PC Specialist Azure (LGA 1151) Gaming PC Review

Test Procedure

To test each system or notebook, we want to stress every component of the system to check stability and performance, giving us an idea as to why those particular components were picked for this particular system. We use a wide variety of applications to gain a broad spectrum of results for comparing diverse aspects of system performance

Hardware used:

• Acoustic dBA meter
• AC “Killawatt” power meter

Software used:

• 3DMark
• AIDA64 Engineer
• Cinebench R15
• CrystalDiskMark
• CPU-Z
• GPU-Z
• HW-Monitor
• MSI Afterburner
• OCCT
• Passmark PerformanceTest 8.0
• PCMark 8
• Prime95
• Super PI
• Unigine Heaven 4.0

Games used:

• Grand Theft Auto 5 (MSAA=Off, FXAA=On, Very High Preset, Advanced Graphics Disabled)
• Metro Last Light (Very High Preset, AF=16x,  Tessellation=Very High, SSAA=Off, PhysX=Off
• Tomb Raider
• Bioshock Infinite

Unless specifically stated, all games are running at maximum settings but any vendor-exclusive features such as TressFX or PhsyX have been disabled to make the results fair. There are some titles where the maximum preset can be altered further in regards to AA, AF, Tessellation, and Draw Distance. To allow our readers to make the most informed decision, any additional options will be clearly labelled in this section.