editorial
a thing or two about a thing or twomaximumpc.com aug 2019 MAXIMUMPC 9
EDITORIAL
Executive Editor: Alan Dexter
Senior Editor: Jarred Walton
Hardware Lead: Bo Moore
Hardware Staff Writer: Joanna Nelius
Staff Writer: Christian Guyton
Contributing Editor: Chris Angelini
Contributing Writers: Alex Campbell, Alex Cox,
Nate Drake, Ian Evenden, Matthew Hanson,
Phil Iwaniuk, Jeremy Laird, Chris Lloyd
Copy Editor: Katharine Davies
Editor Emeritus: Andrew Sanchez
ART
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Photography: Phil Barker, Olly Curtis, Neil Godwin
Cover Photo Credits: Future PLC, Qualcomm, Klei Entertainment,
Ubisoft, Xbox Game Studios, Paradox Interactive.
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Alan
Dexter
We get to play with a lot of high-end
gear here. Our cupboard is bursting
with premium processors, expensive
graphics cards, superfast SSDs,
feature-rich mobos, and everything
else that goes into producing the best
machines we can put our minds to. If we
need to build a rig for a specific use, we
can generally lay our hands on the core
components quickly, and piece together
a PC that excels at the task at hand.
There’s a bit of a disconnect between
having all this gear to play with and
building in the real world, though, and
this is most obvious when we’re building
to a tight budget. It’s rare that we have
everything we need for a budget build,
for a couple of reasons: Firstly, new tech
tends to appear in top-end components
initially, and that’s the gear that makes
it into our labs and cupboards. More
budget-oriented hardware tends to
come later, and it can be hard getting
our hands on it. This is compounded by
the fact that when there’s less profit to
be had, there’s a general reluctance to
promote the gear.
Which brings us to our cover feature:
our $350 kick-ass budget build. When
we were working out what we were
going to do for this feature, we priced
up a number of budget machines, but
eased back on the crazy low price
points, because we didn’t feel that they
would produce the kind of performance
that we demand. It isn’t just about
building the cheapest machine you
can; it’s about checking that “great
value” box as well. So, while there are
cheaper CPUs, we felt that too many
of them were too compromised to be
considered. To find out what we did endup building, turn to page 24. The final
rig was impressive, and can stand on
its own, or form the basis of a more
capable system.
There is one element of this build that
we always consider far longer than we
probably should: the OS. We’re mainly
about Windows here. We talk about
Linux lots, and when it comes to specific
tasks, it can often be hard to beat, but
for general-purpose computing, our
preference is still Windows 10. It’s just
so easy to use, so predominant, and
has so many great tools.
There’s just one problem: cost. While
you can argue that Windows is great
value for money because of how well
supported it is, it’s difficult for Microsoft
to compete with operating systems that
cost zilch. Of course, you should donate
money when you download Ubuntu or
whatever, but you’re not forced to, and
it makes no difference to the software
whether you do or don’t. Which means it
comes down to $0 versus $100. It’s not
hard to see which one gets the nod from
us; something that is made easier by the
fact that the latest versions of Ubuntu
are incredibly straightforward to use,
even for novices. Still, if you can afford
an extra $100, upgrading to Windows 10
makes sense. Enjoy the issue.TigHT BudgeTs demand
cRea Tivi Ty To PRoduce
someTH ing sPeciaL
Alan Dexter is Maximum PC’s executive
editor and a punisher of hardware. He’s been
a tech journalist for over 20 years, and has no
problem upsetting the PC industry as a whole.