Gaming RDY SLHBG216 Review
A $1,500 gaming PC is a competitive space, especially as component prices have tended to drop to near-normal levels over the past few months. There are a lot of people stuck on their hunt for the best gaming PC(Opens in a new tab), waiting for prices and stocks to stabilize so they can make big purchases without hassle. The iBuyPower Gaming RDY SLHB216 (opens in a new tab) (rolled straight off the tongue) enters this competitive modest gaming PC category with an impressive build, but not without caveats for discerning gamers.
Gaming RDY SLHBG216 is not customizable. You can’t choose what type of processor, graphics card, RAM, and storage to put in it. You add it to your cart and it ships to you as listed on the website. Like many other PC manufacturing companies, iBuyPower lists average frame rates for modern games, including Elden Ring (opens in new tab), Lost Ark, Fortnite, GTA 5, League of Legends, CS:GO, Call of Duty Warzone and Brave . This is a solid list for online multiplayer, although it lacks some single-player options, if that’s your thing.
At $1,499 or $1,269 on sale since I received my review unit in late May, it’s a fairly standard build. It comes with an Intel Core i5 12400F, Nvidia RTX 3060, 16GB of DDR4 3200MHz RAM, and 1TB of NVMe SSD storage. All of this is housed in a sleek black iBuyPower case with tempered glass panels and RGB fans throughout. The case design with its jagged front panel and plastic top isn’t flashy or particularly modern. This might be where some of the cost is cut: it’s a rather unremarkable but eventually usable case.
iBuyPower Gaming RDY SLHBG216 Specifications
CPU: Core i5 12400F
Graphics card: Nvidia RTX 3060
Memory: 16GB (2x 8GB) Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB DDR4 3200MHz
motherboard: B660
Storage: 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
Front I/O: 2x USB 3.0 Type-A, Headphone, Microphone
Rear input/output: 4x USB 3.0, 1x USB 3.2 Type-A, 1x USB 3.2 Type-C, 4x DisplayPort, 2x HDMI, Audio, LAN, PS/2
Connectivity: WiFi, Bluetooth 5.2, Ethernet
power supply: 600W 80 plus gold
case: iBUYPOWER Slate HAKO MR Tempered Glass ARGB
operating system: Windows 11 Home
aspect: 9.7 x 20.5 x 20.5 inches
Warranty: 3 years
price: $1,499(Opens in a new tab)
This PC is also fully air-cooled, which hinders its overall performance in games, but it costs around $100 less than its closest competitor. Five case fans keep components (mostly the CPU) cool at the cost of some noise under load. Even in the harshest benchmarks I’ve run on it, the PC has never been so loud that it bleeds into headphones or exceeds moderate volume from the speakers, but if you want a silent setup, this isn’t it.
Compared to gaming PCs like Redux ‘Good’ Tier PC(Opens in a new tab), Gaming RDY SLHBG216 beats it in performance, giving or taking a few frames. That’s good news considering the price tag. For 1080p performance, the SLHBG216 beat the Redux PC in Hitman 3, Horizon Zero Dawn, and Metro Exodus by just a few frames. In F1 2020 it outpaced Redux by about 24 FPS.
Those numbers are pretty standard for an Nvidia RTX 3060, which does well in 1080p gaming. The 1440p test on iBuyPowerRDY was also strong. It matches the frame rates found in similarly priced desktop PCs like the NZXT Streaming PC(opens in a new tab) and CLX Set Gaming PC(opens in a new tab). Unsurprisingly, its 4K FPS wasn’t quite as good, it struggled to get anywhere near 60 FPS in any of our tests, and the air cooling started to have issues. This is a PC for cracking 1080p games and managing 1440p games with a few tweaks; it’s not made for 4K at all.
It’s worth noting that, for whatever reason, I couldn’t get my PC to successfully pass the Horizon Zero Dawn 4K benchmark without the game blacking out or crashing completely. It works fine at 1080p and 1440p, but not at 4K. Regardless, I don’t want these benchmarks to change my opinion on its 4K performance.
The SLHBG216 also sneaks in a 1TB NVMe SSD at this price. It also performed well in our FF14 load time tests. Other PCs with 500GB SSDs are an insult to anyone dabbling in modern gaming. These days, it doesn’t cut it with all the gigantic mounting dimensions. Much like its overall build quality, the SLHBG216 understands what the pure PC gamer wants at this budget. It’s not a fancy addition, but it’s a laudable one.
The SLHBG216’s aren’t a huge hit, but they can hurt if you want to push this PC to its limits. First, it falls short on cooling. It runs hot, with the CPU rising to 100°C in our tests. Presumably you won’t be running it that hard on a regular basis, but other similar PCs aren’t that hot, so keep that in mind. Dust will inevitably build up in the case and could make it worse, so if you decide to bring it home you may need to do regular cleaning maintenance – the lack of a dust filter will make it worse . The graphics card didn’t jump that high, but it still ran a few degrees warmer than the other devices.
There’s also no USB Type-C port on the PC’s top front panel, which is disappointing, though there’s a pocket on the back panel where you’ll also find a PS/2 port, just like in the early 2000s. If you need a lot of USB 3.0 ports, the Gaming RDY SLHBG216 will be in short supply. PCs are designed for a fairly humble person who just wants to play games and nothing else. In an age where streaming and working from home are common, I’d like to see more ports on this thing for external hard drives, webcams, etc.
That’s what you get in the Gaming RDY SLHBG216: a gaming PC that says exactly what it says it will do, and nothing else. Any particularly useful additions aren’t surprising, but it’s also slightly less expensive than other PCs of this caliber. iBuyPower has built a competitor slick enough for the $1,500 gaming rig race to convince you to sacrifice bells and whistles for an average PC. A complete lack of choice might send you in the direction of something like a CLX gaming PC, but choice isn’t always better. The SLHBG216 stands for keeping things simple and getting you to play the game right. I really can’t say no.
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