Alienware Aurora R13 Review: Alder Lake Alien
Tom’s Hardware Verdict
Alienware’s Aurora R13 is an attractive, capable and quiet gaming PC with lots of front-panel USB ports. We just wish it had better CPU cooling for serious productivity tasks.
Pros
- +
Very quiet when gaming
- +
Lots of convenient front IO
- +
Capable gaming and bursty productivity performance
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With AMD’s Ryzen 7000 CPUs, Intel’s 13th Gen Raptor Lake, plus new high-end GPUs from both Nvidia and AMD seemingly right around the corner, right now may not be the best time to buy a new gaming desktop. Then again, if you’ve been waiting years to buy a gaming rig thanks to GPU availability issues surrounding crypto mining and the pandemic, you might be pretty sick of waiting. And it seems highly likely that we’ll only see fresh graphics cards on the very high-end ($900 plus) this year anyway.
For those who care more about getting a gaming rig now than waiting for reasonably affordable next-gen parts to become available, Alienware’s Aurora R13 is an attractive, powerful option.
Its primary downsides are a 120 mm all-in-one cooler that, while sufficient for gaming, doesn’t handle heavy CPU workloads well on higher-end Alder Lake CPUs. Also, as we’ll detail later, stock of our $3,450 MSRP review model (with a Core i7-12700KF, 64GB of RAM, 4TB of storage and an RTX 3080) was not available when we wrapped up this review. But an RTX 3080 Ti model with otherwise the same specs was selling for $90 less ($3,359). Check our Alienware promo codes to see if we can help you shave a few dollars off those prices.
Alienware Aurora R13 Specifications
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| Processor | Intel Core i7-12700KF |
| Motherboard | Custom Alienware Z690 (0C92D0) |
| Memory | 32GB DDR5 (4400 MHz) |
| Graphics | OEM RTX 3080 (10GB GDDR6X,1710 MHz Boost Clock) |
| Storage | 2TB Samsung PM9A1 PCIe 4. 0 NVMe M.2 SSD; 2TB Hard Drive |
| Networking | Killer E3100 Gigabit Ethernet, Killer Wi-Fi 6 AX1675x, Bluetooth 5.2 |
| Front Ports | 3x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A (5Gbps) ports, 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C (10Gbps) USB Type-C port, 3.5 mm headphone/mic combo audio jack |
| Rear Ports (Motherboard) | 4x USB 2.0 ports, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A (5 Gbps), USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C (10 Gbps), USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C (20 Gbps), Gigabit Ethernet, 6x analog audio jacks, 2x SPDIF digital audio (TOSLINK, coax) |
| Video Output (GPU) | 3x DisplayPort 1.4a, HDMI 2.1 |
| Power Supply | 750W 80 Plus Platinum |
| Cooling | 120 mm AIO CPU cooler/exhaust, 3x 140 mm fans (2x front intake, 1x top exhaust) |
| Case | Alienware Aurora R13 |
| Operating System | Windows 11 Home |
| Dimensions | 20. 1 x 23.2 x 8.86 inches / 510 x 589 x 225 mm |
| Price as Configured | $3,450 (as configured) |
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(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
- Alienware Aurora R13 at Dell for $1,249.99
In terms of aesthetics, either you like Alienware’s «Legend 2.0» design language, or you don’t. Personally, I think it’s an improvement over the boxier Aurora R11 we looked at a couple years ago. There is undoubtedly lots of plastic wrapped around the chassis’ internal steel. But the plastic at least feels rigid and of high quality. If you don’t like white (the company calls it «lunar light») there is also a black/dark gray «dark side of the moon» option that in most configurations seems to cost $50 less.
The Aurora’s case, once again, has the motherboard and other components angled upward. And Alienware really anchors down their GPU, with both a plastic bracket on the side and a metal support arm holding up the end of the card.
If you’re the type who takes your desktop with you to LAN parties (or perhaps just college), this will make damage due to the weight of the graphics card much less likely.
