PC Gamer Hardware Awards 2023: The winners

Lenovo Legion Pro 7i
This is the system that really put Lenovo on the map for us in terms of gaming laptops this year. At a time when Razer and MSI were asking us to pay near $4,000 for an RTX 4090 system, Lenovo rocked up with this solid, well-designed and grown up machine that could stand toe-to-toe even with an RTX 4080 at its heart.

The design is pretty classic, showing Lenovo’s ThinkPad origins, but it’s also effective. It runs the hardware inside it at full speed, has all the ports you could want, and even a welcome hardware cut-off switch for the webcam.

The screen may not quite be up there with the Nebula mini-LED panels of the Asus ROG machines, but it’s still bright and crisp and makes the Lenovo a very powerful, pleasant to use, and affordable package.

Read our full Lenovo Legion Pro 7i review.

Alienware 34 AW3423DWF
It might seem odd that Alienware is going to win the best gaming monitor two years running with almost the same display, and in fact the same essential panel, but the AW3423DWF is even better than the AW3423DW that won last year, because it’s both more affordable and looks better thanks to that glossy, high-contrast coating.

Alienware beat the rest of the world to market last year with the first OLED gaming panel. This slightly cheaper follow up is actually better thanks to a glossy coating over the top of the same Samusng QD-OLED tech, which really lets the panel sing.

Read our Alienware 34 AW3423DWF review.

Steam Deck OLED
The Steam Deck launched handheld PC gaming into the mainstream, but Valve wasn’t quite done tinkering with the design. While not quite a Steam Deck 2, the Steam Deck OLED is a revision of the popular handheld that improves upon the original design in oh so many ways.

The screen receives the bulk of the updates with a sparkling new OLED panel. Obviously, hence the name change. Deeper blacks, rich colours, faster refresh rates, and genuine HDR are all on the cards now, and Tyler came away seriously impressed with the new screen during his review.

Beyond a better panel, the Steam Deck OLED also has a bigger battery, a new carry case, and a new 1TB SSD option. All seriously good quality of life updates on an already impressive handheld device.

Read our Steam Deck OLED review.

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D
It was no joke when AMD released this CPU in April, as it was blatantly clear that this was the best gaming processor that the chip giant had ever made. At face value, it was just another eight-core, 16-thread CPU and it even had lower clocks and a higher power consumption that its cousin, the Ryzen 7 7700X.

That ‘3D’ part made all the difference, of course. An extra 64MB slice of L3 cache, bonded to the rest of the die, to give a total cache amount of 96MB. For games, it was like flicking on a turbo switch. Until you’ve tried a CPU with AMD’s 3D V-Cache, it’s a little hard to believe how much difference it actually makes.

Even the high launch price no longer matters, as it’s frequently reduced to around $360. The total focus on gaming means it’s less of an ideal chip for content creation and there are cheaper mid-range CPUs that come pretty close to it in many games.

Read our AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D review.

AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT
While it might not be the strongest GPU when it comes to ray tracing, if it’s excellent rasterisation performance you’re after the RX 7800 XT certainly delivers the goods. At 1440p this card puts on an impressive display, beating out the RTX 4070 in many benchmarks. More than that, launching at a reference price of $499 meant that it was in serious danger of eating the RTX 4070s lunch, so Nvidia adjusted their pricing in kind. A bit of a mover and shaker then, this GPU, and one that still divides opinion as to where to put your mid-range money in 2023.

Read our full AMD RX 7800 XT review.

Lexar NM790 4TB SSD
The Lexar NM790 might use a lesser known controller in the form of the MaxioTech MAP1602A and lack some DRAM, but it nevertheless delivers excellent read/write speeds of 7,400MB/s and 6,500MB/s, and some of the fastest random read and writes we’ve tested. Beyond that it runs cool without the need for an active cooling solution, making it a good candidate for a laptop or small form factor SSD upgrade without any worries about heat. All of this speed and cool, efficient performance is delivered for a very reasonable MSRP, making it a big slab of very fast NVMe storage for less than you might expect.  

Read our Lexar NM790 4TB review.

