Wrap Up: Highly Configurable and Adept Value

If yous're looking to purchase a pre-built gaming desktop that prioritizes performance over ridiculous designs and over-the-top liquid cooling, the HP Omen Desktop is a great choice. It's not ludicrously expensive, yet it provides solid hardware, decent thermals, and loads of configuration options to suit a wide range of budgets.

The Omen Desktop case looks quite decent. HP has managed to achieve a lot with a more often than not plastic exterior, a few red LEDs and some interesting flaps. The carbon fiber design looks neat, the angles are aggressive merely surprisingly pleasing, and I love features like the easy-access hard drive bays and the toolless side panel.

People will know this is a gaming desktop without HP resorting to "look at me" pattern features like non-standard shapes and RGB lighting.

There'due south such a wide range of hardware choices it's hard to say how this system will perform in full general. My test system – a Ryzen 7 1800X and GeForce GTX 1080 – was only equally fast every bit we've seen from this hardware in custom-congenital rigs; in other words it was great for 1440p gaming or 1080p high-refresh. Considering base of operations models beginning with a Ryzen 5 1600 and a Radeon RX 580, I think any option hither will deliver a decent experience, though you can push this all the way up to GTX 1080 Tis and dual GTX 1080s if you take the greenbacks.

I was pleased with the cooling solution used hither. The organization runs tranquility while in games, and temperatures on both the CPU and GPU are respectable. The closed-loop liquid cooler on the CPU isn't the most insane setup, though it tin handle a decent overclock nonetheless: the Ryzen 7 1800X in my unit comfortably hit iii.9 GHz without a massive cost on temperatures or noise levels. It was a similar story with the GPU: enough of overclocking headroom.

Standard parts are used across the lath, so information technology should exist very straightforward to add more storage, bandy out the graphics carte du jour, change CPUs and even do an entire platform upgrade downward the track. My review unit of measurement came with xvi GB of RAM and 2 gratuitous DIMM slots, plus several spare 3.5-inch bulldoze trophy and an Thou.2 SSD. There are only four SATA ports and a single PCIe x16 slot, which is the most limiting aspect of the system'southward upgradeability, though otherwise I was impressed.

Earlier concluding this review with a discussion on pricing, I volition brand some recommendations on configurations. The base model comes with just a hard bulldoze installed, so I would immediately advise upgrading to something with an SSD. The 256GB SSD pick costs an additional $215, which is a piddling steep, though the Samsung PM961 is a great bulldoze. Otherwise you could install your own M.ii SSD for $120 or more.

I'd likewise steer articulate of the Ryzen 7 1800X model, fifty-fifty though I was sent information technology to review. The Ryzen 7 1700 is available for $140 less, and overclocks to the same level of performance as the 1800X without any issue. I'd also tend to avoid the non-Thou Intel CPU options; it may cost $fifty-60 more than for an unlocked CPU, but the gains y'all can get from overclocking are definitely worth it. As for the GPU, get whatever is the virtually powerful within your upkeep, though I'd avoid SLI or CrossFire setups.

Those looking for a upkeep system, I'd recommend the Ryzen v 1600, 16GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD with 2TB HDD, and an RX 580 4GB for $1254.99. Whipping up this sort of system yourself would price around $1,200 for parts equivalent to the Omen Desktop (including a Windows 10 license), so this is outstanding value for a pre-built organization.

With a bit of budget hunting yous could get everything for a fleck cheaper than this, but in any example, at that place's zip outrageous well-nigh the Omen'due south toll.

For something college-cease, I'd expect at the Intel Core i7-7700K, 16GB of RAM, 256GB SSD and 2 TB hard drive, along with the GeForce GTX 1080. This sort of configuration would set you back but over $two,000. Here the price premium for the Omen Desktop relative to a cocky-built system is effectually $250.

Shopping Shortcuts

  • HP Omen Desktop on Amazon
  • HP Omen Desktop on HP.com
  • HP Omen Desktop on Newegg

All things considered, information technology's pretty piece of cake to recommend the HP Omen Desktop for someone after a pre-built gaming desktop. Information technology succeeds strongly in most key areas, particularly when information technology comes to value at the low end, and that's what I love to run across from desktops like this.

Pros: Loads of configuration options, and entry-level models are not bad value. Respectable design with decent cooling, piece of cake upgradeability and a off-white bit of overclocking headroom.

Cons: OEM motherboard with limited SATA and PCIe ports. Value isn't as potent with upper-tier configurations.