The primary downside of the Aurora’s design is parent company Dell’s continued use of proprietary parts. The motherboard here has an L-shaped protrusion that sticks out of the front, presenting the plethora of USB ports there. And while it’s unlikely that more than a small percentage of Aurora buyers are likely to, at some point, want to swap out their motherboards, the power supply that sits below the motherboard and GPU is also non-standard (at least for consumer PCs. Dell is using a server PSU). So if during the life of the system it fails or you need more power than the 750W available in our review unit (which you very well might with future high-end graphics cards and CPUs), that means at the very least you’ll need to get a new power supply from Dell rather than buying a standard ATX supply off the shelf of an online or brick-and-mortar store.
At a time when competitor HP and its Omen lineup (seen most recently in the Omen 45L) has moved steadily toward standardized, name-brand parts for a couple years now, it’s past time for Dell/Alienware to do something similar.
Another area that’s in sore need of a design upgrade is CPU cooling. Intel’s Alder Lake CPUs, particularly on the high end, are notoriously tough on coolers. It’s likely their Raptor Lake replacements will be kindred in that regard,. Aand AMD’s Ryzen 7000 CPUs look to be similarly thermally taxing. But the current Aurora’s cooler tops out with the 120 mm AIO that shipped with our review unit. And that won’t change without a case redesign because there’s no place for a larger radiator in the current chassis.
Ports and Upgradability of the Alienware Aurora R13
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Alienware’s Aurora R13 features more convenient front-mounted ports than most desktops. You get three 5 Gbps USB Type-A ports and a 10 Gbps USB Type-C port, alongside a single headphone/mic combo jack.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Around back, there are six analog jacks, along with optical in both TOSLINK and coax forms (for just about any conceivable audio connection option). Also there are four USB 2.0 Type-A ports (two with what Dell calls «smart power» for charging your gadgets) and two blue USB 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps) ports. Also around back are two – twice as many as we commonly see – USB Type-C ports, one of the 20 Gbps variety and one that runs at 10 Gbps. Last up is a gigabit Ethernet jack, powered by Killer (E3100). Wi-Fi 6E comes from a card on the motherboard.
The custom motherboard lacks any video ports, but the RTX 3080 GPU brings the usual three DisplayPort 1.4a ports and a single HDMI 2.1. And aside from the occupied M.2 slot in our review unit (sporting a 2TB Samsung PCIe Gen 4 SSD), the board has a second empty NVMe M.2 slot next to the Wi-Fi/Bluetooth card, near the front of the motherboard/case. And aside from the 2TB 3.5-inch hard drive that came with our system, there is an empty 2.
5-inch hard drive/SSD sled in the bottom front, along with two unoccupied SATA ports on the motherboard.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Looking at other aspects of internal expandability, you can double up the DDR5 RAM (32GB in our review unit), or swap out the two sticks here for a maximum 128GB total in the four slots. There’s also a closed-end PCIe x4 slot above the graphics card, but whatever card you consider putting in there will have to be single- slot, and shouldn’t get too warm as it will be sitting right above the GPU. All in all, for a compact mid-tower from a big-box PC maker, the expandability here is pretty good.
Gaming Performance on the Alienware Aurora R13
While Nvidia’s next-gen, high-end Ada GPUs are arriving shortly in the form of the expensive RTX 4090 and a pair of 4080s (with an AMD RDNA 3 announcement also coming in early November), the RTX 3080 in our Aurora R13 configuration is certainly no gaming slouch. I played Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands at ultra settings on my 4K monitor and averaged just under 60 fps (59.
83, to be precise). While that was enough for the game to feel smooth and plenty playable for me, you could of course dial down or turn off one or two settings, or lower the resolution to improve frame rates. That being said, the other desktops we’ve tested lately have even more gaming muscle than our configuration of the Aurora. Falcon Northwest’s compact Tiki tower paired an AMD Ryzen 5800X3D with an RTX 3080 Ti, while HP’s bigger (and better cooled) Omen 45L packed a Core i9-12900K and an RTX 3090. Lastly, Corsair’s One i300, another compact power tower, combines an i9-12900K with a 3080 Ti (and liquid cools both the CPU and GPU). All of these systems as tested sell for $1,000 or more than our Aurora review unit. The MSRP of our unit is technically $3,450, but the RTX 3080 option is currently not in stock (and it’s unclear whether it will come back in stock again). But when we wrote this, the same configuration as our unit, but with a more powerful RTX 3080 Ti, was selling for $3,359.