ASRock Z790 Riptide WiFi
ASRock has come a long way in the past few years, creating a motherboard stack that encompasses everything from the very high-end to the very affordable. And with none of the cheapening out that we’ve maybe seen from the brand in times long gone.

This new Riptide board represents the top Intel chipset, ready and waiting for the latest 14th Gen chips, with a level of performance to allow them to hit their full potential.

It’s also one of the few Z790 boards to really have a care for your storage concerns, with plenty of SATA ports and a full five M.2 sockets, too. It’s feature set is strong, the performance right up at the top of the pile, and it’s one of the best value Z790 motherboards you will ever find.

Read our full ASRock Z790 Riptide WiFi review.

Audeze Maxwell
There’s no getting away from the fact that the Audeze Maxwell is a very expensive headset, especially outside of the US. But there’s a good reason for this: Outstanding build quality, great features, and planar magnetic drivers.

Rather than use the traditional cone-and-coil arrangement to generate sound waves, the Maxwell pulses a flat sheet of material back and forth between two magnetics. The result is a more fulsome and natural sound, and you’d notice the difference immediately.

The cool tech does make the headset a tad on the heavy side but Audeze has done a great job at making them really comfortable to wear for long periods, and given it a long battery life too. Heck, even the microphone is pretty good!

You’ll be paying top dollar for all this, of course, but it really is worth it.

Read our Audeze Maxwell review.

Sennheiser Profile Streaming Set
An excellent all-in-one package for any budding streamer, the Sennheiser Profile Streaming Set gets you a handsome cardioid condenser mic with onboard mix, gain, headphone volume controls and a mute button, along with a sleek looking boom arm. It’s a good looking piece of gear all around, and something you’d likely be happy to show off on cam. The sound profile is warm, with a crisp professional quality that’s rather pleasing to the ear. 

An all-round contender from a well-respected brand, and a great starter kit for professional sounding audio. 

Read our Sennheiser Profile Streaming Set review.

Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2
Remember when I said I’ve kept the same shape mouse for a long time? That’s because over the past few years I’ve had a Logitech G Pro and I eventually swapped it for a Superlight. They’re basically the same, except the Superlight is, well, lighter. You could say similar things of the Superlight 2. It’s lighter than its predecessor, for starters, but it also comes with a new and improved sensor.

The Hero 2 sensor handles quick movements, polls wirelessly at 2,000Hz, and only weighs 60g. Perhaps the most important update is one most wouldn’t think about these days: gone is the Micro USB connector and in its stead is a USB Type-C port. That’s almost worth the price of admission alone, and I’m sort of sad I didn’t get to review this mouse myself.

Admittedly, I think you’d get along just fine with the original Superlight, which is often found for less cash, but I would say that since that’s my mouse. No, the Superlight 2 is right up there with the best of the best.

Read our Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 review.

Asus ROG Strix Scope II 96 Wireless
Our Jacob has been a keyboard geek for as long as I’ve known him, and when he raves about a new board you know it’s going to be good. But I never thought I’d hear him rave about an Asus gaming keyboard.

At least not until we had our first taste of the excellent ROG Azoth board, and then realised Asus was filtering all the good stuff from that mighty mini keeb into a far more affordable form with the Strix Scope II 96.

It’s still a compact design, but manages to fit in an entire numpad, and despite its relative affordability compared to the Azoth still features hot-swappable switches, proper sound dampening, and PBT key caps. And yes, it’s still wireless. Though you probably guessed that from its name.

Read our full Asus ROG Strix Scope II 96 Wireless review.

Corsair TC100 Relaxed
A gaming chair. Yes, it might seem bland or boring next to a VR headset that gobbled up billions in development, but you have to understand something: a cheap gaming chair that’s actually good is a rare thing. A rare thing indeed.

You’ll find an overwhelming number of cheap chairs on the internet, often from brands you’ve never heard of. I’ve come into contact with a few of them, and I’m usually left reeling at the quality. This Corsair, however, is cheap and actually built well.

It might not come with the high-end features of some other premium chairs, and it doesn’t have any gimmicks, but it’s a solid, comfy, and reliable chair from a reputable brand. It’s tough to find that, it really is.

Read our Corsair TC100 Relaxed review.