With themuted furore surrounding Intel ’s late processors , and the continue absence seizure of unexampled top - tier graphics cards , it ’s easy to bury just how fast some aging factor are . Intel ’s 14900KF is still one of thefastest processors ever made , and theRTX 4090 has n’t been eclipsed in over two years .
So , while the Corsair Vengeance i5100 that I test does n’t have any major unexampled hardware revelations , I still expected it to be an absolute colossus play PC . Combine god - tier performance with swish looks and splendid connectivity , and you have a strong combination that ’s well deserving considering .
Indeed , its usance of a slightly older program from Intel ’s 14th generation of hardware helps keep pricing a little more reasonable , too . You might not be excessively interested about savings if you ’re able-bodied to throw close to $ 5,000 down on a back PC , but if it knock off off even a couple hundred dollars , it ’s got to be worth at least thinking about . With that said , the Corsair Vengeance i5100 has its effectiveness , but does n’t quite land among thebest gaming desktopsyou can buy .
Specs and pricing
It feels odd to say that one of the biggest selling points of this PC is that it uses an older processor , andone maligned at launch , too . And yet a year on from its underwhelming debut , the Core i9 - 14900 K ( and its KF variant ) have discover a new recession , as the fastest Intel CPU for gaming and many productivity tasks , despite a whole new multiplication of central processor having launched since then . But unfortunately , theCore Ultra 9 285 K just ca n’t contend , specially in gaming .
On paper , at least , that makes the i5100 an arguably more attractive buy than its newer Corsair counterpart , the Vengeance i5200 . Both sport up to an RTX 4090 , with the choice of an RTX 4080 Super if you need to redeem some money at the cost of absolute flagship performance . Doing so does switch you over to half the computer memory and storage too , but then the prickle price is just $ 2,900 . This RTX 4090 version with all the trimming is an eye - watering $ 4,400 .
That high-pitched cost tag gets you 64 GB of DDR5 - 6000 memory and 4 TB of NVMe SSD depot , a 360 mm AIO tank on the CPU , and six more system fans to help keep the interior cool .
It ’s slimly disappointing to see only a B760 motherboard in this scheme . At this sort of price , I feel like a agiotage Z790 motherboard is n’t too much to involve for . The MSI B760 M Project Zero is a nice one and reckon great with its sneak design and unpretentious colors , but it ’s missing some of the top chipset features , most notably overclocking . If you ’re buy a PC with a 14900KF , as pit to something like the 7800X3D , which is n’t overclockable anyway , you plausibly want that ability . particularly with the expansive cooling system Corsair has built into this PC .
Along with the Corsair H150i 360 mm AIO cooler , you get nine 120 mm fans in aggregate . That ’s not only a good deal of RGB lighting to act around with , it ’s a gross ton of arrangement airflow . Complete overkill , arguably , even if the 4090 and 14900KF are two of the hot and most demanding component you could fit in a PC like this .
Build quality and design
The overall vibration of the i5100 is excellent . It appear clean and classy , with a slightly stocky shape that help it stand out — as if the superfluity of RGB light does n’t do that enough already . It ’s a show window PC . It grabs the eye and turns heads . It ’s the sort of thing your less - pettish relative will comment on as take care like a spaceship .
The dual - venire , wraparound tempered glass gives you a full sight of the interior of the PC , too , and the boxlike shape make it super soft to reach just about every part of the microcomputer . If you require to tweak and adapt and DIY your newfangled impost physique in the futurity , this system is tailor made for it . TheStarforge Systems Navigatoris another gambling PC we fuck that take a interchangeable feeler in terms of blueprint .
Corsair has clearly put a spate of sentence and effort into cable length management to facilitate that clean and open look , too . Everything is tuck away and routed out of mess . It really is a adorable face machine , and everything feel sturdy . Even the RTX 4090 does n’t shift , despite the lack of a GPU brace . Those armoured motherboard slots are doing some gravely sound lifting .
It ’s not gross , though . The twofold - bedroom design is broad , so even though the overall purpose is technically mATX , it takes up more space than my mid - tower Fractal North . For a microcomputer that you ’re go to want people to be able-bodied to see , you ’re cash in one’s chips to need to budget a circle of desk blank space for it .
The exterior turning point are also a little sharp . It ’s nit - picking an otherwise lovely pattern , and maybe I ’m just clumsy , but I expunge myself a few times while maneuvering the pillow slip around . I get that it pass the front a sharper flavour , but a little filing down would have gone a foresighted agency to eliminating that issue .
Thermals and cooling
Corsair take the cooling of this PC seriously , and it should , because with an RTX 4090 and a 14900KF , there ’s the potential drop for hundreds and hundreds of James Watt of heating system to be dumped into that expansive lawsuit when they ’re being pushed intemperately . To that end , Corsair has the central processing unit fitted with an H150i 360 mm AIO ice chest , and the graphics card is the Asus TUF variation using its oversized , triple - fan cool down design . There are also six more 120 millimetre organisation rooter : three inspiration on the bottom , two intakes on the correct - hand control board , and one exhaust system at the rear .
