from a gaꦍming laptop, with eight hours largely pushing the upper limits. This will be affected by a lot of the choices you make elsewhere, with bigger screens, more powerful processors and graphics cards, general efficiency, as well as the kind of games you want to play, all having a say in how long you can go between charges.  

3. Portability and weight is up to you

Nowhere does the b🎀alance and compromise of a portable gaming setup show more than when you🧜 have to put it in a bag and lug it about. If you want the fastest most powerful thing you can take with you, then expect the bag to be heavy. Again, really think about what you actually need, rather than want. If you're happy with a little less here and there where it doesn't matter so much to you, then you can keep the weight down and even get something surprisingly portable. 

4. Don't skimp on the CPU…

This is the powerhouse of your laptop. Obviously, the GPU does the heavy lifting graphically, and we'll get to that in a moment. But you'll also need a good CPU to avoid bottlenecks. This is what makes 13th Gen Intel Core processors a good option, with multiple cores, extra memory, and I/O (input/outpu𓂃t) to significantly increase performance and efficiency. You can have up to 16 cores on an Intel HX processor across 8 Performance-cores for high-intensity tasks and 8 Efficient-cores for more day-to-day work, while higher-bandwidth connections like PCIe Gen 5 and RAID support ensure faster data transfer. They're a powerful and efficient mobile option.  

5. …but get the GPU you ACTUALLY need 

Probably the biggest things to consider when it comes to a GPU is what you need it to do, as well as longevity. Gaming laptops aren't always the best option to upgrade so you want a graphics card with some life in it. Although that also depends on whether🌺 you're happy playing at lower settings. If 60fps 1080p is fine for you, then you can get a card that will last for a while to come at a competitive price. Want your frame rate and resolution as high as it can possibly go for as lo꧅ng as possible? Then expect to pay more. 

6. Make sure you future proof the RAM

It's easy to forget about RAM but PC gaming is increasingly making high demands of it for recommended specs. Ideally, you want 16GB of RAM minimum for basic gaming. But the Intel Core HX range of processors are ready for whatever the future may demand with support for up to 128GB of 💃DDR5/LPDDR5 or DDR4 memory. 

7. There are a lot of storage options to play with

Unless you plan on only playing a few games at a time you're probably going to want a decen💛t amount of storage. You're also going to have to think about whether you want a physical HDD or a faster SSD. Or both, with a boot up SSD and storage HDD a common combination. If loading times are a big deal for you generally, then you're going to want to consider SSDs, and 13th Gen Intel Core processors💫 have enough oomph to support up to four of those. 

8. Double check all the ports and inputs, just to be sure

Generally, you won't be short of inputs and outputs but it's always worth checking just to be sure. Have you got enough USBs to plug everything in? Are enough of𒀰 them USB 3.0? If you're thinking about plugging it into anything like a TV or desktop setup, have g🌄ot all the connections you need? It's rarely anything to worry about but always worth checking. 

9. If you care about keyboards, you're probably going to be okay

There can be a lot of keyboard option variations when looking at gaming laptops. You might find fully mechanical options indistinguishable from a desktop setup. Or more portable and slimline options that maximi🥂ze form factor and weight. It's entirely up to you and your preferences but if you care about that sort of thing you'll probably find the setup for you.  

10. Pay attention to cooling options 

Gaming demands a lot✤ from your GPU and that means a lot of heat. There's a range of solutions and options for cooling gaming laptops and, realistically, you always want as much as possible. Without it you might be sacrificing power instead to keep the temperature down which can defeat the whole point of some specs. Look out for mention of cooling systems and technologies and you'll know you'll be able to run higher power games. 

The design

Before you even start thinking about specifications, the first thing you should consider when looking for a gaming laptop is the design and weight. If you’re planning on regularly travelling with it for gaming on the go, then you should be aiming for a light🦂weight system that doesn’t take up too much space🤪, while if you’re getting a laptop for convenience that will mainly stay at home then you can afford to go for a bulkier machine which doesn’t need moving around as often.

The size of your gaming laptop also ties directly into the display you’re after, and whether you’ll mainly be using the built-in screen or connecting to an external monitor or television. A larger built-in display means a physically bigger system overall, but if you plan on outputting to another device then you can choose something more compact. When it comes to those displays, there’s no point in splashing out on a laptop capable of 4K gaming if you’re only hooking it up to a 1080p screen, but conversely if you have a 4K display and want to take fu𒈔ll adv☂antage of it then you need to know that your laptop will have the power to do it.

Your specs

Probably the biggest consideration when choosing a gaming laptop is the CPU that it’s built on, as this is where all of the central processing takes place that keeps your machine running. When determining the power of a CPU, you’ll want to look at the clock speed or frequency as this represents the number of cycles it can execute per second, a☂nd aim for the highest rate you can get with your budget. However, a more important measure to look at is the core count, as with a multiple-core processor each one can work independently on different tasks to handle much larger concurrent workloads.

Your processor

For a CPU that rates highly in both of those aspects, you should look no further than the 13th Gen Intel Core processors (HX Series) processor range, as these are a perfect fit f♔or giving your gaming laptop the power it deserves. 

Although the CPU can handle a certain amount of graphics output, if you want to enjoy reliable gaming at a high resolꦓution then you’ll need to pair it with a dedicated GPU to handle that side of things. Whether you’re aiming for 1080p, 1440p, or 4K, make sure the GPU is capable of steadily outputting that in at least 60 frames per second to ensure a smooth experience – and higher if you’re connecting to a higher-end monitor with a refresh rate or 120Hz, 144Hz or beyond.

Bear in mind that dedicated GPUs generate a lot of heat and drain battery charge rapidly, so the more powerful your separate graphics processor is the less time you’ll be able to use your laptop away from mains power. For this reason, most gaming laptops have built-in options to switch between the graphics output of the CPU, known as inteꦆgrated graphics, and the dedicated GPU so the CPU can take care of the less demanding desktop display tasks. This can significantly boost battery life by only using the GPU when needed, so check that your CPU has integrated graphics and is capable of making this switch.

You also need to ensure that your gaming laptop has enough RAM, so that it can function effectively while completing demanding tasks. A minimum of 16GB RAM sho🌄uld be your target as this will cover most games at higher settings along with some multitasking, though if you’re a content creator taking on additional tasks such as video editing and rendering then 32GB will ensure you stay up to speed. In most cases, you won’t be able to add extra RAM to your gaming laptop later, so it’s better to overestimate here and future-proo🌌f yourself as much as possible.

Your storage

When it comes to storage, SSDs are the way to go as these solid-state drives are more reliable and have much faster read/write speeds than traditional HDDs, meaning faster load times for your games and files. As they don’t have the moving parts of mechanical drives, SSDs are much better suited to portability as they won’t be as affected by any knocks 𓄧and bumps your gaming laptop may receive. At a minimum, you need a smaller SSD installed to run your operating system and most used programs, then you can expand your storage if necessary with an external SSD or HDD.

Your connectivity

The final consideration for your gaming laptop should be connectivity, as if you’re planning to attach items ౠsuch as an external keyboard and mouse, controller(s), a headseꦛt, and more then you need to have enough ports available to plug everything in. You’ll also want to ensure you have at least one high-speed USB port free if you’re connecting external storage, so you can access your data at the full speed of the drive without any unnecessary lag being introduced.

Put all of tho♏se considerations together, and you’ll be able to invest in a gaming laptop that will keep you ahea🐈d of the competition for years to come.

To clarify, however, this doesn't mean all models of the Intel Arc A770 have been discontinued. The models made by brand partners like the Acer Predator Bifrost a🌌nd Gunnir Photon will continue to sell since Intel will ship silicons of them. 

The Intel Arc A770 launched back in October of 2022 and has been praised by many in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming PC markets for its affordability - even Nvidia's 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 4070 Ti doesn&a﷽pos;t have the 16GB of VRAM the A770 LE does.

All orders of the Lim🐎ited Edition GPU made before the 20th of June will still ship to customers, and this change doesn't impact the A750 Limited Edition, which Intel will continue to manufacture.

While many reported the news yesterday as though the 16GB Intel Arc GPU's product life was coming to a final end, it's actually the case that Intel is just ceasing to manufacture its "limited edition" models. This is comparable to Nvidia's Founders Edition 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:graphics cards being in limited stock,🔯 and only being manufactured for a new mo🍷del's release.

This 🍬news was first broken by our sister site , which reported the story after Intel issued a statement﷽. 

The A770 will most likely still see the performance patches and software support that it has up until now, as Intel has bigger plans for its graphics cards now that it's initiated the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Balanced Builds scheme.

Back in March, Intel announced via its social media channels that the Acℱer Predator BiFrost A770 would receive a 43% performance boost, and driver updates continue to improve p🃏erformance as the company rolls them out.

Moreover, there seem to be A770 boards from more brand 🐻partners on the way. Sparkle announced it would introduce an A770 Titan. 

Intel's second-generation of Arc graphics architecture is slated to be on the way, 🅘and is codenamed♓ Battlemage, meaning that we'll likely see more Intel graphics cards entering the fray next year.

In other news, Intel announced a new naming structure for its better-known CPUs last week, which is the first 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:branding update in 15 years from the component giant.

Upgrade your rig in other ways with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming.

The change comes as Intel prepares to launch the Meteor Lake line of CPUs, which is essentially the company's 14th generation of processors. This follows on from Intel's 13th generation which we're currently in the process of testing out. Although we've been used to referring to the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming with those signature "i" levels, the biggest change of this branding upd🧔ate drops that completely.

Intel explains that "Meteor Lake represents an inflection point in Intel’s client processor roadmap. It will be the first client processor manufactured on the new Intel 4 process node. It’s the first client chiplet design enabled by Foveros advanced 3D packaging technology, and it will deliver improved power efficiency and graphics performance. It’s also the first Intel client p🌄rocessor to feature a dedicated AI engine: Intel AI Boost."

Gaming hardware and PC components almost never have names that are easy to understand. While it is big news for one of the biggest computing br🥂ands to change its naming convention, we thought it might be easier to set out precisely what is and isn't changing down below. For a change that's supposed to simplify the company's branding, it sure does take some explaining. 

Hopefully, the areas down below will clear up any ques♈tions𝓀 you might have.

No "i" in team... anymore

The biggest and most notable change is that from ꦕnow on, Intel is abandoning the "i" before its processor tier numbers. So where there were Intel i3/i5/i7/i9 CPUs, they will now keep those numbers, but omit the letters. Think of AMꦆD Ryzen 5/7/9, for example. 

So now, with the Meteor Lake CPUs, we have Intel Core 3/5/7. Having said that, we won't have a Core 9, as that🌼's been kicked into a new family of its own. More on that 𝄹soon.

Intel says it will no longer place generational messaging in front of its Intel Core brand, although the generation of the processor will be listed in a chip&apo🐬s;s processor number. What's slighไtly more confusing, is that Intel wants its CPUs to bear the name "processor" before its identification number.

So, for instance, a 13th Gen🐻 Intel Core i5-13600K will become an Intel Core 5 processor 13600K. These changes will take effect starting with the Meteor Lake line and will apply to all releases going forward. 

It isn't entirely clear whether Intel will try t♏o make this a retroactive change and apply these new naming conventions to their older CPUs, so forgive that example if not.

What is Intel Core Ultra?

🍎The other reason these naming conventions might not work back-the-way is that there are now going to be two separate tiers of Intel CPU available. We've seen performance-boosted processors before. Again, think of AMD's Ryzen CPUs that are geared toward content creators and designers, and hold that X after their name.

It's not totally clear just now what exact form will take because we don't have officially named Meteor Lake CPUs to use as examples. My guess is that The "KF" versions of Intel's processors will now be separated into their own tiers. This new family will be calleꦯd💃 the "Intel Core Ultra" range.

Again, there won't be any "i" lettering involved here. In this family we will have Intel Core Ultra 5, Intel Core Ultra 7, and Intel Core Ultra 9. This is the new premium line of Intel processors, which will likely hold the best gaming performance. As I say, I expect these to be the equivalent performance boost of an In♔tel Core i5-13600K vs an Intel Core i5-13600KF.

When it comes to numbering, it's a similar story to the Core family - Intel wants the number after the word processor, so for example, an Intel Core Ul😼tra 7 processor 14700KF (that number is unc🍒onfirmed, just a potential example of what we'll see).

In summary:

So in short, Intel is doing the following:

• Dropping the "i" lettering from its CPU naming conventions.
• Removing the i9 tier from the Core line.
• Creating a new band of higher tier processors named Intel Core Ultra.
• Moving the CPU's identification number to after the word processor.
• Trying to shift away from using the word "generation" in front of its Intel Core branding.

Try to think of it like Nvidia's big G🔯TX to RTX change with its graphics cards, and it almost makes sense. Or, again, think of it like a move toward AMD's branding levels, and it sort of lines up. 

The entire "number goes afte🤪r the word processor" move is the most disjointed to me, and it makes things a bit wordy. In truth, once this naming convention enters the zeitgeist and the internet gets a hold of it, it'll likely be called variations of these things. 

What's also strange to me is moving the i9 to the Core Ultra tier. Don't get me wrong, these CPUs are often overkill for most people, even for folks who play a lot of games at high settings. My guess is that this move is also a way to introduce more people to 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Balance Builds, an initiative the company is moving to in order to pair more of its components together to help people capitalize on price-to-perfor🐻mance ratios.

Even so, moving the "KF" processors to this higher ti༺er, which is definitely what it seems like, will be a bit of a strange one that might actually make things more complicated. Imagine if Nvidia moved its "Ti" variant graphics cards to a separate range, for example. Then again, there's precedent in the CPU market to do so because of the high perfor🌜mance of AMD's "X" or "X3D" processors.

Fancy some other PC component upgrades? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming.

The unexpected retailer that is running this offer is B&H Photo at a price , a 41% reduction from its standard MSRP of $2,899.99. This is equivalent to a deduction of a whopping $1,200. Not only is that a major saving, but the specs that come with this HP Omen gaming laptop are damn impressive. Alongside the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, you get an Intel Core i9-12900H 14-Core (12th gen) processor, 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD,🍸 a 17.3-inch display, and Windows 11.  

Seeing a gaming laptop with this powerful graphics card installed is great but if you'd prefer to spend less, it's worth checking out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best cheap gaming laptop deals for all of the latest offers. In the meantime, this deal has limited stock so it's worth taking advant🌄age of while it's available. It's one of the best offers we've seen in 2023 for an RTX 3080 Ti.  

Today's best gaming laptop deal

More of today's best gaming laptop deals

A budget alternative is this ASUS ROG with an R✨TX 3060, which is down at Best 🐟Buy. That's a $500 discount and gives you access to a great budget gaming laptop with one month of Xbox Game pass thrown in for free. 

Not sure about this deal? Well, make sure to read up on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RTX 3070 laptop deals as well as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RTX 3080 laptop deals on the web today. We've also rounded up the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best cheap graphics cards for June 2023 in case you want to upgrade your own setup. 

Whether you're shopping for just these two components so you can build 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:the best gaming PC  possible, or you're looking for an entirely new rig, it seems as though you can benefit from a Balanced Build from today. GPU and CPU packages start their pricing levels at $4ও23 USD for a Core i5 and A750. Meanwhile, whole systems based around the same configurations will start at $899 in the US.

These may seem like bundles Intel is putting together to try and ship its latest pro🦩cessors, but in fairness, there's decent price-to-performance herꦫe. To buy separately, a 13th Gen i5 would cost $319 and Arc A750 would cost $289 in the US - showing that there's some value to be had from a Balanced Build bundle.

In a that goes into detail about Balanced Builds and the research that went into them, Ryan Shrout of Intel Arc marketing and Intel Fellow Tom Peterson discuss these component pairings. They also talk about Intel's goal to inject some pricing balance back into the world of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards.

"What it's all about is,✃ we're using the Intel engineering resources to actually solve a real question that's been out there forever. 'Hey - I've got a GPU, what's the actual, right CPU to pair with that?'," says Peterson.

"It's going to make it easier for gamers t🅘o find the right systems", he added.

The testing process, Inꦿtel assures, was ca🐽rried out across 10 different CPUs, 9 different GPUs, and 15,000 test runs that were done in more than 50 games at two different resolutions.

"It's obviously gonna vary a bunch based on cooling, and storage, and memory capacity, and other components... but the important part is that - these are the most crit♔ical components of that build, that define if you're getting good value for your dollar", said Shrout.

The video goes into great detail about the extensive testing Intel did in the lead-up to this announcement. Still, of all the revelations to come from the research, Intel supposedly found a bit of a shocker - that the performance of its A750 and A770 GPUs taper off after being paired with an i5 and i7 processor. So essentially, if you were thinking of grabbing a pricey 13th Gen i9 CPU (ie, one of the very 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming you can find) to match wiཧth an Intel Arc graphics card - don't. Go for an i5 or i7 instead𝔍 and save yourself some money. 

"It's taking in performance and cost, and sayi𒆙ng this is the optimal place to build a system", ✱said Shrout.

