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Best Music Player For Windows 2024

By admin April 29, 2024

Best Music Player For Windows 2024, Browsing for the best music player for Windows 10? There are tons of such tools available, which makes choosing the perfect one tricky. Whether you’re a casual or ardent music listener, picking the right player enhances your listening experience. I, for example, love apps that support lyrics and have many customization options.

So, in this detailed guide, I took into account all these features and many more and singled out 5 tools that performed the best. You can find out about my testing process below.

Ready? Let’s get started!

How We Test

I prioritized certain criteria like sound reproduction, user interface, and customization while hunting down the best music player for Windows 10.

Music evokes certain emotions in us when we listen to it. However, when it plays like a broken record from an application, then it ruins the experience.

Here are the qualities I examined during my tests:
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1.User-friendly interface: A music app should be intuitive, especially for beginners.

2.Audio quality: A good player supports a variety of audio formats, and allows users to adjust sound settings like equalization.

3.Album organization: It should be easy to sort and search for songs, artists, and genres. The app should also support features like auto-tagging and album artwork.

4.Offline playback: The right music player should allow users to download and access songs on their PC without the internet.

5.Low system resource usage: No one wants their music player to consume too much. So, the perfect application should run smoothly using minimal PC resources.

6.Gapless playback: This feature allows you to play a long list of songs seamlessly without unnecessary breaks in between.

7.Visual customization: Although this may seem trivial, being able to switch around colors, tools, and features on your music app can be satisfying.

Out of 15 apps I tested, only 5 made the list. I made sure to pick tools that suit both novices and advanced users.

Best Music Player for Windows 10

By now you are fired up to know the good music players I chose for Windows 10.

Now, let’s discuss each of them extensively:

1. AIMP – Lightweight for Windows 10

This free audio player was developed by Artem Izmaylov, a Russian developer. AIMP is simple to use and takes up less PC resources.

While listening to music or podcasts, you may want to attend to something else. That’s where AIMP‘s bookmark feature comes in! Just activate it and when you’re back, it starts just where you left off.

This player also supports 20 audio formats and its sound reproduction is top-notch. Additionally, you can perform inline searches, control playlists, and customize homepage themes.

Also, if you exit the music app, you can hide it at the edge of your screen, and then bring it out only with the cursor.
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Pros:

• Lightweight

• MP3 / ID3 renaming

• Zero advertisements

• Multiple audio support

• Built-in 18-band equalizer

• Audio converter

• Tag editor

Cons:

• Poorly colored UI buttons

• Music files don’t automatically update

2. Spotify – Supports Seamless Playback

What sets Spotify apart is its seamless playback feature – now your music can flow from song to song.
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Furthermore, the app’s interface is not only colorful but beginner-friendly. Another fun thing Spotify does is daily personalized album suggestions.

In addition to that, you’re at liberty to create, arrange, and share your own specially curated playlists with both the public and loved ones. There’s also an option for offline playback.

If your network is poor, you can save video podcasts as audio as well.

Pros:

• Responsive customer support

• Flexible subscription fees

• Supports offline playback

• Inline search

• Creation and sharing of playlists

• Lyrics support

• Personalized music suggestions

Cons:

• Excessive ads in the free plan

• No live radio

3. MediaMonkey – Supports CD Burning

MediaMonkey automatically finds all songs on your PC and adds them to its collection. It doesn’t stop there, it goes ahead to label them into their corresponding genres and singers.

Although this app doesn’t have the best graphical design, you can adjust it to fit your preferences. With its automatic file renamer and playlist organizer, you can relax and just enjoy your music.
MediaMonkey supports various formats, including MP4, MP3, OGG, AVI, PLS, WMV, WAV, M3U, and FLAC. It even has a CD ripper that allows you to extract audio from CDs to WAV or MP3.

Additionally, there’s an option to burn CDs, manage podcasts, download songs for offline listening, and sync devices.

Pros:

• Easy syncing to mobile

• Manages over 50,000 music files

• Countless settings and customizations

• CD ripping/burning

• Downloads album art

• Auto-tagging and Auto-conversion

• Functions as a server for DLNA/UPnP devices.

Cons:

• Poor user interface

• Searches PC without permission

• The free version lacks some features

• May associate music files wrongly.

4. Windows Music Player – Theme and Accent Color Customization

Windows 10 has an in-built music player, and it’s pretty decent. So, if you don’t want to download additional apps, you can go with this one.

Windows Media player supports various audio and video formats like WMV, AVCHD, 3GP, AAC, and MPEG-4. The interface is straightforward and easy to use, too. It has a taskbar with efficient playback controls.

Furthermore, you can easily customize this app to your taste. It has a dark and light theme, including accent colors to vary the tones. There’s also the option to use the system’s graphics settings instead.

Do you enjoy mixing and adjusting your music cadence all by yourself? Then you’ll love this app’s 9-band slider equalizer. Additionally, it supports DVD, making it one of the best free DVD players for Windows 10.

Pros:

• Metadata editing/lookup

• CD ripping

• Multiple audio and video formats

• Free

• Easy to use

• DVD support

Cons:

• Lags sometimes

• Resource-heavy

5. VLC Player – Audio and Video Support

Millions of Windows PC users are familiar with this media player – in fact, it’s most people’s favorite choice. But why is this so? First off, VLC is free and it plays both audio and video files. It’s also the best PC Blu-ray player.

Files that fail to open on other apps will easily do so in VLC. So, maybe your music album link isn’t broken, you just haven’t tried using this app.

You can customize the VLC media player with both built-in tools and plugins to give you the best listening experience. It further enhances sound reproduction with quality settings for equalizers and lots more.

Pros:

• Hotkeys

• Customizable features

• Support various videos and audio formats

• Simple user interface

• Built-in equalizer

• Free

Cons:

• Poor playlist arrangement

• Lack of tagging and renaming

• Files aren’t updated automatically

Conclusion

It’s not easy to choose the best music player for Windows 10, given all the options.

That aside, whichever app you choose, ensure to download it from its official website of a trusted source. You should still run an antivirus check afterward, for good measure.

Feel free to share which player is your favorite and why in the comments below!

What do I look for in a digital, PC-based music player? Well, for starters: it needs to be free of charge, as I’m not paying for the privilege of listening to my own music! It also needs to run on Windows 10, as that’s my desktop operating system of choice these days.

But beyond being free and working on my PC correctly, I’m looking for a player that plays music well. It’s important, for example, that it doesn’t mess with the music signal in any significant way: what comes out of the speakers must be, close enough, what the digital music file contained, with nothing added or taken away by the software doing the playing of that file.

In similar vein, it’s critical that a music player must be able to do proper ‘gapless playback’. That means, when you have one track on a CD run immediately into another, the music player software must be able to handle that without introducing a gap, pause, click or other interruption.

As well as playing my music well, however, it’s important to me that my music “player” also acts as a supremely competent music library or organiser. When you have tens of thousands of pieces of music to choose from, it’s vital that you can pick a composer, or a named piece of music, at will, quickly and efficiently. The grouping and sorting functions a music library function has must therefore be rational, logical and sensible.

I don’t choose to listen to a piece of music by the key it’s written in, for example, so a music library that has a tab which sorts music by its key is useless to me (unless it also has tabs which sort by composer and genre equally well). A player that sorts music by the year it was recorded, to take another example, is perhaps useful to people who listen to the pop music of the 1970s – 1990s, but it’s decided un-useful to someone who chooses which Bach cantata to play by its BWV number (i.e., the composition’s formal title)! So: sensible grouping, sensible filtering, sensible sorting.

A good search function is also important for working with a large music collection. I may want to find all music that I own that’s a passacaglia, for example. Or on which Franco Fagioli is singing. A player that forces me to click through a lot of things before answering the latest spontaneous brain-wave I’ve just had is of limited to use me, in other words.

Optionally, too, because I inhabit almost exclusively the world of classical music where we talk of composers and compositions, I’d ideally like the player to use ‘classical music language’: players that talk ‘album artists’, ‘songs’ and ‘playlists’ are of less use to me than ones that know to talk of ‘composers’, ‘works’ and so on. If I have to, however, I can live without this so long as the basic music playing functionality is good and the music library functionality meet my needs.

I think that pretty much states what I want from a music player; what I definitely do not want is a music player that will, by default, start fetching metadata about my music from Internet sources… or, even worse, changing the metadata I’ve applied to my music using that Internet-fetched stuff as its replacement! (Internet metadata for classical music is always, and without exception, 100% utter rubbish, so you never want to see it being fetched or applied to any music collection you care about).

On the other hand, whilst I don’t want my music player pulling information down from the Internet, I would like it to be able to push it up to the Internet: specifically, I use Last.fm to record my music listening habits. Being able to ‘scrobble’ to that service is important to me (being able to scrobble to the similar, but open-source, Libre.fm is a nice-to-have feature, too).

I don’t really have views on the looks of a player: good use of Album Art to help me navigate my collection is quite important, but my player doesn’t need to look spectacularly wonderful, so long as it meets my other requirements. I would like to be able to tweak it a bit and change its default appearance to suit my needs, if possible; but if that functionality is missing for some reason, I wouldn’t mind too much.

So, with that set of requirements in mind, I went searching on the Internet and found several articles that claimed to list the best Windows music players. By combining the various suggestions in those (and other) articles, I decided I’d take a look at (in no particular order):

• AIMP

• Dopamine

• Foobar2000

• MediaMonkey

• MusicBee

• Songbird

• Strawberry Music Player

• Winamp

• Windows Media Player

• Groove

I should explain that I excluded players such as VLC or Media Player Classic because whilst those can play music well, they are mainly geared to playing video and don’t have great music library management functionality. You can create playlists for VLC, for example, but not browse though an entire music library, picking which tracks to play as the mood takes you. I also didn’t review DeadBeef, because its Windows version currently has no means of displaying Album Art. When its Windows offering matches the functionality of its Linux versions, I may have a second look at DeadBeef.

Anyway: the music players bullet-pointed above are both music players and music library managers and I looked at each in detail on the pages linked to each of their names.