It’s also worth mentioning that the Aurora R13 was very quiet when gaming, which I wasn’t necessarily expecting given the 120 mm AIO that the company uses to cool the CPU. That said, as we’ll touch on later, the cooler gets quite loud when you heavily stress the CPU for any sustained length of time.
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On the Shadow of the Tomb Raider benchmark (highest settings), the Aurora R13 delivered a butter-smooth 155 frames per second (fps) at 1080p, and landed just two frames shy of 60 fps at 4K. That’s 16 fps behind the Falcon Northwest and Corsair systems at 1080p, but just 5-8fps shy of all the pricier competition at the higher 4K resolution.
In Grand Theft Auto V (very high settings), the Aurora R13 performed similarly, delivering 171 fps at 1080p and 56 fps at 4K. It was further behind the competition at 4K here, with the compact Tiki delivering 11 more fps at that resolution.
In Red Dead Redemption 2 (medium settings), the Alienware once again dipped 8-12 fps behind the competition at 1080p, while still managing a respectable 113 fps. Its 44 fps at 4K put it 6-10 fps behind its pricier peers.
On the Far Cry 6test, the Alienware arguably looked its worst, lagging 14-53 fps behind at 1080p and 32-34 fps behind its competitors at 4K. Still, at 128 fps at 1080p and 74 fps at 4K, this game still runs extremely smoothly on our configuration of the R13.
Last up in Borderlands 3 (badass settings) the Alienware Aurora R13 managed 141fps at 1080p and 59fps at 4K. That puts it 22 fps behind the Tiki at 1080p and 10 fps behind that system at the higher resolution.
We ran our typical Metro Exodus stress test on the Alienware Aurora R13, simulating a half-hour of gaming by looping the benchmark 15 times. We were curious about how hot the Core i7 CPU would get with just a 120mm AIO cooling it, but we saw an average CPU package temperature of just 64.
84 degrees Celsius, with one brief peak at 82 degrees C. That’s far from the 100 degrees C you’d need to hit for the CPU to throttle. And frame rates were also extremely consistent on this test, with a high average of 60.29 frames per second (fps) on the second run and a low of 60.21 fps.
That being said, if you’re hoping to do serious CPU-hammering tasks with your Core i7 CPU, the cooling here isn’t adequate. When running our Cinebench R23 stress test, temperatures approached 100 degrees Celsius within a matter of seconds, and the CPU throttled down to keep temperatures under control. This both limits your performance and means the cooler gets very loud. Again, this isn’t an issue when gaming, and most Alienware buyers are going to primarily interested in gaming. But considering Alienware doesn’t offer a larger cooling option, you should opt for another system if you want to do lots of video editing or other time-consuming CPU tasks. And if gaming is your primary concern, you’re better off opting for a Core i5 model and spending more on the graphics card and/or fast storage for games, anyway.
Productivity Performance on the Alienware Aurora R13
With a Core i7-12700KF CPU, 32GB of RAM and a 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSD, this R13 is a capable work and media crunching machine as well. But as we just discussed, the 120mm AIO cooler isn’t a great choice here for longer CPU-heavy workloads. Let’s see how the system did in our productivity tests. Once again, note that the competing systems below in our charts have higher-end Core i9 CPUs, save for the Tiki with its gaming-focused 3D V-cache-carrying Ryzen 7 5800X.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
On Geekbench 5, the Aurora’s single-core score of 1,835 impressed, easily beating the Tiki’s 1,640 and not lagging too far behind the two Core i9 systems. But on the multi-core side, the R13’s 10,557 wasn’t enough to beat any system here, with the liquid-cooled Corsair One delivering 17,965, or about a 70% improvement over the Aurora.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Aurora’s PCIe 4.0 Samsung SSD was fast in our testing, moving our 25GB of files at a rate of 1,873 MBps.
But all the other systems here were even swifter, with both the Tiki and One i300 systems hovering around the 3,000 MBps mark. I do like that this configuration of the Aurora ships with both a 2TB SSD and a 2TB hard drive, letting you store lots of games and files. Last up on our Handbrake test, which transcodes a 4K video to 1080p, the Alienware R13 finished the task in 3 minutes and 50 seconds. That was more than fast enough to leave the Tiki in the dust (4:55). But as expected, the Corsair (3:28) and HP (3:39) were faster with their liquid-cooled Core i9 CPUs.