For Balanced Builds to reach consumers, Intel has🦹 partnered with a myriad of retailers, including the likes of Newegg, iBUYPOWER, Best Buy, Thermaltake, CYBERPOWERPC, and Skytech Gaming to name a few.

"That tꦉo me꧃, is the most important part", said Shrout, "that we have retailers, system integrators, partners all over the world that are going to help us talk about Balanced Builds and make sure we're matching the right components across CPU and GPU.

Balanced Builds are available now from any of Intel's chosen component partners. In th♊e UK, that includes PC Specialist and soon, eBuyer. For more ret♋ailers in your region take a look at

Want a different gaming PC upgrade? Take a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases.

Now fully compatible with 13th Gen CPUs, DDR5, and wielding th🉐e Lovelace power of Nvidia's RTX 4090, Acer has managed to keep a hold of the solid reputa💖tion it's earned through the last year of Predator Orion 7000 acclaim while futureproofing its innards for the new generation. 

In doing so, they've refreshed one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs on the market, making it even more powerful than before with fas𒀰ter, beefier components. Unfortunately, they've done so without fixing some of this rig's biggest issues, like the offensively loud fans. With even more power inside, these problems are exaggerated, presenting themselves more abruptly than before.

I tested the new Orion 7000 PO7-650 configuration that's made up of an (unlocked) Intel Core i9-13900KF, RTX 🍃4090, 32GB of ADATA DDR5 RAM, and 1TB SSD + 2TB of HDD storage. All that comes to a rather sickening in the UK, with the equivalent configuration with last-gen components costing in the US.

Design and features

If you're familiar with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Predator Orion 7000 (2022) case, you'll immediatel🃏y notice a striking resemblance to the 13th Gen refreshed version. This is because, despite plenty of complaints about the case's fans that resemble a 747 charging up its jets for take-off, Acer hasn't improveไd the airflow or radiator in the case at all. 

Obtrusive noise levels from the ARGB-infused Predator FrostBlade 2.0 fans aside, it is a beautiful ATX chassis. You've got plenty of room inside for beefy components (duh, the RTX 4090 is already in there), and you ꦦhave some lovely RGB lighting that, in my opinion, is some of the classiest-looking in the pr🅰e-built market. I do genuinely love how subtle the Orion 7000's lighting is. It's like a tinted car window that, when the fans aren't on, you can't really peer through. As soon as light shines from within though, it gives a lovely burst of colour that almost fades into the dark void the components are encompassed by. There's real visual depth there.

The best part is, that depth doesn't translate to an overly bulky size. Our testing rig uses a Corsair iCUE 500T RGB case which is enormous. The 7000 is comfortably smaller than that behemoth at 485 mm x 219 mm x 504.8 mm, weighing in at 17kg, but it still has plenty of space left over when housing the BFGPU, the aforementioned 4090. If it was available as a standalone, I'd be confident this chassis would be at home on our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases list.

In terms of connectivity, you have Dual-band WiFi 6E, a Gigཧabit Ethernet port, and Bluetooth 5.0 for the speediest of wired and wireless connections. For accessories and devices, you have 2x USB-C ports, 4x USB 3.1 bays, and another 4x USB 2.0 slots. For display, it's worth noting that the motherboard itself doesn't have an HDMI, so it depends entirely on the GPU's 1x HDMI and 3x DisplayPorts.

In term🌜s of software, you get Windows 11 Home which comes with a 30-day trial of Microsoft Office 365, as well as DTS:X Ultra audio, and the Predator Sense monitoring softღware. This was useful for tracking fan speeds, accessing settings that are typically confined to the BIOS, and customizing lighting colors. It was a real benefit being able to change CPU overclocking profiles without footering about in the BIOS and going through restarts, but for the most part, I still used NZXT Cam as it gives a more conclusive view of temperatures and performance from a PC's anatomy.

Rounding out specs and features, allow me to run you through the configuration in a bit more detail. The brain of the computer is an unlocked Intel i9-13900KF, which has a stock frequency of 3000MHz, and 24 Cores (8 x P-Cores + 16 x E-Cores). It's backed by 32 threads and has a max boost clock speed of 5.4 GHz. There were three profiles to choose fro🅺m when overclocking, although, in two rounds of benchmarking and playin𝔉g around with them, they never made a lot of difference to in-game performance, they just meant louder fans and higher CPU temperatures. More on that in a bit. 

The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 is as you'd expect, beefy, powerful, and genuinely awesome thanks to its 24GB of GDDR6X VRAM. For storage, you get 1TB of SSD from a Micron 3400 1TB NVMe gen 4 drive, a💜nd 2TB of HDD space. Additionally, one of my favor𒉰ite things about the Predator Orion 7000's chassis is that there are hot-swap bays to add more SATA drives if you want even more room for games.

The biggest problem with the build, in my opinion, is the combination of the Acer Z790 motherboard, and its 32GB of Adata DDR5 RAM which has a quoted clock speed of 4800MHz, similar to the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Sabrent Rocket DDR5 RAM we reviewed not so long ago. This is undoubtedly up there with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, but the catch with DDR5 is that to get the quoted speed on the box, you'll need to head into the BIOS and access things like XMP profiles. Unfortunately, Acer's BIOS menu has no XMP compatibilit🍸y, and no way for you to customise RAM speed.

Gaming performance

Gaming performance from the refreshed Predator Orion 7000 is a conflict of extremes. On one hand, the fact you have pretty much the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming on the market alongside the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics card ever made means you get some stunning results no matter the title y🍰ou throw at it (except any of the dodgy PC ports we've🤡 had so far in 2023, mind you).

On the other, much more frustrating side of things, you have fans that are so distracting and intrusive that they compromise a lot of experiences if you aren't wearing one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming headsets with active or passive noise canceling. I cannot express enough just how loud the fans of the Orion 7000 are. There were plenty of complaints about them in reviews this time last year, but with newer hardware that is more power-hungry across the board, you get fan speeds of over 9000RPM (must be read in Vegeta voice), and noise levels that gave my 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Ruark MR1 MK2 speakers a run for their money.

Not only that, but as good as the in-game performances are (we'll get to them in a second), this rig feels a bit hamstrung by the fact that 🌱you don't get a fraction of the help from the 32GB of DDR5 that you should. 

To my knowledge, it's always been the cas✨e with Acer's prebuilt gaming PCs that you can't overclock RAM or fine-tune its speeds. With previous versions of this PC being caught between generations so to speak, I could sort of understand that decision. But with a refresh to 13th Gen Intel CPUs that are known to run hot, and are designed for easy and safe XMP DDR5 overclocking, the decision to keep that unchanged is unimaginable to me. There is essentially no point in spending this much on a high-end PC if you can't boost the memory to the quoted 4800MHz or beyond. If anything, you could take some strain off the CPU and potentially help it to stay a bit cooler. The BIOS of this rig tells me it's capped at 4400MHz.

Heading back to the positive end of extremes, there's very little in the way of gaming performance that an RTX 4090 and 13th Gen Intel i9 processor can't handle. As you can see from the table below, the 4K, ray tracing, and maxed-out settings frame rates were very impressive. I may sound salty, but I can't help thinking they'd be improved further with some XMP profiles - as we've seen fr🧔om a lot of our DDR5 RAM reviews of late.

Playing Control was smooth, Shadow of the Tomb Raider was just downright impressive, and in HUNT Showdown and A𒆙pex Legends, I played some incredibly tense matches, ho💛nestly feeling like I had an unfair advantage over my opponents. Of course, these beefy innards will never make you better at a game, but having every setting cranked up to full without the PC even really breaking a sweat is something else.

The outlier here is obviously Metro Exodus, as being honest I expected higher frame rates. On the other hand, even the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX didn't manage to get over 100fps in that game. Although, it did🦹 get a higher score in our testing rig that uses an Intel Core i7-12700K. For those interested, it scored 90fps.

Benchmark performance

I do want to quickly note that I had to do two different rounds of benchmarking for this PC. Despite the configuration having 32GB of RAM, the system was only quoting me 16GB out of the box. I thought I'd just been given a weaker configuration, but upon further inspection before writing up this review, I found that one of the RAM sticks hadn't been properly seated. When I reported this to Acer, they told me this was something that has been known to happen during the shipping process, and that thౠey're working toward some kind of fix. Either way, it's something that goes against the entire ethos this type of PC stands for: simple plug-and-play gaming, with no knowledge of component surgery necessary.

This is definitely something I recommend double-checking if this is the gaming PC you buy. Having a single channel of RAM is not what you want when you spend this much on a computer. The worst part is, the RAM sticks have small stickers on them that say "warranty void if removed" - I'm not entirely sure if that's referring to the Predator l🐼iveried covers on the sticks, or indeed the RAM itself, but if it's the latter, that's the warranty of a four and ﷽half grand gaming PC voided straight out of the box. Not great. 

In any case, these are the benchmark scores I recorded afterℱ installing the RAM🍨 correctly.

One note I'd like to draw attention to is the CPU temperatures and fan speeds during these benchmarks. With minimal load, the CPU would operate at 28°C. During 3DMark's Fire Strike physics test, the i9-13900KF was at a toasty 98.86°C, and well above 80°C during Time Spy. This is despite the fans working overtime 💧at 9246RPM while the Fire Strike test was running. Much has been said about how the latest generation of CPUs can run hot, but I'm shocked to see an i9 come this close to boiling point (literally) when the fans are kicking up as much noise as they do.

Rest assured, the CPU never got that hot during gameplay, with 4K maxed out Metro Exodus only claiming around 5% of the CPUs power. T🍷he RAM, for anyone interested, took 🧔readings of 36-36-36-70.

Encouragingly, this Fire Strike score overall is up from when we benchmarked and reviewed the previous generation configuration. That rig scored a 37 101, and housed an RTX 3090 and Intel Core i9-12900K. So, surprising nobody, there are de❀finitely some substantial power increases from the last-gen version to this o♌ne.

Should you buy the Acer Predator Orion 7000 (2023)?

Should you buy one of the priciest big-name pre-built gaming PCs on the market? On paper, and when it comes to in-game performances, the answer's a pretty simple yes. When you sp෴end over four grand on a PC, you're going to get some serious bang for your buck. There's barely any game you could throw at the refreshed Acer Predator Orion 7000 that it won't crunch up and spit out with 🐟ease. If you have the money for it, this is a cracking PC to play games on.

Having said that, if you're going to buy this monster of a gaming PC, I would strongly, strongly urge you to take a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC headset for gaming, because by golly are you going to need it. The fans in this rig seem louder than they've ever been, and in all honesty, don't do a great job of keeping tꩲhe components cool𓂃. 13th Gen CPUs are known to run hot, but no one should have to suffer this much noise pollution for temperatures that are still this high. 

Finally, if you have any aspirations to upgrade or adapt this PC as time goes on, I'd suggest thinking again. For a refreshed motherboard that's been put in place to cater to 13th Gen CPU clock speeds, I'm baffled that there's no XMP compatibility or even any way for you to fine-tune your memory s𝕴peeds. Overclocking the CPU is possible, and easier than ever thanks to Predator Sense, though. 

Overall, this is a titan of the pre-built gaming PC world. If you can put up with obnoxiously loud fans (and I mean obnoxiously loud), and you have the money to pay for a DDR5 sysꦆtem that won't really make use of true DDR5 speeds, then this is your ship to go down with.

How we tested the Acer Predator Orion 7000

I put the 13th Gen Acer Predator Orion 7000 to work over the last month or so to test its high-end capabilities. I used it for a mixture of work and play, and put it through plenty of industry-standard benchma𝄹rk tests. 

While playing games, I never had to crank down the settings of what I was playing to below🌱 4K maxed-out settings. If a title had ray tracing or DLSS I'd test out performance with and without, using CPUZ, Geekbench, 3DMark, and NZXT Cam to benchmark and record information about each component of the rig. 

In the unfortunate case that you aren't happy with how I've gone about this review, you can take a look at our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Hardware Policy to see how we test the lat✃est gaming tech. Thereafter, feel free to write me a strongly worded email or a hand⛎written letter.

Want to take your games on the go? Take a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptops, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Nintendo Switch accessories, and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming earbuds.

With two Strix Scars on the shelves in 2023, Asus has completely redesigned the main chassis. Of course, that's largely to accommodate the new components under the hood, shared between the Scar 16 and 18. We recently had our hands on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus ROG Zephyrus M16, a similarly chunky 2023 release, and were blown away by the power on offer from th🐟e 4090 and Intel i9-13900H. With the Strix Scar's boosted thermals, and blitzing i9-13980HX at the controls, there's certainly plenty to live up to here. 

Design

• So much RGB, all housed in a translucent design
• Build quality feels solid and durable
• Ports are back on the sides

The new Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 is certainly distinctive. Nestled within a halo of RGB lights sits a translucent chassis with large grills to the rear. Add that to the chunky nature footprint and 16:10 aspect ratio and the Strix 🐼Scar 16 risks feeling boxy, though is saved by softer rounded corners and lighter grey of the per♋imeter material. 

Let's get onto that translucent design, though - because it will likely make or break the Strix Scar 16 from an aesthetics perspective. Personally, I'm not a fan. This plastic already picks up too many fingerprints and smudges (and holds onto them), and adding those oils to a translucent panel already makes this deck feel far cheaper than it ought to. Yes, it's cool to see the innards of the rig on show, but I don't want them staring me in the face all the time, at the expense of feeling like I'm using as high a quality machine as this. This is, ultimately, going to be down to personal preference, bu💫t I would recommend avoiding if you're going for a clean aesthetic. 

That chassis design does make some more controversial changes to the location of your ports. Whereas we previously enjoyed power and HDMI connections neatly tucked away behind the main lid, that space is now reserved for the gargantuan grills, relegating these connections to the sides once again. While I understand the reasoning behind such a move, it's a shame such a handy design feature has been dropped in this latest iteration. Instead i'm back to my laptop looking more like a rat-king spider an🦋d less like a slick addition to my setup.

The build quality is particularly solid hereꦏ. There's no flex in the main deck, only the slightest of wobbles in the screen, and a hefty sense of durability to everything from hinges to keycaps. While the aforementioned fingerprint smudging may cause issues with oily deposits later down the line, I have confidence this chassis will last.

Features

• Blindingly fast Intel i9 processor
• The best display i've ever seen on a gaming laptop
• Spongey trackpad

One of the biggest features separating this year's ROG Strix Scar 16 from the other RTX 40-Series laptop we've tested so far is that Intel i9-13980HX. This is𒊎 an absolute beast of a processor, seemingly built for workflows so demanding they haven't even been invented yet. That means you're picking up significantly more power 🌳under the hood here, alongside the RTX 4090 configuration's 175W TGP if you do decide to go all out. 

Above the hood, though, there's still plenty to celebrate. The keyboard 🅘sitting atop of the main deck offers a particularly satisfying typing experience. Sitting slightly higher than your average chiclet deck, there's a nice clunk to each stroke and responsive feedback as well. 

This is a slimmed down layout compared to the full-size keyboards you might find on a 17- or 18-inch device, dropping the numpad and dedicated navigation keys in favor of a small strip of media playback buttons along the right and a suite of volume, mic, and Armory Crate options running along the top left. This setup suited me just fine for work, and I particularly valued the larger arrow keys in play as well. Previous 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus gaming laptops have dropped these in size, cramming them into the corner, whereas here you're gettin🌺g a full-sized set to work with.

Unfortunat♈ely, I can't layer the same praise on the trackpad. While spacious, its tracking seems to suffer sometimes and clicks feel particularly spongey. Of course, even for work, I tend to use a separate mouse all together, but when using the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 on the road the clunky feel of this trackpad made itself known.

Up top, you've got one of the best screens I've ever used on a gaming laptop. Asus's Nebula HDR display is back for the Strix series (we previously reviewed an iteration on 2023's Zephyrus M16) and shines just as bright - literally. With HDR content represented in gorgeous detail and colors popping from the screen with excellent vibrancy, this is a real feast for the eyes. The display♒ itself boasts 1,024 dimming zones💞 as part of its Mini LED genetics, with a 240Hz refresh rate, and 1,100+ nits of peak brightness. 

That means sꦅuper smooth, super clear visuals that never compromise on accuracy. The matte finish also means this is a screen capable of actually showing up on a sunny day or in a well-lit environmenꦆt as well, though the contrast doesn't shine through quite as well. That immersive display is only enhanced by four speakers running a Dolby Atmos system with a solid virtual surround sound as well.

Performance

• Record breaking benchmark figures
• Silky smooth and responsive
• Strange rattling sound from fans on game load

It's easy to say the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 is powerful. It's running Intel's fastest CPU yet, and balancing it all with Nvidia's latest and greatest graphics cards. In practice, this is an extraordinary amount of power. With Time Spy and Fire Strike scores blowing all our previous gaming lapt🦩op reviews out the water and the CPU providing some stunning numbers across PC Mark 10 and Cinebench, things were looking good at the start of my testing. 

And those numbers didn't lie. I was marvelling at not only the detail and vividity of The Division 2's landscapes, but also the three-figure framerates even in Ultra settings in the screen's native 2560 x 1600 resolution🍸. Trifles like a full Planet Coaster map or a bu💧stling Cities Skylines save didn't even cause the Scar 16 to break a sweat.

