On the I/O side, the AW2725Q features an HDMI 2.1 port, an HDMI 2.0 port, a DisplayPort 1.4 port, a 3.5mm audio output jack, 3 USB-A ports and a USB-C port. The screen also features 10-bit colour depth, as well as compatibility with both AMD’s FreeSync and Nvidia’s G-Sync technologies.

Other features in the monitor include AI-based technology that will attempt to prevent objects from burning into the display alongside a graphite sheet between the layers of the display panel.

Interestingly, the AW2725Q’s design is more subdued than what the Alienware line-up is typically known for. The new monitor will look sleeker on a table, especially compared to other Alienware monitors and even desktop and laptop systems.

The Alienware AW2725Q is slated to hit stores in March 2025 and will be priced at $900.

Alienware 32 4K QD-OLED Gaming Monitor

Marketed as ‘the world’s first 4K QD-OLED gaming monitor’, This Alienware powerhouse outperforms the competition in a number of ways. Alienware’s Quantum Dot technology aims to eliminate the halo effect surrounding lights and accompanies the monitor’s Dolby Vision HDR well to deepen the range of colors and clarity. And if you need something that’ll help with eye strain, this features built-in low-blue light technology. You can only get the exclusive 4K edition in the 32-inch package, but it’s worth it if you want that extra punch in visual dynamics.

SAMSUNG 49-Inch Odyssey G9 Series

Here’s our ultrawide monitor pick: the Samsung Odyssey G9. This thing manages to wrap around a full desk with a 1000R curve and still allow for complete peripheral vision. Besides the usual HDR visual flair, this monitor supplies one of the most impressive refresh rates in the business at a rapid 240Hz and 1ms response time. This thing can also be used in place of a multi-monitor setup with its built-in picture-by-picture mode allowing divided screens from two separate sources all displayed on the same monitor.

SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Headset

The Arctis Nova Pro is a true all-in-one headset. The multi-system connect feature allows for you to listen to different devices simultaneously through Bluetooth and 2.4GHz wireless. The audio itself features some of the best 360-degree spatial audio in the industry and even allows you to customize the sound yourself. This headset is intended to be used alongside SteelSeries’ Sonar equalizer software, which detects specific game sounds like footsteps and allows for custom tweaking of each parameter. The ClearCast Gen2 mic is regarded as a good mic, but the AI noise canceling needs some improvement.

Razer Viper V3 Pro Mouse

The ‘Pro’ in the name isn’t just for show; pro esports players tested and helped develop this mouse for ultimate precision. The optical sensor in this thing is quoted at providing 99.8% accuracy, with the option to adjust levels yourself in the software. The granular adjustments possible with this mouse allow for a very personalized experience, even if the base settings are lightning-fast already.

SteelSeries QcK Prism RGB Cloth Gaming Mouse Pad

SteelSeries has long been the industry standard for precision mouse pads and the QcK Prism is the creme of the crop. Gamers come to this pad for the patented QcK micro woven cloth because of its track record providing uninterrupted mouse swips. I particularly like the XL version with RGB lighting since it illuminates under and around your keyboard and not just the mouse.

Herman Miller x Logitech Embody

First off, the back position of this chair looks like it was grafted from Isaac Clarke’s suit from Dead Space, so that’s awesome. This is a cool chair, and a very high-end one at that. The sprockets on the back of the chair allow any position you take to form into a doctor-recommended lumbar position for spine support. It’s like memory foam but for gaming chairs. The tremendous H-flexor structure accounts for the lack of a headrest with its upright support. The seat cushion uses a patented cooling foam technology that keeps the cloth from getting too hot as well, allowing for unsightly hours of gameplay without too much discomfort.

Eureka Ergonomic 72″ Wing-Shaped Gaming Desk

The winged design of this Eureka desk allows for a complete PC setup with all the bells and whistles already included. The cupholder, headphone rests, phone holders, and RGB convertible shelving is icing on an already substantial cake. Don’t like how it’s arranged in promotional material? The layout is customizable to accommodate a variety of setups. This desk is going to fit any computing setup you can imagine, capable of holding 300 pounds with a 72-inch width that can sit the largest monitors out there.

Homall Gaming Desk

If you want a more compact, cheaper solution that’s no less stylish, here’s the 44-inch $69.99 Homall Gaming Desk. If you’re sick of fake wood breaking with other desks, you might prefer Homall’s metal frame construction. This gaming desk includes a small cupholder and headphone clip along with a full-sized mousepad free of charge.

DualShock 4 with Back Button Attachment

PlayStation’s DualShock 4 has long been held as the best controller for PC use due to its durable design and precise buttons. This beats out the recent DualSense because of its ease of compatibility and lighter weight. We recommend you get the back button accessory with it because of the 16 different functions that can be programmed to the two added back buttons.