Software and Warranty of the Alienware Aurora R13
Alienware pleasingly delivers little in the way of software cruft with the Aurora R13. There’s a bit of the typical Windows 11 bloat, like Spotify and Xbox, but even that is fairly light. Apart from that, there’s the Alienware Command Center for lighting, cooling controls and monitoring, as well as functioning as a game launcher. And the Killer app lets you tweak wired/wireless network controls and settings.
That’s, pleasingly, all you get apart from the Windows 11 Home OS.
Alienware sells the Aurora R13 with a 1-year warranty. You can add longer coverage for $149 for an extra year and $100 per year after that at purchase (up to 4 years).
Configurations of the Alienware Aurora R13
Dell sells the Alienware R13 starting at $1,199 with an RTX 3050, a Core i5-12400F, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. When we wrote this, there was also a version with a GTX 1650 Super, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD for about the same price, indicating the 3050 model with twice the RAM and storage is likely on sale. A top-end option with a Core i9-12900KF, an RTX 3090, 64GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD sells for $3,749.
Frustratingly, when we wrote this, our review configuration with a Core i7-12700KF, 32GB of RAM, 2TB of SSD storage, a 2TB hard drive and an RTX 3080 was not in stock. In fact, there were no models with an RTX 3080 available on Dell’s site–though there were configurations with RTX 3070 Tis and RTX 3060 Tis.
It’s unclear if the 3080 model will come back in stock, but with the 4080 starting at a high $899, it’s clearly not a direct replacement for the previous-gen RTX 3080. Nvidia, at least, says the 3080 will remain in its lineup for now.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Alienware Aurora R13’s RTX 3080 and Core i7-12900KF in our review configuration aren’t the freshes slices of silicon on the gaming PC block, but this gaming PCstill performs very well with them – particularly when it comes to gaming. Those looking for a rig that does double duty as a video editing machine will want to look for a system with an option for a larger 240 or 360 mm AIO cooler for today’s (and tomorrow’s) thermally demanding CPUs.
But if you primarily care about gaming and your other tasks don’t leave your processor churning for several minutes or hours at a time, the Aurora R13 is a powerful, quiet-running and attractive rig that should keep most gamers happily fragging and streaming for years to come.
After a rough start with the Mattel Aquarius as a child, Matt built his first PC in the late 1990s and ventured into mild PC modding in the early 2000s. He’s spent the last 15 years covering emerging technology for Smithsonian, Popular Science, and Consumer Reports, while testing components and PCs for Computer Shopper, PCMag and Digital Trends.
2022 Gaming PC build guide
(Image credit: Future)
When prebuilts don’t cut it or you finally have the chance to jump into PC gaming properly, building your own rig is the way to go. This gaming PC build guide is your guide for constructing a powerful rig to run your games and more. Below is a list of the best PC parts and components to slot into your dream gaming rig.
This guide is your reference for building a reliable gaming PC. You don’t have to pick up every piece of hardware in this list, but each one will give you a good idea of what to look for and why certain things are better than others. PC building is about having fun and making something that caters to you; this list is a cheat sheet and by no means a rule book.
Speaking of budget, the cost for this gaming PC build is $1,000, with around $400 (keep an eye out for deals) reserved for an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti that should provide an excellent framerate for most games at 1080p (and even 1440p). And with the help of upscaling tech like DLSS, 4K gameplay is within reach on some games.
The Ryzen 5 5600X is the best choice for a CPU for this build because of its price, performance, and overclocking potential. However, if you are strictly in an Intel camp, Intel Core i5 12400 and B660 motherboards are good choices. Remember, you can get by with a smaller SSD or slightly slower RAM and upgrade those later to save a few bucks.
The last thing you should know is that all the hardware on this guide are all things I’d want if I were building my own PC. Each component has been tested on the PC Gamer Test Bench and merits my full recommendation. If this isn’t what you’re looking for, check out our budget PC build guide and high-end PC build guide.
Or skip the whole building thing and get a cheap gaming PC.