If you just want the ‘final answer’ rather than the detailed reviews, however: my choice of best music player on Windows is… (much to my surprise, I have to say) …MusicBee (9/10). It’s graphically pleasing, nicely functional, responsive, handles a large music collection well, does gapless playback well, doesn’t mess with my metadata too much and gets out of my way acceptably when I don’t want to be looking at it as it plays in the background. It ticks all the boxes and looks good, so becomes my new music player of choice (from a long-standing Foobar2000 user, that’s quite an endorsement!)

Foobar2000 (9/10) and Strawberry Music Players (8/10) are slightly old-school players (i.e., lots of text and not much graphical bling!) that are nevertheless excellent for managing large music collections, too. If you find the visual ‘froth’ of MusicBee to be a dreadful distraction, either of these players would be worthy alternatives. As a long-time Foobar2000 user, I was expecting Foobar2000 to win the final accolade -but it just loses out in the looks department.

Of the other seven players, in descending order of greatness:

• MediaMonkey: 7/10 – Almost a contender, but let down by an interface that is inflexible, text-heavy and pretty ugly, even when you switch on album art views. I had repeatable problems with gapless playback, but of a rather unique kind (clicks on track changes); on the other hand, gapless was fine at other times. Go figure!

• Winamp: 6/10 – Looks old-fashioned, few graphical touches, but does proper gapless playback and is responsive in use. Mostly let down by being, as far as one can tell, abandonware. Close run thing with MediaMonkey otherwise.

• Dopamine: 4/10 – Visually quite good, but utterly unresponsive with massive pauses as you click just about anything (even with a dedicated graphics card handling the graphical display side of things); no proper gapless playback

• AIMP: 3/10 – Visually poor, quite responsive, but no proper gapless playback

• Songbird: 2/10 – Visually good, very responsive, gapless but can’t display embedded album art and the software has been discontinued for over 6 years now

• Windows Media Player: 1/10 – Has all the graphical charm of a spreadsheet -and much of the functional inflexibility. It wants to overwrite all your good metadata with rubbish fetched from the Internet. It is slow to process a large music collection. It hasn’t been updated in years and may not have much of a future

• Groove: 0/10 – Visually appealing, but functionally completely useless. No scrobbling, no album art, no control over sort order… the worst player reviewed, bar none.

And from left field…

I doubt it will make anyone’s top list of everyday music players, but I was so impressed by the command-line only Musikcube that I thought I should give it a once-over. If you need a comprehensively-functional player without any graphical flim-flam at all, Musikcube’s for you. I’d recommend it as a top pick if only it was possible to run it in a standard command window. Unfortunately, it insists on launching a window of its own, making it impossible to run in a terminate-and-stay-resident drop-down terminal, such as ConEmu. As such, it lost its allure for me in a hurry. But give it a look anyway and see if its minimalism appeals: it’s a really strong contender!

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How to factory reset Windows 10 or Windows 11

By admin April 23, 2024

How to factory reset Windows 10 or Windows 11, Factory resetting Windows 10 or Windows 11 can be a great way to fix a sluggish or unresponsive computer. It clears our a lot of changes you might have made, applications that might be causing trouble, and old drivers that might not have been uninstalled properly. A fresh start can make your PC feel even better than general Windows speed up tricks.

Here’s how to factory reset Windows 10 and Windows 11 to get your PC feeling right again.

First, back up your computer

Before you reset your system, you’ll want to back up important information that you don’t want to lose. This includes documents, photos, music, and movies, but there are other items to back up as well. Make sure that you know all of your saved passwords, export all of your browser bookmarks, and have installation files for all the software you’ll want to reinstall — or know where to get them.

Also, make sure you back up app-specific data, like custom filters saved in a photo utility, save files from your favorite games, and back up emails if using an offline client.

How to factory reset Windows 10 or Windows 11

How to factory reset Windows 10

Windows 10’s reset feature is found in the settings panel. It can rebuild a fresh copy of Windows 10 if you so choose, replacing all drivers and resetting all settings.

Note that this might be technically different from a “factory reset” option provided by manufacturers. Check your documentation or give technical support a call if you want to return your PC to how it was when you first pulled it out of the box. The manufacturer might have special partitions set up on the hard drive or might be able to provide a factory restore image on bootable media.

Step 1: Click the* Notifications* icon on the taskbar (or press the Windows button + A) and then select the All settings tile in the Action Center. You can also select the start button followed by the Gear icon on the Start Menu.

Step 2: Select Update & Security.

Step 3: Select Recovery listed on the left.

Step 4: On the right, you’ll see two options. The first, Reset this PC, is the method we’re going to use for this guide. When you are ready, click the Get Started button listed under Reset This PC.

The second, Advanced startup, is worth considering if you have a little more technical skill. It’s for modifying your computer on a deeper level or installing a completely different operating system. This comes in handy if your manufacturer provides a factory restore image or external drive containing the image to return your machine to its factory state — proprietary software included.

Unless you’re completely sure you understand what each of the options in this setting does, it’s probably best to leave it alone.

Step 5: A new window will appear with two options, Keep my files and Remove everything.

Here you need to decide whether you want to keep all of your files and folders intact, or truly start from scratch and then use your backup to restore those files and folders. Whichever you choose, you will need to reinstall all apps and programs acquired outside the Microsoft Store. Your settings, such as the Start Menu arrangement, will go back to their defaults.

Select one of the two options.

In both cases, it rebuilds Windows 10 using the current installation. It’s Microsoft’s “imageless recovery” system so installation media doesn’t need to lurk on a hidden partition, taking up space. However, the Local reinstall option may not be able to repair Windows 10 if it’s too broken, too corrupted. That’s where the Cloud download option comes in: Windows pulls everything from Microsoft’s servers to rebuild the local copy.

Both options return all settings to their factory defaults and remove all software not installed from the Microsoft Store. However, the Keep my files option keeps your profile intact along with the associated files and folders. What it doesn’t do is update Windows 10 to the latest version if you never bothered to install patches and feature updates. The Cloud download option installs the latest version stored in Microsoft’s cloud.

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Step 6: Select a source: Cloud download or Local reinstall.

Step 7: On the following screen, select the Choose settings link if you would like to alter the current reset settings. Otherwise, skip to Step 9.

The image is based on the Remove everything option and using the cloud as our source. Since our example PC has multiple drives, we have an additional “Delete files from all drives” setting. Note that you can toggle off reinstallation, but if you’re having serious issues related to Windows 10 components, a fresh copy might be ideal.

Likewise, if we took the Keep my files route and selected the Local reinstall option, we would see two toggles: Restore preinstalled apps and settings that came with the PC, and rebuild Windows 10 using the local installation.

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Step 8: Select the appropriate toggle next to the setting you want to alter and then select Confirm.

Step 9: Select Next to proceed.

Step 10: The Reset tool will present a summary. If you chose the Keep my files option, you’ll see a link you can click to see all the apps that will be removed during the reset, like Google Chrome, Steam, and even Microsoft 365. This list will be saved to your desktop when you finish the recovery process. You won’t see this link when you select the Remove everything option.

Make sure you are good with everything, and then select the *Reset *button.

Your PC will reboot automatically and enter the Windows Recovery Environment. The reset process might take an hour or more, so if you’re using a laptop, it’s a good idea to plug in the power cord. It may reboot itself several times. Wait for Windows to restart and begin the setup process, then enter your personal information and login information if prompted.

Once you’ve confirmed everything’s working, make sure Windows 10 is up to date and install the latest drivers from hardware manufacturers.

How to factory reset Windows 11

The factory reset process for Windows 11 is much the same as it is for Windows 10.

Step 1: Press the Windows + I keys together to open up important pinned apps. Here, look for the Settings menu with the gears icon, and select it.

Step 2: Select Update & Security. Look at the left-side menu and choose Recovery.

Step 3: Select the Reset PC option on the right.

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Step 4: At this point, things should look like they do in Windows 10. You will need to choose to “Keep My Files” or “Remove Everything.” Then you will be able to choose between a “Cloud Download” and a “Local Reinstall”.

Step 5: Here things get a little different. Instead of another Settings menu, Windows 11 streamlines the process for clarification and shows you the current settings you have chosen in a summary window. If everything looks all right, select Next. Do one final check, then select* Reset*.

Another way to factory reset Windows

Another method is to use the manufacturer’s recovery tool, usually located on a separate partition on your hard drive. You’ll find a wide variety of recovery software with name brands numerous enough to match the various brands of electronic devices in which you’ll install them. We have tried to make it less overwhelming by narrowing the list down to our preferred software. Each brand has a different name for what you are looking for, so here is a list of what to search for according to each brand:

• Acer: Acer eRecovery or Acer Recovery Management

• Asus: Asus Recovery Partition or AI Recovery

• Dell: Dell Factory Image Restore, DataSafe, Dell Backup & Recovery, and various other names

• HP: HP System Recovery or Recovery Manager

• Lenovo: Rescue and Recovery or ThinkVantage Recovery (on ThinkPads)

You can also access these recovery options outside of Windows, which means you still have hope if your OS won’t load. Every manufacturer is different, but you can find the method for accessing recovery just after powering on your machine. Read the text as your machine boots and look for the recovery mode key. Many devices use the F11 key as a shortcut to recovery mode.

The most common Windows 11 problems and how to fix them

With Windows 10 officially losing support next year, Windows 11 is poised to take over as the dominant operating system. Many users have already switched over to the latest Microsoft OS – and while it’s not perfect, most are finding it to be a nice step forward from Windows 10. Of course, there are a few quirks people will have to get used to, but most of the bugs and technical issues have already been ironed out.

That’s not to say Windows 11 is perfect. In fact, there are still a handful of common Windows 11 problems that people are encountering, including ones that cause no sound to play, network connections to be laggy, and games to run at less-than-optimal speeds. Thankfully, many of these issues are easy to resolve without extensive troubleshooting or the need to contact customer support.

If you’re experiencing any growing pains, here’s a look at the most common Windows 11 problems and how to fix them. Once you’ve solved your issue, be sure to look at our favorite Windows 11 tips and tricks to make the most out of the operating system.

