Shopping for the best gaming PCs can be really intimidating, especially if you're not used to all the confusing component names and high prices. Things get even more complicated when you start to realize that the options in the US are a totally separate bag from what we get here in the UK, and two computers of the same name can vary wildly from one retailer to another. Luckily, I've been testing as many prebuilt systems ꦐand gaming PC components as I can, and I've pulled together a list of the ones that are worth your investment.
My goal is to narrow down your search and make things as simple as possible. Prebuilt gaming PCs are the plug-and-play alternative to building from scratch, and although they used to be looked ♛down on, I can feel the winds beginning to change. Naturally, you're always going to get some purists who will tell you building is the only way, but their fears of prebuilt systems have mostly eroded in the last five years or so. No longer do they all use proprietary parts or prevent you from swapping components out. For the most part, they come without bloatware or loads of preinstalled nonsense you don't actually need. After all, Windows 11 has that regardless of whether you build or buy.
If I can offer you one bit of advice before we get into the entries on the list below, it's to think about futureproofing. A new gaming PC can be a daunting investment, so I wouldn't blame you for aiming at the budget end of the scale. Th✱at's totally fine, but to make sure your investment is worthwhile, be certain that the motherboard you choose has a CPU socket that can see some upgrꦕades if you want them down the line. Try to get something with room to grow you can upgrade the parts you want to later on, because chances are, you might want to the more you play.
The new Predator Orion X🌱 takes the power and pedigree of previous Orion builds and channels it into a smaller chassis. Th𝔉is is one of the best there is.
The Refract Gaming Jade is frequently discounted below its MSRP, and with a 4060 Ti and Ryzen 7♊ 7700 inside, there's a lot of valu﷽e to be had from it.
The HP Omen 35L is the sequel ꦦto a true s𝔍taple of the PC market, and its wide availability combined with premium parts makes it a must-consider in the UK.
The Alienware Aurora R16 points to a brightꦜ new future for the brand. It looks lℱike a conventional gaming PC, and it still plays like something out of this world.
The refreshed 13th Gen Acer Predator Orion 7000 isn't perfect, but if you can afford something at the premium end of the scale, the 7000 can pack some serious power🐻.
After a growing obsession with too many games designed to be played on PC, I started getting nerdy about computers in 2019. In 2020 I bought my first gaming PC, and I found out f📖irst-hand how tricky it can be to balance price and power. Since joining GamesRadar+ in 2022, I've been testing all sorts of gaming PCs and components, even building a few systems of my own. I love breaking down the specs of a prebuilt machine seeing how it performs, and working out which brand is worth your hard-earned cash.
Recent updates
Thursday, May 29:After adding the HP Omen 35L to this list last month, it's a quieter update this time around. I've refreshed the order of the list so that the new mid-range competitor is easier to access, and I've added an answer to the question "which gaming PC should I buy in the UK?" This is a frequently asked question, according to Google, and probably comes because people think the rigs they see people use in the US aren't available here. That can be true, since a lot of manufacturers will only supply one territory, often not bridging the Atlantic divide. But the parts in those PCs people covet are available here, either by themselves or in different computers.
Acer Predator Orion X | Acer Predator Rift Gaming Chair | In this bundle offer from Currys, you can get a new gaming chair along w🌟ith your new gaming PC. We've reviewed both parts of this bundle and we're amazed at the quality on offer. You even save a generous £200 on the combined price.
The Acer Predator Orion X is one of the most innovative, powerful, and compact PCs we've had the pleasure of testing. This is a small form factor build, but one that acts nothing like an ITX build at all. If you can afford this little monster, it's the best preb🍌uilt gaming PC in the UK right now.
Buy it if:
✅ You want a small PC. This is a small form factor build, which means it'll actually fit on top of your desk ꦑif you want it to.
✅ You want something quiet. The liquid cool♋ing 💯in this rig is especially good, meaning that even when the PC is working hard, you're not going to hear it struggle like you would a bulking great mass of a computer.
✅ You're aiming for 4K. An RTX 4080 is a seriously powerful GPU. Combined with an Intel Core i9, you're goinꦓg to have gaming power for days if you want to play in 4K.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You need a fast SSD. The SSD hereไ is particularly weak, so keep that in mind if you're going💟 to splash out.
