Thought it was an American style fridge lol

Reasonable price, but it's the 3GB 1060 for those interested...

I know nothing...but looking at the HP website the 256GB SSD version (everything else the same I think) is £950
http://store.hp.com/UKStore/Product.aspx?hpproduct=ECC_BUNDLE_6305000

The 128GB SSD version has an RX480(4GB) and is £900
http://store.hp.com/UKStore/Product.aspx?hpproduct=Z7C44EA#ABU

So it looks like this Argos deal is pretty good if you want a quick way into PC gaming.
I'd ask questions about the PSU which is a 300W "adapter"; is it not a standard case PSU?!?!

Usually I would just say build your own PC or go with a PC specialist. But you can't go wrong for £750. Even if building your self using similar parts you wouldn't be saving much. https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/h4Dr8K

But then on the other hand the PSU inside this doesn't look great and I do question if you can replace it or not. If not then putting a more powerful card inside this like a 1080 is a big fat no. But if the PSU is replaceable then you should be able to but will obviously cost more due to having to buy a better PSU.

Nope, it's a laptop style brick on the omen. I think it might even be 2 of them!

the more i check PC's the more i think my Alienware Aurora i7, 1070 was a bargain at £1150 lol

Hmmm. I guess the i5 CPU + GTX1060 are quite power efficient. But a laptop style brick(s) is not an ideal baseline for future upgrades.

Thought it was an American style fridge lol

Is the CPU running at 666MHz?

Thankyou Bud! :smile:

Sorry, I just don't see how this is any kind of deal. I know its cheaper than it was but then it was horrifically overpriced in the first place.

I particularly liked the 'Overclock with the best' tagline. On an i5 7400? Really?

You can bet the components will have the old Dell trick of being dirt cheap to maximise profit. The motherboard will be the cheapest of the cheap H110 junk using the stock cooler along with the RAM, PSU being as close as possible to running the system at full load safely as can be which will destroy any chances of a straight upgrade and a cheapo SSD.

I understand that people are saying you cannot build it for much cheaper but you can build it a with FAR better parts for similar money either yourself or by paying a specialist PC shop to do it for you.

A big money saver is that you can usually find Windows activation codes from Amazon or resellers like CDKeys for under £15. With that saving you can get down to under £650, leaving a nice little chunk of money for making changes based on personal preference like a nicer case, more RAM/SSD storage etc. Of course building a PC isn't for everyone, and for anyone that wants a prebuilt this is a very good deal.


Well it sounds like a bargain in the context of Alienware's habit of overpricing everything, but it's nothing out of the ordinary. I was even able to find an i7/1070 based desktop for £1000 on ebuyer.

Thanks for posting, but that would have to be more like £500 for me at that spec. You're basically paying for the name. Only 8gb RAM too.

How original people banging on about it being under specced and over priced but never providing examples/proof.

I highly doubt this will handle VR well, if so not for long.

Would this be good for 4k video editing? I'm after a pc/laptop for 4k video stuff but can't spend thousands.

A 3GB version of the 1060 wont really do the job for the HTC VIVE. 6GB Version minimum.

For those suggesting a home build, that doesn't come with warranty. Not my choice, but this is a hot deal for a name brand pc

Very good price. I have the same one with Gtx970 paid around £540 on amazon lightning deal in January

Whilst I agree with you, many people who want to game but simply do not have the time or effort to DIY. Many find a decent tower like this as an attractive plug n play option.
Albeit Id probably want 16gb of ram if your playing big open world titles such as PUBG, Arma, GTA etc as even with the vram, 8gb of ram is sharp used up.

Absolutely! Although I'm not saying it's a bad price, just wouldn't tickle my fancy for over £700. There's some good deals from smaller companies if you have around £800 and you're willing to shop around/wait for a sale. You should be able to find a 1070, around 200gb SSD, and 16gb RAM too

Care to provide an example?

I did a thread in Ask about this PC last week for a friend. Would this be suitable for someone who will be playing mainly single player games, maybe a bit of Overwatch, who has no interest in VR and won't be too bothered about not having ultra settings (plus she'll be buying a sub £150 monitor so visuals aren't the be all end all for her)?

