Let’s not rush, but there is light on the horizon in this era of ridiculously priced graphics cards. HP is currently running a sale that gets you an entry-level AMD-based gaming rig for $500, up from $650. Yes, you can finally buy a gaming PC again for less than $500! The downside, however, is that you’ll have to wait a while for this platform, with shipping not starting until the end of March.
HP classifies this particular Windows 11 platform as suitable for the casual gamer. This means it will have acceptable performance for esports enthusiasts and people who want to lower the graphics settings in triple-A games for faster performance. If you’ve been looking for a solid fortnite Where League of Legends PC that won’t break the bank, here it is (finally).
This desktop has a Ryzen 3 5300G APU, which has four cores, eight threads, and a max boost to 4.2 GHz. Since it’s an APU, it has integrated graphics, but they won’t get you very far for gaming. That’s why HP also outfitted this rig with an AMD Radeon RX 5500. It’s a pre-built only part designed to deliver acceptable 1080p performance at a reasonable price for PC buyers.
The Radeon RX 5500 is fine, but if you want to add another $20, HP will swap that graphics card for an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 Super. This promises much better performance than the RX 5500, although it’s still a 1080p machine. Still, given that the GTX 1650 Super itself sells for $300-$500 these days (it was originally a sub-$200 card), it’s a bargain.
The rest of the rig includes 8GB of RAM and 256GB of onboard SSD storage. It’s not a ton, but again, you can add 1TB of HDD storage for an additional $49 if you need it. If you already have a PC, a better option would be to take all the 2.5 inch hard drives and SSDs you have in your current office and migrate them.
It’s a bargain even with the low amount of onboard storage – again, this is a sub-$500 gaming PC in an era when many graphics cards alone sell for around that amount – and if you’re willing to add that extra $20 upgrade to the GTX 1650 Super, you’ll have a particularly pleasing entry-level gaming machine. Radeon or GeForce, you don’t want to miss that.
[Today’s deal: HP Pavilion Gaming Desktop for $500 at HP.com.]