❌ You want to upgrade a familiar machine. The layout of this PC's innards is a bit confusing and is like no regular ATX motherboard we've worked with. If you plan to upgrade, you 💙might need to study it closelꦿy first.
❌ You're on a budget. Annoyingly, this PC only comes with some of the beefiest, and most expensive parts on the market, so you're going to struggle to afford it if you don'tꦕ have a serious budget to play with.
Design & Features: Contrary to larger Orion 7000 gaming PCs, the Orion X is remarkably quiet thanks 🍌to an AIO cooler 😼that uses a mix of water and air to keep its innards cool. It works surprisingly well, and it would need to since the configuration we tested comprises an unlocked 13th Gen i9 processor and an RTX 4080 GPU.
Despite these being some of the beefiest components you can buy for PCs at the moment, they're housed in a chassis which is as quirky and inventive as ITX cases get. There are three "zones♒" 𝄹in the chassis to direct you to different components of the rig, and while this is excellent for cramming big components inside it, it may prove quite difficult to operate on if you want to upgrade it later on.
Performance: Regardless, in general use, gaming, and content creation, this PC performed brilliantly and outshone the larger Orion 7000 in terms of quality of life and value. This is cheaper and arguably perfor🦄ms better thanks to that AOI cooler. There's next to no noise pollution and it won't take up all the space underneath your desk.
Moreover, there's very little you can throw an RTX 4080 at and not win when gaming. the visuals you'll be able to muster up at high frame rates are breathtaking, and combined with an i9 there's so much legroom to play and 🍨create in 4K. Rather bizarrely, the SSD you get for your money is the worst bit - a commo🐠n theme with some prebuilds that manufacturers probably use to keep costs down. CrystalDiskMark showed us a sequential read speed of only 3,622MB/s, which isn't ideal for a PC of this price.
Still, gaming results were spectacular, with even 4K and ray traced Hitman 3 m🎀anaging to get a ben🎀chmarking score of 92fps. That test usually humbles every other rig we test, but the Orion X chewed it up and spat it back out.
For us, 💝it doesn't g🉐et much better than this in the prebuilt gaming PC world.
Refract Gaming Jade | The Refract Jade only comes in this one configuration, which makes things pretty simple! You get some great parts inside this rig for the money you pay, although the weakest part you might want to upgrade in the future is the SSD.
The Refract Gaming Jade PC is a prebuilt machine by the team at OverclockersUK, and it's taken the mantle of "best value" on 🍌this list because it can frequently be found discounted, or with fun game bundles being offered alongside it. With fairly beefy mid-range components in there, you get some great value for money, regardless of the resolution you aiꦐm to play at.
Buy it if:
✅ You want a smaller chassis. The case used here isn't quite as bulky as a lot of the rival 𝓡gaming PCs of this price range, so if you don't have a lot of space, this is for you.
✅ You want to control RGB lighting easily. We haven't heard of any ༺other gaming PCs that coꦿme with handy remotes you can control the RGB lighting with. That's a neat trick!
✅ 1440p if the resolution you're aiming for. With ཧa 4060 Ti inside, there's a lot of room to gallop at all three mainstream resolutions. Quad HD is the natural middle ground for this graphicꦦs card though.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You want a quiet PC. This is air-cooled, which means when😼 it's working harder, it's going to make a lot morಞe noise than something with an AIO inside. If you're sensitive to noise pollution, look elsewhere.
❌ A fast SSD is what you need. The weakest part of this rigꦯ is its SSD, which didn🃏't score highly when we benchmarked it.
❌ You want a better GPU for the money. The 4060 Ti is a great, and versatile GPU, but with a Ryzen 7 and 32GB of RAM, you could argue for the money a 💙4070 would fit better.
Design & Features: The Refract Gaming Jade comes in one configuration, and sports a Ryzen 7 7700 CPU, an RTX 4060 Ti, 32GB of DDR5, and a 1TB SSD. Its Micro ATꦺX chassis is a Kolink Citadel Glass case that won't take up loads of room under a desk or next to a TV stand. It's a real-estate effici🎉ent machine that's versatile as a result of its smaller footprint.