No sound in Windows 11

Windows 11 does have sound. It should have sound. But if your version of Windows 11 stubbornly refuses to make any sound, you might need to fix it. There are a few reasons that you might have no sound on Windows 11, so try a few of these potential fixes:

• Check your volume levels: Right-click the speaker icon in the bottom right (next to the date and time) and select Open Volume Mixer. Make sure that the volume is raised high enough that you would hear it.

• Check the sound settings: Right-click the speaker icon in the bottom right and select Open sound settings. Check that next to Choose where to play sound, your speakers or headphones are selected.

• Check the connections: If you’re using external speakers, make sure they’re properly connected. Double-check any cable connection, and if you’re using wireless speakers or headphones, disconnect and reconnect them again.

• Run the Windows 11 audio troubleshooter: Right-click on the speaker icon in the bottom right and select Troubleshoot sound problems. Then follow the on-screen instructions.

Windows 11 network issues

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Can’t connect to the internet? Connection slower than expected? Windows 11 network problems can crop up from time to time. Try these possible fixes:

• Reset your router: It may not be Windows’ fault. Try resetting your modem and/or router to see if that fixes the issue.

• Reset your PC: Just rebooting can sometimes fix network issues. Give it a try.

• Reset Windows 11 network settings: Press the Windows key + I to open the Settings menu. Select Network and internet > Advanced network settings. Scroll down and select Network reset. Select Reset now > Yes to confirm.

• Change the connection method: If you can, switch from Ethernet to Wi-Fi, or vice versa, to see if that helps.

• Run the Windows 11 networking troubleshooter: Search for Network Troubleshooter in the Windows search box. Select Find and fix network problems. Select Next > Troubleshoot my connection to the internet.

Your Windows 11 screen is flickering, blurry, or black

Is your screen not behaving properly in Windows 11? If it doesn’t look right, here are some fixes you can try:

• Turn it off and on again: Reset your PC and turn your monitor off and on again.

• Check the connections: Confirm the cables are connected correctly to your PC and monitor. If in doubt, unplug and replug them.

• Update your drivers: If you have a dedicated graphics card or chip, try updating your GPU drivers. Download the latest ones from AMD, Intel, or Nvidia from their respective websites. Need more help? Here’s our guide on how to update Windows 11 graphics drivers.

• Update Windows: Try updating to the latest version of Windows 11. Certain patches and fixes might address this issue for you. Here’s how to download the latest big update.

Games running slow on Windows 11

Gaming performance on Windows 11 has been a mixed bag since its debut, and some people have faced serious performance issues.

• Check that your system isn’t overheating: Check your CPU temperature (and your GPU while you’re at it) to make sure they aren’t overheating. If they are, that might be why gaming performance is down.

• Update your graphics drivers: Download the latest graphics drivers from AMD, Intel, or Nvidia from their respective websites.

• Install the latest Windows updates: Try updating to the latest version of Windows 11; some of the recent releases have gaming related patches. Here’s how to download the latest big update.

• Try disabling VBS: Windows 11’s Virtualization Based Security can reportedly cause some issues with gaming performance in Windows 11. Try disabling that to see if it helps.

If your game performance is still poor, you might need to adjust your in-game settings for better performance. Check out our guide to in-game settings so you can maximize your frames per second.

Windows 11 search can’t find your files

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Windows 11’s search tool is smart, but sometimes it acts really dumb. It might just need to index your files again, though. Try this:

Use Windows search to look for Index and select Indexing options. Select Advanced > Rebuild.

Now that you’re a wiz at Windows 11 troubleshooting, why not brush up on printer setups? Here’s how to set your printer up properly in Windows 11.

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How to dual boot Linux and Windows

By admin April 23, 2024

How to dual boot Linux and Windows, Windows might be your bread and butter, but you can dual-boot it with Linux if you want to tinker, or play around with a wider range of open source software. Whether you’re using Windows 10 or Windows 11, you can install a range of different Linux distributions as a secondary operating system to give you the best of both worls.

Here’s how to dual boot Windows and Linux.

Microsoft

Start by installing Windows

The first step is to install Windows, assuming you’re starting from scratch. We have a full guide on how to install Windows 11, so make sure to keep that handy if you need extra detail. For dual booting, the process is largely the same minus one key difference.

Instead of allowing Windows to take up all of the space on your hard drive, you’ll allocate it a partition. If you have multiple hard drives for dual booting, you can allow Windows to take up the full space on your hard drive. This process works for Windows 10 and Windows 11, but we’ll be using Windows 10 for our example.

If you don’t have an extra Windows PC to create installation media, you can install Windows first before installing Linux (though you may need to fully defrag your hard drive to create a partition for Linux).

Step 1: With your spare PC, download the Windows Media Creation Tool and follow the steps to create installation media on one of your blank USB drives. Note: you may be asked to format the drive, which will remove all of the data.

How to dual boot Linux and Windows

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Step 2:Leaving your installation USB drive plugged in, turn off your PC. Turn it back on and select the F12 on your keyboard rapidly while the computer boots. This will take you to a boot menu. Select your Windows USB drive and continue.

Step 3:Follow the steps for the Windows installer until you reach the What type of installation do you want page. Choose Custom: Install Windows only.

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Step 4:You need to create a partition on your hard drive. You’ll likely see multiple partitions here unless you’re using a brand-new hard drive. Assuming you want to start from scratch, delete the partitions (note: this will remove all the data on your hard drive, so make sure your hard drive is backed up).

Step 5:Select your hard drive and select New to create a new partition. Set how large you want the partition to be and confirm. This will be the total amount of space Windows has access to, and you’ll need extra space to install Linux. We recommend splitting the empty space in half, allocating half to Windows and half to Linux.

Follow the remaining installation steps to finish.

How to Install Linux

Installing Windows first is a good idea because it makes installing Linux much easier. If you already have Windows installed, you can still dual boot Linux, but you’ll need to create a new partition on your hard drive.

We’ll be using Ubuntu for our example, but the process is similar for most Linux distros.

Step 1: Download the latest version of Ubuntu and store it somewhere you can easily access. Grab your second blank USB drive and insert it into your computer.

Step 2: Download balenaEtcher and open it up. Select your blank USB drive and your Ubuntu image and run the software to create your bootable Linux media.

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Step 3: Keeping your Linux USB drive plugged in, restart your computer and rapidly press the F12 key to enter the boot menu. Select your Linux USB drive to boot into the installation screen.

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Step 4: You will be able to try or install Ubuntu, so if you’re unsure about Linux, try out the OS first. It can run off of your USB drive, though with decreased performance. Once you’re settled, select Install Ubuntu to continue.

Select your keyboard layout and language and opt for a Normal installation. Make sure to check both boxes under the Other options section on this screen.

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Step 5: Ubuntu will automatically detect if you have Windows installed. Select Install Ubuntu alongside Windows 10 on this screen. The other option, Erase disk and install Ubuntu will remove Windows from your PC.

Step 6: If you started with a blank hard drive, you’re done. Finish the installation and use the boot menu referenced above to choose which OS to boot into (select the hard drive partition you want).

If Windows is taking up the entire drive, you’ll see a screen that allows you to allocate disc space to Ubuntu. Choose how much space you want to allocate and continue. We highly recommend creating a partition through Windows first, however, to avoid accidentally deleting data.

Most Linux distros will launch into a boot menu that allows you to select between Linux and Windows, but you may need to use the boot menu to choose which OS you want to load into.

How to dual boot Windows and Linux FAQ

Does dual boot slow down a PC?

No. Dual booting does restrict that quantity of storage space you have access to within each operating system, since you’ll need to dedicate drive space to not only the operating systems themselves, but their respective services, drivers, and applications. However, when you’re using either of the operating systems, you are not using the other one, so they don’t slow down your PC at all.

How do I share files between Windows and Linux on a dual boot?

The same way you would share files between two different computers running Windows and Linux. You can use a flash drive or external hard drive to manually transfer files between the two installations — the only difference is you don’t have to unplug the drive. You could use a cloud storage provider for the same purpose, or set up a shared folder on a partition both operating systems can access.

Depending on the files you’re transferring, there can be compatible issues, however, so consider the best way to transfer the data for your needs.

Windows is an operating system designed by Microsoft. The operating system is what allows you to use a computer. Windows comes preloaded on most new personal computers (PCs), which helps to make it the most popular operating system in the world.

Windows makes it possible to complete all types of everyday tasks on your computer. For example, you can use Windows to browse the Internet, check your email, edit digital photos, listen to music, play games, and do much more.

Windows is also used in many offices because it gives you access to productivity tools such as calendars, word processors, and spreadsheets.

Microsoft released the first version of Windows in the mid-1980s. There have been many versions of Windows since then, but the most recent ones include Windows 10 (released in 2015), Windows 8 (2012), Windows 7 (2009), Windows Vista (2007), and Windows XP (2001).

About this tutorial

This tutorial is designed to show you the absolute basics of using a Windows computer, including how to use the desktop, how to open different files and applications, and how to move and resize windows. The information in this tutorial will apply to more recent versions of Windows, including the ones mentioned above. However, once you’ve learned the basics, you may also want to review one of our version-specific Windows tutorials. Just select the version of Windows that’s installed on your computer:

• Windows 10

• Windows 8

• Windows 7

• Windows XP

Windows 8 vs. other versions

While most versions of Windows are relatively similar, Windows 8 works very differently from other versions. However, if you have Windows 8 on your computer, you should now be able to upgrade to Windows 10, which is more similar to earlier versions, including Windows 7. We recommend upgrading your computer to Windows 10 if you can. Review our Windows 10 tutorial to learn how.

However, we’ll still point out any major differences between Windows 8 and other versions, which means you’ll see some Windows 8-specific information from time to time. If your computer uses Windows 8, you’ll want to review both this tutorial and our Windows 8 tutorial to learn more about the differences.

Navigating Windows

Whether you’re new to computers or just Windows, it’s important to learn the basics of using your computer. If it all seems a little overwhelming right now, don’t worry! We’ll take you through it step by step and show you some of the most fundamental things you’ll need to know, including how to work with the desktop, open and close windows, and turn off your computer.

