PC Gamer Presents - PC Hardware Handbook - May 2018

ROUND-UP

GPU

Priced out of the stratosphere due to

cryptocurrency mining, and coupled

with nasty power draw and little room

for extra performance, Vega 64 was

nothing more than a disappointment.

The 56, on the other hand,

somewhat redeems the series.

Priced at a reasonable £450, it

fortunately provides some very

AMD’s GPU offerings have been a little lacklustre, to say the least.

Even with all the hype in the world, they fell far flat of what we hoped.

competitive performance with the

GTX 1070. However, right now, you’re

still forking out an extra £80 for it, and

with no aftermarket cards scheduled

for team red, it’s not looking good at

all for Radeon going forward.

GPU: VEGA / LITHOGRAPHY: 14NM FINFET /

CORES: 3584 / MEMORY: 8GB HBM 2.0 /

MEMORY BUS: 2048-BIT

92 %

91 %

84 %

64 %

AMD RADEON

RX VEGA 56

http://www.msi.com £500

MOBO

And a new chip means new mobos,

which may sound sucky, but if you’re

buying a new system, it does mean

you get the latest gear.

The Godlike Gaming is the

pinnacle of MSI’s mobo arsenal. It

may be pricey, but its features

sell it: triple Ethernet, wireless

A/C, support for three M.2 PCIe

Intel has broken away from its ‘four cores’ ideology with Coffee

Lake, and implanted an extra two into its mainstream offerings.

SSDs, and four GPUs. Incredible. The

real joy lies in the audio, though: if

you’re not willing to invest in a DAC,

but still want the best sound you can

get, this is the board for you.

CHIPSET/SOCKET: Z370 / LGA 1151 / FORM FACTOR: E-ATX /

MEMORY SUPPORT: 64GB DDR4 @ 4133 MT/S /

M.2 / U.2 SUPPORT: 3X M.2, 1X U.2 /

ATA SUPPORT: 6X SATA 6GB/S

91 %

MSI Z370

GODLIKE GAMING

http://www.msi.com £530

STEELSERIES RIVAL 310

http://www.steelseries.com £60

We’ve long been fans of the Rival

series from SteelSeries, and the 310

doesn’t disappoint. It’s a lightweight,

FPS-oriented, intuitive gaming

mouse, with pixel-perfect 1:1 tracking,

thanks to its Pixart TrueMove3 optical

sensor. It’s comfortable, sleek,

effective and highly

recommended.

LOGITECH G613 WIRELESS

http://www.gaming.logitech.com £130

Why, oh why, has it taken this long

for us to get a wireless mechanical

keyboard? Logitech’s G613 has finally

arrived to fill that gap. Offering an

impressive 18 months of battery life,

it’s powered by only two AA batteries.

Sure, It may not feature any of the

fancy LEDs that we’re used to,

but the inclusion of that

wireless switch is enough

for us.

RAZER TIAMAT 2.2 V2

http://www.razerzone.com £125

Razer’s Tiamat 2.2 V2, is an

impressively designed, dual-driver-

per-earcup headset. The latter is what

drew our attention to them. The

headset sounds crisp, with no

muddiness in the treble or upper end,

making it actually fairly well

balanced. Still a touch pricy,

but not bad.

Reviews

HARDWARE