CPU
(Image credit: AMD)
AMD Ryzen 5 5600X
AMD’s top affordable, and available, Zen 3 CPU today
Specifications
Cores: 6
Threads: 12
Base Clock: 3.7GHz
Boost Clock: 4.6GHz
Overclocking: Yes
L3 Cache: 32MB
TDP: 65W
PCIe 4.0 lanes: 20
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
Awesome gaming performance
+
Great value for money
+
Decent overclocking potential
+
Wraith Stealth included
Reasons to avoid
—
$50 more than 3600X
—
… 3600X came with a better cooler
When it comes to gaming, everything that’s great about the 5900X rings true for this more affordable Zen 3 chip as well.
There’s nothing between any of the Ryzen 5000 chips in games, which means you’ll hit the same frame rates with this chip as you will the much more expensive chip. Which is incredible when you think about it—top-tier performance from the most affordable Zen 3 CPU? We’ll say yes to that every single day.
This does have half the core count of that top chip, rolling in as it does with 6 cores and 12 threads. This is only an issue with those more serious workloads, though, and this is more than sufficient for more reasonable stuff. You could argue that gaming could go beyond the 12-threads we have here, but there’s no evidence that is the case so far, and that’s even though the next-gen consoles are rocking 8-cores and 16-threads.
The Ryzen 5 5600X also bucks the Ryzen 5000 family’s trend by shipping with a Wraith Stealth cooler, so you don’t have to drop extra money on a third-party chiller. You don’t need to, but if you do, you’ll hit higher clocks for longer and also open up the wonderful world of overclocking, which could make it worthwhile.
This is a decent little overclocker, and while it won’t affect gaming much, it’ll help in other areas nicely.
Read our full AMD Ryzen 5 5600X review .
Motherboard
(Image credit: Asus)
Asus ROG Strix B550-E Gaming
The best B550 motherboard
Specifications
Form factor: ATX
Memory support: 4x DIMM, up to 128GB, up to DDR4-4600
Expansion slots: 2x PCIe 4.0 x16, 1x PCIe 3.0 x4
Storage: 2x M.2, 6x SATA 6Gbps
Networking: Intel WiFi 6, Intel 2.5Gb ethernet, Bluetooth 5.1
Rear USB: 3x USB 3.2 Gen 2, 4x USB 2.0
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
Extensive feature set
+
Build quality
+
Top-end networking
Reasons to avoid
—
Pricey for a B550 board
—
Stock-clock performance is unremarkable
Sure, the Asus ROG Strix B550-E isn’t the cheapest motherboard for a Ryzen 5 5600X chip, but it offers a huge amount of potential room for your PC to grow in the future.
It’s a premium motherboard, with all the trappings you’d expect from Asus’ Republic of Gamers stables, such as 14+2 power stage, M.2 heatsinks, and pre-installed backplates. You also get Wi-Fi 6 wireless networking as well as Intel 2.5Gb ethernet too. And RGB LEDs, of course.
At a glance it cuts a convincing enthusiast dash thanks to copious heat sinks and spreaders, including one for each M.2 slot, snazzy LED lighting, and three full-length PCI Express slots, two of which come in Gen 4 trim.
Impressively, those slots support dual-GPU graphics, each in eight-lane PCIe 4.0 configuration, ensuring the maximum currently available bandwidth for high end graphics. A niche concern? Perhaps, but it’s indicative of the ambitions of this board. Similarly, the Strix B550 has not just an eight-pin but also a four-pin supplementary CPU power supply connector. Again, that’s an indication of a board designed for high performance.
Performance too is typically good for a high-end Asus board, matching X570 motherboards for gaming performance without issue.
The Asus ROG Strix B550-E Gaming is the whole package then, and right now is our all-around pick for the best B550 motherboard.
Read our full Asus ROG Strix B550-E Gaming review .
GPU
(Image credit: Nvidia)
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti
A GPU that can take on the RTX 2080 Super… and win
Specifications
GPU Cores: 4,865
Base Clock: 1,410MHz
Boost Clock: 1,665MHz
TFLOPS: 16.2
Memory: 8GB GDDR6
Memory Clock: 14GT/s
Memory Bandwidth: 448GB/s
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
4K performance
+
Decent ray tracing performance
+
Great cooler
Reasons to avoid
—
Impossible to find…
—
…stupidly expensive if you do
The RTX 3060 Ti is the GeForce card that we want in our mid-range machine.