Watch the video below to learn the basics of navigating Windows.

The desktop

Once your computer has finished starting up, the first thing you’ll see is the desktop. You can think of the desktop as the main workspace for your computer. From here, you can view and manage your files, open applications, access the Internet, and much more.

Click the buttons in the interactive below to become more familiar with the desktop.

In Windows 8, you will usually see the Start screen before the desktop. To learn more, review our lesson on Getting Started with Windows 8.

Working with applications

An application—also known as a program—is a type of software that allows you to complete tasks on your computer. Windows comes with many built-in applications you can use. For example, if you want to browse the Internet, you can use Microsoft Edge (or Internet Explorer if you’re using Windows 8 or earlier).

To open an application:

1.Using your mouse, click the Start button, then select the desired application. If you don’t see the one you want, click All Programs to see a complete list of applications. In our example, we’ll open Microsoft Edge.

2.The application will appear in a new window.

There is no Start menu in Windows 8, so you’ll usually open applications from the Start screen. Click the Start button to go to the Start screen, then click an app to open it.

Working with windows

Whenever you open a file, folder, or application, it will appear in a new window. You can have multiple items open at the same time in different windows. You’ll use windows all the time, so it’s important to know how to switch between open windows, how to move and resize windows, and how to close windows when you’re done using them.

In Windows 8, some programs will open on the Start screen, not the desktop. If you’re using Windows 8, note that the information below applies only to windows you have opened on the desktop.

Parts of a window

You’ll see the same three buttons in the upper-right corner of almost every window. These buttons allow you to perform several functions, including these below.

• Click the Minimize button to hide the window. The window will be minimized to the taskbar. You can then click the icon for that window on the taskbar to make it reappear.

• Click the Maximize button to make the window fill the entire screen.

• If the screen is maximized, the Maximize button will be temporarily replaced by the Restore button. Just click it to return the window to its original size.

• Click the Close button to close the window.

To move a window:

1.Click and drag the top of the window to move it to the desired location on the screen. When you’re done, release the mouse.

2.The window will appear in the new location.

To resize a window:

1.Hover the mouse over any corner of the window, then click and drag the mouse to make the window larger or smaller. When you’re done, release the mouse.

2.The window will be resized.

Switching between windows

If you have more than one window open at the same time, you can quickly switch between them by clicking the icon for that window on the taskbar.

Shutting down your computer

When you’re done using your computer, it’s important to shut it down properly. The procedure will vary slightly depending on which version of Windows you’re using.

To shut down your computer:

• If you’re using Windows 10, click the Start button, then the Power icon, then click Shut down.

• If you’re using Windows 8, click the Start button to access the Start screen, click the Power icon near the upper-right corner, and select Shut down. If you don’t see this option, it means you’ll need to upgrade to Windows 8.1. Review this page from our Windows 8 tutorial to learn how.

• If you’re using Windows 7 or earlier, Click the Start button, then select Shut down.

Restarting and Sleep mode

You can also click the power button button for more options. For example, if your computer has become unresponsive, you can choose Restart to quickly turn it off and on again.

You can also choose to put your computer into Sleep mode. This turns off most of your computer’s processes, but it remembers which applications and files are open. It allows the computer to start up more quickly because you won’t have to wait for the operating system and applications to load. Note that your computer may go into Sleep mode automatically if you haven’t used it for more than a few minutes.

If you have a laptop, you can simply close the lid to put it into Sleep mode.

Waking your computer from Sleep mode

If your computer is in Sleep mode, you’ll need to wake it to use it. To wake the computer from Sleep mode, click the mouse or press any key on the keyboard.

What is Linux?

Linux (pronounced “linnucks”) is a monolithic, open-source kernel, and a family of operating systems based on that kernel. The Linux kernel was developed by Linus Torvalds, who announced it on the comp.os.minix newsgroup on August 25, 1991. Since then, it’s been ported to computer architectures including x86-64, x86, ARM, RISC, and DEC Alpha. It is licensed under version 2 of the GPL.

Developers can access all Linux source code, and are permitted under the license conditions to modify and distribute it.

Where is Linux used?

Presently, Linux is used by several million users worldwide. The composition of users varies from private users, training centers, universities, research centers, and companies. Below are examples of where Linux is used today.

• Android phones and tablets – Android phones and tablets use a form of Linux.

• Servers – A vast majority of the web servers that run many web pages (including this one) are using Linux.

• Supercomputers – All of the top supercomputers use a Linux-based operating system.

• TV, Cameras, DVD players, etc. – Most of the appliances that use some form of a computer use Linux.

• Amazon – Many of the computers that help run Amazon use Linux.

• Google – Computers that help run Google and Google search results use Linux.

• Planes – Airplanes computers and screens you watch on the plane use Linux.

• U.S. Postal service – The computers and servers that help run systems to sort and manage mail in the U.S.

• NYSE – The New York Stock Exchange uses Linux to help run its exchange.

• LHC – The Large Hadron Collider uses Linux.

• OLPC – The One Laptop Per Child program used Linux on all its computers.

Who makes Linux now?

Thousands of organizations, corporations, and individuals help develop Linux and each of its various distributions. For more information, visit LinuxFoundation.org. You can read what’s happening right now in Linux development at LKML.org, the Linux kernel mailing list.

Linux distributions, flavors, and variants

Linux may be obtained in different ways. All the necessary components can be downloaded free of charge from the Internet, which means an operating system can be assembled for almost nothing. An alternative is to use a so-called distribution, a Linux variation offered by many companies. They include a broad range of applications and full programs that significantly simplify the installation of Linux.

There are hundreds of different distributions of Linux were released. Below are a few that we currently have listed on our site. A great site that lists almost every distribution, and rankings is DistroWatch.

System requirements

There are many variants of Linux, each with hardware requirements. Some can run on minimal systems with small amounts of RAM and disk space.

To run Linux, and your computer meets the following specifications, it should be able to run any variant of Linux.

• 64-bit Intel or AMD processor

• 1 GB RAM

• 10 GB of hard drive space

• CD/DVD drive or a USB (universal serial bus) port for installation

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Featured

9 best processors for PC gaming 2024

By admin April 18, 2024

9 best processors for PC gaming 2024, It’s tough to find the right gaming CPU for your next PC. We’ve benchmarked dozens of processors to find the best CPU for gaming, and there’s a clear winner right now: AMD‘s Ryzen 7 7800X3D. Although the latest chip from Team Red claims the crown, there are still several other great options on the market.

Whatever your needs and budgets, though, we have options from AMD and Intel that will be great performers. We’re focused on gaming here, but if you want a processor that can game and get work done, make sure to check out our list of the best processors.

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D

The best gaming CPU you can buy

Why you should buy this: It’s the fastest gaming processor you can buy, by far.

Who’s it for: Gamers who want top-tier performance and don’t need productivity power.

Why we picked the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D:

AMD is back on top of the gaming charts, but it isn’t with the flagship Ryzen 9 7950X3D. It’s with the midrange Ryzen 7 7800X3D. Through our testing, we found that the Ryzen 7 is sometimes even faster than AMD’s flagship and blows away the competition from Intel.

As we saw in the last generation, the reason why is 3D V-Cache. The Ryzen 7 7800X3D has the unique advantage of leveraging AMD’s cache tech with a single core complex (CCX), though. This, according to AMD, offers faster cache-to-cache transfers and speeds up gaming performance.

That’s what we saw in our testing. Overall, our testing revealed that it’s around 13% faster than Intel’s Core i9-13900K and a massive 20% faster than last-gen’s Ryzen 7 5800X3D. By a decent margin, it’s the fastest gaming CPU you can buy right now.

There are some trade-offs, though. Productivity performance, although solid, is still behind the flagship options from both AMD and Intel. In addition, single-core speed suffers due to the lower boost clock speed of the Ryzen 7 7800X3D. For gamers, though, those issues are easy to look past.

best processors for PC gaming

Intel Core i5-13600K

The best Intel processor for gaming

Why you should buy this: It’s the best value on a gaming CPU available today.

Who’s it for: Gamers who want near-flagship gaming performance without paying the high price.

Why we picked the Intel Core i5-13600K:

You don’t need to spend a lot of money on a processor for gaming, and Intel’s Core i5-13600K is proof of that. It’s the best Intel CPU you can buy right now, sporting 14 cores (6P + 8E) and 20 threads, with a boost clock that hits as high as 5.1GHz.

It’s not the fastest Intel CPU, or even quite the fastest for gaming. However, it’s so much more affordable than the 13700K and 13900K, and yet offers very comparable gaming performance — especially at resolutions above 1080p — that it delivers much more value for the money. It dominates the AMD competition, too. It is far faster for gaming than the Ryzen 5 7600X and goes toe-to-toe with the more-expensive 7700X — even exceeding it if you overclock it.

While you’ll get your best performance with the 13600K using DDR5 memory, you don’t have to. Running it on a more affordable motherboard with DDR4 memory can make upgrading to the 13600K much cheaper than the alternatives, leaving you plenty of room for upgrading your CPU and memory in the future. However, you won’t be able to move up to 14th-gen chips in the future, as Intel is moving to a new socket design with the next generation.

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D

The best last-gen AMD processor for gaming

Why you should buy this: It’s competitive with some of the latest CPUs and it’s an easy upgrade.

Who’s it for: Anyone with an AM4 system who wants the best performance possible without a system overhaul.

Why we picked the Intel Ryzen 7 5800X3D:

AMD ended its Ryzen 5000 generation with a bang. The Ryzen 7 5800X3D was so good for gaming when it was released that it’s still competitive with the latest Intel and AMD CPUs, outclassing chips that cost twice as much in many cases. The fact that you can install it in motherboards that cost less than $100 with DDR4 memory makes the 5800X3D an amazing value and arguably the best bang-for-the-buck gaming CPU that AMD offers, even with its newer — and faster — Ryzen 7000 CPUs available.

