Forget Prime Day, This RTX 40 PC Is The Best Gaming Desktop Deal Under $1K
Amazon's second Prime Day of 2023 has concluded, but as it turns out the best bargain for a gaming desktop was not a Prime Day deal, or even a discounted PC for that matter. Instead, it's a sub-$900 setup with some surprising hardware inside, including current generation parts from Intel (13th Gen, otherwise known as Raptor Lake) and NVIDIA (GeForce RTX 40 series, or Ada Lovelace).
While not everyone will agree, I'd argue that this Skytech Nebula Gaming PC for $849.99 on Amazon is the most well-rounded and up-to-date prebuilt for the money. Technically that's the actual list price, but while not on sale, it was selling for $1,099.99 as recently as the end of August. So it's $250 less than what it was priced at just two months ago.
I came across this configuration when a family member informed me that my nephew's gaming PC was now long in the tooth, and he was wanting to replace it with something newer that could handle Starfield. The budget? Only around $500 to $800.
My initial thought was that he'd be looking at a setup with a 12th Gen Intel or Ryzen 5000 series CPU, paired with a GeForce RTX 30 series or AMD Radeon RX 6000 series GPU. But then the Skytech Nebula system popped up.
As configured, it rocks an Intel 13th Gen Core i5-13400F processor (10C/16T, up to 4.6GHz, 20MB L3 cache) based on Intel's latest-generation Raptor Lake architecture, with a GeForce RTX 4060 sitting shotgun. Those are both decidedly mid-range parts but if there are other PCs in this price range that flex Raptor Lake and Ada Lovelace, I haven't seen them.
On its own, the GeForce RTX 4060 has caught some flak—it only has 8GB of VRAM with a narrow 128-big bus and is not a substantial upgrade over mid-range cards from the previous generation. However, it's a capable mid-tier GPU. It also supports DLSS 3 with frame generation, which is exclusive to the GeForce RTX 40 series.
Other specs here include 16GB of DDR4-3200 memory, a 1TB NVMe solid state drive, Wi-Fi 5 connectivity, a 600W 80 Plus Gold power supply, RGB lighting, and Windows 11 Home. According to the listing, users won't find any bloatware on this PC.
DDR4 is not terribly exciting now that we've entered the era of DDR5, but the amount hits the sweet spot, as does the capacity of the SSD. If you can find a better prebuilt for the money, by all means, shout about in the comments section below!
I don't have any particular affinity for Skytech, but if you're looking for a bump in GPU firepower, this discounted Skytech Blaze Gaming PC gets you there for $1,199.99 (save $100). It trades the GeForce RTX 4060 in the other configuration for a meatier GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB. You don't gain any memory bandwidth (it's the same amount tied to the same 128-bit bus), but you get a sizable 41.7% jump in the number of CUDA cores (4,352 versus 3,072), along with more Tensor cores (136 versus 96) and RT cores (34 versus 24).
The rest of the setup consists of a Ryzen 7 5700X (8C/16T, up to 4.6GHz, 32MB L3 cache), 16GB of DDR4-3200 RAM, 1TB NVMe SSD, 650W 80 Plus Gold power supply, all-in-one liquid cooling for the CPU, Wi-Fi 5 connectivity, and Windows 11 Home.
Here are some prebuilt desktop PCs worth looking at...
- Omen 45L (i7-13700KF, RTX 4070 Ti): $2,197.48 (save $302.56)
- ABS Stratos Aqua (i7-13700KF, RTX 4070 Ti): $1,799.99 (save $200)
- Lenovo Legion Tower 5i (i7-12700F, RTX 3070): $1,499.99 (save $180)
- HP Envy (i9-12900, RTX 3070): $1,330 (save $569.99)
- Skytech Archangel (i5-12400F, RTX 4060 Ti): $1,144.22 (save $105.77)
- Acer Aspire (i5-12400, 12GB DDR4, 512GB SSD, iGPU): $561.10 (save $58.89)
- STGAubron Gaming PC (i7-4770, Radeon RX 580): $399.99 (save $100)
That last one is running dated hardware, but if you're looking to go as cheap as possible while still getting a discrete GPU, it's an option. As for the rest, they're okay, just not spectacular. In terms of bang-for-buck, the Skytech Nebula featured up top is tough to beat.
