during our secret shopper project we
discovered that while some pre-built
gaming systems offer a solid value in
terms of their performance with Tier one
providers like HP and Dell you can often
run into proprietary parts limited
upgrade ability and configurability and
questionable software load outs that can
affect the overall experience
so the popularity of machines that are
built from retail parts by smaller
system integrators like iBUYPOWER or
main gear is understandable boutique
builders in particular don't always hit
the best performance per dollar but what
most of these shops offer is a high
degree of customize ability and more
transparency into the actual components
you're buying now a lot of you watching
our channel would look down on the idea
of buying a pre-built computer but
consider this what if a well-known and
respected manufacturer came out offering
the type of system that would be similar
to what you would end up configuring for
yourself and at a reasonable price
offering a turnkey solution with a solid
warranty well that is what Corsair tried
to do with the Vengeance gaming PC 50
180 let's see if it's worth your
hard-earned money
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that handcrafts boots using the highest
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that linked below
[Music]
so let us cover the four pillars of any
gaming system price quality performance
and support which together help us
determine the value of this thing
after spread shooting the components all
together and checking non sale prices
through both Amazon and Newegg it turned
out that the prices of the parts came to
just over $2,100
this means that Corsair is marking up
this machine 12 to 13 percent or about
$300 over regular Street pricing but
it's not time to make a final judgment
here just yet
first let's dig a little deeper Corsairs
markup also includes assembly and two
years of warranty support on the
completed system and check this out
Corsair has multiple RMA centers for
their machines so depending where you're
located you might not end up having to
ship the machine which is currently only
available directly from Corsair all the
way back to them if you run into an
issue what's even better is they'll
cover shipping both to and from the
service depot and they'll even send you
replacement packaging if you tossed out
your original box that's pretty rad at
least on paper when it comes to the next
pillar quality well we'll start with
that aforementioned packaging our array
arrives protected with open celled foam
and had this peered contraption to
ensure that the graphics card wouldn't
snap out of the slot you know it's kind
of ghetto looking but hey if it works it
isn't stupid so no complaints there
cabling was neat on the front and
tightly bundled on the back chamber and
we didn't have really I mean any gripes
with the machines construction quality
overall we did wonder why they would use
a 240 millimeter AIO
to cool a non k processor in a B Series
board but the answer here is most likely
for the looks and a single 120
millimeter cooler would have made the
system look kind of asymmetrical the
only thing that really stood out here
was Corsairs use of an 80 plus bronze
750 watt power supply now to be clear
it's a decent 2nd gen unit from their CX
series and
five year warranty so I guess the logic
here was that more people would care to
have 750 watts than would care if it had
higher efficiency which is a trade that
they could have easily made moving on to
the performance in a massive surprise -
absolutely no one in games our machine
performed exactly as a core i7 eighty
seven hundred plus an RT X twenty eighty
should turbo boost on our CPU worked
correctly our GPU reached anywhere from
1935 to 1950 megahertz while gaming and
we never heard more than a low hum from
the direction of the tower no cooling
issues and no weird fan ramping behavior
or anything like that to report it's
almost like Corsair has a lot of
experience when it comes to PC cooling
now as for storage our SSD uses a fine
controller and it sits on an X two PCI
Express laws so as expected that puts it
somewhere in between a SATA SSD and an
enthusiast class nvme one
and while Corsair applied no performance
optimizations to the UEFI BIOS no
factory profile saved even everything
worked out of the box without an issue
now when it comes to pre-purchase and
post-purchase support well we didn't
have a chance to actually test the
latter due to this being a review unit
which was not secret shoppers so we
couldn't stage a tech support scenario
or anything like that maybe in the
future let us know in the comments if
you'd like to see that and as for
pre-purchase support well
disappointingly it actually does not
exist at all
you see Corsair presently has just four
machines available on their site all of
them none configurable with the other
three being Corsair ones with the
closest configuration their commanding a
much higher price while using the same
class of graphics card maybe ok
conspiracy theory moment here
maybe Corsair doesn't want to have a
sales rep because that person would just
spend all day down selling customers to
the Vengeance I don't know that's pure
speculation anyway let's get back to the
value conversation because it's the most
complicated part of this video
compared to configuring a system over on
iBUYPOWER trying to include as many of
the same components as possible corks
airs pricing actually looks really solid
for our vengeance PC but that doesn't
necessarily mean I'm happy with it
before I can explain why we need a
little bit of history now in spite of
their wide portfolio covering the vast
majority of PC components from cooling
to cases to RAM and storage Corsair
surprised everyone when they introduced
the Corsair 1 a fully integrated ready
to ship system like Windows
pre-installed in everything for gamers
not because anyone thought they weren't
capable I mean obviously there are
plenty of people at Corsair who know how
to assemble a gaming tower but rather
for business reasons by branching out
into completed systems Corsair stood to
alienate the same partners system
integrators like main gear and ibuypower
who I mentioned before that they rely on
for a significant chunk of their
business by effectively competing with
them directly and potentially unfairly
since Corsair obviously has more profit
margin on a Corsair power supply than a
reseller of Corsair power supplies could
now Corsair story at the time was the
one is unique it's too difficult to
assemble to offer this chassis as a
standalone case so it doesn't really
compete with anyone elses offerings but
like this one this is the Vengeance PC a
fully built gaming PC from Corsair using
all off-the-shelf components so is it a
great value well it is if you were gonna
buy exactly these parts anyway but it's
not if you were the kind of person who
was more likely to spend their
hard-earned money on raw performance so
Corsair was in kind of a unique position
here to use some of the extra profit
margin that they gained by being the
manufacturer of both the components and
the finished system to deliver great
performance and
flashy aftermarket looks but by choosing
a non overclockable cpu and a B 360
motherboard at this price point I do
feel like they fell a little short of
that goal if that was their goal and you
know I have to wonder if maybe this was
on purpose to avoid disrupting the
market whatever reason there was for it
the good news is that we have no qualms
about the quality of the system or
Corsairs ongoing existence if you ever
need support so as they continue to
expand into this business I think
vengeance gaming pcs are gonna get only
more interesting to gamers as time go on
that is the ones that don't feel like
DIY either for themselves or for their
friends because as it goes with
pre-built you could get a faster
computer if you built it yourself then
again maybe of course they're doesn't
care I'm sure they'd be happy to sell
you their components - excuse me master
Ops vast curved gaming monitor is 35
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millisecond response times and it's got
free sync it runs at a maximum 100 Hertz
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link in the video description for your
own seamless visual experience whether
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