GEAR OF THE YEAR

A lot has happened in the last year, with plenty of game-changing releases, but which bits of gear should you be lusting after?

Since this time last year, we’ve had new processors, new graphics cards, improved SSDs, peripherals aplenty, and a wealth of nips and tucks to put the PC in as good a shape as it’s ever been. However, not all the changes have been obviously for the better, with some releases being downright confusing in terms of the bigger picture. So, what hardware have we been most excited about over the past 12 months? Which releases stand out as being modern classics? Well, it’s time to find out.

Before we dive into the various categories, though, it’s worth noting that in the case of full systems and laptops, we are still expecting some major changes to filter through. We’ve yet to look at a machine that employs Intel’s ninth-generation chips or AMD’s new Zen+ CPUs, and the same goes for Nvidia’s RTX graphics cards. So, it may be worth waiting a bit to see what system builders do with the latest technology before pulling the trigger on a big purchase.

Speaking of graphics cards, the jury is still very much out when it comes to the ray-tracing revolution. The hardware may be here, but until we get the games that actually use the technology, they’re very much an unknown entity. It could well be that it’s DLSS (Deep Learning Super-Sampling) that is the killer app for these graphics cards, but again, we don’t know for sure just yet.

With that said, let’s move on to look at the gear that is impressive right now. From kick-ass laptops to mice that have stood head and shoulders above their peers. What follows is the very best gear to be released in the past year. The pinnacle of PC hardware.