In-game performance was stable and silky smooth, though I did notice some more concerning aspects of the Strix Scar 16's performance. While it must be noted that future firmware updates can offer up fixes, I did notice a cursor freeze whenever I returned to the desktop after quitting a game. It ce𒉰rtainly never aಌmounted to more than a few seconds of stasis, and never escalated into a full-scale crash, but was enough to slow the overall experience when switching between games.

Then we come to the fan noise. In general, for the sheer amount of cooling taking place under the hood, the Strix Scar 16 was relatively quiet. Yes, you'll still need to use a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming headset for full imme💝rsion, and it's by no meaไns silent, but I've used far louder machines running far weaker components in the past. That's when the fan isn't creaking, of course. This might be down to the fact that the review unit I'm using has been shipped here and there for a few weeks now, but on booting certain games there was a distinct screeching noise that seemed to taper off after a few minutes. That's a concern for longer term durability, though I never noticed a slowdown associated with the sound so performance itself never suffered for it.

The benchmarks really do speak volumes, though. And, while reaching these dizzying heights I really valued the boosted thermal desi🍷gn of 2023'🔯s iteration. I never felt the chassis becoming uncomfortably hot, and even during longer stress tests, rising temperatures never impacted on-screen experience.

Should you buy the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16?

The Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 is the most powerful gaming laptop I've had my hands on yet (though I've got the Razer Blade 18 and MSI Raider GE78 waiting in the wings for their turn next). However, it's certainly not the most expensive rig on the market. You can spend far more and pick up weaker performance overall, which - while it's still definitely costly - makes it excellent value for money as well. This generation of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware gaming laptops are certainly boosting the cost, as are RTX 40-Series 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Razer laptops as well. 

Of course, if you're not going to make use of that high-e𓆏nd gaming potential, then the $3,000 / £3,000 isn't going to be worth it. You're better off waiting for more affordable configurations to hit the shelves in that instance. However, if you&ap𒐪os;re looking to dive in early with the next generation of top tier graphics cards and processors, the Scar 16 should definitely be on your radar. 

How we tested the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16

I used the Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 over the course of two weeks, running everything from daily work to lengthy gaming sessions during that time. During everyday playtesting, I used Sable, Planet Coaster, Cities: Skylines, Doom Eternal, and Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, before stress testing across in-game benchmark systems for Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, The Division 2, Metro Exodus, and R🔜ed Dead Redemption 2. 

I also completed a range of industry benchmark tests, including PC Mark 10, 3D Mark's Time Spy and Fire Strike, Maxon's Cinebench, and Crystal Disk Mark. For more information on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming laptops, check out the full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy. 

We're also rounding up all the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best laptop backpacks for those taking their PC on the go, as well as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming desks to keep your setup fresh. 

The PC specs were revealed during the latest developer update, which also revealed a surprisingly adorable 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Diablo 4 beta reward in the form of a baby wolf in a backpack cosmetic (yes, really). Anyway, both the minimum and recommended PC specs to run Diablo 4's open beta are very inclusive, but it💦's worth noting that the requirements for the full game could be different.

Diablo 4 open beta minimum system requirements:

• Operating System: 64-bit Windows 10
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 or AMD Radeon R9 280
• Processor: Intel Core i5-2500L or AMD FX-8100
• Memory: 8 GB RAM
• DirectX: Version 12
• Storage: SSD with 45 GB available space

Diablo 4 open beta recommended PC specs:

• Operating System: 64-bit Windows 10
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 or AMD Radeon RX 370
• Processor: Intel Core i5-4670K or AMD R3-1300X
• Memory: 16 GB RAM
• DirectX: Version 12
• Storage: SSD with 45 GB available space

Now, Diablo has never been a particularly demanding series from a technical perspective, but I'm a bit surprised to hear the recommended specs are no better than my ancient i5/RX 580 build. I'll definitely be curious to see if the full game requires a better rig, but until then I'm happy to play along and pretend I'm rocking a high-end PC that can handle all the hottest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:new games of 2023 at their highest settings.

The Diablo 4 open beta runs 𒁃from March 17-19 for pre-orders and March 24-26 for 🌺everyone else.

Here are some fun 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:games like Diablo to play while you wait.

This is one of the first 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming laptops to storm out the RTX 40-Series gate. That means it's under the microscope not only as the next iteration of Asus's popular do-it-all machine but also as a carrier for the next generatio💜n of Nvidia and Intel hardware. What can the M16 do with an RTX 4090 and i9-13900H at the helm? A hell of a lot.

Of course, that hardware isn't going to come cheap. The RTX 4090 spec I've been playing with for the last couple of weeks comes in at £4,099.99 here in the UK (US pricing is yet to be revealed, but that measures out at $4,950 with current exchange rates). That means the M16 is entering an arena of lightning-fast machines packed with the latest and greatest tech and engineering designs to draw the m⭕ost power possible out of it. 

Both Razer and Alienware have 16-inch devices on the way, both offering RTX 4090 GPU configurations and Intel&a🍷pos;s 13th generation i9 processors for around the same price point. So, should the M16 be your next heavy investment? I put this scarily expensive machine to the test to find out exactly what all this fuss is about. 

The Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 will launch in mid-March 2023. This review was completed using a pre-retail unit running early drivers. 

Design

• Sleek and solid soft-touch design with minimal branding
• Lighter than upcoming Razer and Alienware devices but thicker overall
• Durable Ergolift hinge with plenty of air vent space

Fans of previous generations will be glad to know that the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 doesn't mess with perfection too much. There are some minor upgrades (and the addition of the AniMe M🐽atrix LED display on the back of some models), but in general, the clean lines and subtle aesthetic of previous models are retained here. 

Even with those powerful components under the hood, the 2023 M16 still manages to hold onto i✨ts compact form factor, coming in at just 2.3kg and 22.9mm in thickness. That's lighter than both the upcoming Razer Blade 16 and Alienware x16, though thicker than both of these models as well. Of course, a machine trying to pack as much punch from the RTX 4090 as it can, won't be your average slimline, backpack-friendly rig, but the Zephyrus M16 is on the right side of the line here. 

Not only that, but the body itself feels particularly solid. I felt no flex in this build, which is impressive considering that spongey architecture is something I've noticed creeping into 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus gaming laptops. Lik▨e its predecessor, the 2023 M16 features an aluminium lid with magnesium alloys for the main chassis and interior, but this time around everything feels significantly sturdier. 

Many have complained of a drop in build quali☂ty around the base of previous models, which has been completed ironed out here. Yes, it ♔feels slightly thicker than the streamlined devices I'm used to, but it still holds a slimline aesthetic and angles itself downwards from the main body which carries the illusion of a smaller device as well. On top of all that, you'll find a soft-touch material keeping everything feeling luxurious and comfortable, especially with the generous space either side of the touchpad and gentle, rounded corners.

🃏The screen itself is set back from the base with a dropped hinge running on either side of a large grill area. The Ergolift hinges are back from previous models, allowing for greater airflow around the back fans and for a full 180🦋 degrees of movement as well. It's a slick implementation of a hinge design rapidly being adopted into more and more gaming laptops, and compliments the 16-inch, minimal-bezel display well.

Slapped on the back of certain configurations (namely the more expensive ones), you'll also find the AniMe Matrix display. This is a collection of white LEDs packed underneath small holes dotted across the main lid with a range of customizable animations, text options, stat displays, and even a virtual pet to play with. It's a gimmick, for sure, and one I never had too much time for in previous iterations. Just as I found with last year's 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus ROG Zephyrus G14, I would much rather pay l🐎ess and have a thinner gaming laptop than sport a series of flashi🧸ng lights that I wouldn't even get to see most of the time.

Your main control panel is made up o🍒f a standard𝕴 keyboard deck, a spacious touchpad, and a series of four additional media / Asus Armoury Crate buttons. I'm a big fan of this keyboard spacing in particular - though it feels a little wider than I'm used to, I had plenty of room to scan across the deck itself. Like the rest of the body, the keycaps themselves feel silky soft to the touch - perfect for the satisfying clack of the switches underneath.

I found the typing experience to be a little softer here, compared with my own 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Asus TUF Dash F15, but the tactile clunk of each actuation ensured just the right amount of feedback. There's no number pad here, instead the extra base board space is taken up by two upward firing speaker gꦡrills. There's a bountiful glass trackpad here as well, offering a smooth glide and precise controls with very little flex to harder clicks.

Features

• Latest components but a slightly weaker processor vs competition
• Mini LED display won't suit competitive players but can be tweaked
• Offers plenty of connections, but only two USB-A ports

Of course, the biggest features to land with the 2023 Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 are the new Intel processor and Nvidia graphics cards. All M16 configurations come packed with the Intel Core i9-13900H, a hefty CPU for sure, but not quite the most powerful up for grabs. Of course, this processor is going to be absolutely singing for gameplay and demanding workflows (it certainly did in my testing), but it is worth noting t🙈he spec sheets for both the upcoming Razer Blade 16 and Alienware x16 boast slightly more impressive CPUs. The former will offer an i9-13950HX while the latter packs an overclockable i9-13900HK. When you're spending this much on a gaming rig, those finer performance details become all the more important. 

Of course, we haven't had our hands on Razer or Alienware's entries yet which means we can't speak to the performance of these chips under the hood♒. On paper, though, the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 is heading into the market at a slight power disadvantage when compared against similarly designed machines. 

Onto that all-importantꦯ GPU, though, and those not concerned with the RTX 4090 will be glad to know that the M16 is also available with RTX 4080 and RTX 4070 cards to nudge those costs down a little. Elsewhere, each device ships with 32GB DDR5 RAM and a 2TB SS🐷D, as well as a new motherboard to accommodate everything. 

Up top, you'll find a 16-inch 16:10 screen, with the configuration I tested sporting a MiniLED panel. These displays are only starting to make their way to the world of mainstream gaming laptops, having previously been reserved for high-end ꦰTVs and more specialist rigs. Only the RTX 4090 models offer what Asus has branded its &a🌠pos;ROG Nebula' screen, with other variants offering IPS displays only. The new tech treats your eyes to over 1,000 dimming zones and over 1,100 nits at peak HDR brightness, covering 100% of the DCI-P3 color range. 

That's because Mini-LED really means 'more LED' - loads of tiny lights working to offer more precise picture representation, with individual zones raising or low🎀ering their light levels to offer much greater contrast on-screen. What does that mean for everyday play? Vibrant colors, rich, deep blacks, and a super bright HD♈R picture. Asus has other machines heading to market with its Nebula screen – namely the ROG Zephyrus G14, Strix G16, and G18 as well as the Flow series –  but Razer will also take its own stab at the tech with the Blade 16 as well. Our other competitor, the Alienware x16, won't offer a MiniLED display configuration - at least at launch.

While MiniLED is going to be slower than the traditional IPS panel, and therefore potentially push eSports-focused customers away, there are ways to speed things up. Asus's Armoury Crat🍸e software allows users to disable the most power-intensive aspect of a MiniLED display - zone dimming. The picture is noticeably flatter, of course, but will become more responsive as a result. That's a nice workaround for anyone after tournament-level performance, or those after a more color-accurate display for media editing.

The 240Hz refresh rate is more than enough for mid-range play - yes, you can find 360Hz panels out there (and 480Hz is making its way to more gaming laptop screens this year), but I'd only recommend splashing o꧂ut on these 𒉰kinds of speeds if you're truly serious about your eSports chances.

Ports and connections are plentiful, though it would have been nice to pick up an additional USB-A on top of the two available here - at least to bring connectivity options in line with the three USB-As you'll find in Razer and Alienware's competing models. As it stands, you're getting two USB-A Gen 2 ports, two USB-C (one with Thunderbolt 4 and the other offering standard power delivery), HDMI 2.1, a microSD card reader, and a 3.5mm audio jack. The fingerprint sensor of previous iterations has once again been scrapped here, but you'll still find an IR camera up topꦜ.

Performance

• Silky smooth framerates of over 80fps in QHD Ultra settings 
• Graphics performance averages 30% improvement over 3080 Ti machines
• Max power draw hampers true potential of RTX 4090

Onto the good stuff. It's safe to say, the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 can easily handle anything modern and demanding games can throw at it. QHD resolution and Ultra graphical settings? No problem, it'll spit out 80+ framerates without even blinking. The power on offer here is staggering and made booting up to scratch a Stardewꦍ Valley itch one morning feel laughable - like the Hadron Collider being used to play Pong. That RTX 4090, combined with Intel's Raptor Lake prowess, ups the game in a big way. 

We've all grown a little fatigued with iterative updates over the last few years, but this is a tangible jump in performance, quality, and stability. I ran our usual benchmark tests and compared results with some of the top-performing RTX 3080 Ti gaming laptops from the previous generation, and the numbers speak for themsel▨ves. 

Of course, the biggest gains were seen in comparisons with 15.6-inch devices, with the Razer Blade 15 and Alienware x15 both lagging around 45% behind in Fire Strike and Time ౠSpy benchmarks. However, even the Razer Blade 17's performance still averages a 20% deficit over that𝔍 of the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16. Those 3D Mark results are the highest I've personally tested - and they should be, they're running on cutting edge tech. But it's the size of this leap that has me this excited. 

Yes, CPU peformance doesn't quite reach the same heights of improvement, but there's still a solid 7,947 score here - a feat none of our previous generation machines could manage. The Asus ROG Zephyrus M16's Cinebench and Crystal Disk Mark score🦹s were also promising, offering excellent rendering performance across both single and multi-core tests and keeping that SSD snappy as well.

In a real world setting, those lofty numbers start to make more sense. Not only does everything whistle through frames, but that MiniLED display keeps visuals popping the entire time. This is one slick machine that made everything from Cyberpunk 2077 to Planet Coaster feel like a next-gen experience. The role of DLSS 3 shouldn't be discounted here, it's implementation in the RTX 4090 chip means we're pushing well above the means of that medium i9 CPU. While Cyberpunk 2077 is the only title I was able to take advantage of this supported per🗹formance with, it certainly pushed things to the next level. You'll find our full suite of in-game benchmarks in both 1080p and 1440p below. 

Not only di𓄧d the voluptuous landscapes of Red Dead Redemption 2 manage to hold their frames under the stress of QHD Ultra, but the speed of The Division 2 was also maintained even in the same graphical fidelity. That's no mean feat and a testament to the impressive combination of CPU and graphics card here. 

All of these benchmarks were taken in the standard Performance mode, keeping that RTX 4090 tampered with an 85W power draw. That's well below the card's 175W limit, so t💧here's plenty more to be seen from this card in chunkier gaming laptops that can really let it sprint. 

Bumping settings up to the system's built-in 'Turbo Mode' does unlock a 120W power draw, but I was surprised by the roar those fans produced when under this kind of pressure. In my own everyday play, I was more than happy with Performance Mode, which didn't require the use of a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming headset to concentr𝕴ate and still provided pꦗlenty of horsepower. 

Those fans are working hard, and temperatures are manageable as a result. Asu😼s has boosted the cooling design of the ROG Zephyrus M16, in order to keep up 🧸with the latest components, with a heatsink spread across the full back of the rig and three fans whirring away. 

For the ♛most part, this did the job. I was comfortable playing older games like Shadow of the Tomb Raider and indie games on my lap. However, turn the power on fully and I did notice a single spot of significant heat running towards the back of the main deck. That was enough 🐭to move me to a desk, though didn't noticeably impact performance.

Should you buy the 2023 Asus ROG Zephyrus M16?

There's no denying it, the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 is a powerful gaming laptop - and the best gaming laptop we've tested yet. That's only because it's the first out the gate, though, and there will be plenty of RTX 40-Series laptops to see soon. As it stands today, the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 is a masterclass in power and style - portable enough to sit in a backpack, but with next-generation performance to outclass the vast majority of the market. It'⛎s a long-term buy with a blinding price tag to match its gaming prowess.

If you're after an eve♌ryday machine, it should be obvious by now that the ROG Zephyrus M16 isn't going to be for you. Even the cheapest configuration is still set to hit over $3,000. 2023 versions of the Asus TUF F15 and Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 with RTX 4070 GPUs will still send you home with the latest components without breaking the bank when they launch. 

However, if you are jumping in with a big purchase for the 40-Series, the M16 is certainly well worth your consideration. That Mini LED display has competition from Razer, but all we can say without seeing the opposition is that it truly outshines anything we've had our hands on before. If Asus's prices fall in lin♎e with that of the Razer Blade 16 (slated to hit $4,299.99 for a like-for-like configuration), there's going tꦏo be some difficult decisions. On paper, the Razer Blade 16 sports a better spec - a boosted i9-13950H processor and an additional USB-A port, alongside an ever so slightly slimmer design. However, the M16 avoids the constriction of a super skinny build, and may be able to draw better performance because of it. 

When it comes to the Alienware conundrum, your decision is a little more clear-cut. You're getting beefier guts under the hood by waiting for the x16, but - based on spec alone - the displays simply won't match up. Dell's installment doesn't offer that Mini LED screen, so if premium HDR and co♒ntrast handling sound like a deal-breaker, you'll be set with Asus. If, however, you're looking to pump as much power into that RTX 4090 card as possible, the i9-13900HK processor under the hood of the x16 will be far better suited. It's worth noting, though, that we still don't know the price of a like-for-like configuration from Alienware. 

