98 MAXIMUMPC JUN 2019 maximumpc.com
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Maximum PC (ISSN 1522-4279) is published 13 times a year,
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PRODUCED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.For more of our component recommendations,
visit http://www.maximumpc.com/best-of-the-best Approximate Price: $2,725INGREDIENTSPART PRICE
Case NZXT H700i $180PSU 750W Corsair RM750X 80+ Gold $110Mobo ASRock X399 Phantom Gaming 6 $240CPU AMD Threadripper 2950X $840Cooler Be Quiet! Dark Rock Pro TR4 $90GPU MSI GeForce RT X 2080 NEW $700
RAM 32GB (2x 16GB) Corsair Vengeance
RGB Pro @ 3,000MT/s NEW
$225
SSD 512GB Gigabyte Aorus RGB M.2 NVMe NEW $120HDD 2x 2TB Seagate BarraCuda ST2000DM006 $120OS Windows 10 Home 64-bit OEM $100DETECTING A THEME? It feels like RAM upgrade month here. We’ve
gone for a pretty straight upgrade to the Pro version of Corsair’s
Vengeance RGB memory, a set of two 16GB sticks that deliver solid
performance at a better price per gigabyte. Threadripper CPUs
have leapt up in price—the 2950X is a relatively inexpensive one,
but still dropped an extra $40 on the price of this build this month.
A quick switch of the GPU saved us 10 dollars, moving away from
Asus and over to MSI’s bulkier RTX 2080, which rocks an extra
DisplayPort and two fans, as opposed to one, albeit with an ever-so-
slightly lower boost clock. The biggest saving, though, was made on
the SSD. Samsung’s 970 Pro is a lightning-fast drive, but it comes
with a price tag that leaves us feeling like we’ve been lightning-
struck; we saved nearly 50 dollars by moving to the 512GB Gigabyte
Aorus RGB M.2 SSD, released earlier this year. RGB on an M.2 drive
might seem a little over the top, but this SSD is a nifty piece of gear
with a sensible price. The RGB tech gave Gigabyte room to include
a heatsink on the top of the SSD, meaning there’s no need to shell
out for motherboards that come with removable M.2 heat shields.
No fiddling around with sticky pads, either. Seagate’s BarraCuda
HDDs mercifully didn’t rise in price, so our 2TB of reserve storage
remained safe. Overall, this build came out $43 cheaper than last
month—and probably about 10 percent more colorful.UPGRADE OF THE MONTH
RGB on your SSD? Sure, why not? Honestly, we love this little
drive for other reasons: It’s speedy enough to compete with
Samsung’s dominating M.2 SSDs, with a sleek integrated
heatsink. This is the first SSD to come with motherboard-
compatible RGB lighting, so if you’re rocking a modern Aorus
mobo, you can link them together for bonus bling. Otherwise,
Gigabyte’s RGB Fusion 2.0 software is freely available.
The 512GB model offers up to 3,480/2,000MB/s read/write
speeds, and comes with a five-year warranty, making the
$120 price tag all the more attractive—already a surprisingly
affordable price for a fast, flashy M.2 drive like this.
$120, http://www.gigabyte.com512GB GIGABYTE AORUS
RGB M.2 NVMe SSDTURBO