- Hey guys, this is Austin
and today, Ken and I are going head to head.
He has purchased some of the most expensive
gaming gear on Amazon.
Whereas I have chosen to go with a different route;
I have bought the cheapest gaming gear that I could
find available with Amazon as well with Prime shipping.
Today, I am challenging Ken to a battle.
All he does is talk about how great his expensive
mouse is, or how great his ancient keyboard is.
What I wanna do is show him that you don't need to spend
a fortune to have a great gaming setup.
And the cool thing is that I'm still going to beat him
in his favorite game because he's a weeb.
- That's a really interesting challenge
What happens if I win?
- [Matt] What do you think should happen if you win?
- Because I have a pretty good idea.
- A dumb mystery tech budget?
$5,000
- [Matt] You think a $5000 mystery tech budget?
- Yeah, $5,000
- [Matt] if you win.
- Look we couldn't get the $3,000 one,
might as well just expedite it.
Let's do $5,000.
let's just skip $3,000.
- [Matt] But what if Austin wins?
- We delete the channel.
- [Austin] So I've taken a look at a lot of cheap Amazon
keyboards over the years but I don't think
I've ever actually done one that's this cheap.
In fact, it's so cheap,
I'm actually not entirely sure what this is.
Okay that's definitely a membrane keyboard.
The superior type of keyboard.
Prepare yourself for aural bliss.
(keyboard clacking)
- [Ken] What?
- [Matt] Aural
(Laughter)
- [Matt] Aural, with an "A".
- Aural bliss, man get your head out of the gutter.
- So while Austin tries to browse dictionary.com
to get his words in check,
we actually got a better keyboard.
This is the Massdrop CTRL,
and it is about as jerk off as you can get
for a keyboard, with your money.
- [Austin] Language man, Jesus.
- Get your head out of the gutter.
- [Austin] What is jerk off?
How else can you interpret the word jerk off?
- [Matt] That is so much better than, "oral bliss".
(Laughter)
- So, the really cool thing about this keyboard
is that it not only is $200 and has RGB,
- [Austin] What?
Wait, it is $200.
Did you just break...
Wait wait wait wait wait
Don't try to hide that.
Your $200 keyboard is already broken.
Let me see this.
Alright, all is forgiven
- I put it the wrong way.
(laughter)
You can actually swap out the key caps.
They're hot-swappable.
So, if you, say, want to have a different feel
for like your W-A-S-D or your arrow keys,
you can get that.
You have options.
That is what $200 gets you.
- Yeah, but, I mean look.
My keyboard is black, and everyone knows
only gamer gear is black.
Who wants silver gamer gear?
Like, that's ridiculous.
- Gamers with style.
Gamers that...
What?
Hey, look man.
I'm out here today.
I got the style.
- [Austin] I'm not gonna lie,
those actually are pretty fresh.
- Not as fresh as these.
- [Ken] What the hell are we doing?
This used to be a tech channel, you know.
- So when it comes to mice,
honestly, I actually don't think
it's a good idea to spend a lot.
Which is why I picked this guy.
Again, another $17 amazon pickup with Prime shipping.
And, again, this had a whopping 10 percent discount.
Which means that I saved a total of $3.40
with my mouse-keyboard combination.
With 7200 DPI, and what is, admittedly,
a little bit of a light mouse,
but it's got a nice feel if your hands
are shaped a specific way.
- [Ken] Can you lift your...
That looks like Logitech and Deathadder had a child.
- [Austin] Nah, it's Red Dragon.
- All right, so while Austin spent $15 on his mouse,
I spent 10 times as much on this:
The Logitech G502
- [Austin] You don't even know
the name of your mouse, man.
- Wait a sec
- [Austin] This is a wireless mouse?
- [Ken] It, in fact, is.
- [Austin] What kind of gamer are you
with a wireless mouse?
- [Ken] Hey, Mr. I-watch-Linus-Tech-Tips-Religiously.
He did a video on this.
- [Austin] Matt, I thought that was private.
I thought these interviews were never gonna be shared.
- I watch Linus Tech Tips religiously.
And I've learned that skill is optional.
- So, apparently, this also has like
11 programmable buttons on it.
Oh wow.
Ooooohhh
Logitech is doing great with the packaging.
- So, to show Ken exactly how much you
don't need to spend on a gaming headset,
I got this.
Now what do I strive to do in life?
I strive to be excellent.
So this is a headset of many purposes.
So if you want to plug it into
say, a console, then you can get it to work
straight out of the box.
Or, if you're using a PC,
you can use this handy little splitter cable
to get not only a headphone, but also
microphone input or output?
Input, whatever.
So, some people might tear me up on this,
but I got a classic for you all.
This is the Astro A40
- [Austin] Is it 2009?
- Yes, actually.
Because, they worked so well in 2009.
They work well now.
- [Austin] How much was this?
- [Ken] $250.
This box is really elaborate.
You might not be able to see it on camera,
but it's there.
It says "tuned for gaming".
- [Austin] But are you going to be excellent?
- Probably.
That's really close.
- So, I know that Ken has spent
an insane amount of money on a monitor.
I like to keep it simple.
Which is where this comes in.
This is the Sceptre 22 inch, 1080p.
Now, if I'll kinda direct you to the back,
you'll see this has a 75 Hertz refresher
with 2 HDMI ports.
- [Austin] What is that?
Ken, what is that?
- [Ken] This, my friends, is the
Predator
X27
gaming monitor.
- [Austin] What is all this?
X27, DCI-P3, 144 Hertz?
- [Ken] 144 Hertz and it's 4k and G-sync HDR.
- [Austin] How much was this?
- $1600 dollars.
- [off-Camera] Bruh
- [Austin] Do you mean to say
that you spent $1600 on this?
- [Button] Nut, nut.
- [Ken] Yes, I did.
- [Button] Nut
Nut
- [Austin] I've gotta say, this is actually pretty good.
So, the bottom of the mouse has a DPI switch,
so I've got it on that...
I don't know what mode this is.
It's one of the more sensitive modes.
But it actually feels really responsive.
Keyboard's a touch mushy.
- [Ken] You mean the membrane keyboard
that you specifically chose to
- I died, what was that?
What, did I miss something?
- [Ken] (sarcastically) Nothing. Don't worry about it.
- Cool.
- [Ken] I will say the RGB on the mouse is really nice.
I wasn't expecting it to be nice.
It's not bright, especially when you,
I'm gonna spoiler, when you put it next to the keyboard.
It's definitely not bright, but it's how much? $17?
- [Austin] $17 minus 10 percent.
Lowkey, the best part of this setup,
real talk, is this monitor.
So right now, I'm running, actually,
at a fairly low brightness
because I don't want to blow it out on camera,
but it actually is really nice.
75 Hertz.
It does support FreeSync maybe?
Don't quote me on that.
- [Ken] For how much, again?
- [Austin] $80.
- [Ken] It's almost a dollar a Hert.
- That's a great point.
One dollar per Hert.
Is Hert the correct singular of Hertz?
1 Hertz?
1 Hertz.
I think is the correct one.
Not 1 Hert.
Well, you know what?
My wallet isn't Hertz.
- [Crowd] Ohhhhhhh
- [Ken] So, as we talked about earlier
this is the ideal setup.
Now, I will gloss over the fact that
Austin gave himself the better PC.
- [Austin] What? That's old boy.
Look at this.
How is that the better PC?
It's clearly...
- [Ken] Do you want to open it up?
- [Austin] No, it's fine.
- [Ken] Okay.
This is just an Acer Predator laptop
that we did another video on.
- [Austin] That's your personal laptop.
- [Ken] That is my personal laptop that
I may or may not have taken from work.
But it has a 2060 max... p? q?
- [Austin] I don't remember.
- P
- [Austin] Sure.
- One of those things.
But, it's enough to run Nvidia, G sync.
The other thing, too, is that this monitor
actually gets particularly bright, so...
- [Austin] Oh no, don't do that.
- Oh, I'm gonna hurt the lens, my friend.
Right now it's set to 172 nits of brightness.
It just keeps going.
We're not done yet.
Now we're there.
500 nits of brightness.
- [Austin] I'm just gonna adjust the camera for a second.
Don't mind me, I'm just gonna
- [Ken] And I will stand next to it for context.
This is how bright my face is now.
- [Austin] I like this, actually.
This should be how bright your face is all the time.
Sorry, wait, hang on let me just.
There we go.
That's about how bright your face should be.
I like that.
- [Ken] Oh, look at that.
Look at that.
144, yeah.
We're at the monitor.
- [Austin] That, actually, is pretty smooth.
I mean, granted, this is medium.
But, I mean, whatever, right?
- [Ken] It's also 4k, isn't it?
- [Austin] It's 4k, yeah.
- [Ken] Okay, that's pretty good.
- [Austin] Yeah, with G sync, too.
- [Ken] I also see you have a headset here.
Well, so mine, unfortunately, doesn't light up.
- [Austin] Bro, your $250 headset doesn't light up
and my $20 one does.
- This isn't a toy, though.
The surround sound's really insane on this.
I hear stuff happening behind me.
The directionality is fantastic
(snapping)
Okay, if you're snapping behind me,
I can obviously hear that.
- So now it's time to see whose setup really is best.
It's a 1 v 1.
Is it 1 v 1?
- No, it's not.
We're going to go into the same lobby as a team,
but we have to see who gets the most kills.
Even though that's not the main objective.
Wait, so our giant comparison is that we're teammates?
Can you hear me right now?
- Woah, how did you do that?
- Press the tilde
- [Ken] Ay, can you hear me?
- No.
- [Ken] No?
- No.
- [Ken] What?
Testing. Testing.
One. Test. No, wait. Testing.
Why isn't this working?
I'm actually really upset.
- Anyway, let's just play a game now that
your setup is confirmed trash.
So, wait, how much was your headset, again?
- Don't worry about it.
- It was, what was it?
Double my entire setup?
That was what it was, right? $250?
- [Ken] Don't worry about it.
- I'm glad he really got his money's worth.
I'm really glad that it's super functional.
- [Ken] I can raise the volume now,
so I can't hear him.
(talking over each other)
- [Ken] Can you hear me now?
(shocked and disturbed sound)
Oh it works!
- [Austin] It was just glitchy.
It was like (obnoxious noise)
- There it is! I'm back.
- Oh my god!
Turn that down.
(Ken laughing)
- [Ken] (echoed through headset) Hey,
what's going on y'all?
This is Ken.
And, we're here playing Overwatch.
I sound like a twitch streamer.
(loud screaming)
- I'm gonna play soldier 76.
- [Ken] Alright, I'm gonna play D. Va.
Oh, my mouse is so sensitive right now.
I should change that.
- [Austin] Five minutes. Let's do this.
- [Ken] Bastion! Ah, got him.
- Okay, I got him, I got him, I got him.
Up top, up top.
- [Ken] Got him.
(devious laughter)
- Five player kill streak, my friend.
- I can't get as many kills as Austin because
I'm literally playing the objective.
- [Austin] You're playing the excuse game.
- [Ken] Hey, look at that, we won.
- Who got the most kills, I wonder?
I wonder who it could possibly be?
- [Ken] I got a 23 kill streak.
- [Austin] What? You got 23 eliminations?
I had 17.
- [Ken] I have 23 eliminations, 6 objective kills,
because I was on the objective the whole time.
- [Austin] I got 12 objective kills.
- [Ken] That don't sound right.
(laughing) You were barely next to the objective!
- [Austin] I was around.
So whoever gets the most amount of eliminations,
straight up, is the only thing that matters here.
- [Ken] Alright. So, luckily we're defending,
so it shouldn't really matter.
In fact, eliminations will probably
play to our benefit, anyway, so let's do it.
Oh god, (screams)
Five player kill streak.
- [Austin] I'm feeling pretty good right now.
- [Ken] Are you?
- Yeah, I'm feeling great.
Excellent, in fact, would be a better way of putting it.
(Ken singing)
- [Ken] Ope, alright.
- [Austin] 15 player kill streak, Where are you at?
- [Ken] I have no idea how much I have, actually.
- [Austin] Not 15, I'm guessing.
- [Ken] Oh, Jesus Christ! Oh, God! Hey!
- [Austin] Now he's mine. He's mine.
- [Ken] Dammit!
- [Austin] 20 players!
- [Ken] You just took my kill.
God, son of a...
- [Austin] Alright. We have less than 2 minutes left.
- [Ken] Oh, wait they're back there.
Oh, oh wait, oh wait.
- [Austin] Alright, I think that's it.
- [Ken] Ope. Okay, hold on, hold on.
We gotta get back there.
- What was your score?
(bangs on desk)
- [Austin] I got 27 eliminations.
- [Ken] 27? I got 22.
- Going into this, I knew that Ken was wrong.
I knew it deep down in my heart,
but actually to have the realization
that you don't need to spend
$3000 on a gaming setup feels good, man.
Feels good for the people.
- So Austin's probably really smug right now.
He's probably super smug that he won.
He thinks that his cheap setup was, you know, hot (beep).
- I get the expensive peripherals are nice.
I get that RGB is cool.
I get that lots of frames and
mechanical keyboards are great,
but you know what's more important?
Winning.
- [Josh] That's a good point.
Winning is nice.
- Of all the products that I chose for my setup,
man, I really liked that monitor.
No one in their right mind should buy it at that price.
Unless you're super serious about what you're doing,
you need to have, you know, 4K res,
and 144 Hertz refresh rate. If you need all that,
for what ever reason, by all means.
But, otherwise, you shouldn't get it,
but, it looks so good.
- I was legitimately impressed
with what I was able to pick up.
The monitor, in particular, was really solid, right?
I mean, yeah, it's a little bit on the small side,
but it's 1080p, 75 Hertz, fairly bight,
decent viewing angles.
The keyboard was probably my biggest downside.
It's fine and, yeah, you've got
a little bit of colored lighting,
but, there's a huge gap between using
a membrane keyboard and a mechanical keyboard.
And, the thing is, you can get
a low-end mechanical keyboard for not that much more.
So that's definitely something I would have avoided,
but I'm really happy with that monitor.
- [Ken] For the Astro headset, I thought it would
work way better than it did.
The mic, I could hear from his headset, sounded trash.
Like, absolute trash.
- Yeah, it's nice to have the high-end peripherals,
but also, I'd like to have a bunch of cash in my pocket.
That's pretty underrated.
Spend that money on a better computer
And, a trip to Hawaii,
Ken.