How we tested the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16

I used the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 over the course of two weeks, using the laptop for the vast majority of my daily work during that time and stress-testing gameplay over the course of one week. I used in-gam🍃e benchmarking tools for Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, The Division 2, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Metro Exodus while also playing Cyberpunk 2077, Doom Eternal, and The Witcher 3 during casual play sessions. 

I ran industry benchmarks from 3D Mark, PC Mark 10, Cinebench, and Crystal Disk Mark to further test graphical, processing, and storage performance. For more information on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming laptops, be sure to check out the full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

For more from the competition, we're also rounding up all the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Razer laptops and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Alienware laptops as well. Or, for a more permanent solution, check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs on the shelves right now. 

As revealed by the game's official , future players will have the choice of different graphics modes for 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Hogwarts Legacy whe꧑n it releases next month. The full specs will be included below, but at a quick glance, players will need at least 85GB free on their hard drive as well as 16GB of RAM to play the game on its minimum setting. Not to mention an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 4GB or AMD Radeon RX 470 4GB GPU. 

If you're pla🌄nning to play Hogwarts Legacy with its highest specs though, you'll be looking at the same 85GB of storage as well as 32GB of RAM and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT GPU. Don't worry if neither of these specs is your preferred way to play though, as there ar🗹e actually four different specifications listed in the requirements including minimum/low specs, recommended/high specs, ultra specs, and finally ultra 4K specs. 

Hogwarts Legacy PC requirements:  

Minimum/Low Specs 

• OS: 64-bit Windows 10
• CPU: Intel Core i5-6600 (3.3 GHz) or AMD Ryzen 5 1400 (3.2 GHz)
• RAM: 16GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 4GB or AMD Radeon RX 470 4GB
• DirectX Version: DX 12
• Storage: 85GB HDD
• Notes: SSD (Preferred), HDD (Supported), 720p/30 FPS, Low Quality Settings 

Recommended/High Specs 

• OS: 64-bit Windows 10
• CPU: Intel Core i7-8700 (3.2 GHz) or AMD Ryzen 5 3600 (3.6 GHz)
• RAM: 16GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce 1080 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT or INTEL Arc A770
• DirectX Version: DX 12
• Storage: 85GB SSD
• Notes: SSD, 1080p/60 FPS, High Quality Settings 

Ultra Specs 

• OS: 64-bit Windows 10
• CPU: Intel Core i7-10700K (3.80 GHz) or AMD Ryzen 7 5800X (3.80 GHz)
• RAM: 32 GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT
• DirectX Version: DX 12
• Storage: 85GB SSD
• Notes: SSD, 1440p / 60FPS, Ultra Quality Settings

Ultra 4K specs

• OS: 64-bit Windows 10
• CPU: Intel Core i7-10700K (3.80 GHz) or AMD Ryzen 7 5800X (3.80 GHz)
• RAM: 32GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT
• DirectX Version: DX 12
• Storage: 85GB SSD
• Notes: SSD, 2160p / 60FPS, Ultra Quality Settings  

There's clearly a demand for Hogwarts Legacy on PC, as demonstrated by the fact it's been 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:flying up the Steam charts ahead of its February 10, 2023 release date. At the time of writing this, Hogwarts Legacy is currently in second position, right behind the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Steam Deck, in Steam's list. It's also currently sitting at the very top of the digital storefront'🃏s list. 

Although she is not involved in the development of Hogwarts Legacy, GamesRadar+ acknowledges the role of J.K. Rowling in the creation of the Wizarding World, as well as her publicly-stated, harmful views regarding the rights of transgender people. If you’d like to offer your support to the communities affected by Rowling’s rhetoric, consider donating to the in the US, or in the UK. 

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 is still my best graphics card pick overall despite its beefy RTX 5090 sibling arriving on the scene. If I'm being real with you, both GPUs aren't realistic options for most players due to their price tag, so while I'll acknowledge that they' offer up tremendous 4K abilities, my real starting point is the GeForce RTX 5080. Even then, that cheaper card is extremely hard to get hold of and can cost far too much if you go f🔴or a cꦓustom model.

If you're simply looking for a great GPU right now that boasts great value and performance, you'll find my current best graphics card picks below. If you can find current gen options for a good price, it could be worth𒈔 picking them up instead of jumping into next-gen options, but if I'm being real with you, it's better to let the next wave arrive before any big spends.

Quick list

The best graphics card overall

It'll s൲oon be replaced by the RTX 5090, but the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 is the most powerful graphics card right now by a country mile, and is has undoubtedly changed the standards of PC gaming. Not only does it run circles around its predecessor, the RTX 3090 Ti, but it also benefits from new AI tricks that will help keep it on🐼 the throne for even longer. That said, the card's $1,499 / £1,649 MSRP means is firmly an enthusiast option.

Features: Thanks to a 4nm GPU, the RTX 4090 packs in 52% more graphics processing CUDA cores than the RTX 3090 Ti, and it also runs 43% faster than the RTX 3090 Ti as well — all while drawing the same amount of power as ꦯthe last-gen card. Despite its hardware prowess, some of the 4090's biggest strengths are found in the software side of things, as this card launched alongside Nvidia's Frame Generation tech, which works in conjunction with DLSS to boost fps beyond the imaginable.

Design: We checked out the RTX 4090 Founder's Edition when it arrived in 2022, and it's one of the best looking versions of the card out there. Nvidia's blend of silver and black metal help the shroud feel a bit more sophisticated than custom variants, and its illuminated logo steers clear of the usual gamer aesthetic. Its fans are also sensibly placed, but we're not too keen on both the placement and design of the GPU's 12VHPWR connector, which uses a dongle🌸 to bridge PSU compatibility.

Performance: In terms of gaming performance, it’s the only graphics card that can confidently game at a native 4K resolution with ray tracing without the help of DLSS. It’s more than 50% faster on average than the RTX 💫3090 Ti, and with DLSS 3 with full frame generation, the RTX 4090 can get as much as double the frame rate achieved with last gen’s DLSS 2.0.

Verdict: If you can comfortably afford an RTX 4090, you probably won't need to upgrade your GPU for the best part of a decade. While most screens out there largely stick to 4K, Nvidia's latest flagship GPU can actually handle 8K gaming, meaning it'll play nice with screens of the f𝓡uture that cater to beyond UHD. Not that we'd suggest picking one up for that purpose, as the RTX 5090 will send it into retire♛ment.

Read more: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 review

The best graphics card for most players

It's safe to say the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 is still a premium GPU, but the new Blackwell model is the car⛦d mo༒st players should aim for. Sure, if you've got at least $2,000 burning a hole in your pocket, you'll want to invest in the RTX 5090. However, I'd recommend the 80-class card first since it boasts new DLSS 4 superpowers and

Features: Just like the rest of the RTX 5000 crew, the RTX 5080 enters the scene with a new box of AI upscaling tricks. Dubbed DLSS 4, the ne💜xt-gen version includes "Multi-frame Generation" support that'll enable you to boost fps even further using generated frames, and you'll encounter fewer visual quirks thanks to the new Transformer model under the hood. Simply put, by enabling 4X Frame Generation in supported games, you'll end up playing at much higher frame rates with less caveats than before.

DLSS 4 is exclude to RTX 50-series cards, making it a huge selling point for the next-generation range. There are players who will argue that Multi-Frame Gen꧃eratioꦑn isn't a true performance boost since it's artificially predicting visuals. But, it's hard to ignore the benefits when it comes to single player games, and with a Nvidia Reflex 2 on the way to kick latency to the curb, it could even come in handy for fast-paced shooters.

Design: Nvidia has found a sweet spot ജwith its Founders Edition design this generation, resulting in an RTX 5080 that is much sleeker than its 4080 predecessor. The card will only take up two PCIe slots in your PC case, which should create less havoc if you're currently using an older GPU. That said, keep in mind that if you go for a custom overclocked card, you might end up with something the same si💜ze as the RTX 4090 since it'll feature extra cooling.

That's not to say the RTX 5080 hasn't got a lavish fan setup, as Nvidia's redesign enables the card to keep itself much cooler using dual-fans. The GPU maker has actually split i🐬ts main PCB up into three parts this time around in a bid to direct airflow and position heatsinks more efficiently, resulting in a card that's better at fighting off heat.

As for power, you'll have to use Nvidia's new 12-pin connector like before. For most of you, that'll mean using the included PSU cable dongle in the box, so keep that in mind if you've got a specific cable management strategy. Thankfully, the green team has placed the GPU's socket at an angle to help direct cabling out of the way and prevent any damage during installation. While the company has resolved the melty cable issues꧙ associated with Lovelace cards, this extra step will help ensure it doesn't happen again via wear and tear.

Performance: I've spent a lot of time benchmarking both the Founders Edition RTX 5080 and the custom 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:PNY RTX 5080 OC, and it's safe to say both ꧋pack beastly 4K capabilities. The performance jump between t🌺he RTX 4080 Super and the new Blackwell GPU is a bit modest, but you're still getting faster visuals than before and the option to boost things even further using DLSS 4.

To paint a picture of RTX 5080 performance, I was able to run Cyberpunk 2077 with 4K Ultra settings enabled at 71fps with no AI upscaling assistance. That's a pretty nice uplift compared to 57fps using the RTX 4080 Super, but taking advantage of💯 4X Multi-Frame Generation ramps that figure up to a remarkable 316fps. Those same benefits apply to outings like Dragon Age: The Veilguard, which leaped from a native 77fps to 288fps with DLSS 4 on, hammering home the benefits of the new features.

Naturally, you will be able to spot discrepancies with DLSS 4 if you squint hard enough, but I only really noticed a difference in fa🏅st paced scenarios. During ordinary gameplay, you're unlikely to notice anything that'll completely break your immersion, so it's hard to argue against using the AI tools. What I will say is that support isn't a ꧃given right now in every single new game, and while native performance in the likes of Total War: Warhammer 3 is pretty impressive (an 87fps average at 4K ultra), it might not always be there to boost your frame rates.

Verdict: It's early days for Nvidia's next-gen GPU line-up, but the RTX 5080 is the class of graphics card most players should aim to get hold of. It'll pack more than enough performance to handle the latest PC games in 2025 whether you use DLSS 4 or not, and it should hold up pretty wel🍌l in the future too. You will want to still try and pick up an RTX 4090 or the new RTX 5090 if you want more than 16GB VRAM, but with AI changing the foundations of PC performance, games might not need as much memory compared to previous years.

Read more: 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 review

The best budget graphics card

It's needless to say the AMD Radeon RX 7600 isn't going to win any fights with performance, but it boasts a ferociously competitive MSRP. For often less than $260 / £250, you'll be able to run all the latest games at 1080p and take advantage of team red's neat coll꧟ection of FS𓆏R 3 tricks.

Features: Armed with a Navi 33 RDNA 3 chip, the Radeon RX 7600 serves as AMD's cheapest g♚raphics card this generation. That does come with some cꦍaveats, as you'll have to make do with just 8GB GDDR6 VRAM and limitations in terms of ray tracing. However, tapping into features like FSR 3 and Fluid Motion Frames can make all the difference, especially since you can use Frame Generation in every game at a driver level. That in itself comes with latency and stability caveats, but no other GPU maker has attempted a similar approach as of yet.

Design: The specific model we tested for out review is the Acer BiFrost RX 7600, and the card's custom blower and f🃏an combo is pretty effective. We found that temperatures st𒊎ayed chilly even when under intense load, and it's nice to see that traditional methods of GPU are still around in 2024. The GPU's shroud is pretty minimalist, but a mix of glossy and matte plastics help give it a premium vibe, despite costing less than alternatives.

Performance: It probably won't come as a shock to hear the RX 7600 isn't the most powerful GPU around, but there's a lot to respect considering the low cost of some models. Demanding games like Returnal managed to respectable averag✃e frame rate𒅌s of 84fps at 1080p, and actually pulled off 60fps at 1440p. Admittedly, it's main rival, the RTX 4060, pulls ahead slightly in similar tests, but Nvidia's contender comes in at over $50 more depending on the model.

Verdict: Out of every graphics card out right now, the AMD Radeon RX 7600 ultimately serves as the best budget option for well under $300. Versions like the Acer Bifrost will set you back a bit more, so that's worth weighing up while browsing. Still, this card is one to watch if you like to hold off until Black Friday, and it could en🧸d up providing an even better experience as more FSR 3 features roll out.

Read more: 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7600 review

The best graphics card for under $500

Grabbing a graphics card for under $500 in 2024 isn't always easy, especially if you still want to hit 4K in the latest games. However, the AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT provides commendable specs and performance headroom while still hit⭕🅠ting a sweet price spot, even if its ray tracing capabilities are somewhat behind its green rivals.

Features: Kitted out with a Navi 32 XT GPU and 16GB GDDR6 VRAM, this mid-range graphics card won't have an issue hitting new-release system requirements. Of course, just like the rest of the current-gen Radeon range, this card also has FSR upscaling to fall back on, an🌳d new Frame Generation tricks offer up a multitude of ways to boost fps in different scenꦜarios.

Design: We specifically took Acer's Bifrost RX 7800 XT model for a test drive this time around, but this version sticks with what is a fairly standard tri-cooling solution this time around. For a card of this calibre, it's probably wise not to experiment with a blower fan, and the GPU's larger size means this approach will look more ordinary inside your rig. Subtle ridges and grill marks help add a bit of flavor to what is otherwise a vanilla looking component, but its basic design 🥂will appeal to some enthusiasts out there looking to avoid flashy parts𝓡.

Performance: While 4K is something high-end cards are designed for, cheaper alternatives like the RX 7800 XT ꧋prove you can achieve UHD gaming on a mid-range system. In the benchmarks, we managed to hit over 60fps in Returnal, and Hitman 3 flourished at over 130fps. More demanding releases like Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Total War: Warhammer 3 did take somewhat of a beating at higher resolutions, but switching on FSR did help keep every tesﷺted game above 60fps.

Verdict: There are undoubtedly better graphics cards out there, but for under $500, the 7800 XT has an impressive performance punch. Naturally, graphics card prices are ever-changing, so we can't promise weꦗ won't opt for an Nvidia equivalent for better ray tracing performance in the future.

Read more: 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT review

The best 4k graphics card

We have nothing but respect for the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, especially since it had to follow the tremendous entrance of the RTX 4090. Wisely, the red team 🍰decided to fight Nvidia on price rather than performance, and the result is a GPU that offers up an incredible 4K performance for under $1,000 / £1,000.

Features: Kitted out with a flagship Navi 31 GPU and 24GB GDDR6 VRAM, AMD's premium contender occupies a weird middle ground. By that, we mean that while it's the company's top GPU, it's designed to take on the more reasonably price🃏d RTX 4080, rather than punching above its weight at the RTX 4090. When it first launched, it actually lacked a way to fight Nvidia's DLSS AI tool suite, but it now has an excellent collection of FSR 3 settings and driver level Frame Generation at its disposal.

The latter can actually work with any game, while AMD's Fluid Motion Frames tech is making its way into more releases as the year progresses. Jus💫t like DLSS, there are caveats when it comes to latency and artificing, but we're still talking about tech that can fill in the gaps left by native performance.

Design: AMD caꦅrds normally feature a specific vibe, and the Radeon RX 7900 XTX is no exception. Its triple fan cooler and silver shroud won't be to everyone's tastes, but that design serves the noble purpose of keeping everything ice cold. Plus, this card's design retains a traditional set of dual 8-bit power connectors, so you won't have to wreღstle with silly dongles to get everything hooked up.

Performance: There's a good reason that the RX 7900 XTX is our go to 4K GPU right now, and it's not just because it beats the RTX 4080 in the benchmark ring. Ultimately, it feels like AMD's flagship card is providing what we'd expect from top tier GPU of this generation, rather than showboating with enthusiast pe⛎rformance. UHD visuals are still going to be accompanied by😼 high frame rates regardless, and the rat tracing experience at hand is pretty great if fancy lighting is your jam.

Verdict: Like it or not, the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX can't take on the RTX 4090, but it can offer up a more approachable 4K experi꧋ence and keep the rest of Nvidia's squad at bay. We're also excited to see how this card🌳 improves as FSR 3 matures, and adding future AI abilities into the mix could be a game changer.

Read more: AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX review

The best 1440p graphics card

In a heroic effort to provide mid-range PC gamers with better performance, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super swoops in with higher specs than the original. Better still, it's price hasn't changed, but we are slightly wary that the vanilla variant could drop to a distracting price as the year progresဣses.

Features: We're still slig💯htly grumpy about the fact the RTX 4070 Super comes with 12GB GDDR6X RAM. However, that's perhaps not a deal breaker since it has a higher core count and slightly faster clock speeds than the original. Those improved specs go a long way to pushing this card to a slightly higher 1440p performance standard, and the usual DLSS and Frame Generation tricks are to hand to make 4K gaming a possibility.