That was true last year, when buying one was almost impossible, but it’s true today for another reason. The next-generation of Nvidia and AMD GPUs are just around the corner, but history tells us the first to launch will be the high-end GPUs. That means that mid-range and budget GPUs, such as the RTX 3060 Ti down to the RTX 3050, will stick around a lot longer before being replaced.
So if you want a great gaming PC now, and one that doesn’t break the bank, the RTX 3060 Ti is one of the cards out there we’d still recommend.
It marks the same incredible generational leap in performance that has come to epitomize the Ampere architecture, up until the non-TI GeForce RTX 3060 , that is. With performance that can often outpace the RTX 2080 Super, for a nominal $399 price tag, it’s the mid-range card to beat.
And, because of its RTX 2080 Super performance levels, that means you can nail 1080p and 1440p frame rates, but also that 4K at 60fps isn’t beyond the realms of possibility for this GPU.
The RTX 3060 Ti then delivers gaming performance that’s rather stupendous when you look at generational gains over even the RTX 20-series—next to the 10-series, it’s quite frightening, actually.
Read our full Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti review .
Memory
(Image credit: Corsair)
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4-3200
The best value RAM you can get
Specifications
Capacity: 2x 8GB
Speed: 3200MT/s
Timings: 15-17-17-35
Voltage: 1.35V
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
High frequencies on a budget
+
Low latency too
Reasons to avoid
—
Lacks the RGB pretties
Memory is pretty straightforward these days, though if the price isn’t much higher you can improve performance slightly with faster RAM. DDR4 prices have thankfully galvanized somewhat, with typical costs for 16GB often falling well below $100.
There are many options to choose from: Adata, Ballistix, Corsair, Crucial, G.Skill, GeIL, Gigabyte, Hynix, HyperX, Micron, Mushkin, Patriot, PNY, Samsung, Team, and XPG are all good brands as far as we’re concerned.
Our main goal for gaming memory is DDR4-3000 or higher, with as low a CAS latency as possible, but at a good price. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to buy extreme memory for a mainstream build, but with DDR4-3200 only costing $10 more than basic DDR4 kits, it’s worth paying a little extra for AMD builds .
For more information, check out our guide to the best gaming DDR4 RAM .
Primary Storage
(Image credit: WD)
WD_Black SN770 1TB
Deent capacity and low cost makes the SN770 a winner
Specifications
Capacity: 1TB
Interface: M.2 PCIe Gen4 x4
Sequential IO: 5150/4900MB/s read/write
Random IO: 740K/800K IOPS read/write
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
Decent capacity
+
Gen4 without breaking the bank
+
Easy installation
Reasons to avoid
—
500GB is a viable option to save cash
You could spend more on a high-performance PCIe 4.
0 SSD, but you can get awfully close to top performance with this SN770 from WD.
An NVMe M.2 SSD offers swift access to your data, and the SN770 delivers that snappy response at an exceptionally agreeable price. Fitted with 1TB worth of NAND flash, there’s enough space for your operating system, applications, and plenty of games. So feel free to go wild downloading your favourite games on Steam. Well, not too wild.
If you wanted to save some cash, you could opt for the smaller 512GB version here. It’s more agreeable on price, and your secondary storage could make up for lost capacity later down the line.
Read our full WD Black SN770 review .
Additional Storage
WD Black 1TB (Optional)
The quickest regular HDD, offering storage on a budget
Specifications
Capacity: 1TB
HDD speed: 7200RPM
Cache: 32GB
Connectivity: SATA 6Gb/s
Warranty: 5 years
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
A cheaper storage option
+
Great reliability for a HDD
+
High capacity for files less often accessed
Reasons to avoid
—
Slow compared to SSDs
Given the install sizes of most modern PC games, it’s probably a good idea to get yourself a new drive for your gaming PC.
While SATA SSDs are almost cheap enough to recommend as secondary storage (what a world we’re living in), you’ll probably look to a regular HDD to keep the cost down when you hit multiple terabyte demands.
We recommend the WD Black drive because it’s a 7,200 RPM drive with a respectable 32GB cache, which offers 1TB of storage for about $70 or less. While you could get a WD Blue or Seagate Barracuda for less, the WD Black offers speed and reliability over capacity. Realistically, you’ll appreciate that speed if you’re planning to keep your HDD inside a gaming PC for more than a couple of years, as we already see load times creep up for the biggest games of 2022.