Some of her friends (including myself) have been trying to help her decide but we all console game so we're quite derpy in all things PC. Even though Argos is more preferable to her someone suggested to her a site called Chillblast and she likes the look of this PC even if she would have to save up a bit more (tbh if I find the person who suggested this to her I'd kick them because it's pretty much muddied the waters as she was 90% sold on the Argos one so we're back to square one).

Sorry to go on a bit of a tangent there. :P

This PC will be more than capable of playing most games on high/max settings at 1080p, so yeah, it will be well suited to her.


She'd be paying an extra £300 for about £200 worth of improvements, but for the usage you've described she's not likely to get her money's worth- gaming at 1080p on a 60Hz monitor will not need 16GB of RAM for example. She'd be better off with this deal from Argos and adding an aftermarket SSD, as this the going to make the largest difference to day-to-day usability, and then purchase additional storage, RAM etc if she ever finds herself needing it later down the line.

Did you have a question about that link, or a point you wanted to make?

Thank you very much. :smiley:

Very true I my self have not bought a retail version of Windows since Windows XP. I simply just bought OEM keys (with the stickler) from eBay for £15 - £20 each for Windows 7 and 8. But you are right if I was in a situation where I wanted a new PC to game on. I would build my self and swap the 1060 for a 1070 at the total cost of about £770.

But again taking noting away from this pre-built PC it's very good value for those who don't know how/want to build there own PC.

If it was my choice. I would go with this argos one. That chillblast one is not a good value for money compared to this argos one. It uses the same CPU as the argos one with the only difference being extra 8GB RAM, Extra 1TB HDD Space, Extra 100+ GB SSD storage and the same GPU (but with more vRAM).

I honestly can't recommend paying an extra £320 for not more much benefit. For £40 she can slap her own 1TB HDD into the argos PC or even an external HDD. That argos system is a solid system for 1080p 60FPS gaming.

https://www.google.co.uk/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwiRkMOi5vLUAhUIFtMKHSn-CXcYABABGgJ3Yg&sig=AOD64_09XA59-uolf9f-_E7IbR8B5viRog&ctype=5&q=&ved=0ahUKEwiTiMCi5vLUAhXHCsAKHZrvDaYQqCsIGw&adurl=

Not sure about SSD, but that's just a quick Google shopping find

Your link is broken.

I found building your own PC these days costs an absolute fortune, although when i was trying it was with i7 etc! maybe doing an AMD build would work out substantially cheaper these days.

I've bought a bunch of Win 10 Pro keys on ebay for £4-5, all worked perfectly, so even more savings to go towards better hardware.

People were asking for PC's with a similar price but a better spec.

This is one of them. PC Specialist allow you to customise it so you can spec up/down parts of the build depending on your needs.

The model you've linked to has a 1050ti, moving to a 3GB 1060 makes it more expensive than this deal. The Ryzen chip performs more or less in the same ballpark as the 7400 for gaming, and certainly won't compensate for dropping down a GPU tier. I've recommended PCSpecialist a lot over the years, but in this particular instance they're more expensive.

At this price you will not get a machine that is anything special.

Dropping down the GPU allows for a better Motherboard etc.

The point is you can spec up a machine based on your preferences for a similar price and you aren't locked to an external power brick limited to 300w.

I understand the pro's/con's being a gamer and an IT consultant and a "gaming" PC from the big brands is unlikely to be value for money given the relative specification.

It has a lower grahics card and doesnt even have a SSD?

This one was posted a while back but still looks like a decent spec...
http://www.awd-it.co.uk/awd-titan-intel-i5-7400-3.5ghz-gtx-1070-8gb-ddr5-vr-gaming-pc.html
£749....
Damn OOS hang on...

This one is the 1060, better mobo and is the £729 one...

http://www.awd-it.co.uk/awd-enthoo-pro-m-i5-7500-3.8-ghz-asus-prime-z270-p-gtx-1060-6gb-gaming-pc.html

It's a 1050ti with 4Gb VRam not a standard 1050... if you don't know the difference then you probably arent qualified to have an opinion on Gaming machines tbh.

This might help explain http://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Nvidia-GTX-1060-3GB-vs-Nvidia-GTX-1050-Ti/3646vs3649

At this price point you can choose a bottom of the range 1060 or a top of the range 1050. I know which one I would pick for getting the most bang for your buck.

Also you can add an SSD for very little extra cost.

Most gamers will want to customise their rig. This allows you to do that for a similar price but still comes with a warranty.