Design: We used the Zotac Trinity RTX 4070 Super for our review, and it's admittedly a chonker compared to most other mid-range models. It wields the triple fan configuration as the company's RTX 4070 Ti models, and it takes up the same amount of space as a premium GPU as a result. That's not entirely a bad thing, as the bigger shroud and extra fans result in nice low temperatures, but it could be a pain you've got a small♌er case with a traditionally sized card. If you reckon that could be an issue, we'd suggest browsing for a two-fan variant🌃 instead.

Performance: When it comes to QHD gaming, the RTX 4070 Super has it in the bag, making short work of 1440p visuals in games like Cyberpunk 2077, Hitman 3, and Total War: Warhammer 3. Across the board, we were able to reach 100fps without any upscaling assistance, but switching DLSS and Frame Generation on will help you satiate the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors and their speedy refresh rates. Even 4K is pretty smooth when using Nvidia's AI sui🦂te, even if there's some scaling 🃏shenanigans involved to make it happen.

Verdict: Nvidia's refresh has effectively transformed its mid-range offering into something th🌟at's hard to beat, and the RTX 4070 Super deserves the QHD crown. If you're planning on sticking with 1440p monitors for a while, this 70-class card should stop you from thinking about upgrades for a while, provided a potential RTX 5070 doesn't rock up and change a fundamentals of mid-tier gaming.

Read more: 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super review

The best 1080p graphics card

Coming in at $299, the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 is the cheapest of the Lovelace bunch yet. However, don't let its lower price fool you, as it's a punchy 1080p GPU that can actually handle a bit of 1440p and 4K with DLSS 3 enabled. You could say it relies on Frame Generation and fancy AI upscaling a bit too much, but the results speak for themselves when you can technically play dem✨anding ports like Returnal without performance caveats.

Features: Just like the AMD Radeon RX 7600, the RTX 4060 is insistent that 8GB is enough VRAM for 1080p gaming in 2024. We wouldn't say that's entirely incorrect, but it will mean that future endeavours and ever improving textures could become an issue down the road. Nevertheless, this card provides one of the m🀅ost solid entry-level experiences right now thanks to its DLSS and Frame Generation arsenal, making up for any pitfalls tied to its scaled down AD106 GPU.

Design: If it's a dinky GPU you're after, the RTX 4060 won't disappoint. The MSI version we checked out at launch is small enough to fit in most small cases, and the fact it uses a traditional 8-pin power connector will prevent any awkward dongle situations. In terms of looks, most models are pꦡretty minimalist, meaning you won't have to worry about intrusive shrouds getting in the way of your tiny build plans.

Performance: We put the RTX 4060 through our usual benchmarks, and it managed to outpace the RTX 3060. We even ran specific RTX 4060 Cyberpunk 2077 tests and enjoyed around over 100fps at 1080p w🎃ith all the ray tracing trimmings using DLSS 3. The GeForce tool even makes 4K possible on the entry-level card, as it achieved 72fps in Hitman 3, albeit with ray tracing set to one side.

It's worth noting that if you're looking to boost fps without picking up an RTX 4070, you'll probably want to consider the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 Ti. However, while the souped up version offers higher 1080p frame rates, it costs $100 more🌃, and we reckon the vanilla RTX 4060 hits more of a sweet spot.

Verdict: Overall issues with Nvidia's RTX 4000 pricing and reluctance to offer more than 8GB RA𓆉M at entry-level, the RTX 4060 is a solid 1080p option that isn't going to disappoint. That's particularly true if you're one of the many Steam players out there still using a GTX 1660 today, as while the 2019 card is still a budget favorite, it's worth considering an entry level Lovelace model over the aging Turing card.

Read more: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 review

The best value graphics card

Intel makes graphics cards? Yes! And the Arc A770 is serves as a 16GB light in a dark world filled with 8GB entry-level GPUs. Gags aside, the flagship Alchemist card actually packs more value into its shroud than most options out there, making it a solid op🏅tion for players who want to make💖 their dollars stretch.

Features: Intel arguably makes the best gaming CPUs around, and while AMD might have an issue with that statement, it might want to focus instead of guarding its budget GPU crown. Packing 16GB GDDR6 VRAM and a 2,400MHz boost clock, the A770 packs elevated specs for not far off the price of a RX 7600. Admittedly, Arc models haven't gained powers on par with DLSS and FSR 3 quite yet, but it's early days for the blue team's venꦬture into graphics card land.

Design: Funnily enough, the Intel Arc A770 we tested shares DNA with the RX 7600 on our list, as both are Acer Bifrost models. That means that the two graphics c✤ards use the exact same shroud and fan configuration, with that builওt-in blower helping provide a similar result in terms of cooling. Just like AMD's budget model, you'll also be able to hook straight up to your PSU with an 8-pin connector, and that's a big boon if you've not got much space to work with.

Performance: In-game benchmarks were impressive enough, but we found in testing that 4K 60fps was achievable in Returnal, Cyberpunk, and Hitman 3 if we turned the settings down a touch. With that 16GB of GDDR6, a boost clock of 2400MHz, and 19.66TFLOPs to work with, there's a lot of headroom for great gaming pওerformance here, and for under $300, that deserves your attention. Even older games that use DirectX11 or older, which the Intel Arc's struggled to find deal with originally, are now handled with ease.

Verdict: Acer's model 🦄is one of the pricier 16GB A770s around, but all models arg🔜uably make for the best value graphics card around considering the specs and features on offer. Now that the Intel Arc B580 is a thing, it's entirely likely it'll replace the Alchemist option here, but I'll let you know once I'e completed testing.

Read more: Acer Predator BiFrost Intel Arc A770 OC review

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How we test graphics cards

At GamesRadar, we take an encompassing approach to testing the best graphics cards with a strict set of benchmarking tools before the GPUs end up on our list. First and foremost, we use the likes of 3DMꦬark for quantified and comparable figures in our extensive write-ups. Secondly, and arguably most importantly, we use demanding games w꧒ith ray tracing enabled, if applicable, to see how the graphics cards hold up in real-world performance.

You can find out 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test graphics cards in our full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar Hardware Policy.

Best graphics cards: Frequently asked questions

Looking to pay less for a GPU? Check out the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best cheap graphics card deals and bag a budget AMD or Nvidia model. You might also want to check out our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming CPU picks if you're putting to gether an entire rig.

The architecture of modern chips has come a long way, so much so that "mid-range" isn't what it used to be on the Intel or AMD side. That means that if you want something that will keep up with the very 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs, you don't need to look far, and even Intel's last-gen chips will likely be enough𓂃 for you because of the move to DDR5 technology. The ♏chips on the list below will do you just fine, and most importantly, won't break the bank.

For the vast majority of PC gamers, a 13th-generation Intel Core i5 CPU or AMD Ryzen 5 7000 CPU will do the trick these days since this category of pr🐎ocessor has gained a lot of power in recent years. But you'll need to be doubly sure you've got the right motherboard sockeಞt for whatever CPU you go for. For example, AMD CPUs can't be used for Intel motherboards, and the same goes for the other way around. DDR5 processors won't fit on an older motherboard either, so you really need to plan these things out thoroughly to make sure you don't burn a hole in your pocket for parts you can't actually use.

The Quick List

The best CPU for gaming overall

The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D has earned a reputation as the best gaming processor thanks to its excellent performance-enhancing 3D V-Cache and reasonable price to performance versus the Intel competition. Even as it continues to age, it's still 🦂a truly brilliant CPU to build with, and whether your rig is targetting 1440p or 4K, you're going to get excellent gaming performance thanks to this chip𒁏.

Specs & Features: Built for the AM5 socket that's also used for the Ryzen 8000G and Ryzen 9000 families, it's a great option to install today because there's an upgrade bath lying ahead of you, with even newer Ryzen 9000ꦛX3D models offering the best performance increase (when they come down in price a bit). With a boost clock of 5GHz, the habits of most gamers and content creators are going to be satiated, although it must be said that single core performance can be increased by choosing the newer Ryzen 7 8700G, which has a slightly higher boost clock. With a base clock of 4.2GHz though, you're getting better general performance than a lot of Intel's Raptor Lake i5 competition.

The main draw here is going to be the 3D V-Cache, which essentially allows a larger L3 cache to store more data on tꦇhe proces🃏sor if it needs to access it often, and access it quickly. This means for tasks like gaming and content creation, this thing is a beast.

Performance: I saw inexplicable performance gains in some CPU-intensive games, like a 40fps gain in Planet Zoo compared to a🍌n even newer Ryzen 7 model. In other games and benchmarks, the wins weren't that dramatic, but they were a significant boos🅰t in performance compared to other AMD CPUs we've tested. All-round, as it continues to age, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D is still showing itself to be the best CPU to buy if you're looking for dedicated gaming processor.

The best CPU for most players

The Raptor Lake Intel Core i5 processor is an absolute powerhouse that 🏅should really make us question what we deem a mid-range CPU to be these days. Packed with 6 performance cores, 6 efficiency cores, and 20 threads, on paper, this is essentially a cheaper and more efficient 12th Gen i7.

Specs & Features: If 🥃there are any flaws to note here, it might be that there's no turbo max 3.0 - that's reserved for 13th gen i7 and i9 processors. Like the others in the Raptor Lake bunch, this CPU can be a tad more power hungry than you might like, and it can run hot under stress. Rest assured though, the i5 gives you the best all round package in these regards, and won't be nearly as extreme as an i7 or i9.

The 13600K has 14 cores and 20 threads, making it excellent value for money versus so many of the other contemporary processors out there. It offers more headroom tha🐈n AMD processors in terms of specs, and since its getting discounts more often these days, it's becoming excellent value for money.

Performance: In gaming, benchmarking, and content creation, this CPU barely broke a sweat, and doing both at the same time barely used up to 15% of the CPU's capacity. That's so efficient that I thought ther🌳e was something going wrong during testing, because an i5 definitely isn't expected to be this powerful.

When you take price-to-performance into account, there really isn't any beating this CPU without moving to the AMD side. For a large majority of players, money shouldn't be wasted on an i7 or i9 because they simply don't need the extra architecture Intel gives them and charges more ✨money for. A𝕴n Intel Core i5-13600K is all you'll need for 4K gaming and great content creation power right now.

The best budget CPU for gaming

The AMD Ryzen 5600X may not blow anyone away with its sheer power, especially with AMD's 7000 series on the shelves now. But as far as AM4's last-generation chipsets from the company go, it's very hard to beat in terms of price. What's more, the 5600X is frequently on sale, down from its already competit♏ive $260 MSRP.

The AMD Ryzen 5600X is a solid all-around performer with both its single-core and multi-core capabilities in-game, too. It has 6 cores and 12 threads, which may not sound like much compared to the DDR5 options on this list, but that's plenty for a budget gaming PC build that's targetting 1080p. This CPU has a hi♔gher-than-average clock speed combined with its quiet-yet-cool operation over extended per🧸iods of time.

If you're after a processor to keep your rig under budget for now, the꧒n the 5600X continues to impress across the board all these years later.

The best value 4K CPU

AMD Ryzen chips are known for their phenomenal value, and if there are any builders on a budget looking foౠr a DDR5-compatible CPU that can handle gaming and content creation in 4K, this is the one we recommend. It's available both with and without an AI-oriented NPU, and if you opt for the version without, you get a slightly slo⭕wer clock speed but pay even less money.

Specs & Features: Six cores and 12 threads may not seem like an awful lot for a modern-generation of processor, but such is the poꦰwer and efficiency of AMD's Zen 4 architecture. You get less architecturally than you do if you opt for an Intel Core i5-13600K, but you get bang-on equivalent clock speeds and gaming performance, which is very impressive.

Performance: Using this CPU for our benchmark tests, I was pleasantly surprised by the results when I was gaming in 4K. Single and Multicore performance in the likes of Cinebench and Blender weren't quite as strong as in Intel's corner, which maybe speaks to how this processor is less viable for content creators. Still, if it's ꦺjust some gaming 🍒in 4K you're after, this is surprisingly capable. Playing Planet Zoo, Homeworld 3, and Cities Skylines, I was able to get 4K60 out of this processor, which is very impressive for something of this price.

There's great value to be had here because we've seen how well supported AMD's 5000 series platform has been since 2016 (it's still seeing new additions to the lineup today), and that makes us confident that if you opt for a CPU and motherboard like this for your DDR5 machine✱, you'll likely get years of upgrades and support for your money.

The best Intel CPU for content creators

Before there was a Raptor Lake Refreshed Intel Core i7, there was a Raptor Lake Intel Core i7. While we're just about to start testing the 14th gen version of this processor, at this point in time, it's hard not to recommend the 13th gen model. It'll likely start to get cheaper now there's a new wave of Intel chips, a𓆏nd the performance it nets you is no short of ridiculous.

Specs & Features: The 13700K has 16 cores - only two more than the i5. These are made up of 8 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores. In terms of threads running through these cores, you have 24 - four more than the i5. So the real questi🌞on remains - do you actually need this extra headroom for the money? For most people, we'd still recommend the 13th Gen i5, but for content creators looking for that extra piece of mind, that extra headroom does make a difference when gamin🤪g at higher resolutions and settings.

Performance: For a full rundown of how benchmarking scores differ between the two, take a look at our review. For now, we'll say that if you're willing to spend that extra $100 or so, you'll get an increase in performance, but just be prepared to work harder when keeping this CPU cool. Similarly, check out the price of the latest AMD Ryzen 7, because the rival version will almost always be found chea🍬per.

Regardless, this is i9 power in a chip with i7 branding. Iಌf you need extra headroom for content creation tasks like live s🍸treaming and video editing, you can't go wrong with the 13700K.

The best value Ryzen 7 CPU

While shopping around for a CPU these days, you'll probably hear wonders about AM🐼D's Ryzen 7 options since they offer excellent gaming and content performance for solid value prices. That much is true, but if you dip into the X3D models that are designed for ultimate gaming performance and content creation, you can actually end up spending more than you need to. For me, the Ryzen 7 8700G which can go toe-to-toe with some of those X3D products but costs less is actually a better option for most playꦕers.

Specs & Features: The only down side is that compared to the Ryzen 5 8600G, you don't get many wins on your spec sheet. In fact, your base clock speed here is slower than the Ryzen 5 from the same generation, and your L3 cache is just the same. Luckily, single core performance thanks to a higher boost clock speed is better, and you do get a big emphasis on integrated graphics, which could be useful if you're waiting for a GPU upgrade and ne♊ed a h𒁏oldover.

Performance: Fortunately, performance isn't as dicey as the spec sheet might have you think. In fact, in content creation, and especially in single core performance in Cinebench, the Ryzen 7 8700G matched the former generation's Ryzen 7 X3D model. That's really encouraging as this chip's price continues to fall. Elsewhere, 4K gaming tasks were handled with ease, and one of this processor's most impressive traits is its ability to stay cool under pressure. Each of our benchmarking games saw more stable, and higher frame 🐻rates than the Ryzen 5 8600G, although not an awful lot. If you want that extra bit of room to gallop with in content creation tasks, I'd go for this one, but the Ryzen 5 is still an excellent option for even less money.

The best Intel flagship CPU

Intel's 13th Gen flags🅠hip CPU is a powerhouse that few will need, but if you're going to go for a top-of-the-range processor from the last few years, this is the sweet spot. Yes, the 14th Gen Core Ultra equivalent will likely give you better performance, but this is the one you'll get better value from in terms of price. The specs separating the latest model are few, so you really are getting the best deal with the Raptor Lake version.

Design & Specs: This i9 sports a whopping 24 cores and♈ 32 threads, which is enough to make even the busiest of workloads weep. With that amount of headroom, there just isn't anything that'll make this CPU struggle - in gaming, content creation, or anything else you have in mind. We've seen the sorts of performances that come from the lesser i7 and i5 in the Raptor Lake wave, and they were plenty for most gamers to get by on. If our review of this fꦑlagship is anything to go by, nothing will stop you with this i9 house in your rig.

Performance: Onꦜe of the biggest concerns we had with this chip was that it would be unruly in its temperature management. With the right AIO in your system though, we actually found very passable results. While providing the best benchmarking scores of any CPU we've tes🌟ted until now, it remained below 66°C, which is very impressive for a generation of processors that are known to run hot.

Again, let us💟 stress that this processor is overkill for the majority of people. For most gamers, a🔯n i5 or i7 in the 13th Generation will get you by easily. For the enthusiast, however, there's no beating this right now.

The best 12-core CPU for gaming

The Intel Core i7-12700K was our testing rig's processor of choice for a time, and it still has a place on this list because it lies in a 12-core category and manages to stand out after all this time. 12 cores is a sweet spot for many gamers today, particularly those upgradin꧒g their rigs after a long time. AMD has a few options in this category, but they're now more expensive than the 12700K.

With DDR5 compatibility on the Intel side, you 🦂don't have many 12-core options to choose from, particularly because the 13th generation really upped the ante when it comes to core and threat numbers.

We used this processor to tes♊t some serious GPU power, including the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, and so many RAM kits. It never failed us and offered excellent power for 4K gaming. As the price of this chip continues to drop, you're going to g✅et loads of value from it. That said, if you can afford more, the 13th gen equivalent should be more tempting to you.