One downside is that it's cooled only by air. On the front, lie two intake fans which bring cool 🍌air across the motherboard. The CPU cooler is a fairly simple fan that steals some of that air before a singular exhaust fan blows it out the back. We wish there was maybe an AIO liquid cooler here to compensate the lack of a third frontal fan, but if you aren't opposed to a bit of noise pollution, this won't really be a problem.
The 650W PSU and space inside the case will allow you to customise and upgrade parts as you go. If getting in about your motherboard is a frequent occurrence for you, y🌠ou'll be glad to know the glass panel folds open with a simple pull, and no tools are required.
Performance: With a 4060 Ti inside, there's capable gaming performance to be had from the Jade at any of the three resolutions. At 1080p, you've got something that will frequently spit out triple digit framerates, and at 1440p, you're going to find a lot of sweet spots between graphical fidelity and smooth gameplay. There is some room at the top for 4K gaming, if that's your thing. Just remember that with only 8GB of VRAM you're going to need to use DLSS more, or fo🐟rgo ray tracing to really get playable frame rates. Still, you can see from the table below that in Shadow of the Tomb Raider with DLSS and max 4k settings, the Jade was still able to get over the 60fps mark.
Unfortunately, the SSD inside the Ja𝄹de does let the side down, as our CrystalDiskMark benchmarking tests only produced a 5,227MB/s sequential read speed, and 4,823MB/s write speed. That's a disappointment for any gaming PC over a grand, and it's definitely the part of this machine we'd recommend upgrading first.
Great performance across 4K, 1440p, and 1080p resolutions
+
Easy to upgrade
+
Simple to setup and use
+
Quality mid-to-high range PC
+
Lots of availability
Reasons to avoid
-
The price is quite high
-
Only one HDMI port
-
WD Blue SSD isn’t the fastest
-
No AIO cooler as standard
Our favourite configuration:
HP Omen 35L | If you're wanting something pretty affordable but still want decent bang for your buck, ♓you'll do well wi🎉th this configuration of the HP Omen 35L at Very. It sports an RTX 4060 and Ryzen 5 8500G, which I deem one of the best value processors on the shelves right now.
The HP Omen 35L is a refinement of this well-established range of prebuilt gaming PCs. It brings the design and power of HP's desktops into the modern era, with more color, more efficient cooling, and updated parts. Like with the older HP Omen 30L, 25L, and 40L machines, this is available across multiple retailers and at a lot of differ🍷ent prices. For us, it's hard to find a more versatile and readily available mid-range PC you can always bet on.
Buy it if:
✅ You want mid-range specs: Let's be honest, affording the highest tier components is impossible for the majority ꦏof us. But that doesn't mean being confined to the budget aisle. The 35L mak♍es mid-range power accessible.
✅ You don't know your PC brands that well: It can be hard to trust lesser-known brands ๊if🌟 you're new to the market, and luckily, the Omen rigs use well-known partner brands to bolster their power.
✅ You want something reasonably sized: Our reviewer found 𓄧this appropriate to sit next to his TVꦿ, as well as under his desk.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You want the best deal: If you look hard enough, you can find cheaper PCs than this.𒉰 That said, there are few big-name brands you'll see discounted as often as the꧙ 35L.
❌ You want a speedy SSD: Th♈e storage drive in this PC is fine, but it's not up there with the best of the best. If you do a lot of content creation or just want the fastest loadi🎐ng times, look elsewhere.
❌ You only have a 60Hz display. If you aren't going to make 🅘the most of the modern power in this PC, ꧒you could get a console for cheaper.
Design & Features: The HP Omen 35L was a welcome sight when it arriv🐟ed lꦿate in 2024. The HP Omen desktops have been around for a while now, and I've always been a fan of them because they combine great power and solid components with a wider availability than most big-name PC brands. The 35L replaces the older 30L, which was discontinued after it found itself in a tricky position between the existing 25L and 40L rigs.
The 35L's main goal was to make cooling more efficient, make it quiღeter, and manage to cram some modern mid-range configurations in for reasonable prices. It absolutely achieves that, especially on the cooling front. New Omen fans are a standout, the case now looks more lively, and although I have my reservations about an A🐭IO cooler not coming as standard, I'm glad noise pollution is better than it used to be.
What's great about the design of the Omen PCs is that you can find them from so many sellers. Although CPUs and GPUs may vary, you'll a💯lways find the same motherboard, Kingston RAM, and WD storage.
