PC Gamer’s highest hardware review scores of 2022… and the five lowest
All the top tech to hit the magic 90% mark in our rigorous testing as well as the ones which fell waaaaaay short.
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We’re an exacting bunch here on PC Gamer, and we have the highest standards. We know our gear, and we’ll only hand out the highest review scores to the kit that meets, or exceeds those standards. And, of the 200+ PC gaming products we’ve reviewed over the course of 2022, only 19 have managed to get over the 90% mark.
Yes, we still use the hundred point range, get over it.
It’s a somewhat surprising list, with some names you might not expect to be in there, and some you might have thought would make it into the top echelons of PC gaming gear this year. I definitely reckon you’ll be surprised to see which brand managed to get the absolute highest score of the year.
The fact there’s no AMD or Nvidia kit repping in the top tier of our reviews is likely not a surprise, and is largely a symptom of the fact that both have launched new hardware with unrealistic price tags. And that doesn’t win them any favours with us.
But with everything from gaming headsets, to CPUs, to PCs and screens, there’s a good spread of gear to whet your appetite. And then, just to balance out all the positivity, I’ve dropped the five lowest scoring products in at the bottom.
Seems like I’m the mean one, too, because all of the lowest scores were handed out by yours truly. Ain’t I a stinker?
The highest rated PC gaming gear of 2022
90%
If the high price of X670E motherboards turns you off, this affordable X670 alternative delivers almost all of the goodies at a much more affordable price.
90%
On the eve of a new generation of PCIe Gen 5 SSDs, SK Hynix has rolled out what proves to be one of the very fastest Gen 4 drives yet. There are cheaper options that are only slightly slower, but if you want the very best, this is the drive to beat right now.
90%
TheAftershock Ultracoreis a highly customizable and gorgeous machine with impeccable attention to detail. If you want a desktop to show off as much as enjoy using, it’ll be hard to find something better.
90%
The Razer Enki Pro has plenty of premium appeal with a price tag to match. It’s extremely comfortable, well built and will work for most body heights and weights, making it a fantastic addition to luxury gaming setups.
90%
I couldn’t recommend a better wireless gaming headset than the HyperX Cloud Alpha Wireless. They sound amazing and the battery lasts what feels like forever. Plus they’re comfortable for long sessions. These may not have the versatility of headsets with more connections, but if what you want is a wireless headset that works amazingly with your PC, this is the one to buy.
91%
The Kone XP has everything the discerning gamer needs: great ergonomics, tons of accessible buttons, and glorious RGB lighting.
91%
TheWooting 60HEis a superb gaming keyboard with genuine benefits for PC gamers of all kinds. The Wootility is one of the best peripheral applications out there too.
91%
It’s a lot of money if you’re thinking about it as just a chassis, but with a bundled 750W PSU, liquid cooling, and routed cabling, it’s your best bet for a quality minimal fuss, mini-ITX gaming PC build.
92%
TheNZXT Streaming Plus BLD Kitisn’t exactly a pre-built PC, as you have to actually piece it together yourself. Still, a cut above the competition when it comes to component selection, and you’ll understand and care about your PC that much more too because of it.
92%
Seasonic maintains its top spot in the power supply game with its excellent PSU platform, and with a stellar 12-year warranty you can be sure this PSU is built to last.
92%
The Thronmax MDrill One Pro comes out of nowhere to unseat some of the better-known and pricier brands. Offering excellent audio, stylish good looks, and onboard controls with no need for extra software, this is an excellent mic.
93%
Mountain has taken all it’s learnt from its first keyboards and created the best-feeling, most usable 60% gaming keyboard I’ve ever used. It’s solid, reliable, responsive, and offers the best typing experience around. It’s also good-looking and surprisingly expandable with the numpad accessory, alternative switches, and PBT keycaps.
93%
The Beyerdynamic MMX 100 is as close to perfection as a wired gaming headset can get thanks to its impressive sound, comfort, and build quality.
95%
The Kaiser 3 is named well, it’s a great chair that coats your butt and body in plush PVC leather, accompanied by an adjustable magnetic neck pillow and lumbar support.
The Top 4 best products of 2022
95%
It’s been an incredibly long time coming. But OLED awesomeness has finally come to the PC. LCD technology still has the edge for latency, but this quantum dot-enhanced OLED screen is incredible when it comes to contrast, HDR performance, and response. Net result? Simply one of, if not the, best gaming monitors ever.
95%
Without the unprecedented overclocking potential inside the i5 12400 I’d be heartily recommending this chip forms the basis of your next budget gaming PC build. With it, this processor stands a good chance of becoming the legendary processor of Intel’s Alder Lake generation.
96%
The inclusion of four more E-cores turns this processor into a 14-core chip with the multithreaded performance to deliver in high-demand applications, and that makes it a great fit for streaming, content creation, editing, and more. The Core i5 13600K is much more of an all-round powerhouse than I had expected it to be.
98%
The Corsair AX1600i is the highest performance PSU available on today’s market, even several years after its release. Corsair did well to be the first to adopt GaN MODFETs and the totem-pole APFC converter in a desktop PSU and this gamble paid off. If there were a PSU to get close, it’d be the Be quiet! Dark Power Pro 1500W, but Corsair takes the top spot here.
The five worst products of 2022
57%
Maybe the excessive bass response works for your musical tastes, but the weak battery life, and sacrificing audio in favour of low latency gaming, makes me want to swerve the Gravastar buds.
52%
There’s active noise cancelling, ambient mode, long battery life, and a long-range wireless connection. A great feature set, then, but the Barracuda Pro is absolutely a worse headset than Razer’s far cheaper, and better-sounding BlackShark V2 Pro.
47%
A graphics card built to offer the barest minimum of hardware, fails to move the game on, and feels like the most cynical, GPU-crisis graphics card we’ve seen yet.
43%
This is a gaming chair simply not designed for me. The mesh fabric should be comfortable, but the thick plastic frame keeping it taut jabs in all the wrong places.
43%
The MelGeek Pixel ought to be everything I’m looking for in a wireless enthusiast gaming keyboard. Ultra-customisation, from the switches to the keycaps, and with the added bonus of LEGO compatible studding across the entire board. And yet it delivers an abysmal typing experience and the brick compatibility is a definite let-down, too.
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Dave has been gaming since the days of Zaxxon and Lady Bug on the Colecovision, and code books for the Commodore Vic 20 (Death Race 2000!). He built his first gaming PC at the tender age of 16, and finally finished bug-fixing the Cyrix-based system around a year later. When he dropped it out of the window. He first started writing for Official PlayStation Magazine and Xbox World many decades ago, then moved onto PC Format full-time, then PC Gamer, TechRadar, and T3 among others. Now he’s back, writing about the nightmarish graphics card market, CPUs with more cores than sense, gaming laptops hotter than the sun, and SSDs more capacious than a Cybertruck.
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