The best budget Intel CPU

The 12th generation Intel i5 Alder Lake processor does what people were expecting from Rocket Lake - and actually dethrones AMD Ryzen 5000 series for a competitive price-to-performance ratio tha🌳t's hard to argue against.

Comparing the Intel Core i5-12600K with the less-than-well-received Intel Core i9-11900K, the 12600K actually outperforms it for a fraction of the cost. Indeed, its documented performanc𒅌e means it more than deserves a high spot in our roundup but misses out on that top slot for one simple reason: the 13600K is unreal.

Regardless, one of our editors has this as their CPU of choice, and it's handled gaming and benchmarking with an RTX 4090 with absolute ease. If you like the look and feel of the 13🔜600K buꦇt don't wanna splash out as much dough, this isn't too far behind.

Best CPU for gaming: FAQs

How we test the best CPUs for gaming

Testing CPUs for review can get fairly comput🐲er science-y, and rightly so. This is the chip that's going to process all of the things you do on your gaming PC, so we try to get a sense of how each will perform while gaming, content creating, and more general tasks.💙 At the same time, we also want to make the numbers and results as clear to understand as possible.

To begin, we'll benchmark CPUs using industry-standard software 🔴like Cinebench and Blender. These emulate rendering and processing tasks for a CPU during content creation and give us a standardized way of looking at a chip's raw performance against its rivals. This will tell us a lot about its multicore and single-core performance, andꦆ we'll typically do each test three times and take a mean average as our result.

While doing these tests we track temperatures, voltages, and percentage of use through monitoring software li🅠ke HWiNFO, NZXT Cam, or other similar programs. Then, it's onto gaming.

To really test a CPU's mettle, we'll play games that are known to make them sweat. This includes RTS games and City Builders that have to simulate loads of calculations and character models at any one time. Across all our tests, you'll notice sco♚res from Total War: Warhammer 3, Home🥂world 3, and Cities: Skylines. We'll also test in other CPU-intensive games that we're playing, these could be Planet Zoo, Baldur's Gate 3, Civilization, or anything else that puts a processor under pressure.

For more on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming PCs and their components, check out our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Hardware Policy.

How to choose the best CPU for you

The first thing to determine which CPU you should buy is what moꦓtherboard you have. It'll be locked to one type of processor and that'll seriously narrow down your shopping list between AMD and Intel. Besides that, I'd be asking some questions about how you plan to use a CPU. And it'll come down to three things.

Gaming: Do you tend to play a lot ꧃of games that put strain on a processor? These are things like RTS games and City Building sims. If you do tend to play games like that, especially at 4K with high settings, you'll probably want a more powerful processor. If you play a wide variety of genres, you can get by with a Ryzen 5 or i5 processor.

Content creation: If you're a content creator, be it a strea🍨mer, video editor, graphic designer, or 3D artist, you'll probably need a bit more processing power than a typical user would. Again, a lot of Ryzen 5 and i5 chips can handle these tasks with ease these days, but if you want things to run as smoothly as possible, a Ryzen 7 or i7 is the one to go for.

Budget: Lastly, budget is going to play a big role i𝄹n the sorts of processors you shop for. Luckily, it's a buyer's market just now, so it doesn't take long for even the latest chips to get discounted, but your budget might decide which generation and manufacturer you go for. AMD tends to be cheaper, but Intel offers you more in terms of raw specs. i9 and Ryzen 9 options are more expensive, but Ryzen 5 and Core i5 options are more accessible.

Now you've got one of the best chipsets available for the money, keep your rig in top tier shape with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming keyboard and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitor on the market, too.

These GPUs are found in some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptops on the market but can sit in a sweet spot between value and price if you're sticking to a budget. If you're looking to spend between $900 and $1,500 (£900 and £1,500) on RTX 3060 laptop deals, this is the configurat🐈ion you should be looking at and, paired with Ryzen's 5000 series or Intel's 11th generation processors, these machines are capable of some serious power. 

While it's rare to find 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming laptop deals with an RTX 3060 GPU for under $1,000 / £1,000, it can be done if you're browsing at the right time. We're rounding up all the best RTX 3060 laptop deals this week right here🌠, with our top picks from retailers known to regularly discount current-generation models. 

RTX 3060 laptop deals - US

Tod✃ay's best RTX 3060 gaming la♛ptop deals in the UK

If you're after a desktop PC, we're also rounding up all the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RTX 3060 gaming PC deals, or if you're already settled on a brand, check out the latest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap Razer laptop deals and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap Alienware laptops on the market. 

Razer produces some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptops on the market right now but the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Razer laptops pack the latest components into impossibly portable footprints with a slimline and lig𝔍htweight flourish. Add gorgeous displays and plenty of customization and you've got a machine working particularly hard to justify its higher price tag. Even 2021 and 2020 releases still live up to this name, with price tags that are rapidly receding. 

That's why cheap Razer laptop deals are so exciting. When they do appear, there's some serious value for money up for grabs, even if you're dropping down your GPU generation to score a top offer. After all, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming laptop deals are rarely cheap in themselves, but there's often far better value for money in this upper-midrange than in t🔯he entry-level bracket.

Cheap Razer laptop deals (2023 Series)

With Intel's 13th generation processors, Nvidia's RTX 40-Series GPUs, and new 18-inch and 16-inch form factors, this year's Razer Blade series is still pretty expensive. You won't f🎃ind too many major discounts here - and any that do pop up are still going to leave you with a hefty final price. However, it's worth keeping an eye on these savings towards the end of the year when the new generation is within sights. 

Cheap Razer laptop deals (2022 Series)

2022 brought about a new series of Razer laptops to the market, but these machines have stubbornly held onto their MSRPs for a while now. We are starting to se♔e some retailers offering discounts on these high-end machines, though, so it's time to start tracking the latest generation's prices. 

It's true, we really haven't seen many Razer laptop deals hitting these monsters. If you're looking to invest in a high-end rig you're still going to have to pay those high-end prices here. However, as we move into the holiday sales period it's well worth keeping 💧a close eye on this range ꩲ(and comparing prices like for like against the 2021 versions) for the best value on the shelves.

Cheap Razer laptop deals (2021 Series)

2021's lineup of Razer Blade laptops is starting to drop its price no🥃w that the 2022 versions have hit the shelves. That means you'll likely be able to score Razer laptop deals on RTX 30-Series configurations, with both AMD and Intel processing options up for grabs as well. 

While the Stealth 13 model received an upgrade ꦜto Intel's 11th generation processors (though still holding onto that GTX 1650 graphics card), the Blade 15 holds onto a 10th generation CPU. That's not to say you're going to be getting dramatically less power out of these cheaper Razer laptops, but you may be less future-proofed as a result. However, the Pro 17 does still offer some 11th generation configurations.

However, 2021 also brought the AMD Razer Blade 14 into the mix - a nifty mach🐲ine built to take on some of the larger gaming laptops out there while also offering the form factor to make a MacBook jealous. This 🤪is still considered a luxury piece of kit, though, so prices do sit a little higher here. 

The cheapest 2021🔴 Razer laptops will still come in at around $1,799 / £1,799.99 - but that's considerably less th🥀an some of the more premium cutting-edge options hitting the market these days. 

You'll find all the latest Razer laptop deals on the 2꧑021 series just below. 

Cheap Razer laptop deals (2020 Series)

The 2020 series of Razer Blade laptops are starting to look a little old now, with 10th generation Intel processors and graphics cards ranging from the GTX 1660Ti to the RTX 2080. However, th𝓡ese cheap Razer laptops certainly shouldn't be written off because of their age. They're still incredibly powerful performers, with a form factor that makes them perfect for both work and play. Plus, you're going to be saving considerably on that price tag, especially if you're after a smaller configuration for luxury everyday gaming.

You can generally pick up a 2020 Razer Blade 15 for as little as $1,499 / £1,499, but these models are ﷽now regularly on sale so there are plenty of cheap Razer laptop deals to take advantage of here. 

You'll find all the 🌼lowest prices on the ไRazer Blade 15, Razer Blade Stealth 13, and Razer Blade Pro 17 just below. 

Razer laptop deals: FAQs

If you're after a look through the rest of the competition, you'll find plenty more of the latest offers just below. These discounts cover everything from 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3050 laptop deals to 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 laptop deals, but you'll find plenty of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3060 laptops and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3070 laptops on sale as well. Or, take a look at our guides to the latest 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap Alienware laptop deals and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best Asus gaming laptops. 

Admittedly, RTX 3090 PC deals are still reasonably pricey in the grand scheme of things but that's parred the course given the nature of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3090 stock combined with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming from Intel and AMD. Just as the high-end Ampere video cards are coming down in price, so too have the rates of prebuilt machines, as more rigs from trusted manufacturers and boutique builds alone are much cheaper than at any other point this year 🐈so far. As a result, it's now possible to walk away with an RTX 3090 build for around $2,000 or less, which is a chunk under what you'd pay for a new-gen RTX 4090 machine.

We're also frequently rounding up the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best cheap gaming PC deals for more modest bu🤪dgets with awesome hardware inside. It's updated often to bring you the best prices possible, and includes new gen RTX 4000 rigs as well as older options that still pack a punch by today's standards.

Where to find RTX 3090 PC deals in the US

Where to find RTX 3090 PC deals in the UK

And i🦂f you're looking to try your luck with individual componeꦡnts, these are the best prices available on the RTX 30-series in all its forms. 

Graphics card stock
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Game in comfort with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming chairs and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming desks, and if you're wondering whether you should overclock your PC for gaming, we've got the answer. 

In a statement on the , the company says "EVGA will not carry the next generation graphics cards," referring to the upcoming RTX 4000 series from Nvidia. The statement says 💞that EVGA will continue to support and sell "current generation products," however.

If you're not familiar with how the PC video card marke🦋t works, companies like Nvidia design architectures for cards such as, say, the RTX 3080. Nvidia will then manufacture some of those graphics cards internally, but will also license additional manufacturers, such as EVGA, to manufacture those cards, as well.

YouTube⭕ 🔯channels and both report having meetings with Andrew Han where the CEO confirmed that the company plans to cut ties with Nvidia.

According to these reports, EVGA feels disrespected by Nvidia's treatment ♋of its partners, with claims that Nvidia does not even provide pricing information to those partners until graphics cards are announced on-stage at public events. The reports further cite poor profit margins and a lack of flexibility around making more creative board designs as contributions to EVGA's decision.

According to Gamers Nexus, EVGA plans to cease all video card manufacturing, and once it sells through its stock of cards - the RTX 3000 series is expected to run out by the end of 2022 - that's it. No more EVG✱A GPUs. Gamers Nexus says it spoke with Han "at length" about the possibility of making graphics cards with partners like AMD or Intel, but says EVGA has no plans to do so.

While EVGA is best known for its versions of Nvidia graphics cards, it also manufactures things like PC power supplies, keyboards, and other components and peripherals. According to Gamers Nexus, around 78% of EVGA's gross revenue comes from video cards, though the company claims that low profit margins on Nvidia-licensed products mean that the company will be able to make💃 up the pro𝔉fits elsewhere.

Gamers Nexus quotes EV꧅GA as sayi𒐪ng that it will continue to do business, and that there are no plans for layoffs.

The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards are about to start looking a lot different.

First up we've got those all-important gaming machines. At the lower end of the price spectrum, you’ll be looking at the MSI Katana GF series. Thಌis range focuses𓆏 on bringing high-end specs to a lower price point, so you’re already getting solid value before the current promotion kicks in. For example, you can pick up an RTX 3050 configuration (complete with the latest i7-12700H Intel processor) for £899 (was £1,099) for a full £200 off. 

If you’re after something capable of running more demanding games, though, it’s worth checking out the Pulse and Crosshair gaming laptops. Capable of running processors up to ✃the Intel i9-12900H, these are for serious digital libraries, packing high-refresh rate displays and larger SSDs to keep all your schoolwork to hand as well. Rainboꦫw Six lovers will also be excited to see a special edition Crosshair on the shelves, decked out with vibrant yellow accents and insignias. 

Don’t like the idea of lugging a larger gaming laptop to college or university every day? The MSI Stealth might be the perfect fit. The slimline series still pac🐭ks some impressive specs (including 240Hz refresh rate displays and Ti versions of Nvidia’s latest graphics cards), but does so in a streetwise form factor that keeps everything streamlined and subtle. Plus, with the Stealth GS66 and the Stealth 15M on the shelves, you’ve got options for both high and low budgets. MSI’s Back to School sale is hitting all of these machines right now, and some even come with additional accessories like headsets and backpacks included.

Of course, not everyone is going to need a full gaming rig with them day to day. That’s where MSI’s Creator and Busineജss & Productivity series’ come into play. The former is designed to offer a premium content creation tool, with prices starting at just £1,399. You’re still getting all the graphical grunt you’ll need for media editing and the high resolution display for colour correction, but in a sleek chassis built for those on the move.

The cheapest laptops in this latest sale, though, are the Prestige series. These business machines drop dedicated graphics cards to keep their p🦄rices low, but maintain high efficiency processors for a super smooth experience. The smaller 14-inch form factor is perfect for slinging into a backpack, and you're still getting Intel's latest 12th generation CPUs under the hood. Prices start at £849💎 on these machines right now.

MSI's Back to School promotion is running f💝rom August 15th - September 30th 2022, and is .

Retailing for $2,499.99 and $3,699.99 for the top-end model with an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 Ti which is what I have here for review. That’s a large amount of money but the sheer amount of performance and utilit𓆏y you get out of this small machine means you can use it to render 3D animated films and then move it to your living room for some tru🍰e 4K@120, ray-traced gaming on your big screen TV.

Design & Features

The Trident X is impressively svelte standing at 16.6 inches tall, 15.61 inches deep, and just 5.4-inches wide. To put that in context, the PS5 is 1༒5.4 x 10 x 3.6-inches so that’s pretty darn close but the Trident X packs far more of a punch than that console and has the benefit of easily changing parts.

The Trident X is a rectangular slab with some edgy flourishes and sits on a wider base for stability – which means you can't lay it on its sidꦿe without killing critical airflow. That’s fine though as it really doesn’t take up much space on a desk or TV cabinet. The case has two side panels that easily pop off to 🃏give you access to the innards and also comes with a tempered glass panel in the box in case you love looking at your hardware.

The front of the Trident X has a good selection of ports: USB Type-C, USB 3.2, and dual audio jacks. There's a distinctive thunderbolt-shaped RGB light strip as well as RGB on the internal case and cooler lighting which is customizable in MSI Center. At the back, you're well serviced too with a total of six more USB 3.2 as well as three DisplayPort and an HDMI 2.1 – perfect for playing games at 4K 120Hz on one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming TVs (or 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors, of course). Additionally, there's Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth and Gigabit Ethernet for🧸 networki🃏ng.

Powering the Trident X is an air-cooled Intel Core i7-12700KF (one of the very latest and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming), sitting on a Z690 MSI motherboard with 16GB of DDR5 RAM🅺 and a 1TB M.2ဣ NVMe SSD. An 850W PSU ensures that the RTX 3080 Ti has plenty of power to run 4K games.

Performance

It goes without saying that the Trident X is a performance beast. I wasn’t kidding when I said you can play big screen gaming at 4K 120Hz, something I was able to do in Destiny 2 with the Trident X paired with the excellent 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Sony A80J OLED. The new 12th Gen Intel’s are serious performers in both productivity and gaming especially when paired with DDR5 memory and a fast 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:SSD for gaming.

In our usual benchmarks, the Trident X scored top marks, coming in only a little behind the much bigger 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware Aurora R13 we recently reviewed. The system drive measured 6893MB/s and 5283MB/s read/write making Windows 🤡tasks and game loading quick and snappy.

Creative task🅰s like 3D animation and video editing will fly but I spent most of my time using the Trident X for pleasurable gaming. The MSI Ventus RTX 3080 Ti ran every game I had with laughable ease and I was often well past the limits of my 165Hz monitor in quite a few titles. Wolfenstein Youngblood and D💟oom Eternal even at ultra settings and ray-tracing often ran so fast it was almost nauseating.

More impressively, the Trident X does this while staying cool and relatively quiet; temperatures generally settle around the high 70s on the GPU and high 60’s o꧙n the CPU during my prolonged gaming sessions which is great. The fan noise is noticeable when under load but certainly far from unpleasantly so like Alienware Aurora.

You can tweak performance settings in the MSI Center though it does come with some performance presets that you can switch between at any time but I was hap🌄py to leave it in Balanced Mode which was perfect for performance and ♓quietness.

Overall - should you buy it?

The MSI MEG Trident X 12th is a fantastic 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 Ti PC that works just as well in your living room as it does on your desk. It👍 outperforms most prebuilt PC’s in this form facto൲r and handily wipes the floor with current-gen consoles. The update to 12th Gen Intel processors and PCIe 5.0 plus the inclusion of DDR5 memory certainly future proofs this machine for years to come.

However, the Trident X costs as much as four next-gen consoles and is also $200 more than the bigger 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware R13. That’s a lot of money and the argument can be made for a DIY build now that GPU prices are coming back to normal. That saꦇid, ✨MSI is a well-established brand with great hardware quality control and support. So for what it is, this kind of power is well worth the money.