That gives this system a 5:4 ratio of inlet to exhaust system , keeping the arrangement at positive pressure and ensuring that any gaps in the chassis will push air and scatter out , rather than pulling it in . All inhalation are fitted with robust and easy - to - bump off and fresh debris filters , and all fan are managed by Corsair ’s iCUE system , which provides in - depth temperature and sports fan speed monitoring and a mix of automated and manual ascendancy .
All good in possibility .
However , in practice , the effectuation feel heavy - handed and lack in subtlety . Where you would ask such a combination of cooling systems to be nuanced in its approach , the world is far more blunt , and far more obvious .
At even the flimsy tinge of load on the 14900KF , the fans twirl up dramatically and noisily . This might be for just a few instant if the system is idling , but give on a benchmark or a game , and the fan noise is uniform and very audible . You would n’t inevitably hear it in earpiece , but you might and it ’s louder than I personally care my gaming PCs — especially an expensive one .
This is something that you may gear up with some readjustment in the iCUE software package . Switching most lover to a placid visibility eliminated much of the issue , but the out - of - the - box experience with the i5100 ’s noise levels leave behind a muckle to be hope . In our examination of theAlienware Aurora R16 , we find out the quieter and cooler performance a bit more impressive , though it only go up to an RTX 4070 . Another Corsair scheme we ended up liking quite a deal , theCorsair One i500 , also had some job with fan noise .
Bloatware
Corsair does set up a fistful of its own applications like iCUE for manage cooling and RGB lighting and some diagnostics software to aid if you run into bother . That ’s about it , though , provide the organisation feeling clean and unburdened by unneeded apps and services . What is there can be promptly uninstalled , but it does n’t feel too glaring or in - your - face .
I would have liked to see a few more canonical applications programme pre - instal in such a high - remainder gambling system , though . Just for easier setup . Steam , Chrome , Discord perhaps . Not something you ca n’t do yourself easy , but if you ’re going to pass the time installing apps you call up people might need , you might as well set up the ones you know they will .
Performance
As much as Intel might not have made waves in 2024 with its big CPU launching , let ’s not pretend that its top chip are n’t seriously hefty and more than capable of consecrate AMD ’s best a streamlet for their money . Even as maligned as the 14900 K was at launching , it ’s still one of the most powerful processors ever made , and paired with a 4090 , there should be nothing it ca n’t handle .
And indeed , that configuration in this Corsair i5100 is supremely powerful , but perhaps not quite as hefty as it should be .
In Cinebench 24 , while the 14900KF does well , its musical score were about 10 % lower than I expected , with a boost clock that never break 5.7GHz in the unmarried - threaded trial run , or 4.9GHz in the multi - threaded test . I dug into thewhyon this one for a while , and discovered somepower terminal point choking and current / EDP limitation throttling warnings in Intel XTU . Corsair suggest we update the BIOS to the in vogue variation , which I promptly did , but it made piffling difference .
Fortunately , Geekbench did n’t seem to show the same problem , and the Handbrake transcoding was impressively warm , so this may have been a Cinebench quirkiness with this system . I still do n’t like see any choking on a PC this expensive , and my stake is on the B760 motherboard not having the bean this CPU needs to really elongate its legs , but if it does n’t pan out in the real world , how much does that really matter ?
One plus , though , is that I never find any thermal throttling . Whether in gaming , or synthetic carrying into action examination , this notoriously blistering and fleshy chip never break-dance 83 degrees C. Fan noise was seriously obtrusive , though and something I would likely run with extensively to bring it down if this was my day-by-day driver punt PC .
Suffice to say , uncanny bound behaviour or not , this personal computer is incredibly powerful and can play just about anything well — though as per common , Cyberpunkwith everything maxed out still give it some trouble . DLSS 3 to the saving .
Should you buy the Corsair i5100?
Probably not — at least not in this configuration I try . It is powerful , and it await great . There ’s potential there for a quiet organisation once you ’ve tweaked and adjust the cooling and the fan curves . But at that price ? It ’s hard to apologize compared to the contest .
The 14900KF might be libertine than the newer 285 K , but it ’s not as uniform as I ’d care to see on this comparatively - pedestrian - feeling B760 M motherboard . The fact that this microcomputer does n’t support overclocking for such an expensive bod feel like a stumble and one that I ’d be miff about if I had put down over $ 4,000 on it . Especially not when Corsair also offer a comparably price version of this same system with Ryzen X3D CPUs . For gaming , they ’re just way better , and way cooler than this aging monster .
If you do buy the i5100 , I ’d intimate opt for the RTX 4080 Super edition . It has less storage and retentivity , but 2 TB and 32 GB are still plenty , and you shave around $ 1,500 off the price for perhaps 20 % performance drib in real - world gaming . That still gives you a stupendously degenerate system in a large and airy case with some great esthetic , and you’re able to always kick upstairs it afterward if you chance it miss in the long term .
Realistically , though , thebest gaming desktopsout there offer better time value , with a good out - of - the - box experience , good pricing , and a better upgrade path . Just , good . At this form of money , that ’s not really skilful enough .