Performance: The version of this PC we tested for review sports an RTX 4070 Super combined with a Ryzen 7 8700G processor. That is truly the epitome of a mid-range combination in this day and age, and one you can expect to deliver excellent, playable frame rates, regardless of the resolution you want to pla🐼y at. It's these sorts of CPU and GPU pairings that mak꧒e the mid-range market so competitive, and with HP's Omen 35L casting its net wide at so many retailers online, you're bound to get a good deal on one.
It finally feels as though 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware is turning a new leaf, and although🐭 the brand revealed a PC at CES 2025 that, for once, doesn't use proprietary parts, the journey toward convention began with the Aurora R16. We were thrilled to see this PC when it was first revealed, because it held onto the space theming this brand is known for while leaning more into a convenient, compact package that's far easier to grapple 💖with. We weren't disappointed when we got our hands on it, because it's the best Alienware PC we've tested.
Buy it if:
✅ You don't plan to upgrade anything anytime soon: Alienware PCs are infamous for their inability to accept new component upgrades that are💎n't made by Alienware. If you plan to do some surgery down the line, this isn't the make for you.
✅ You don't mind paying a bit more: There's no way around the fact that Ali💯enware charges a lot for its PCs. Sometimes you can find a good deal, but a lot of the time you'll be paying a premium versus other brands.
✅ You want great cooling: One benefit of Alienware is that you'reꦜ guaranteed to get great cooling, regardless of the components that come in your build.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You're on a tight budget: Honestly, there sometimes are good deals, but a lot of the time you're paying more fo🅠r parts that shouldn't cost as much as t༒hey do.
❌ You've heard that Alienware is the only prebuilt brand out there: It used to be the case that Alienware was the best gaming PC brand out there, and some people still mi🤪ght feel that way. I think the market has expanded🔯 though, and there are other options worth considering.
Design & Features: The last 🦹few iterations of the Aurora PC have had a tilted chassis design and a lot of quirks, which you'd expect from this brand. The R16 case is shaped like a regular-old gaming PC, although it's a smaller size than the majority of them. Nevertheless, it still has some out-of-this-world personality thanks to its clever ventilation and ambient lighting.
The Alienware Command Centre is still here to help you navigate all your games and adjust various settings. This app comes pre-installed and also helps you control RGB colors. You'll find all sorts of configurations available, with the ability to swap out parts on Dell's retail page so you can determine what area of the motherboard you want to spend the most on. Most of the time you'll find Intel's 14th generation of processors running the show alongside Nvidia 40 Series GPUs. DDR5 comes as standard though, and although itဣ's a cheaper option, we'd try and steer clear of the builds that only pack a 500GB SSD. For how much you'll inevitably pay for one of this brand's PCs, you deserve more storage than that.
Performance: We wanted to see what kind of things this latest Alien spaceship was capable of, so we reviewed the top-end configuration that features an RTX 4090. We've gone hands-on with that GPU quite a lot by now, but paired with an Intel Core ♛i9-13900K, it had a lot of room to gallop. Perhaps most impressively, the Aurora R16's Dyson-like fans managed toꦉ keep things cool and not too loud. The processor didn't peak past 90°C during our tests, which is great for a processor that we've seen get to boiling point in other rigs.
For some more detailed performance figures, ch♋eck the graphs below. As you can imagine, there's nღot much an RTX 4090 and 13900 processor can't handle with ease.
Acer Predator Orion 5000 | This may have the 🎀number 5000 at the end of it, but it's still the same PC packed into the same case. Compared to our review configuration, which sported an RTX 4090, this is a little scaled back, but it means a more affordable price, which isn't always the easiest to find for a well-known brand like Acer.
The Acer Predator Orion 7000 has been a mainstay of this list for a few years now, once holding the top spot for its excellent performance and lovely case design. A new version of this PC is coming in 2025 which alleviates 𒐪a lot of the issues I currently have with it, which is exciting. Fortunately, those issues don't spoil the mood for what we have right now.
Buy it if:
✅ You want power. The upper allowance of con൩figurations here is wild, and the version we tested is a testament to that. If you want the beefiest parts, this is a reliable option.