PSU
Corsair TX650M 650W
Highly reliable and efficient power without going overkill
Specifications
Output: 650W
Efficiency: 80 Plus Gold
Connectors: 1x 24-Pin ATX, 1x 8-Pin (4+4) EPS12V, 4x 8-Pin (6+2) PCIe, 6x SATA, 4x Molex, 1x Floppy
Modular: Partial
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
Good efficiency and price
+
Sane output rating
+
All Japanese capacitors
Reasons to avoid
—
650W may not cover it for some super high-end GPUs down the line, but be realistic about whether that matters to you or not
Power supplies are not the most exciting part of a gaming PC build.
After all, it can be hard to tell them apart in terms of features. Even so, you don’t want to skimp on your PSU. Corsair has an excellent and well-deserved reputation for its power supplies, and the TX650M comes at a reasonable price and delivers 80 Plus Gold efficiency.
Most power supplies from the bigger names are generally good, but we wouldn’t recommend that you put your money in anything with a warranty of fewer than five years or an efficiency rating below 80 Plus Gold (maybe Bronze in a pinch). The $10 or $20 saved often isn’t worth the risk .
We also tend to go with modular PSUs where possible. It means less cable mess inside the case since you don’t have to stash unused cables somewhere. Instead, the remaining wires have to find a home in your closet.
Here’s our guide to the best power supplies for PC gaming.
Case
(Image credit: NZXT)
NZXT H510
Clean design and great cable management
Specifications
Type: ATX mid-tower
Motherboard Compatibility: ATX, Micro-ATX, Mini-ITX
Drive Bays: (Up to 7) 3.
5/2.5-inch internal , 2x 2.5-inch SSD
Front Ports: 1x USB-C, 1x USB 3.0, Headphone, Mic
Fan Options: Front: 2x 120mm or 2x 140mm, Top: 120mm (included) or 140mm, Rear: 120mm (included)
Max GPU Length: 381mm
Dimensions: 460 x 210 x 428mm
Weight: 6.6kg
Today’s Best Deals
Reasons to buy
+
Tempered glass side panel
+
Plenty of expansion options
+
USB-C front panel connector
Reasons to avoid
—
Getting on a bit
Cases can be as stylish or boring as you want. We’re going to go for the former rather than the latter, with the NZXT H510, a slick, tempered glass case available in white or black. The NZXT H510 is also reasonably priced, which is always a bonus.
If you want other options, check our guide to the best mid-tower cases . The clean look goes well on any desk and doesn’t stand out like many so-called ‘gaming cases.
‘ There’s also the pricier H510i that integrates some smart features if you like the look of the H510 but want a few more bells and whistles.
Picking a case can be an entirely personal choice, so for more options, here are the best PC cases you can buy right now.
Components
Reduced Price
AMD Ryzen 5 5600X
£279.99
£158.99
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RTX 3060 Ti
£569.99
£496.98
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Corsair TX650M
£79.
99
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Asus ROG Strix B550-E Gaming
£177.10
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WD Black 1TB HDD
£116.22
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Reduced Price
NZXT H510
£107.99
£92.28
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Dave has been gaming since the days of Zaxxon and Lady Bug on the Colecovision, and code books for the Commodore Vic 20 (Death Race 2000!). He built his first gaming PC at the tender age of 16, and finally finished bug-fixing the Cyrix-based system around a year later. When he dropped it out of the window. He first started writing for Official PlayStation Magazine and Xbox World many decades ago, then moved onto PC Format full-time, then PC Gamer, TechRadar, and T3 among others. Now he’s back, writing about the nightmarish graphics card market, CPUs with more cores than sense, gaming laptops hotter than the sun, and SSDs more capacious than a Cybertruck.
PLAYER 1
Cooling
No chance for hot air
The housing is blown from three sides at once. Minimal temperatures even when the system is heavily loaded.
Up to 5 powerful coolers
In PLAYER 1 we use only the highest quality and most efficient fans in their price range.
Design
materials
Beauty in metal
The mix of aluminum and steel gives the computer a solid feel.
