Review Console Killer: Building a Liquid-Cooled Living Room PC

[Admin]

Eliminating both noise and heat from a high-powered gaming PC typically means one thing: water-cooling. Can you truly make a quiet, cool gaming PC to rival any console? Let’s find out.

Console Killer: Building a Liquid-Cooled Living Room PC : Read more

 

[pelegbn]

A $1,800 console killer?? can it run God Of War, Horizon Zero, Uncharted 4 or any of Sony's [$350] many great exclusives? I rest my case.

 

[g-unit1111]

Sick build. I love the Evolv Shift and would love to use it in a build.

 

[JackFlakk]

Enjoyed the article. You put together a fantastic looking rig. Nevertheless, I wonder if perhaps you lost your way when attempting to call an $1,800 build a "console killer".

To borrow from (and somewhat misuse) Shakespeare, "the play's the thing." With your budget, after spending $300 on the console I can then go on to purchase 25 games at the full $60 price tag. Sure, they may all run at a miserly 30 FPS, but at what cost does one place a buttery-smooth frame rate? Me, I'd rather have a lot of games to play.

 

[AnimeMania]

I think building a computer for roughly the same price as a console or finding out how much it costs to build a PC that has the roughly the same graphic quality as a console would have been a better article. For the price of the video card, you could have purchased all of the popular gaming consoles. There needs to be some apples to apples in the article. Custom water cooling is never cheap or plug and play.

 

[blacknemesist]

Console killer? can it run God Of War, Horizon Zero, Uncharted 4 or any of Sony's many great exclusives?? I rest my case.
A better title would have been "Xbox Killer" but Sony already did that as well...

Can a PS4 run PC exclusive titles? Point is moot.

 

[blacknemesist]

Enjoyed the article. You put together a fantastic looking rig. Nevertheless, I wonder if perhaps you lost your way when attempting to call an $1,800 build a "console killer".

Its almost a console killer since it is compact, perform away above anything the PS4 can offer and only lacks the ease of mobility and maintenance. Given any title that exists on both PC and PS4 versions( not just a PS4->PC port) this machine completely wipes the PS4 out. It is overkill but it replaces the PS4 place in the living room.

 

[JackFlakk]

It is overkill but it replaces the PS4 place in the living room.

As you wish. For the money, I'd still rather have the PS4 and the 25 games. I suppose one could have an entertaining evening playing with the Ambient Occlusion slider, instead. To each their own.

 

[rakadedo]

The problem with the PS4 Pro (the more powerful of the two 4K consoles right now)

Mistake there. You either meant to say Xbox One X, or weaker instead of more powerful.

 

[fry178]

lol, "console killer".
stay within power and cooling envelope of a console and then see how much of a killer it is.

 

[USAFRet]

Water cooling is absolutely not a slam dunk as far as 'quieter'.

 

[escksu]

I wouldn't call this console killer. The main reason is this thing cost $1800 while a PS4 Pro is less than $350 (5x the price). Not everyone has that kind of budget.

Perhaps its better you build a $500 PC and make it perform better than PS4 Pro, then it will be a real console killer ($150 more but way better performance).

 

[airforceones0010]

I recently bought a computer on CL for $500. 4770k,16gb corsair vengeance, 980 ti hybrid, z87 expert, 250gb 840 Evo, 500gb 850 Evo, seasonic 860 Plat, corsair 750D, corsair h100i. Bought an open box air 540 for 78 and sold the 750D for 70. At this price point, makes much more sense to compare vs ps4 pro or xb1x. This article makes no sense, only in the physical size based on volume alone... OBVIOUSLY spending almost $2k on a brand new rig is going to "kill" something that is a slightly upgraded version of hardware from late 2013 LOL

 

[bit_user]

Nice writeup.

For me, the main takeaway was the anti-RGB build, which I had missed when it was first published.

 

[pelegbn]

Can a PS4 run PC exclusive titles? Point is moot.

I agree my "Exclusives" point could have been moot unless Sony's titles weren't that good...

GOW is GOTY [and rightfully so]!! & if I'd have to rank my favorite titles of the last few years:
My top 5 places would consist of Sony's exclusives, with the exception of RDR2 [which, btw, PC players still can't play].

 

[throughfire]

I agree my "Exclusives" point could have been moot unless Sony's titles weren't that good...

GOW is GOTY [and rightfully so]!! & if I'd have to rank my favorite titles of the last few years:
My top 5 places would consist of Sony's exclusives, with the exception of RDR2 [which, btw, PC players still can't play].

I do agree that they have had some good games on PS4 lately, however if we are going by quality of games, we should also include all of the amazing games you can play on PC via emulator which you cannot play on PS4. They may be older games, but the point remains.

 

[Mr5oh]

So I actually have a PC hooked to every TV in my house. They aren't mini ITX machines and they aren't water cooled either. My actual living room PC has fans, but they are slow moving fans that are plenty quiet enough that you don't hear them. It also has an optical drive in it, as we watch movies from that PC all the time. It boots from SSD, but it has a spinning disk in it, as games are large so unless you want to constantly install and uninstall games or have a very small Steam collection keeping everything on SSD is not a realistic option. The case is a SilverStone HTPC case that fits nicely on the entertainment stand.

I understand that building something realistic is boring and doesn't make for as good of an article, but lets not pretend this is the ultimate living room PC. This is a show piece.

 

[Exia00]

A $1,800 console killer?? can it run God Of War, Horizon Zero, Uncharted 4 or any of Sony's [$350] many great exclusives? I rest my case.

Can your PS4 play Gears of War, Forza and Killer Instinct maxed out at 4K? I rest my case.

 

[Exia00]

A $1,800 console killer?? can it run God Of War, Horizon Zero, Uncharted 4 or any of Sony's [$350] many great exclusives? I rest my case.

Well to be fair God of War for the PS2, PSP and PS3 can be emulated on the computer and play at 4K and to be honest the games are good but never that great.

 

[Skatendo]

"The problem with the PS4 Pro (the more powerful of the two 4K consoles right now) " I am assuming you are referring to the Xbox One X, since it's the only other 4K console out right now? You do realize it is 40% more powerful than the PS4 Pro, right?