✅ You are okay with a more up-to-date version being available. We haven't tested it yet, and it isn'🍌t out yet, but there is a redesign𝔍 of this PC coming soon that may fix many of the problems we had with it.
✅ You don't mind paying a bit more. Acer has some great options on the shelvꦜes, but thཧey aren't always the cheapest.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You want something quiet. This is up there with the noisiest PCs we𓂃've ever tested,ꦑ so keep that in mind.
❌ You want good temperature control. I'm not joking, even with all the f♛an noise, you'll still have to deal with a lot of high temperatures.
❌ You hate proprietary software. It's not super intrusive, but you will need to deal with 💦the odd bit of software that's pre-installed on Acer's computers.
Design & Features: The Acer Predator Orion 7000 is a big boy.ꦓ It's got plenty of transparent paneling so that you can enjoy the various RGB parts within, and at the front ,you'll find two fans blowing their hardest to keep things cool.
Acer is slowly getting to a point whe🀅re it uses all of its oꦺwn components, which is an interesting direction to go in seeing as Alienware is headed the other way. Until Acer gets some RAM out the door though, you'll find Adata providing memory for these builds, with Nvidia and Intel seeing to the headliners.
Predator Sense is the app that will come pre-installed, helping to control cooling, performance modes, and lighting. It's slowly been♏ getting better over the last few years, but I get the impression the next update in 2025's Orion models will be the one to really look out for. H𝄹opefully, that updates to older models too because from the small demos I've seen, it looks a lot better to navigate.
Easily, the worst thing about this build is its volume, so 🔯let's talk about it.
Performance: This PC has a transparent front, and I feel like it's dying for a more efficient design. The fans make an ♕absolute racket trying to keep this machine cool, and you may have heard jokes about airpla🏅nes on runways, but that's actually what this sounds like. It is stupidly loud, and even the version with an AIO cooler I tested wasn't efficient enough to keep the temperatures of a 13th gen i9 CPU at bay.
That said, there's a lot of power to be had in this machine, and if you invest in a good headset, you should have more than enough to enjoy. I am a bit ꩵsurprised that this was the first Acer PC to ship with DDR5 RAM out of the box, and yet the motherboard and BIOS had no allowance for fiddling with XMP settings. Luckily that's something that💧 was remedied with the Orion X, so maybe a BIOS update would help.
Framerates suffer in 1080p and outside of Turbo preset
Our favourite configuration:
Asus ROG Ally |AMD Ryzen™ Z1 Extreme Processor | The best price we can find for the 💜Ally in the UK right now without going pre-owned is from John Lewis. We have seen the Z1 Extreme model go on offe🅷r for less money, but at this time of year we'll settle for MSRP.
By this point, you'll probably have heard about the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Steam Deck. At this point, you'll probably have heard, or seen one of its rivals too, because they're coming from all angles at the moment. The 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming handheld for us at the moment is the Asus ROG Ally. Although it's now got a more powerful sibling in the form of the Ally X, the 🥀Ally remains the best option for most PC players, since only the most power-hungry will be in need of the X's additional oomph.
Buy it if:
✅ You want a Switch that's synced to your Steam library. All the novel🌊ties of the Nintendo Switch are here, but you can also clear the backlog you have in your Steam library while playing. Just imagine that.
✅ You miss handheld play. Taking games on the go is a real novelty, and for once, you w🦹on't have is🙈sues running the games you already play at home when you're commuting.
✅ You don't plan to run super demanding games on it. There are ܫlimits to how far the ROG Ally can go, even with the Z1 Extreme processor. If you plan t💛o play the really demanding games, maybe look at the Ally X instead and try your luck there.
Don't buy it if:
❌ You'll only play at home. It sort of goes without saying, but you c🧜ould put the money toward a laptop or desktop if you're never going to actually use a handheld.
❌ You want SteamOS. If it's the true Steam Deck experience you want, you mighꩲt as well go for the Steam Deck, or one of the other 🍒portable PCs which run it.
Design & Features: You'll find a 7-inch, 120Hz display aboard the ROG Ally, and it can be operated with touch, or with handheld controls. Naturally, if you find a dock for it you'll be able to hook up a mouse and keyboard, or any other p🐓eripherals that are compatible with Windows systems. If you know of the Nintendo Switch, you'll be familiar with the design here, although it's not locked to only Nintendo accessories, and there aren't detachabl🦄e controllers on either side.