How we tested the MSI MEG Trident X

In my month-long period with the MSI MEG Trident X 12th, I stress tested the gaming PC with our industry-standard benching software, suc🍷h as Firestrike, Time Spy, PC Mark 10, and CDM, while also using it as my♔ primary gaming machine.

I don’t have a personal gaming PC so the MSI MEG Trident X 12th was my main rig connected to an ultrawide 34-inch QHD MSI monitor. I exclusively and judiciously used it to make headway on my understandably massive backlꦜog of Steam, Xbox PC, Ubisoft Connect, GOG Galaxy, and the Epic Games Store for an encompassing overview of what this machine could do.

I also tested this PC when connected to a 4K OLED Sony TV over HDMI 2.🌟1 where I benefited from VRR, HDR, and experienced living room PC gaming.

You can read more about澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询: how we test gaming PCs in our full澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询: GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy, as well aꩲs how we decide verdicts on our reviews, too. 

And if you fancy your gaming machines portable, be sure to check out our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming laptop guide right now too.

This is not a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap gaming PC. With a $3,500 MSRP, you're paying a considerable premium on all that power. However, the performance on𒊎 display really does speak for itself, and there's seldom an easier option for those wanting ray traced 4K60 this year, with few compromises to speak of.  

Design and Features

The Alienware Aurora R13 is quite the substantial jump from the tried-and-true visual aesthetics of the previo🔯us Intel-lead Aurora machine. This new version's most prominent additions include a clear window on the left-hand side which allow you to look into the internals of the unit itself. There's a custom-developed pump and radiator AIO water cooler, with the Alien head logo itself over where the CPU is housed. It's a small touch, sure, but there's certainly something to be said for the transparency on offer with having your hardware visible in this way. 

I think it's fair to say that 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware gaming PCs have always had a love it or hate it design philosophy; you either like the rounded edges and glossy plastic chassis or you don't. I'll be entirely honest, I am not a huge fan of the look of this machine, but I do enjoy the new changes made to its visual language this time around and that's certainly a step in the right direction. Considering the premium paid on rigs like this, 🤡h🎐aving an all-plastic chassis doesn't exactly scream luxury, though looks are entirely subjective. 

What I can praise in the Alienware Aurora R13's design is the RGB lighting. ♕The re-tooled front pacing panel allows for a bright and vivid LED display, which can be custom-tweaked in proprietary software giving you all manner of color combinations for both the newly-visible componeไnts inside and the face of the machine. It's a really nice touch, and is sure to add an aura of personality to one's personal setup in a way that few manufacturer-made machines have been able to rival.

Looks aside, easily the biggest advantage that the new Alienware Aurora R13 has over its older siblings is the adoption of PCIe 5.0 compatibility and DDR5 support through Intel's Alder Lake Gen 12 processors. Our review unit came running the powerful Intel Core i9-12900KF, with SK-hynix 64GB DDR5 RAM clocked at 4400MHz, and an RTX 3080. That's a pretty good combo, and while the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming RAM and graphics card are far from t🐭he flagship sꦐtatus of the processor, they're still more-than-solid additions in a build like this.

Performance

Opinions on how the Alienware Aurora R13 looks are all well and good, but it's in the performance that this gaming PC genuinely shines. Given how our review unit is spec'd out, you will be unsurprised to hear that you can generally expect maxed-out ray-traced 4K60🐷 FPS in the vast majority of titles, and that's likely to be the sweet spot for a machine like this in 2022. 

Our industry-standard tests proved little match for the rig as I clocked some respectable numbers in the likes of 3D Mark and PC Mark 10, which have only really been bettered by the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Acer Predator Orion 7000 with a slightly more powerful configuration. Still, whether Time Spy (DirectX12 testing) or Fir💮estrike (DX11) in their various forms, the Alienware Aurora R13 excelled where it matters.

Particular attention can be given to the included Samsung PM9A1 NVMe drive, which, while lacking the name recognition of some of the brand's 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSDs for gaming, more than achieved its quoted Gen 4.0 speeds. Cry꧋stalDiskMark gave it a sc💖ore of 7,020 MB/s read and 5,211.86 MB/s write, so that's more than fast enough to take advantage of DirectStorage API and push those HD textures in titles that support such technology.

Gaming on the Alienware Aurora R13 was a very pleasant experience, as our review unit had nothing to worry about whatsoever with our suite of benchmarking titles, nor the games that I used it for in my own time. As with any gaming PC that's capable of true 4K performance, everything in our roster was extensively tested in 1080p, 1440p, and 2160p and the results really do speak for themselves. If you've got your hands on one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best 4K monitors for gaming, then the visual f💝idelity afforded by the Alienware Aurora R13 can certainly accommodate. 

For the sake of parity, I ran the games that could support Nvidia DLSS in Performance mode in order to get a fair spread when pushing the ray tracing capabilities to the limits. 4K60 was the mean average inও games su🤪ch as Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition (set to RTX Extreme) with Red Dead Redemption II at its highest setting proving a similar benchmark figure.

Even several years after their initial release, these are still graphically demanding and hardware-intensive titles, and the RTX 3080 inside keeps up with them well. The GPU's onboard 10GB GDDR6 VRAM isn't likely to be exceeded by too many games in the near future, so you have significant overhead to keep enjoying maximum visual fidelity with a rock-solid framerate. Even the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors haven't widespread adopted 4K at h🧸igher frame rates, yet, so you should be covered in this respect, too.

For those gamers chasing a higher average FPS, you'll need to scale things back to 1440p. QHD has long since been the trade-off for that crucial balance between visuals and smoother gameplay, and the same can be said for the Alienware Aurora R13. The vast majority of the games in our test setup more than exceeded the 120 FPS+ range, whether set to High or Ultra settings, with 1080p numbers cl🧸imbing over 200 FPS in some instances. This means that the Alienware Aurora R13 is ideal for Esports titles should you want to meet those 240Hz limits for zero latency.

That brings me to my one main criticism of the Alienware Aurora R13, and that's all down to the small AIO water cooler used. It's no secret that the i9-12900KF, for as great as a processor as it is, does run on the hotter side of things, and this machine definitely lets you know that. Even under the most mild of stress, be that in benchmarking or casual play sessions, the rig itself gets both incredibly lo𒁃ud and unsurprisingly warm. I didn't clock any dangerous temperatures in my testing, however, you can certainly 🐼tell the difference between a machine with a full-size radiator (240mm or 360mm) and those without. 

Altho𒆙ugh you can alter your heat dissipation settings in the Alienware Command Center, I choose to let the machine itself regulate its own cooling. This was done to see how the software itself could keep the Alienware R13 chill without me having to intervene. The PC doesn't get deafeningly loud when in full throttle, though, the sounds are not what you want to be hearing for extended periods of time when the action on-screen gets heavy. This isn't necessarily a criticism of the Alienware rig itself, though, as the 12th i9 does run hot, I just think that better thermals could be achieved by giving the chassis a little more room to breathe and having more than just a 120mm AIO on such a behemoth of a proce𓃲ssor.  

Should you buy the Alienware Aurora R13? 

The Alienware Aurora R13 is a great gaming PC, that much should be apparent, however, the brand does come with its own premium price tag to match. Our specific review unit configuration will cost you $3,500, and that's right at the top of the pricing spectrum for an 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 PC. It should be stated, however, that you're benefitting from not only the latest line of Int📖el Core processors here, but the futureproofing PCIe 5.0 compatibility inside, that other RTX 3080-enabled machines on the market right now are rarely matching. 

Considering the performance of our review unit itself, as well as the wide spectrum of configuration options available directly from Dell itself, the Alienwar🔜e Aurora R13 is one of the better investments you can make from a reliable manufacturer this year. 

How we tested the Alienware Aurora R13

In my three-week period with the Alienware Aurora R13, I stress tested the gaming PC with our industry-standard benching software, such as Firestrike, Time Spy, PC Mark 10, and CDM, while also putting it through 💎its paces in many demanding games. 

The Alienware Aurora R13 replaced my usual gaming PC for both my working days and in my own time so I was able to fully test it up against my rig as PC gamers would actually use the device. This meant playing games that were available through the likes of Steam, Origin, Ubisoft Connect, GOG Galaxy, and the Epic Games Stℱore f𝓰or an encompassing overview of what this machine could do. In the interest of fairness, I also tested this PC when connected to not only my 4K gaming monitor but also a 1440p and 1080p panel, too. 

You can read more about 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming PCs in our full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:GamesRadar Hardware Policy, as well as how we decide veဣrdicts on our reviews, too. 

Gear up for the Alienware Aurora R13 with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming keyboards, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming mouse, and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming desks.

Teased at the event were the Apacer AS2280F5 and the Zadak TWSG5, both Gen 5 NVMe SSDs supporting rates of up to 13,000 / 12,000 MB/s apiece. As expected, both models were shown with s𓆏ignificantly chunky heatsinks to keep the internal temperatures down. However, little is known at this point as to what motherboard space will be needed to accommodate h🦄eat spreaders of such a size. 

Both Gen 5 drives have been confirmed to be utilizing the latest NVMe 2.0 standard, which originally launched in June of last year, and boasts✅ substantial across-the-board changes to what we've seen from NVMe 1.4 for the past three years. 

What makes Gen 5 NVMe SSDs so much faster? 

In the simplest of terms, PCIe 5 doubles the available bandwidth of what's currently possible through PCIe 4, with additional CPU lanes going to components such as your 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:graphics card and SSD. If we take the rates claimed by into consideration, which is the only chipset manufacturer offering PCIe 5.0 compatible processo🅰rs right now, we can see that the theoretical maximum speed is in fact doubled (speed per la🅷ne). 

Gen 4 topped out with a maximum of 16 GT/s whereas Gen 5 is quoted to be as capable as to offer up to 32 GT/s. Essentially, with double the throughput available, your components have much more available data to take advantage of. With games continuing to demand much larger file sizes and VRAM-intensive textures in the wake of advancements like the DirectStorage API, you're going to need all the available bandwidth you can get to keep the loading times down and the frame rates consistent.💞 

For Gen 5 SSDs specifically, it comes down to which controllers are in use to make the most of the available sequential performance. If we cast our minds back to Gen 4, the hardware is generally capable of up to 8,000 MB/s, with many of the most popular NVMe drives on the market right now, such as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Kingston Fury Renegade, topping out at around the 7,300 MB🥃/s mark. That's down to the Phison E18 controller, which you will find on many drives that opera👍te in the field of 7,000 MB/s reads and up right now.

We know that Phison has been working on its new PCIe Gen 5 controller, the🦩 PS5026-E26. The company has claimed this will offer the sequential performance of up to 12,000 MB/s read and 11,000 MB/s write, with 4K random rates of 1,500K and 2,000K IOPS respectively, according to material obtained by from earlier in the year. It's currently unknown as to which new drives will support the likes of Phison E26, but we do know that these claimed figures are a good benchmark to keep in mind with Gen 5 SSDs on the horizon.

When can we expect Gen 5 NVMe SSDs to launch? 

If the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AMD Computex 2022 keynote is anything to go by, then we can generally expect the first mainline Gen 5 NVMe SSDs to launch between 🅷September and December 2022. The 'Fall' date was given in relation to the launch of the company's newest Ryzen 7000 Socket AM5 processors, which have been confirmed to be PCIe 5.0 compatible. 

At the conference, the Crucial and Micron's names were dropped as partners who would have Gen 5 NVMe drives ready at launch alongside Zen 4. What&apo🦄s;s more, the Phison logo was present among several other notable partner logos, including th༒at of Gigabyte, Corsair, Sabrent, and Apacer. 

It's worth remembering that we've already had a brief look at what's possible on the platform earlier in the year. Back in January, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查🧸询:TeamGroup announced the T-Force Cardea Gen 5 SSD which also pr✅omised rates of up to 13,000 / 12,00💝0 MB/s read and write, too.

Whether you🌌're running an Alder Lake Intel system or waiting for the Ryzen 7000 line to launch before upgrading to PCIe 5.0, one thing is certain: with games being more demanding than eve🍸r before on the platform, the added bandwidth will allow for performance capabilities never conceived before as we head into 2023. 

Gear up for the latest in Gen 5 compatibility with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC cases, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors. 

According to , the "unlocked i9-12900KS processor is the ultimate processor for enthusiasts and gamers w🦋ho want the fastest processor available."

The Intel Core i9-12900KS fඣeatures 16 cores (24 threads) with up to 5.5 GHz max turbo frequency with Intel Thermal Velocity Boost. Also of note, this special edition of the flagship CPU features a processor base power of 150 W. 

Akin to the first iteration of the CPU, the Intel Core i9-12900KS will be compatible with up to DDR5 4800 MT/s and DDR4🔯 3200 MT/s support. 

Who is the Intel Core i9-12900KS for? 

The new processor is no doubt going to be up there as one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming from a raw power perspective. Keep in mind, though, at $739, it's substantially more expen🐽sive than the standard Intel Core i9-12900K (which tends to retail commonly for around the $620 mark), there's certainly a premium to pay for all that power.

Having a fully unlocked version of an already incredibly fast CPU is going to prove advantageous for PC gamers wanting to push their rigs to the absolute limit. Though on paper it's only looking like a 0.3 GHz clock boost, that bump up in turbo frequency spells out a significant potential performance boost when dialing everything up to 11. If you want to build one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs possib🅰le, this processor is one that you'll want to be considering at the heart of it. 

The Intel Core i9-12900KS boasts some incredible performance figures and will no doubt be the item of longing for many prospective PC gamers in 2022. The actual potential of such a fast processor, though, is geared primarily toward the enthusiasts with the highest-end components available, such as the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best SSD for gaming.

It remains to be seen how effective the Deep Link technology between 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Intel Arc Alchemist and this high-end processor will be from a gaming perspective, though we're anticipating that some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards 🔴coul🅘d be rivaled should the desktop GPUs impress later in the year. 

Today's best CPU deals 

With the Intel Core i🐠9-12900KS still a week away from release, our price comparison software has ꦏyou covered with stellar CPU deals to take advantage of on both sides of the power spectrum. 

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If you want to experience FromSoftware's latest title at its highest quality then you'll need one of the best graphics cards for Elden Ring. Fortunately, due to fairly modest system requirements, the challenging action RPG can be played on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap graphics cards as well as the bleeding-edge models, depending on the resolution you want to be g🍃aming in. 

Experiencing Elden Ring in all its visual splendor, however, requires one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards for gaming to push those sliders to the max. The game very much relies on its art direction more so than flexing those textures and polygons in a fashion that Soulsborne fans are no doubt accustomed to nowꦰ,🌸 but that doesn't mean it's a slouch in the graphics department. 

There are two other considerations that are going to make your Elden Ring experience more enjoyable as well, these are your processor of choice and the amount of memory in your machine. Recommend system requirements are enforcing 16GB memory, so you'll need at least an 2x8GB kit of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming to keep up. As for the chipset, an 8th generation Intel i7 or previous-gen AMD Ryzen 5 should see you through; far from the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPU for gaming out there, but if you're rocking anything less in 2022 then you m𒅌ay be due an upgrade.  

Recommended graphics card for Elden Ring

As with other FromSoftware games, you💫'll no doubt notice that Elden Ring is quite graphically stunning with an emphasis on strong art direction above raw visual prowess, though. The recommended specs for Elden Ring on PC are advising the use of either an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 8GB or AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 8GB or similarly powered equivalent. Both of these GPUs are around puဣshing six years old now, however, and are running aging GDDR5 VRAM, so if you're buying a new graphics card specifically to enjoy Elden Ring, we'd recommend future proofing yourself.

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is the best graphics card for Elden Ring that most PC players are going to want to consider. This is because the Ampere GPU features 8GB GDDR6 memory and a 256-bit memory bus, meaning you can push the graphics potential of FromSoftware's latest opus at high settings in both 1080p and 1440p. If you're after stable 60 FPS in 4K (2160p) natively, though, then you're going to want to think about something on the higher-end of the s🌄pectrum.

While the RTX 3060 Ti can indeed run the game in 4K at its capped 60 FPS frame rate, there have been reports of stuttering and slow down in certain areas of the game world at this resolution. We would recommend keeping things locked to 1440p for that perfect mix of visual fidelity and smooth performance. At the time of writing, Elden Ring does not currently support DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) meaning you're solely ha🐻ving to rely on the native performance of the video card. 

With that said, this GPU for Elden Ring is ideal for most people, and we've seen 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3060 Ti prices begin to come down🉐 from what they were throughout the majority of the previous year.

• Check US RTX 3060 Ti stock:  |  |  |  
• Check UK RTX 3060 Ti stock: | |  |  |  

High-end graphics card for Elden Ring

If you're after a high-end graphics card for Elden Ring then the RTX 3080 is all you're going to need to experience the world of The Lands Between in stable 4K60. 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 stock is available with ei♉ther 10GB (including the Founders Edition) or 12GB VRAM (exclusive to partners which launched in January 2022). Regardless of which m👍odel you choose, you'll have substantial overhead in order to push the graphics prowess of FromSoftware's tough-as-nails open-world action game. 