It comes with the same eight Zen 3 cores as the Ryzen 7 5800X, but with an additional 64MB of L3 cache stacked on top of the chip. That extra cache is put to good use in games. Across a suite of seven titles, we found it was 6.4% faster than the 16-core Ryzen 9 5950X.

It doesn’t beat out the top 7900X and 7950X in gaming, and it loses out heavily in multithreaded workloads and productivity applications, but if you’re just looking for gaming, and especially if you already have a compatible AM4 system, the 5800X3D is the best AMD CPU for gaming.

AMD Ryzen 5 7600

Best budget AMD processor for gaming

Why you should buy this: It’s an affordable new-generation gaming CPU with heaps of upgrade potential.

Who’s it for: Gamers who want to have a clear upgrade path for the future.

Why we picked the Ryzen 5 7600:

AMD’s Ryzen 5 7600 is the baby of the new generation, lacking the high core counts of its bigger siblings and the clock speed of its X-counterparts, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a great CPU. In fact, it punches well above its weight, offering comparable performance to the 7600X at its default settings – and it’s almost identical once you enable precision boost overdrive, despite running at a lower power draw.

AMD hasn’t done an affordable, overclockable CPU like this for a few generations, but it’s returned to its roots with a great option for anyone looking to build a new AM5 system without paying sky-high prices. Motherboards and DDR5 memory still aren’t cheap, but this platform will be supported for years to come, so you shouldn’t need to upgrade anything for several generations of processors.

There are more affordable options in the older Ryzen 5000 generation of processors, but they perform significantly worse than the latest AM4 designs, and you are locking yourself into a dead-end platform with no upgrade potential.

Intel Core i9-13900K

The best high-end gaming CPU

Why you should buy this: It’s the fastest gaming CPU money can buy.

Who’s it for: Gamers with deep pockets who want the absolute best gaming and productivity performance possible.

Why we picked the Intel Core i9-13900K:

You don’t need more than the Core i5-13600K for gaming, but the Core i9-13900K is a true enthusiast-class processor. It comes with 24 cores (8 performance and 16 efficient) and it can hit a staggering 5.8GHz. In a straight shootout with any other CPU, it’s the fastest, so if you need flagship performance, there isn’t any other chip worth considering. There are some caveats, however.

For starters, most other top CPUs are almost as good, especially in games where GPU power is more important. You also need a very powerful cooler, as even 360mm all-in-ones have proved unable to keep this chip cool enough to prevent thermal throttling. That’s because it uses a lot of power — over 300 watts in some cases. You’ll need to make sure your power supply is up to the task.

If you stream and game or want to edit your gaming footage, this is easily the best CPU for the job, as it is not only the fastest at gaming, but often beats even AMD’s best in video-editing performance, too.

Wondering why we didn’t pick the 14900K? Because it’s basically the same CPU. The performance difference is almost non-existent, and it’s more expensive, making the 13900K by far the better choice.

Intel Core i3-12100F

The best $100 gaming CPU

Why you should buy this: It’s the fastest CPU at around $100.

Who’s it for: Anyone building a gaming PC on a tight budget.

Why we picked the Intel Core i3-12100F:

The Core i3-12100F is an unassuming quad-core processor, but it’s hard to expect more for around $100. It’s not as powerful as the Ryzen 5 and Core i5 options, but it’s not far behind — especially considering how much less it costs.

Unlike Intel’s other 12th-generation offerings, it ditches the efficient cores for four performance cores. Overall, it’s about 10% slower than the Core i5-12600K, but it depends on the game. In some titles, it’s just as fast.

Many games don’t need more than four cores, especially when those cores can hit 4.3GHz. Because of that, many older games run great on the Core i3-12100F. Newer titles, like Horizon Zero Dawn and Red Dead Redemption 2, may not have as high of performance, however.

AMD Ryzen 5 8600G

The best processor for gaming with integrated graphics

Why you should buy this: It has some of the most powerful onboard graphics of any CPU available.

Who’s it for: Anyone building a gaming PC now, but who plans to buy a GPU later.

Why we picked the Ryzen 5 8600G:

The Ryzen 5 8600G is for the gamer who doesn’t need one of the best graphics cards. It includes Radeon graphics on the chip itself, which is powerful enough for playing even AAA games at 1080p at lighter settings, or running esports games at high frame rates for competitive play.

It’s based on the Zen 4 CPU architecture, so it has six powerful cores and a high clock speed, while the onboard graphics are an enhanced version of the excellent RDNA 3 design found in AMD’s RX 7000 series of graphics cards. While the 8700G is more powerful, it’s not by a huge leap, and the price is almost 50% higher, making it harder to recommend.

What’s great about the Ryzen 5 8600G is that you can still use a discrete graphics card. Although we recommend one of the processors above if you already have a graphics card, the Ryzen 5 8600G is a great stopgap product that allows you to game while you save up. It also has a great upgrade path ahead of it, since you’ll be able to drop in a future AM5 CPU without the need to upgrade your motherboard too.

Ryzen 9 7950X

The best CPU for gaming and streaming

Why you should buy this: It’s the processor with the most performance cores.

Who’s it for: Anyone who wants a high-powered machine for gaming and streaming.

Why we picked the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X:

AMD’s 7950X goes back and forth with Intel’s top CPUs when it comes to gaming performance, and there’s a tussle when it comes to streaming performance, but for gaming and streaming, we lean towards AMD’s flagship CPU. This 16-core, 32-thread processor has the most high-speed performance cores of any modern CPU, making scheduling far easier whether you’re on Windows 10 or Windows 11, and that means you get more consistent performance across a wider range of applications.

The 7950X is also a monstrously powerful CPU in its own right, whether you’re gaming or streaming — or both. It offers heaps of cache and a near-6GHz clock speed. It is pricey, and you’ll need to factor in the cost of a high-end motherboard and DDR5, but if you want a powerful machine for gaming and streaming, there’s nothing quite like AMD’s 7950X. Recent price cuts have made it far more attainable, too.

Intel Core i5-13400

Best affordable gaming CPU

Why you should buy this: It has 12600K-level gaming performance for a cheaper price.

Who’s it for: Anyone who wants impressive multithreaded and gaming performance at an affordable price.

Why we picked the Intel Core i5-13400

The Intel Core i5-13400 hasn’t received much fanfare, but it should. It has 10 cores for around $250, which is incredible considering just three generations ago, you had to buy the top Core i9 CPU to get such multi-threaded capabilities. It doesn’t hit the high clock speeds of the other 13th-gen CPUs, but it still manages 4.6GHz across multiple cores at once, making it great for gaming at any resolution.

This CPU offers the kind of gaming performance you’d typically see on a Core i5-12600K, a CPU with higher clock speeds and much higher demands on power and cooling. The Core i5-13400 is relatively pedestrian with its 65-watt thermal design power (TDP) — a rarity in Intel’s latest processors.

If you’re building an affordable gaming PC, or you want good gaming performance in a compact, low-power system, the Core i5-13400 is a great choice.

Although you don’t need a top-shelf processor for gaming, your CPU still plays a significant role in how well your games run. Picking the right gaming CPU for you is an important choice to make.

Once you’ve decided on it and hit the buy button, check out our guide on how to install a CPU, so you’re prepared when it arrives.

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Computer

How To Build Gaming Computers 2024

By admin April 17, 2024

How To Build Gaming Computers, Welcome to BGC where our mission is giving you all the detailed, updated information you need to confidently build your own gaming computers from scratch – even if you’re a complete beginner who’s never seen the inside of a PC before.

When getting a new computer to experience PC gaming in all its graphical glory, if you want to get the smoothest performance and highest graphics quality for your money to maximize your experience (and to avoid lame lag getting in the way of the fun), building a custom gaming PC yourself is the smartest way and has many advantages over buying a prebuilt desktop.

When you learn how to build gaming computers, you’ll not only stretch your money further and get the fastest performance for your budget (meaning higher frame rates and better graphics), but you’ll also be able to include more reliable, higher-quality parts that will allow your system to run as smooth, cool and quiet as possible – for as long as possible.

Plus, when you build a gaming PC it will be WAY easier to upgrade or maintain your machine, as you’ll have full flexibility and control from the very start which means you can easily tweak it over the years however you see fit (and without encountering issues). For example, some prebuilt PCs are quite limited in the upgrades you can do, and some manufacturers even void your warranty if you simply open up the computer case.

Furthermore, building a gaming computer means you can specifically choose the right parts to fully maximize performance in the specific games/applications you care about most. Last but definitely not least, building a gaming PC yourself also means you can select the exact style, theme and features that you really want, to end up with your dream computer. The bottom line? Buying a prebuilt desktop, while convenient for those who are really impatient or strapped for time, just cannot compare to the many upsides of building your own.

But the Best Thing About Building a PC?

You might have heard that building your own gaming computer is super straightforward and essentially just like Lego but for grown-ups. Well, the great thing is – it’s true. All of it. In modern times, building a gaming computer really is as easy as people often say on forums and elsewhere online. It’s genuinely hard to mess up if you simply learn a bit about the components you’ll need (see below), pick a good list of compatible parts based on your budget and preferences (using build guides such as our monthly gaming PC builds as a base of reference), and then simply follow a step by step tutorial to install your PC parts and software.

There’s really nothing overly-complicated or technical about learning how to build a gaming PC for the first time, and we say that objectively and not just because we run a site on PC building. If you think about it, hardware manufacturers want installation of their parts to be as straightforward to do as possible (so more people buy their products). PC parts are designed to be as effortless to work with as possible.

Avoiding damage to your parts is also as simple as following a few basic safety precautions such as not touching the delicate bits, keeping parts in their anti-static bags until installation, taking things slow, and regularly “grounding” yourself to avoid static electricity (by touching a metal object before handling parts or wearing an anti-static strap). Let’s get straight into the basics of planning your first build.

How To Build Gaming Computers

Introduction to Building a Gaming PC

The 5-Step Simplified Guide for Hardware Beginners

As mentioned, planning and building your own gaming desktop computer is a remarkably easy process considering how complex it may sound to some random stranger on the street who doesn’t realize there’s nothing crazy-complicated or overly-technical about it. However, as straightforward as it is to build a computer in the modern PC age, you’ll still need an introductory step-by-step guide to follow along with as a first-timer.