The ROG Ally runs on an AMD APU, which is a combined GPU and CPU. The architecture is very similar to those found in laptops, and it's more than enough to kick great gaming performance out to a small display you can take with you to work. There are two back buttons to help you control things as well and a handy version of Armory Crate to collate all of your gaming librari🐠es into one menu.
Performance: If you don't believe that a portable PC is capable of keeping up with today's games, you might be shocked to learn that the ROG Ally can run games like Cyberpunk 2077 at 60fps🍬, and that's using the same resolution as the Steam Deck. In full 1080p, you'll be able to scale settings to fidelity or performance as you would on a console, but itꦛ's no lie that this type of gadget has a lot of power up its sleeves.
The ROG Ally is our pick for best portable gaming PC right now because it packs a lot of power while granti💜ng all the same Windows 11 benefits your normal PC would. It's extremely💛 versatile in that way, although that does mean it isn't as well optimized for portable play as SteamOS is.
Best gaming PCs - frequently asked questions
What is the price of a good gaming PC?
Generally, a good gaming PC can start as cheap as £800-£1,000 depending on what you want to do with it. If you're after one of the best gaming PCs on a budget for 1080p, then it's entirely possible to get a rig in this price range. Things become more complicated when you add 1440p and 4K gaming into the mix, generally hanging around the £1,500 mark depending on the m🐷anufacturer.
(Image credit: Future / Duncan Robertson)
What is the best PC for gaming?
There are many great gaming PC brands out there in the prebuilt space including Asus, HP, Corsair, and Alienware. In terms of the best of them, that is going to depend on the end-user, as many different PC gamers have different requirements. We've found that Acer and HP make the best mid-range models, with Alienware and 𝄹Corsair cornering the high-end market.
What gaming PC should I buy in the UK?
While often the brands𝔉 and builders can be different in the UK versus the US, the parts we have access to tend to be the same. To tell you the truth, a lot of the builders actually make the same sort of prebuilt machines, so you should always shop for the specs you need and compare prices for the best deal, instead of sticking with just one brand. That said, we enjoyed our hands on time with machines from Acer, HP Omen, Refract gaming, and Asus.
Is it cheaper to build your own computer?
A couple of years ago it genuinely was cheaper to build your own system with your chosen components instead of opting for a premium prebuild. However, pre-built machines may be the cheaper option in the coming weeks, now that a new 40 series of GPUs is being released. As new machines with those 40 series graphics cards are assembled by manufacturers, it's much more likely that our current picks for best gaming PC that 🎃house 30 series cards will drop down in pric꧒e.
This is your computer's brain. CPU stands for Central Pr✤ocessing Unit and it's the component that will manage all of the tasks you ask your computer to run, including games, apps, browsing, and a lot of content creation too. Even if the GPU is 𒁃more powerful when it comes to gaming, the CPU is the boss of the PC, so it's worth investing in.
There are two manufacturers you need to know about, and they're AMD and Intel. Intel has been the top dog for years, but AMD is really asserting itself in the conversation these days due to the amount of ♑gaming power its CPUs have for the amount of money they cost.
Motherboard
If a C♔PU is a brain, then the motherboard can be compared to your computer's skeleton. It's the part that brings together all of your components, and its anatomy can determine what you'll be able to use with it. Different sizes of motherboards exist, and lots of different brands manufacture them. Each maker will integrate a basic form of software onto their boards, and this is called a BIOS.
GPU / Graphics Card
The GPU, or graphics processi🌸ng unit, is often thought of as the main character when it comes to a gaming PC. It's the main spec that will determine the general ওprice of your rig because depending on which one you get, you'll have more or less power when playing in certain resolutions. A GPU is essentially a computer within a computer that has its own memory and everything. Its processor is dedicated to running your gaming tasks and boosting visuals out to a display, but it still needs other parts to really function.
In terms of brands, you need to know about Nvidia, AMD, and Intel. Nvidia is the dominant force in consumer GPUs today, known for spearheading the use of AI upscaling. DLS🏅S, FSR, and XeSS are all forms of the same thing. T𒆙hey generate extra frames by upscaling images to a desired resolution, which ups your gaming performance.