Currently, Elden Ring is capped at 60 FPS on PC and no official word has been released as to when this frame rate limiter could be lifted. What we do know, however, is that, should the day come, you can expect far higher frames with this hardware. It's currently unknown w🧸hether this one was done for console parity with Xbox Series X or PS5, though, having the game run ꦐnatively at 4K60 is sure to be enough given the pace of the title. 

If you're interested in a more thorough run-through of what this GPU can do, then our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3080 review is sure to satisfy any burning 🌊questions in grꦜeater detail. 

• Check RTX 3080 stock (US): | | |  
• Check RTX 3080 stock (UK): | | | |  

Minimum requirements graphics card for Elden Ring

The GTX 1660 Sup𒊎er is the ideal graphics card to hit the minimum recommended requirements in Elden Ring. This budget GPU features 6GB GDDR6 VRAM and a 192-bit memory bus which enables it to run Elden Ring in 1080p at 60 FPS at hig⛦h and max settings. 

1440p performance, though, is a little choppier in places, with frame rates generally hovering between 45 and 60 FPS depending on the area. We recommend keeping the resolution lower to have those frame rates consistent as 60 FPS is the w🎶ay to play the game. 

Elden Ring currently does not have support for ray tracing, though it's been rumored that a patch coming could implement the graphics rendering technology. In which case, it's worth pointing out that only RTX GPUs are capable of runꦬning ray traced shadows, global illumination, reflections, eᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚtc. 

Alternatively, the most affordable of the Ampere line-up is the perfect budget graphics card for Elden Ring due to its 8GB GDDR6 memory and respectable 128-bit memory bus, especially if you&ap💞os;re wanting to future-proof your machine a little more. 

You can find 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3050 stock substantially cheaper than the current 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3060 prices, so if you're after the best bang for your buck ahead of your Elden Ring playthrough then this could be the GPU for you. Should you want to know how this graphics card performs in other games, too, our 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:RTX 3050 review is ideal for anyone wanting further knowledge. 

Check for RTX 3050 stock (US):   | | | | |

Check for RTX 3050 stock (UK):   | | | | |  

Elden Ring's a pretty long video game, so you'll need to be comfortable for your time spent in The Lands Between. You can do so in style with the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming chairs and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming desks. And if your panel's due an upgrade, ditch your old display for one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors. 

I'll cut right to the chase and tell you that the Acer Predator Orion 7000 is easily one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PCs on the market right now. It's clear in everything from the compo🌱nents inside (doubly so when factoring in the jump to DDR5 and PCIe 5.0 support) as well as the ease-of-upgrading, too. If you'v𝔉e been after a machine that's built for the future, which has technologically relevant gear inside and stellar build quality to back it up, then this unit should be at the top of your considerations list as far as prebuilt rigs go in 2022. 

Design and Features

🍒This new iteration of the Aceꩲr Predator Orion 7000 represents a huge visual overhaul from the company's previous efforts in forgoing the tried and true design. Here, the unit has received a substantial facelift, replacing the plastic-heavy, angular nature of the past aesthetics. With this model, glass and class are the name of the game. 

The entirety of the case itself is built without the need for tools to open the side panels or tinker with the roof, which is sure to be a great🐼ly appreciated touch once those upgrade urges come into the fold. On that subject, I was taken back by just how minimalist the inside of the Acer Predator Orion 7000 was. It's common with prebuilt machines to feature specifically engineered parts in custom-made housings out of view, and yet, the guts of this PC look right at home with that of what you can build yourself - for the most part. The one exception is in the form of the in-house AIO water cooler adorned in the brand's Predator logo wi♕th ARGB compatibility, but it's overall a nice touch. 

'Modern' really is a word that describes the full package presented with the Acer Predator Orion 7000 in many respects, from the gear inside to the design ethos. The major shakeup to the formula that this new iteration brings to the table, though, is the inclusion of the super-powerful Intel Core i9-12900K, with the 12-gen Intel processors being some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming. 

Of course, that's only one side of the story, as the real star is support for PCIe 5.0 and DDR5 RAM, meaning that the Acer Predator Orion 7000 is futureproofed for years to come. This review unit features 32GB DDR5 RAM clocked at 4000 Mhz, so while it's not quite scraping the horizons of 6000 Mhz+, you're going to notice a jump up in snappiness across the board. My usual daily driver gaming PC features a♌ 3200 MHz DDR4 RAM dual channel kit, and the leap to DDR5 was immediately noticeable.

Then we get on to the RTX 3090. Though the BFGPU originally dropped back in late 2020, there's nothing outdated about this behemoth. Simply put, it's one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards for gaming, and s💙till the most powerful video card on a consumer level by quite a longshot. Armed with 24GB GDDR6X VRAM, a 384-bit memory bus, and 19 Gbps bandwidth, there's very little that can challenge this card, yet. While we've seen a few games with more demanding video memory requirements creeping up in the past year, you're still not going to need anywhere near this much for a very, very long time.

Performance

Here's what it comes down to, as the Acer Prဣedator Orion 7000's performance is nothing short of exceptional. Given the prowess of the hardware, thou💦gh, that's unlikely to be much of a shock. As you may expect, pairing the most powerful graphics card and processor on the market together makes short work of just about anything you throw its way. I use minimal hyperbole when I say that very little stands in the path of this machine's capabilities, as our benchmarks show.

I was blown away by just how efficiently the Acer Predator Orion 7000 handled itself through all the industry-standard benchmarks, with numbers that were previously unimaginable just a few short years ago. The only real caveat, especially for a rig that costs this much, is i🌄n the Gen 4.0 SSD its🍬elf. 

The 1TB stick, which appears to be a proprietary model, certainly holds its own as far as performance potential goes, though, it would have been better to have a drive inside that was capable of at least 7,000 MB/s read and 6,800 MB/s write, though the figures are more-than-respectable in-game and when booting Windows. You would think for such a high-end rig that 2TB would be included, but the SSD🌱 included does the job well. 

Of course, gaming performance is the most vital element of high-end gaming PCs, and all those shiny components would mean nothing if the Acer Predator 7000 chugged and stuttered in the more demanding titles on the platform. You'll be relieved to hear that this rig absolutely decimates our line-up of benchmarking games in 2160p (4K) and all con♔ventional resolutions for gaming in 2022. 

Should you have access to either one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors or 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best 4K monitor for gaming, you're going to be very happy with the visuals that can be pumped out here. The framerates on offer genuinely surprised mꦐe in my extensive testing sessions. I'll preface no🃏w for the sake of parity that all games that can support DLSS were tested in 'Performance' mode in order to attain a consistent average across the board, and the numbers are nothing short of incredible.

With a few exceptions, as has been noted, the Acer Predator Orion 7000 was pretty comfortable cranking out frame ✅rates of 60+ FPS with ray-traced games maxed out in 4K. It's a feat that was previo😼usly unthinkable with titles such as Metro Exodus (PC Enhanced Edition) and Red Dead Redemption 2 just a few short years ago. 

If you're wanting to chase higher framerates then you're going to need to drop the resolution down to🐽 1440p, and this is where the raw technical power of the RTX 3090 inside of the Acer Predator Orion 7000 comes into its own. If you have a high refresh rate monitor and want that perfect mixtu🎐re of high visual fidelity and high frames in games then this is likely to be the sweet spot. 

Having our benchmark titles exceed the 99 FPS mark with all settings t🐼urned up to 11 is seriously commendable. This metric repres🥂ents not only the power potential of the Acer Predator Orion 7000 but also demonstrates just how efficiently PCIe 5.0 and DDR5 can be when fuelled with the right hardware. 

Interestingly enough, I also completed a full playthrough of Cyberpunk 2077 at max settings in 4K with the framerate generally hovering around the 60 FPS mark. Until very recently, that's not been possible. There's something to be said for being able to explore Night City in all its visual splendor with stable performance that nothing shor𓄧t of the best components would be able to manage.

On the subject of the parts inside the Acer Predator Orion 7000, then. Despite its small size, the 120mm radiator and custom AIO liquid cooler did a stellar job of keeping the Intel Core i9-12900K temperatures down. I'm not going to pretend as though this chipset kept chill at all times, especially during in♐tensive benchmarking, peaks of anywhere near the danger zone (85 degrees and above) were very few and far between. The newest i9 isn't exactly known as the coolest processor going, though. 

That's to say nothing of൩ the PredatorSense software and its ability to overclock the CPU and dial up the fans into a kind of turbo mode. While there was the option to manually go full throttle with the case fans and pump at max, I found that the system's auto function did a decent job of knowing when to tame the heat. The only thing I can tell you is that the case fans inside are far from the quietest on the market, as you'll definitely know when overdrive is engaged. While it's no secret that this degree of hardware needs an effective cooling solution, my best advice is to let the PC itself regulate temps instead where possible. 

Overall - should you buy it? 

The Acer Predator Orion 7000 is nothing short of a triumph as far as modern, high-end PC gaming is concerned. Playing the latest titles on this rig was an absolute joy, and the transition to PCIe 5.0 definitely plays a part in that. With DDR5 RAM support, a fast Gen 4.0 SSD, and that monster of a graphics card, there's very little that this PC can't do. I can wholeheartedly recommend the Acer Predator Orion 7000 to anyone wanting a stellar experience 🌳at a premium.

How we tested the Acer Predator Orion 7000

I stress tested the Acer Predator Orion 7000 over a several-day period to see how it would fare in a string of industry-standard tests as well as some of the more demand💧ing games on the market. This included extensive benchmarking in the likes of Fire Strike, Time Spy, PC Mark 10, and thꦛe others listed above. 

I also used the Acer Predator Orion 7000 as a PC gamer in a series of video games available through Steam, Origin, Epic, and Ubisoft Connect, having this rig temporarily replace my own setup. 2160p was prioritized over 1440p and 1080p, with the unit rigged up to a 27-inch 4K monitor most of the time. This machine was also benched on both a high refresh rate 144ꦡ0p display and a 1080p panel, too.

I've been involved with PC hardware for over seven years - since the days of the 4th gen Intel Core CPUs an🎀d the GTX 900 series. I have also had my hands on the vast majority🐲 of components and gear in this time, too. 

Buy if... 

• You want to experience high-end 4K gaming
• You want a futureproofed PC that's ready for tomorrow's games
• You want to be able to upgrade your machine 

Don't buy if... 

• You would rather build a rig yourself 
• You have no interest in 4K gaming
• If you need to stick to a lower budget

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The deepeไst discount available in the Intel processor deals is reserved for the Intel Core i7-12700K which is retailing for just for a massive saving of $113.26. This deal marks the firs🍌t time that the coveted current-gen CPU has been available for under the $400 mark. The previous historic lowest ever price was $405, so you're saving an additional $22 here. 

Also of note is the Intel Core i9-12900KF which returns to its historic lowest price of only - for a hefty discount of $87.25. We&a♈pos;ve seen the Intel Core i9-12900KF consistently climb back to MSRP, especially through December and early January, so we don't recommend waiting for too long on this one. 

Intel's 12th generation processors are the latest flagship models. Scroll down below to find out more information and make huge savings of some of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best CPUs for gaming in 2022. 

Today's best Intel 12th gen processor deals

Intel's 12th generati🌠on of processors are significant for being the first chipsets to support DDR5 memory for the fastest gaming performance possible. 

If you've had your mind set on forging a future-proofed machine running the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best RAM for gaming, then either the i7 or i9 chipsets are hard to beat at the current price point. Do keep in mind, that the 'KF' series does not feature integrated Intel UHD graphics processing, requiring a discrete GPU, such as one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics cards for gaming. 

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Add Corsair's Vengeance DDR5 RAM into the equation and this is certainly a next generation rig. The Corsair ONE i300 is also available in Ryzen 9 and Intel i7 and i9 processors, with cheaper DDR4 options as well. Today's flagship, however, will ship with an RTX 3080 or RTX 3080🎶 Ti GPU, 32-64GB of DDR5, an﷽d a 2TB SSD. 

• 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Best gaming PC: check out the top desktops available now

The 🦂12th generation Alder Lake chipset has been available in select forms since November, including the 12900K featured in the new ONE i300. While new chips are expected for the start of 2022, this is currently th♒e top of the range.

That newfangled DDR5 RAM has been on the market since late 2021, but it's still going to be a while until it's commonplace on a motherboard. Corsair's Vengeance DDR5 was released back in October and has been implemented in one of the brand&ap🥀os;s desktop PCs for the first time with ONE i300.

The Corsair ONE i300 is now available to order direct from the brand's site. However, y🐲ou might have to break a few piggy banks to get your hands on this star-studded ensemble, prices on the flagship i9-12900K model . 

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But the, let’s call it hardware, on this list takes Doom to a whole new level. Here are 15 things that prove that Doom will run on lite𝓀rally anything.

Twitter

If you use Twitter, it's probably a sizeable part of your daily routine, such is the all-consuming nature of social media. ♚Now, among the news, advertising, and 'discourse' that fills your feed, you can, if you desire, find Doom Guy. Because of course you can. Powered by the , you can now play Doom directly through Twitter, by way of painstaking tweets that reflect a basic scripting language, that can be extended across tweet threads. Clear as mud? Here's some of that fairly chaoti꧋c fare in motion:

A pregnancy test

Yes, Doom is now playable on a pregnancy test. With its monochrome pixel 128 x 32 display, it's a teeny tiny way to get stuck into the classic FPS. Programmer Foone replaced the existing CPU and swapped out the LED d🌜isplay for OLED since a pregnancy test couldn't run the game as is. Controlled using a keyboard, Pregnancy Test Doom is certainly one of the more unusual ways to take on the role of Doom Guy. 

100 pounds of mouldy potatoes 

Beyond that incredibl🌊e sub-header and image, there's not much more we can say here that enterprising YouTuber hasn't already. Technically, this is Doom running on a TI-84 graphing calculator, powered by 770 slices of slowl𓄧y rotting potatoes, but, come on, this is pretty incredible. Over you, Equalo and thank you for your service. 

An Apple watch 

Simultaneously as impressive as it is impractical. 🃏This is what happens when tech people have a hackathon. On the one hand it’s amazing that what was the peak of gamiꦕng in 1995 now runs on *a watch* but on the other, it’s not entirely a practical way to play the game. 

A portable plate edge bevelling machine

because it is just a big computer, albeit one that adds PVC strips to furniture on an industrial scale. Still, let’s not underestiꦚmate the skill involved in making Doom run on a something m🅷ore used to applying the finishing touches to showers and kitchen cupboards.

A Macbook touch bar

Probably the least practical Doom hack ever, creating a version of the game that apꦜpears to be in a 100:10 aspect ratio. Kudos for getting it to work, but it looks like a visual representation of a migr♊aine and probably plays like one too.

A printer

W🗹hat’s int🅺eresting here is that was actually part of an experiment to show security exploits in wireless printers. It was, at one point, possible to force a firmware update on a printer and make it run any software - spying stuff for example to sneak a look at what was being printed. Or, in this case, a version of Doom. 

A graphics calculator 

Graphics calculators are good at one thing mainly: graphical calculation. In terms of innards they don’t have half the things you’re supposed to need 🐻to do this, like loads of RAM or a GPU, which makes a working version of Doom here more witchcraft than anything else. Apparently it drains the batteries in minutes. 

On a single key

The Optimus Maximus was a $1500 keyboard that had a programmable screen on every single key. The idea was you could map just about any lettering or symbols to it depending on the game you were playing. And, if we’ve learned anything so far, is that anything with a screen will be forced to run Doom. In this case . 

Public access tablets

I’m not sure this is what New York had in mind when it provided hundreds of public kiosks to give people free computer access and WiFi. Still, if it can run Doom, it should. This isn’t a true hack, though, as it’s really just playing an online emulator via a browser, but it counts ꧋all the same. 

This old Sony phone

It might not play any sound but this old Sony K-800i apparently “.” It’s made possible by patching the firmware to let the phone run custom 📖executable files. Like Doom. Because what else are you going to do with phone from 2006, call someone? 

On a camera

What’s most impressive about this is that the 1998 Kodak DC260 digital camera is almost as old as Doom itself. A lot🍰 of things on this list work because time moves on and there’s now enough power in a watch to run a game that originally needed an entire PC. Bonus points for the fact that this has a TV out as well if you want a bigger screen. 

On an old iPod

Not just an old iPod, but a Nano at that, for extra showing off. This is probably a hack you could do yourself if you had one lying around🔯, as there’s an guide detailing the steps needed to do it. 

An ATM

Not having any of the right buttons has certainly nev🍸er stopped anyone running Doom on a thing. So an ATM? Sure, whatever. As well as getting the game working on a cash machine, these ambitious hackers have also got it using the ♎buttons on the side of the screens, swapping the $10, $20 money options for pistol, shotgun and so on. 

Doom

There are so many different versions of Doom now that alm♍ost anyth꧟ing is possible, including GZDoom, an open source port that includes support for arcade machines capable of playing other games. Like Doom. In Doom. Doom squared, if you like. Yes it is a bit Inception-y.