Otherwise it’s all too easy to get lost in research land of doom, as while there’s lots of info around the web on custom PCs, the reality is it’s scattered all over the place on different sites, videos, forums, etc. As a first-timer you could spend an eternity trying to learn and piece together the information you need.

Plus, the manuals that come with your parts don’t provide the necessary installation explanations you require as a beginner. Component manuals can include diagrams and important details regarding installation (so don’t throw them out!) but they lack the full instructions that you need to understand every step.

Any questions or concerns you might have right now about building a PC will likely be covered at some point in the walkthrough below. So, if you’re a bit overwhelmed that perhaps YOU can’t build your own PC and that’s it’s too complicated (it really isn’t), just have trust that you absolutely can despite having no prior hardware experience, and just keep moving through one step at a time at your own pace and everything will start to make sense.

Thanos-Sized Tools Optional

With absolutely ALL the steps required to build a PC clearly explained below, you’re in the right hands – many first-time PC builders have used our guides over the years to overcome their fears and end up confidently assembling the custom gaming PC of their dreams. Will you be next? Good luck, enjoy the quest, and may the force be with you and your parts. Building your first computer is a memorable, rewarding experience, and you’ll feel a real sense of accomplishment and satisfaction every time you boot up your new system knowing that YOU made it all happen and are in full control.

So, in our quest to make building your first gaming PC as easy and frustration-free as possible, we’ve carefully-crafted the below simple-yet-comprehensive 5-step guide on how to build a gaming computer from scratch, with the assumption that you know nothing Jon Snow. This fine-tuned guide has been tweaked over many years to make the process as easy as possible as a beginner (and to include all the burning questions that beginners commonly ask us), and we will cover all the basics you need to know all in the one place (and using as simple language as possible without complicated tech jargon/lingo you’ll often see in other hardware articles/guides).

Step 1: Understand the Required Hardware Parts

Parts Needed to Build a Gaming PC

For your new gaming battlestation of glory to be fully-operational once construction is complete, the following are the essential parts you will need to buy when building your own gaming computer:

• CPU/Processor

• CPU Cooler (most CPUs come with one)

• Motherboard

• RAM/Memory

• Graphics Card (or CPU with integrated graphics)

• Storage Drive (SSD or HDD or both)

• Power Supply

• Case

• Operating System Software (like Windows)

• Peripherals (Monitor, Mouse, Keyboard, Speakers, Headset / Headphones)

Everything else is optional for a computer build, as there are a whole bunch of other additional add-on parts and accessories that you could include in your custom setup either from the very start or later on as an upgrade. But the basic parts above are what’s 100% required to construct a new working PC that you can start gaming on straight away.

Let’s take a quick look at the main role of each of these parts, including links to our detailed hardware selection guides should you want to learn about a particular component in more detail (including what all the spec and features mean). But keep in mind that to build a PC you don’t need to thoroughly understand all the hardware parts n too much detail, and a basic understanding is sufficient to get started on planning your build (so feel free to skip ahead to step 2 if you already know a little about hardware).

CPU/Processor

Also called the processor, the CPU (Central Processing Unit) is a fairly small, square-shaped component that sits on your motherboard and is responsible for all the lightning-speed mathematical calculations required by the games and software you run.

You’ll want a good CPU when building a gaming PC, as its importance to gaming performance is second only to your graphics card. See our full guide to choosing the best CPU for gaming to get up to speed with what all the CPU features mean and which specs are most important, or see our latest sample gaming PC builds which include breakdowns of the current best value gaming CPUs and why.

CPU Cooler

Also referred to as the HSF (Heatsink and Fan), this is what sits on top of the actual CPU to keep it cool and quiet. Most CPUs will already come shipped with a cooler in the box, so chances are you won’t need to buy one when building a computer, though when building a high-end gaming computer you’ll want to consider replacing the stock cooler with a better one for more effective cooling and noise reduction.

Buying your own CPU cooler is especially important if you want to overclock your gaming PC as stock CPU coolers aren’t designed for overclocking, though you should probably avoid overclocking if you’re brand new and just building your first PC. When you buy your own cooler, you have the choice of an air cooler or a fancier liquid cooler, though a good air cooler can be just as effective (if not more in certain configurations) than a liquid one.

Motherboard

If your CPU is the brain of your computer, the motherboard is the heart and central nervous system which acts as the center of your build, as well as transferring information between all of the components in the system.

Whilst it doesn’t directly affect the performance or frame rate of your games, the motherboard is an important component and when you build a gaming computer you want to find a decent one that has the features that you need, the upgrade flexibility that you want, and that is from a good, trusted manufacturer. If you need to know the full details of selecting the right Mothership for your battlestation don’t miss our complete guide to choosing the best motherboard for a gaming PC.

RAM/Memory

RAM (Random Access Memory) comes in the form of horizontal memory modules/sticks that you slot into the motherboard, and is the memory in your computer that running programs and games rely on during their operation.

Generally speaking, the more RAM you have in your system, the faster your programs and games will run, although for gaming there is a point where more RAM isn’t going to noticeably increase performance. These days, 8GB-16GB is usually enough to maximize gaming performance.

Graphics Card

The star of any worthy gaming system, the graphics card (also called a video card or GPU, short for Graphics Processing Unit) is responsible for calculating and rendering the 3D graphics and special effects to your monitor. Your choice of graphics card plays the biggest role in how well your gaming PC will perform (ie how smoothly and high-quality your games will run) and without a decent one in your parts-list you won’t be able to view your games at their best.

Therefore, you should allocate a healthy chunk of your overall budget to your graphics card to maximize the gaming performance of your new rig (more on this in part 3 below). See how to choose the best video card for gaming to delve deeper into what GPU specs and features mean.

Storage Drive (HDD or SSD or both)

For your gaming computer build you’ll need some sort of storage capacity to be able to load the operating system and games on, and there are various devices you can use for this with the most common being either an internal HDD (Hard Disk Drive) if you’re on a budget, an internal SSD (Solid State Drive) for faster performance, or a combination of both a HDD and a SSD (where you’d use the SSD as the main drive for your operating system and a handful of programs, and the HDD for all your other files). There’s no need to worry about getting a huge amount of storage upfront, as you can always add internal or external drives later on.

See choosing a SSD for more.

Power Supply

Commonly referred to as simply the PSU (Power Supply Unit), the power supply is a box that sits inside your case (usually on the bottom) and provides the power for your system from your main wall socket in your house. When beginners learn how to build a gaming computer for the first time, it’s often an overlooked component and that makes sense because how important can a power supply really be, right?

But hold it right there – when you build a gaming PC this is a common rookie mistake to avoid at all costs (simply buying the cheapest PSU you can find), as it may come back to bite you later on as cheap PSUs spell trouble. If a power supply dies, there’s the risk of it frying and killing your other parts in the process, so you could say your new custom gaming computer is only as strong as its weakest link.

A bad PSU is a liability, and you can re-word that to HUGE liability if you’re building a powerful, more high-end PC. Choose a good power supply for your PC build that will last the distance, has decent efficiency (80+ Bronze minimum), and that provides enough power for your particular parts-list (and future upgrades).

Case

Last but definitely not least in terms of the core hardware components that make up your PC tower, the case (sometimes called the chassis if you want to get fancy) which will house all your precious parts, provide airflow to your system with a bunch of fans and grills, and which is obviously responsible for how your awesome new gaming computer will look from the outside.

Will you choose a sleeper low-key look for your new custom gaming PC, or more of an in-your-face aggressive all-RGB beauty with see-through side panels? Perhaps something in-between? There’s a vast array of cases out there to suit any taste, and you can see some of our current favorites in our guide to choosing a case for a gaming PC build.

Operating System Software

There are a gazillion software programs you can install on your PC, but there’s only one that is 100% non-negotiable, and that of course is an operating system. Windows is the most popular choice for gaming, with Windows 10 being the latest and greatest and what we’d recommend if you’re building your first custom gaming PC. Linux is your other option, but it’s more technical and will require a lot more work to get started with.

Peripherals

The above are the core parts you’ll need when you build a gaming computer, but to make a working new computer that is also ready to play games from the get, you’ll need a couple extra things. Without things like a monitor or mouse, your new PC will just be a hopeless heap of hardware that sits there twiddling its thumbs in boredom.

• Monitor – Without a screen to actually view the beautiful graphics that your graphics card renders, your new PC is essentially one big expensive box of useless parts. But not all screens are created equal, and they can vary greatly in price, features, sizes and resolutions. Picking the right monitor for gaming is an artform of which we distil as simply as we can in our gaming monitor buying guide.

• Mouse – The mouse is another peripheral required for a new gaming computer build to actually be use-able from the get, and to some gamers it’s an important part of the overall gaming experience as not all mice are created equal when it comes to gaming. Depending on how seriously you take your gaming, and how much you’re willing to invest in a quality comfortable model that lasts, you’ll want to put at least a little thought in the mouse you choose as they can vary greatly in size, weight, features, feel, and responsiveness.

• Keyboard – For a new PC to work you will also obviously need a keyboard, any some gamers will do just fine getting a budget, low-cost keyboard that just gets the job one. Others will want to invest in a higher-quality, more comfortable and/or feature-rich keyboard, such as one with high-quality keys, extra programmable macro buttons, and/or cool LED backlighting.

• Audio – Music and sound effects can play a huge part in your favorite games so you don’t want to neglect your setup’s audio capabilities, especially if you want the best gaming experience. You have various options here, including getting a set of external gaming speakers, picking a monitor with built-in speakers (most aren’t too good though), or finding a nice gaming headset (or gaming headphones if you don’t need a mic).

Step 2: Choosing the Right Budget for Your Needs

How Much is it to Build a Good Gaming PC?

You may wonder how much it costs to build a computer for a good gaming experience, but the answer completely depends on your specific wants and needs. What makes a good experience is subjective, and things like the types of games you play, the resolution you’ll be gaming in, and the performance level (ie frame rate) you’d be satisfied with will differ from gamer to gamer. Let’s talk about it.