Due to their high thermal conductivity, metals are natural heat sinks. Aluminum and steel are the secret to high performance components. nine0005
Production
Gallery
Gallery
Power
Reviews
Sergey Glushakov | concept artist
CD PROJEKT RED
«A big thank you to INVASION Labs for creating such a cool PC for the Cyberpunk 2077 presentation at Igromir. We were very impressed and took a lot of photos with this PC.»
View full review
Hideo Kojima
Kojima Productions
«Oh cool. Did you do that? Cool! Thank you.»
View full review
nine0004 Valentin Petukhov
Wylsacom
“Note how quiet our computer is. It barely rustles, despite the fact that it has a glass lid open. And when it’s closed, you can’t hear it at all. And, of course, it’s very cool.”
View full review
Marin Mocanu
Marmok
«Very powerful and compact device.
I’ve been recording all my VR releases with it for almost a year. The case deserves special attention. I got a fucking logo in volume and an engraving on the front side — it’s very cool.» nine0005
View full review
Oleg Abramov
RADIO TAPOK
«My new Rammstein-style computer. They even put a screen in it! Also, the render time has been significantly reduced: now the vids will come out even faster!»
View full review
Dmitry Puchkov
Goblin
«The Witcher 3 went on sale. Opergamer immediately got into the game and started broadcasting. The settings are outrageous, and The Witcher flies. Power!»
View full review
nine0004 Fabian Servatius | Director of Account Management
ASUS Deutschland
«INVASION Labs offers the highest quality custom-made gaming systems with a completely unique design. We look forward to working with you.»
View full review
Ilya Nodia | Ambassador
Sony Alpha
«Simply the best! Thanks guys, it turned out just like a render.
This little monster grinds all projects at once! I love it»
View full review
nine0004 Federik Audet | Producer
Ubisoft
«Now I’m in Russia with the awesome team at INVASION Labs. They built this awesome Assassins’s Creed Syndicate-style computer for us»
View full review
Tony Young
MSI Russia
«We are extremely excited about our partnership with INVASION Labs»
Head of MSI Russia
View full review
Configurator
PLAYER 1
Configuration
nine0000 REVOLT X
Powerful Intel/AMD processors
Fast and reliable SSDs
GeForce RTX graphics cards
Speedy memory
Cooling
Even quieter!
REVOLT X uses a system of two independent circuits that cool twice as many components.
The first cools the processor and motherboard, the second cools the graphics system.
Silent and durable coolers
We use only top Austrian Noctua coolers, which provide maximum silence during the game. nine0005
Design
materials
Beauty in metal
A mix of aircraft-grade aluminum and steel gives the computer a solid feel.
Due to their high thermal conductivity, metals are natural heat sinks.
Aluminium, steel and vertical cooling are the secret to high performance components.
Customization
Your individual
No two REVOLT X are the same!
Airbrush and styling
Gallery
Gallery
Power
nine0004 Reviews
Sergey Glushakov | concept artist
CD PROJEKT RED
«A big thank you to INVASION Labs for creating such a cool PC for the Cyberpunk 2077 presentation at Igromir. We were very impressed and took a lot of photos with this PC.»
View full review
Hideo Kojima
Kojima Productions
«Oh cool. Did you do that? Cool! Thank you.»
View full review
Valentin Petukhov
Wylsacom
“Note how quiet our computer is. It barely rustles, despite the fact that it has a glass lid open. And when it’s closed, you can’t hear it at all. And, of course, it’s very cool.” nine0005
View full review
Marin Mocanu
Marmok
«Very powerful and compact device. I’ve been recording all my VR releases with it for almost a year. The case deserves special attention. I got a fucking logo in volume and an engraving on the front side — it’s very cool.»
View full review
Oleg Abramov
RADIO TAPOK
«My new Rammstein-style computer. They even put a screen in it! Also, the render time has been significantly reduced: now the vids will come out even faster!» nine0005
View full review
Dmitry Puchkov
Goblin
«The Witcher 3 went on sale. Opergamer immediately got into the game and started broadcasting. The settings are outrageous, and The Witcher flies. Power!»
View full review
Fabian Servatius | Director of Account Management
ASUS Deutschland
«INVASION Labs offers the highest quality custom-made gaming systems with a completely unique design. We look forward to working with you.» nine0005
View full review
Ilya Nodia | Ambassador
Sony Alpha
«Simply the best! Thanks guys, it turned out just like a render.