Didn't post the link to start an argument but feel free to argue with yourself....

When you link something that goes completely against your argument.. All I see is massive green pluses for the 1060. The 1060 is leaps and bounds above any 1050 ti, and an SSD in todays market sets you back over £50, making the link you posted cost way more than the deal listed. You've single-handedly proved why for a manufacturer computer, this deal is really dam good

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MSI-NIGHTBLADE-MI2C-203EU-Intel-Core-i5-6400-Nvidia-Geforce-GTX-1060-Gaming-PC-/182612328846

Refurb but 1 year MSI warranty, also

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MSI-Aegis-Intel-Core-i5-6400-Geforce-GTX-1070-8GB-Gaming-Desktop-PC-Computer-/192233215934

Pretty sure you can't buy the parts for that much.

No SSD either...but thanks for the link

Just build your own guys.. voted cold.

Ryzen 5 1600 -£190 (better than this..)
8gb ram -£70
Mobo -£70
Psu -£60
Gtx1060 6gb -£230 (again, better..)
Fancy case -£60
Windows £20.

... £700 with a miles better cpu, and a model up gpu. And a case you like.

Good job posting a link that goes completely against what your saying.

I was simply showing that you failed in showing a similar price with better specs not quite sure how you construe that as arguing with you or myself lol

You answered my questions before I asked them! Cheers.

I find this poor value really. As always I'm happy to help anyone on this site build a PC for any purpose (but especially gaming), I've helped quite a few now. I can promise you that it's actually really easy, if you can build a Lego model or assemble IKEA furniture you'll manage just fine.

For around £700-750 I'd build this:

PCPartPicker part list: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/WNp9zM
Price breakdown by merchant: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/WNp9zM/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 5 1400 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£146.99 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B350M-A Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard (£63.54 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: ADATA - XPG Z1 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2800 Memory (£89.92 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: PNY - CS1311 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£39.47 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Toshiba - 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£37.98 @ Eclipse Computers)
Video Card: EVGA - GeForce GTX 1060 6GB 6GB GAMING Video Card (£254.11 @ CCL Computers)
Case: Cooler Master - MasterBox Lite 3 (Windowless) MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£34.99 @ Novatech)
Power Supply: Cooler Master - B500 ver.2 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply (£40.05 @ Amazon UK)
Operating System:Windows 10 Pro (£6.30 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £713.35

Advantages over this HP system are:

• 14% faster CPU

• Double the RAM
• 10% faster GPU

• Better quality Power Supply (rather than the awful ones OEMs use)
• More room for upgrades
• If something fails you don't have to post the entire system back to HP
• You get to feel like you've achieved something

Although this is a good route for people wanting to build a gaming PC, for people wanting to simply go into a shop and pick up a system that performs, with the know-how that if something breaks you can just take it back to Argos and have them fix it, you can't find or build a system with that good of value. Your system is good, but the Ryzen CPU is only slightly better and you'd need a decent CPU cooler which is added cost, plus the cost of you spending a good few hours putting it together. It becomes not worth it for £40 gain and slightly better parts.

Erm, no you don't. The one in the box (Wraith Stealth) is absolutely fine for a Ryzen 5 65w CPU. This is not an overclocking system (not with this motherboard any way) and is aimed at people just starting out with building their own systems. And for this purpose you'll struggle to get the temperature of the CPU above the 50 degree mark.

Stop trying to put people off building their own, it's more fun, easy, and stops them from being ripped off with shorter warranties and inferior systems. There is basically zero upgrade path with this HP system due to the custom case, crap PSU and older CPU socket, with the one I suggest you could upgrade is several times over a couple of years when required.

The time putting together can actually be fun, and become a hobby. It can also be a great father-son/father-daughter activity. Some of my best memories as kid were from my Dad and I putting together or upgrading our systems.

I'm really not trying to put people off building their own, I'm weighing up the price and the benefits and making a decision. I use my own custom built computer and its fantastic. However, I built one a few years ago with an 8320 which had 0 upgrade path itself, building it with a motherboard that could only support 6 core processors, all because I wanted to build it as cheap as possible. However, what I built meant that it needs a new motherboard and a new CPU cooler within a matter of months. People could make the same mistake and is easily done, so either spend absolutely hours researching the exact right parts to make sure they fit properly in your computer, then build it which takes even longer. Or buy this, which you're right, won't last as long, but will at least get good gaming performance for the time being.