When building your own custom computer you’re only limited by your budget and imagination, and you have the option to build a very cheap gaming PC for a few hundred bucks, or to fork out a few thousand on a high-end monster of a machine (and everything in-between). If you’re strapped for cash though, the good news is you can still build a good gaming computer on a budget (and for much cheaper than you may realize) and end up with an enjoyable experience. Not everyone needs to run the latest, most graphically-demanding AAA games in super-high resolution and at super-high frame rates to have a blast.

The biggest factor at play for most gamers when choosing how much you should spend on a gaming PC build is the screen resolution you will be gaming in. Higher resolutions than the standard 1080p (like 1440p and 4K) will demand quite a bit more firepower from your system if you want a smooth experience, and if you’re a picky gamer who wants to play at the highest graphics quality settings and/or you’re using a monitor with a higher-than-average refresh rate and wish to get higher-than-average frame rates to take advantage of that refresh rate, you’ll need even more power.

Let’s look at a few different price points and which resolutions/applications are ideally suited for that amount.

Under $500 (Entry-Level Modern Gaming)

With a spending of amount of 500 dollars and under you’ll be quite restricted, but the truth is with smart component choices you can still build a first gaming PC that will play modern titles in the standard 1080p resolution with very playable performance (depending on the game though and how much you turn down the graphics settings).

A build in this price point may be all you need though if you’re just mainly sticking to older, less demanding games, or you don’t mind turning down the graphic settings considerable and/or you don’t mind the occasional slow-down/lag here or there in the more demanding titles.

Many popular eSports titles have much lower demands and can perform really well on a real cheap setup. Obviously you can’t expect much in terms of peripherals and accessories in this tier either, but some gamers honestly don’t mind using a basic, generic mouse, keyboard and monitor that simply gets the job done.

$500 to $1000 (The Mainstream Mid-Range)

The best value PC gaming resolution right now is 1080p (also called Full HD), and building a PC between 500 to 1000 dollars will allow you to achieve good performance at this resolution (and the closer to $1000, the closer to perfect performance you’ll get).

This price range also allows for a decent 1440p gaming computer, which is the next resolution up in quality from 1080p and will make for an even more immersive experience. You could say this price point is the overall sweet spot in terms of striking a nice balance between your gaming experience and your cash outlay, and if you’re wanting the very best 1080p gaming PC possible then $800 to $1000 is more than enough.

$1000 to $2000 (High-End Gaming)

Now we start getting into very high performance for the gamers who demand more such as flawless 1440p gaming on high/ultra settings or high refresh rate gaming for 144Hz monitors. A build between 1000 to 2000 dollars will also get you good virtual reality and 4K gaming performance.

Pro creators, producers, game streamers, and/or artists performing demanding non-gaming tasks such as high-end video editing, game development or 3D rendering/animation should also be eyeing off this type of budget (or even higher if you’re a true professional wanting to leave no stone unturned when it comes to productivity).

$2000 and Beyond (Ultimate Performance)

Now we get into serious power, and building your own desktop in this price range is for gamers seeking the very best gaming experience that money can buy, with little to no compromises. In other words, if you’re either rocking a 4K monitor and want to take full advantage, you’re aiming for 144FPS+ to take full advantage of a 1080p/1440p 144Hz monitor (or even 240Hz; yes, this craziness does exist), or if you’re delving into the deeply exciting rabbit hole that is VR and want the best experience – throwing down a couple grand or more on an extreme gaming computer may be a worthy investment for the experience of a lifetime.

Just don’t forget to put the VR headset down every once in a while to breath the fresh air of reality, as in 2019 it’s legit addictive as hell and only getting better and better.

Step 3: Plan the Perfect Parts-List for Your Budget

Always-Updated Example PC Builds

It’s time for perhaps the most fun part of building a gaming PC – planning, tweaking and perfecting an awesome list of matching, compatible components for your budget, performance aims, and specific preferences. To help you pinpoint exactly where the current best value parts are within the market as a gamer, our constantly-updated Best Gaming PC Builds for the Money series is here to help and has been the go-to, most-popular part of the site since first kicking off the series quite a long time ago.

Every quarter we do the meticulous, painstaking research in coming up with the very best gaming desktop build examples that we possibly can based on over a decade of build design experience, all the way from a super bang-for-buck $300 entry-level setup for casual gaming to a monster $5000 all-RGB rig of glory with all the bells and whistles (and every build budget in-between).

Our gaming PC build guides explain how to choose the fastest, best value parts on the market as a gamer

Allocating Your Budget for Maximum Gaming Performance

If you’re tweaking a build or designing your own parts-list from the ground up, don’t forget that the two most important parts as gamers are the video card and CPU. You should allocate a nice chunk of your overall budget towards these two, and it’s a good idea to base your parts-list around them.

Graphics Card: 25-40% of Total Build Budget

To build the best gaming PC for your money, you’ll want to invest a minimum of 25% of your total build budget on the graphics card, as nothing is more important to gaming performance. So for instance, for a gaming computer build around 1000 dollars you’re looking at a graphics card around $250 to $400 to max performance. Going higher than $400 or so will mean having to make too many sacrifices on your other parts, and less than 25% means you’re not allocating enough of your budget to graphics and leaving gaming performance on the table like many prebuilt PCs do.

CPU: 15-25% of Total Build Budget

The second most important component when building your own custom gaming computer, so look to also spend a healthy portion of your budget on the fastest one you can get. Using a $1000 system as an example again, throwing $150 to $250 on the CPU is about the right balance. Remember this is just a general guideline, and also this is for gamers wanting the fastest gaming performance; if you’re building a workstation PC or hybrid gaming/workstation PC, consider throwing a bit more at a better CPU.

The reason we single out the graphics card and CPU is because, as mentioned in step 1, these are the two most important parts in a gaming PC. You should probably think about choosing these parts first when planning your build, assuming you want to maximize gaming performance. Picking a graphics card around 30-40% of your total budget (and 15-25% for a CPU) is a good ballpark to aim for that will allow you to include the best graphics card you possibly can in your rig, which will lead to the best gaming performance.

For anyone wondering, yes bottlenecking is possible (which happens when your CPU is too weak in correlation with your graphics), but for most builds these ratios will work well and you won’t experience bottlenecking.

Our general philosophy on balancing a build for the fastest gaming performance

Performance Perfectionist? Aiming for Specific FPS Targets

If you follow the general guidelines above, or study how we allocate different spending budgets in our best PC builds for gaming series, you’ll end up with a very good performing gaming PC for your budget (we also provide estimated FPS numbers in all our build guides).

But if you want to take things further and guarantee that your new system will get the frame rate that you want in a certain game at a certain resolution (and settings), then you’ll want to do some further research and look into benchmarks around the web to confirm you’ll get the performance you’re after with the parts that you decide to buy. We also have specific game performance guides for popular eSports in our main menu which can save you time. Also, if you’re building a PC for virtual reality we’ve got you covered with our in-depth guide for that too.

Planning a Hybrid Gaming and Workstation PC Build

As well as predicting the performance your parts-list will get in the games that matter to you, if you’re building a hybrid gaming and workstation system for other demanding tasks for work, you’ll need to take your particular programs and workflow into account when planning your build too. For example, you might want to allocate more money to the CPU and/or RAM if you care just as much about video editing, 3D production and/or streaming as you do about gaming performance. You might also see better performance going with AMD over Intel, or vice versa, depending on the specific programs you’ll be using.

Planning Ahead for Upgrades (RAM, CPU, GPU, etc)

This should go without saying when you’re learning how to build your own gaming PC, and when you plan your parts-list around a well thought-out example build like our own builds this has already naturally been taken into account, but if you’re planning a parts-list from scratch (or tweaking an existing build from someone else) then always consider the upgrade path. Let’s cover a few basic examples that is good to know as a beginner.

First and foremost, with RAM being one of the most common upgrades you can make to a gaming PC (as it’s quite inexpensive yet brings a nice little boost in overall performance), as a rule of thumb you want to always keep a couple of RAM slots free on your motherboard.

That means choosing a motherboard that has 4 RAM slots if you’re getting 2 RAM modules now (which is a good idea by the way as 2 modules usually runs faster than just the 1, even if it’s the same amount of RAM). In the chance you do pick a motherboard with only 2 slots (perhaps it’s a small form-factor one that you really like), you’ll want to consider just getting the 1 RAM module instead to keep one slot free for the future.

If you plan on swapping the graphics card for a better one in a few years time, there shouldn’t be any problem with doing that, but make sure you choose a computer power supply that will provide enough power to accommodate a more powerful card in future. Same thing goes with upgrading to a dual graphics card setup should you want to do that later on, and in that case you’ll need even more wiggle room power-wise.

Upgrading a CPU later on is also possible, but if you’re going for Intel you’re likely not going to be able to upgrade to the latest processor in a few years as you’d also need to change the motherboard too. This is where AMD has a nice advantage, as their current AM4 platform is compatible with future CPUs by doing a BIOS update, meaning if you buy an AMD CPU and motherboard today, in a few years time you can likely upgrade the CPU to the newest edition whilst keeping your same motherboard.

With Intel, you’d have to either upgrade to a faster yet older CPU (as in, the same generation that you’re buying now), otherwise you’d need to get a new motherboard if getting the latest CPU. Although to be fair on the whole AMD vs Intel debate, there’s no telling how long AMD’s AM4 platform will last.

Step 4: Confirm Compatibility & Buy Parts

If you’re using one of our recommended gaming desktop builds exactly as-is, you don’t have to worry about checking compatibility between all of your parts as we do all that for you, but if you’re tweaking one of those builds or designing your own parts-list from scratch you’ll need to do compatibility checks yourself. Although, it must be said that even if you’re using someone’s already-planned build (such as one of ours), we encourage you to confirm compatibility for yourself anyway just to be extra safe as people can mistakes.

A new gaming PC can be expensive so you want to ensure what you’re buying is completely compatible. Furthermore, as a beginner who’s building your first PC, you’ll ideally want to learn at least the basics of how to do basic compatibility checks so that you can be a smarter builder now and for the rest of your merry gaming days, and so you don’t have to rely on someone else or a tool.

