This tiny budget gaming boxes built specifically to be a cheap, but good, entry into PC gaming. It has enough power to handle most games, is relatively quiet, and the entire system draws less power than an RTX 2080.

The PC features an i3-12100f, a 4-core 8-thread CPU that consistently boosts to 4.1GHz. It’s a decent chip with decent performance, and it didn’t let me down in the more CPU intensive games.

Paired with that CPU is a 4GB RX 6500XT, which also performed admirably. I never saw the GPU draw more than 90W, so the performance I got from it seemed pretty good. It could get VRAM limited in texture-rich titles like Snowrunner, but otherwise it did good.

Other than that, the PC has 16GB of 3000MHz RAM, a 500GB SSD, and a 650W 80+ Gold PSU. Being on the LGA 1700 platform, this PC has a good upgrade path, and the motherboard supports an NVMe drive for a future storage upgrade if needed. The 650W PSU also provides ample room for a potential GPU upgrade down the line.

Specifications

CPU - i3-12100f

GPU - XFX AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT 4GB

RAM - V-Color Prism 2x8GB @ 3000MHz

Mobo - ASUS Prime H610M-A D4-CSM

Storage - Crucial MX200 500GB SATA SSD

PSU - Raidmax RX-650AED 80+ Gold

Cooler - Vetroo V3

Case - Zalman Cubix

Benchmarks

3DMark

Time Spy - 5353

CPU Profile - 902-4057

Solar Bay - 19237

Steel Nomad Light - 4774

CS2

1080p Competitive | 257 FPS avg. | 120 FPS 1% low

Satisfactory

1080p High | 70 FPS avg. | 44 FPS 1% low

Sniper Elite 5

1080p Medium | 104 FPS avg. | 72 FPS avg. 1% low

War Thunder

1080p High | 145 FPS avg. | 88 FPS 1% low

Software

OS - Win 11 Pro (lemme know if you want something else)

Browser - Firefox

Extra(s) - Steam, drivers (obviously)