RAM / Memory
RAM is short for Random Access Memory, and it's like your computer's short-term memory. It pulls data from you💯r storage that you're currently using, or your system predicts you might use so that it can feed it to your processor quicker.
The current generation of RAM is DDR5. It's capable 🔯of much faster speeds than DDR4, you just need to keep in mind that it requires a new generation of motherboard than DDR4, which creates a lot of issues for people wanting to upgrade.
SSD / Storage
SSD stands for solid-state drive, and it actually uses the same architecture as RAM does to give you speedy access to your files and data. When it comes to gam෴ing, this all comes down to loading times as sequential read and writ🎀e speeds will determine how quickly data can be processed, or accessed by RAM.
NVMe M.2 SSDs are the ones you'll find in prebuilt gaming PCs. Some oꦕlder, more inefficient options include SATA and HDD, but these are really outperformed by SSDs today, and they should only really be used as additional forms of sto♐rage.
Case / Chassis
The case is the th♔ing that houses all ﷽of your PC's components, and ideally, makes them look pretty using RGB and transparent paneling.
There are a few different sizes of chassis you can find these days, and the most frequently used is ATX. This is a traditional case that uses one or two transparent sides and houses a regular-sized motherbo♕ard. You also get ITX, smaller cases that 🎀tend to be more quirky in order to fit large components into a smaller footprint. If you want the biggest size possible you'll probably look at EATX.
Each case will have differing airflow too, which i﷽s something to consider if you're upg💙rading or trying to make a PC more efficient.
AIO cooler
Some PCs only use the air from fans to cool their components. Air will come in one way, travel across the components, and exhaust fans will remove hot air. This can be efficient if set up correctly, but it can be loud, and more demanding components require better forms of cooling. An AIO cooler is short for an all-in-one👍 cooler. It combines the power of air-cooling, liquid cooling, and a radiator to contrꦛol your computer's temperatures, but it's also great for keeping volume levels to a minimum.
How we test gaming PCs
For a full rundown of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how we test gaming PCs, you can click the link, or check out our full 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:hardware policy. But in case you're curious, I'll give you a brief rundown here. Before we come to a verdict and write up a review, gaming PCs that are sent to us go through some rigorous testing. We'll make PCs sweat to see what they're like when they're working harder than most people will actually require them to because it ༺gives us a benchmark of what each computer is like when it works all out. But that's only o🀅ne part of the testing process, and the majority of our assessment is done by living with the technology as if it were our own.
That means using it like we would our own PCs. Playing games, working on, creating content on, and using whatever review product we have in for whatever we're up to. This can result in some demanding use in its own right. Using VPNs to navigate all the biggest US stores to find the best deals, or creating content and tryiꦇng to squeeze every drop of performance out of the new games we're playing.
Then, th😼e formal testing begins. Software benchmarks using industry-standard programs are often the best way to kick things off because we want to test each of the components in turn⛎ to paint a picture of what could be holding it back, or what's working overtime. To test the CPU, we'll use Cinebench, to test the RAM, we'll check out some numbers and XMP profiles in the BIOS, as well as CPU-Z. SSD testing is done with CrystalDiskMark, and we use 3DMark to run a PC through its gaming paces.
Then, it's onto our suite of demanding benchmarking games. These are Hitman World of Assassination, Total War: Warhammer 3, Returnal, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and Cyberpunk 2077. We use these titles, not only because they give systems a particularly hard time to run, but because they come with their own benchmarking tests integrated into settings menus. We use these because they provide a standardized, fair examination of how each rig compares to another. We'll collect result🍷s from running these at different resolutions, with maximum settings, and toggle things like ray tracing and DLSS.
One of my earliest memories is playing SuperMario64 and wondering why the controller I held had three grips, but I only had two hands. Ever since I've been in love with video games and their technology. After graduating from Edinburgh Napier University with a degree in Journalism, I contributed to the Scottish Games Network and completed an Editorial Internship at Expert Reviews. Over the last decade, I’ve 🎉been managing my own about my love of games too. These days, I'm one of the resident hardware nerds at GamesRadar+, and I take th🐽e lead on our coverage of gaming PCs, VR, controllers, gaming chairs, and content creation gear. Now, I better stop myself here before I get talking about my favourite games like HUNT: Showdown, Dishonored, and Towerfall Ascension.