8bitdo Pro 2 Retro Controller

8bitdo makes the highest quality PC-compatible retro controllers and the Pro 2 is the most versatile of their lineup. Just read the Amazon reviews and you’ll be assuaged that you’re not getting some cheaply made product. The Pro 2 variant adds handles to the base controller, making this a kind of ode to the original PS1, as opposed to the Pro 1’s Super Nintendo paddle design. The 8bitdo is a perfect controller for classic RPGs, platformers, and other games with simple control schemes.

NZXT QUE 2 RGB Lighting Kit

Tired of shopping for a variety of accessories for your lighting setup only to find out they’re incapable with each other? This all-in-one lighting kit illuminates the back of your PC monitor with custom colors and a range of light intensity that you can adjust. Ambient mode cycles between colors, but you can also set it so each strip displays a static color of your choice.

Asus ROG Azoth Gaming Keyboard

This keyboard may look small and unassuming at first glance, but don’t let its appearance fool you, there’s some fun features here. First, I have to point out the OLED display in the upper right. You can set it to monitor various PC settings, from framerate to song info. What gets me is this display can even play custom animations. This keyboard features RGB lighting, swappable keys for lighter action, and tuned mechanical switches for fast keystrokes and durability.

SteelSeries Apex Pro TKL Gaming Keyboard

This keyboard differentiates itself from the Asus with its esports-minded tenkeyless design. SteelSeries uses a state-of-the-art hypermagnetic switch to allow a whopping 40 levels of sensitivity that you can adjust. Keys can be programmed to contain two functions in one, and the RGB lighting doesn’t hurt either. This is your pick if you want ludicrous levels of precision in your keystrokes.

Logitech G Pro Racing Wheel

Just about every racing game fan knows about this wheel, and for good reason. It’s got the best force feedback in its price point and has everything you could want from a sim driving experience. The magnetic gear shift paddles feel so satisfying to shift through with their mechanical weight and sound. The feel and rotation of the wheel itself is durable and responsive, with tensioned resistance just like a real vehicle wheel. The Logitech G Pro comes with an ultra-sturdy mount to attach to your gaming desk, but the pedals come sold separately. Or you can save some money and just accelerate and stop using the wheel’s face buttons, I dunno it’s up to you how sim you want to go, but this wheel is a great first step.

Razer Kitsune All-Button Arcade Controller

To differentiate from last year’s list, I’ve replaced an arcade stick with an arcade leverless controller. Leverless controllers allow for faster input speeds and negates the travel time of traditional arcade sticks. Razer has made a rock-solid arcade controller here that is even tournament-friendly thanks to its negation of left-right simultaneous inputs. This is generally considered the best leverless arcade controller thanks to its precise optical switch design, outperforming mechanical switch and button competitors by a tangible margin.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Alienware co-founder Frank Azor has never been particularly shy about who he thinks really won the video game wars and how. A few years ago, the tech giant made it clear he felt PCs won the day because console architecture was moving closer and closer to basically seeming to mimic the architecture of the top gaming PCs.

Azor recently sat down with Gamespot and doubled down on those comments. He did add that PCs are changing the ways they handle video games as well, saying they are moving towards consoles, though they are still better when it comes to the tech.

“The console market and the PC market have converged in ways that we’ve never really seen before. Consoles look more like PCs, and PCs are starting to look more like consoles.”

“The console guys have realised they can’t operate on seven year cadences anymore, because they can’t keep up with the amount of innovation that’s going on in the industry, with HDR, 4K, VR, and the long path we have ahead of us in VR evolution.”

Talking about how consoles are moving towards the PC world, Azor said, “They’re having to evolve in order to survive, to be a lot more like the PC side, where they can’t come in with a $300 or $400 piece of subsidized hardware. They can maybe only afford to subsidise for $50 or $100, because the lifecycle they’re going to have to recoup that investment over the lifecycle or the customer’s journey is going to be two or three years, not the seven years they had before.”

This has led Azor  to think that PC gaming has won over consoles. Thoughts? Let us know in the comments section below.

The gaming market landscape today is dramatically different than it was just a decade ago- back then, home consoles were a market that were seeing meteoric growth, thanks to the rise of Nintendo and the Wii, handhelds were the most profitable segment of the gaming market, because of the DS and PSP, PC gaming was in danger of disappearing, thanks to the collapse of the PC retail market (Steam, and digital distribution in general, had not caught on yet), and mobile gaming being less than a blip on the radar.

Today, this is all changed- the PC gaming market is the biggest it has ever been, consoles are suffering due to the underperformance of Xbox One and Wii U, handhelds are a highly contracted market, with a struggling 3DS and an irrelevant PS Vita, and mobile gaming is one of the most important pillars of the market. Things have changed, in other words. And console makers need to adjust to these changes.

This is something that Alienware CEO Frank Azor believes, according to an interview he had with VentureBeat– he believes that the OC market has won, and the console manufacturers all need to adapt to the new reality and respond to it, though he does credit Microsoft with trying to adjust their strategy.

“The PC has won,” he said. “To continue to fight that, I think, will severely limit, if not negatively impact, the traditional [console] model’s ability to survive and succeed. Microsoft is aware of that. They’re demonstrating their awareness and their foresight in the announcements they’ve been making, like Scorpio and UWP and bringing content to both Windows and Xbox.”

Going forward, it is clear he sees a market of homogenized high end hardware- no differentiation between consoles and gaming PCs as one might think traditionally, although specialized consoles will certainly continue to exist. At the same time, though, he believes that exclusives will be a thing of the past, and games will hit all hardware at once. It is the kind of future that Valve envisioned with Steam Machines, and that has admittedly not caught on yet.

“I encourage the rest of the console makers out there to focus on what makes them special, which is the games, the franchises, the stories they tell, the characters they’ve built,” Azor said. “The hardware space is an opportunity for less and less differentiation when it comes to what you can build for $300 or $400. That’s okay. Moving forward, we have an opportunity to do incredible differentiation when you have $600, $700, $800 to invest.

“In the future there will still be appliances, still room for guys to go out and build these subsidized boxes at lower price points with limited scalability and limited feature sets, as compared to what some of these more premium, scalable PC architectures have been delivering and will continue to be able to deliver. But the content should be ubiquitous across everything, in my opinion. As much as I want console-exclusive franchises to come to the PC, I want PC-exclusive franchises to go over to consoles as well. It’s not a one-way street. Gamers are going to benefit from that.”

Now, personally, I am not sure if I buy into the second part of his argument, though I definitely buy into the first one- I do think that smartphones and PCs have changed the market, and that consoles need to adjust to that new reality. I also do think Microsoft and Sony are both responding to this change in their own way. That said, I don’t think that this blurring of the lines between consoles and PCs will happen, not any time soon, in any case.

We’ll see how it all turns out. The next few years ought to be interesting.

If you are in the market for a new PC, or just want to get into PC gaming, and are daunted at the prospect of having to build up your own PC, this will come as good news to you- Alienware’s Steam Machine is now available to pre-order. It will start shipping out in limited quantities next month.

The Alienware Steam Machine is available in two variants- they cost $649 and $749 respectively, both run SteamOS, and come included with the Steam Controller in too. Considering that Alienware is a trusted name for high specced branded PCs (even though it is always cheaper to just build your own rig, for far cheaper at that), this Steam Machine should see some good business. Plus, you’d be able to get a machine running Windows, which is infinitely more useful, even for PC gaming, that way too.

Steam Machines themselves launch next month too, alongside Valve’s Steam Link extender, as well as the Steam Controller. For more on Valve’s hardware initiatives, stay tuned to GamingBolt.

Generational shooter Bedlam is now a paperback courtesy of Christopher Brookmyre, and to celebrate the same, RedBedlam has joined with Alienware for a competition to win an Alienware X51.

Christopher Brookmyre stated that, “I’m thrilled my book is now available in paperback; it’s sure to bring a whole new audience to Bedlam. By asking people to share the first chapter we’re ensuring the book spreads by word of mouth, while offering people the chance to win a great gaming rig.”

The PC in question comes with the fourth generation Intel Core i7 along with an AMD R9 270 2 GB. Runners up gets concept art posters signed by Brookmyre. Those interested in participating need only share the first chapter of Bedlam, which can be found here.

As for the development of Bedlam, marketing director Nick Witcher stated that, “Bedlam’s development is progressing at fantastic pace and we can’t wait to show actual game play over coming months. While people wait for the game’s launch later this year, they can whet their appetites by reading the book.”

Bedlam is currently slated to release on Steam in Summer 2014.

Alienware general manager Frank Azor recently spoke to PCGamesN about the next generation of consoles are becoming more like PCs than ever. He reflected on how the x86-based CPUs of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 – not to mention the functions both are incorporating – are the same as what the PC has been doing for years.

“A lot of the innovations and things that are proven on the PC are making their ways onto consoles. The consoles are looking more and more like PCs every day.

“You’re installing games now instead of running them off the disc, because that’s the right thing to do; you’re downloading games digitally, which we’ve been doing on PC for years; they’re integrating certain TV aspects and stuff, well, ten years ago we started experimenting with media center.”

Of course, if the debacle over the Xbox One’s digital model of games distribution and sharing has proved anything, consoles still have a long way to go before they are truly like PCs.