I highly advise anyone with a budget of +£850 to build your own, because you can get a lot better parts for that price (decent i5/i7, 1070/1080), but at sub £750 the challenge is to build a decent gaming PC, upgradeable for future tech (IMO Ryzen doesn't fall into that category, in benchmarks sure it looks impressive, but real world performance in games drops considerably vs intel source: https://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2017/03/amd-ryzen-gaming-performance-analysis/ ) and not going to fail in the first 6 months.

Except:

• PC Partpicker does this for you
• Logical Increments exists
• I am also offering my free time to help ANY member of HUKDs to avoid this issue for free

What's the issue now?

And for Ryzen vs. Intel for gaming? Well actually if you knew your stuff you'd know that games that have been optimised for Ryzen (which a lot are going to be in the future) it performs just as well if not better.

If you've got doubts about that, it's fine, building a system is all about choice.

If want a high-end gaming rig and don't mind penny pinching in the areas that don't really matter, how about a much more powerful Intel rig for very little more?

PCPartPicker part list: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/mpFfBP
Price breakdown by merchant: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/mpFfBP/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel - Core i5-7400 3.0GHz Quad-Core Processor (£151.14 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B250M-K Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£59.75 @ Aria PC)
Memory: ADATA - XPG Z1 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2800 Memory (£50.63 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: PNY - CS1311 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£39.47 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Toshiba - 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£38.06 @ Eclipse Computers)
Video Card: Palit - GeForce GTX 1070 8GB JetStream Video Card (£355.77 @ Amazon UK)
Case: Zalman - T2 Plus MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£23.99 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Power Supply: EVGA - 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply (£38.93 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £757.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Throw in a Windows key and that comes to well under £800.

Granted the CPU and the amount of RAM is the same, however the 1070 is MILES more powerful than the 1060 that is almost laughable.

You can argue with me all you like but I'm the only person on HUKDs right now using my own personal free time to help people build their own systems. And I've done quite a few now, even helping some via Skype calls etc. I put myself out there and contribute the best I can and I don't ask for anything other than thanks in return.

I would agree BUT if someone is buying this system in the first place , they have NO intention of upgrading parts, like 90% of people. This is an appliance, like a fridge, when it breaks or gets too old , you replace the whole thing.. upgrading is a completely unknown quantity for the majority of people.
In fact most people use laptops, or even tablets for their computing/gaming so upgraders are a minority of a minority.
It makes non-upgradeability a moot point.

NB if the ryzen 1600 is £190 and ryzen 1400 is £159 why does anyone buy the 1400 ??

Why do people buy anything that is cheaper? They have a fixed budget, if you're trying to build a gaming rig on a budget that £31 might be the difference between being able to afford say a RX 580 over an RX 470, or going from having 4GB of RAM to 8GB.

For a gaming rig I know where I'd rather spend the cash.

unless you do gaming then forget this and just get a laptop... with the improvement in processor power and now with ssd's a half decent laptop can cope easily with anything but gaming.

not to mention you can move a laptop, use it anywhere, they don't require a desk like this would.

for £750 you could get an HD screen i7 laptop with SSD and 8+GB RAM

I knew this post would be honey to the partpicker bees.

It's amazing they can't understand that people have zero interest in building their own PC. Why do you think Apple is the most valuable company in the world?

This deal is now expired. Argos upped the price by £50. I wonder if my reserved one will be honoured? :man:

Because they make than just PCs?

I don't need some paper and a pen. A crayon and the ground does me fine thanks.

Sigh...

Try this then

Ryzen 5 1400 -147
Mobo - 63
8gb Ram - 60
120gb ssd - 40
1tb hdd - 40
1060 3gb - 180
S340 fancy case - 60
Psu - 40

Windows £20

Total - 670, and a better pc.

Add a mem card reader and wifi if needed.

Spend extra on upgrades if needed.

The point im making is buying prebuilt is stupid in most cases. The only deal ive really seen on a prebuilt that genuinely been cheaper than building is the alienware steam boxes for £250 last Christmas.

There is a lot of build your own v stock. My pc is 6 year old. I wanted a new one that will play all the latest games at decent graphics.

But there was one clincher. 12 months interest free on my Argos card. Take That pcpartpicker. Lol

Jumped to £899. Obvs caught wind on the interest. :smiley: