Sometimes bargain hunters find a cheap PC that could be an awesome little gaming rig—with a small extra purchase. That’s the case today with Office Depot’s deal on an HP desktop for $550Remove non-product link rocking tons of storage, a powerful high-end 8-core AMD Ryzen processor, and entry-level Radeon graphics.
The HP Pavilion TP01-0066 mid-tower features 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD boot drive, a 1TB hard drive, media card reader, DVD drive, Ethernet, 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.2, and 9 USB ports (one USB 3.1 Type-C). You also get a free keyboard and mouse.
Now let’s get to the heart of the machine. It’s packing an eight core, 16 thread 3.6GHz Ryzen 7 3700X. That processor alone is worth more than half the cost of this PC at $330, retail. The specs we’ve listed so far make this one heck of a productivity rig, ready to chew through spreadsheets, web work, and even CPU-based video editing tasks alike—all for a bargain price.
HP’s rig can game too, though it can cheaply upgraded into something so much better. The Ryzen 7 3700X doesn’t come with built-in graphics, and while Office Depot’s page doesn’t specify this, HP’s site confirms the PC is rocking an AMD RX 550 GPU. If all you’re interested in is e-sports or casual gaming with low graphics settings, that might be enough. If you want to play AAA titles with eye candy cranked up at 1080p, however, then upgrading to more powerful graphics cards can turn this humble rig into a gaming beast for far less than you’d normally spend on a play-ready desktop.
The $230 GeForce GTX 1660 Super is our favorite no-compromises 1080p graphics card right now, but if you don’t mind dialing graphics quality down to High in some games, you can find Radeon RX 580 for around $160, or the Radeon RX 570 for around $130 if you don’t mind gaming with Medium to High visuals. And if you want to aim higher, the Ryzen 7 3700X would also pair well with more potent GPUs for 1440p or even 4K resolution gaming. Our guide to the best graphics cards for PC gaming can help you find the best option for your budget and display resolution.
Even if you aren’t interested in gaming, this powerful HP desktop with an 8-core Ryzen chip inside if an utter steal at this price. If you’ve been on the hunt for an affordable desktop that should last you for years and years, don’t miss out.
[Today’s deal: HP desktop with Ryzen 7 3700X for $550 at Office Depot.Remove non-product link]