Speaking of tools, a site called PCPartPicker is handy for checking basic compatibility of the parts you’re thinking of buying, but keep in mind it doesn’t check absolutely everything such as certain spacing/size issues among other things, meaning it is possible to encounter an issue if you don’t do some manual compatibility checks yourself.

But yeah, in many cases (pun intended) you could be just fine relying solely on their compatibility checks. If you want to be extra cautious to avoid compatibility issues, any experienced builder will tell you the same thing: never just rely on a tool and do your own checks to be on the safe side. Even if using a tool like PCPartPicker, if you’re new to hardware and building a gaming PC it’s always best to learn how to do compatibility checks between all of your parts yourself. It’s not hard, and you’ll be a smarter, more informed builder now and for your future builds/upgrades (once you build your first PC, you’ll never want to buy a prebuilt again).

See Also: How Accurate is PCPartPicker for Compatibility Checks?

See our individual hardware guides to learn what you need to know about choosing parts that are compatible. For example, our guide to choosing the right motherboard explains how to choose a compatible CPU and RAM for your motherboard.

Buying PC Parts Online vs Offline

These days, Ecommerce (AKA buying online) has well and truly become the norm in most industries. Going into a physical store to buy something is nice for some people who still want to speak to someone face to face, and while nobody on Earth has the Jedi-level persuasion skills capable of convincing Grandma to start buying her socks online, for most people buying online is a no-brainer for the amazing convenience.

But it’s not just the convenience; if you want the best price on most consumer products, buying online is the best way to go 9 times out of 10 as online stores typically don’t have the overheads of brick and mortar stores, and can therefore afford to offer the most competitive price. With PC hardware, in most cases (pun intended), it’s no different. However, if you’re lucky enough to have a good brick and mortar computer store near where you live such as good old Microcenter in the US, there’s no harm seeing what they can offer (just give them a call).

But in most situations, buying from a trusted, reliable, well-oiled major online store like Amazon will get you the best price possible.

Navigating Customer & Professional Reviews

When researching a particular product, reading both professional and customer reviews can come in real handy to learn more about the product and someones experiences with it if you want to dive deeper into whether a particular model is worth the money or not. Whilst still helpful, be wary when researching customer reviews and ratings (ie amateur reviews) as they can be misleading in some cases because people who have a bad experience often feel inclined to leave negative reviews, whereas those who are on their merry way with a successful component, happy as Larry Page, tend to not leave their thoughts in a positive review.

That sometimes skews the perception of certain products, where you might see many 1-2 star reviews from those who have received faulty or broken parts, and you start to think the product is a piece of junk when the reality could be it’s just fine and those unlucky customers who got a dud/lemon are the exception and not the norm. Don’t get me wrong though, certain products are definitely more prone to fault and DOA (dead on arrival) issues, so if you see a lot of bad ratings it potentially is a bad buy, but don’t take things at face value too quickly in this industry.

If you want to research reviews, lean more towards trusted, credible sources such as top hardware sites like TechSpot, TomsHardware, AnandTech just to name a few. However, customer reviews from sites like Amazon and PCPartPicker can still be very helpful so long as you put your thinking cap on whilst reading, don’t get too caught up in any one person’s opinion as it can be tough discerning between who actually knows what they’re talking about (and giving an accurate representation of a product), and who might just be speaking random, inaccurate nonsense just because they had a bad experience.

It should go without saying, but always base your purchase decisions off multiple sources and not just from that one guy who said “Product worked (for me). Therefore, must be greatest, most amazing product in galaxy. If you don’t buy this, you’re a lower lifeform. 5 stars”. By the same token, don’t necessarily lose all hope in a product after one gal rages “Product didn’t work (for me). Worst product on planet. Obviously made by Jawas in back of Sandcrawler. Nobody on Earth should buy, ever. Boycott company or you’re a bad person”.

Should You Buy All Parts at the Same Time?

You most definitely can slowly piece together a build part by part over time, but if you’re a beginner you’re probably best off buying all the core components of your new system at (or around) the same time. Why? A couple reasons:

1. Some parts will have a limited time frame in which you can return them for a replacement in the odd case that they are defective. If you buy one part at a time, you can’t know for sure if a certain part is working perfectly before you have all of your parts together. So if you get unlucky and receive a faulty part, and you find this out a few months or even later when you finally get around to building your PC, you may not be able to return or swap it.

2. Another reason to favor buying all the PC parts for your build around the same time is that as times goes on new parts will obviously come out, and it’s possible that if you then buy a newer part in future to use with the older parts that you purchased previously, you might encounter compatibility issues. This is both quite uncommon, nad avoidable if you know what you’re doing, but it has happened before to beginners so it’s worth mentioning. An example would be buying a motherboard now, then waiting a few months to buy a new CPU and failing to realize that it’s not compatible with your older motherboard.

When Building a PC What Should You Buy First?

If you are slowly piecing together your build one part at a time, perhaps because you don’t have enough money to buy all your parts in one go, you may wonder which component/s you should buy first. It’s a good question, but there’s no hard or fast rule and will depend on various factors. But a good starting point is to base your build around your CPU and graphics card, and then go from there, because these are of course the most important parts. But you could also choose/buy your case first, and then go from there. It really is down to personal preference.

Cutting Costs to Build a Cheaper PC

If you’re on a tight budget or just looking to assemble the most cost-effective rig that you possibly can (no matter what price point), there’s a host of various things you can do. If that sounds like you, don’t miss our complete guide on this which covers everything from the glaringly obvious ways to save money on a build down to the less obvious ninja hacks and tricks. We told you were you in good hands here at BGC and we weren’t kidding around, so enjoy and hope it helps:

17 Tips and Tricks to Save Money on Your PC Build

Step 5: Assembling Your Gaming Computer

So you’ve planned a well thought-out, fully-compatible list of good-quality, reliable parts to get the performance you want in the games and/or applications you’ll use. You’ve also ordered them all and are ready for the moment of truth to finally construct your epic new battlestation of gaming glory. Fear not, as the installation process really isn’t difficult if you have all the steps laid out for you in an easy to follow manner. Speaking of which, you didn’t think we’d leave you hanging on that now did ya?

Our comprehensive yet easy to follow guide to building a PC was carefully-crafted with complete beginners in mind, and includes all the important little details and detailed explanations you need to get through your first custom gaming computer build with ease:

How to Assemble a PC from Scratch (Step by Step for Beginners)

Our gaming PC build tutorial covers installing all your parts in detail (minus the jargon)

Once a Builder, Always a Builder

That wraps our introduction to planning and building a gaming computer for beginners, and we hope this roadmap helps you on your way to a smooth, hassle-free first gaming PC build. When you’ve finished building your first custom PC, it’s going to be hard ever going back to buying a prebuilt system ever again. You’ve seen behind the curtain, beyond the wall, through the matrix, and [insert witty pun here] – there’s no going back now! Good luck, gamer.

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Application

Gaming Software for Windows 10

By admin April 17, 2024

The best free software for your gaming PC

Gaming Software for Windows 10, Looking for essential free apps for your new gaming PC? You’ve come to the right place. Whether you’ve just bought yourself a gaming PC or built one from scratch, that humming mass of silicon and plastic is in need of superior software to take it to said limits. Lucky for you, even if you’ve just blown all your cash on your rig, there are a few such apps out there that won’t cost you a dime.

Don’t let your shiny new PC sitting in pride of place in your office wait to be pushed to its limits until you refill your bank balance. There are quite a few essential free apps for your new gaming PC that you can download now, at no cost to you, as long as you know where to look.

Our carefully collated collection of complimentary curatives should start you off on the right foot, just in time for PC Gaming Week 2024. These 10 essential free apps for your new gaming PC will help turn your burgeoning beast into a towering powerhouse, enabling you to track frame rates, voice chat with ease, and stream like a seasoned pro.

Gaming Software for Windows 10

Gaming Software for Windows 10.

1. Steam

We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.

Valve’s essential PC gaming platform and marketplace

2. LogMeIn Hamachi

Enjoy multiplayer games over a secure virtual network, completely free

If you want to organize secure meetings or record multiple contributors to a podcast or game session, you need to be able to rely on a strong and robust VPN (virtual private network).

As you might have guessed since it’s included in this list LogMeIn Hamachi is totally free to use, but don’t let the absence of a price tag scare you off – free most definitely does not equal ‘cheap’.

Hamachi enables you to establish an airtight network between multiple computers and do everything from sharing files to playing private games, using a super–secure P2P protocol to ensure it can smoothly access servers, firewalls and routers. It boasts one of the simplest interfaces we’ve ever used in the world of VPNs, so if you’re relatively new to the concept, Hamachi won’t make you feel a total noob.

3. Razer Cortex: Game Booster

Optimize your PC’s settings, no matter what gaming platform you’re using

Razer, as a long established maker of PC gaming peripherals, also makes some very powerful free software to optimize your machine. Of course, there are areas of the suite that will lead you to some of Razer’s premium apps, but there’s still a lot of gratis gold to be mined from Razer Cortex: Game Booster.

It’s been designed to work with every kind of PC, so whether you’re rocking a basic build or a souped–up monster of a rig, Game Booster has something to offer your machine. Whether you’re using Steam, Origin or any other platform to launch your games, Game Booster will start trying to enhance your settings to improve your experience automatically.

It’s a really clever bit of free software for your gaming PC, and it’s ideal if you’re looking for a little extra improvement without much effort. It’s also great if you want to make an older PC work a little harder.

4. TeamSpeak

The perfect voice chat application for gamers, with optional encryption

Gaming can be a great source of escapism, but few things compare to joining up with your friends online for a good chat over your headset. Whether you want to link up on World of Warcraft or simply chew the fat while everyone is playing their own thing, a great a VoIP (voice over internet protocol) app is essential.

There are a lot of options out there when it comes to voice chat, but our favorite VoIP app is TeamSpeak. You can connect to your friends with ease, and its suite of options is seriously impressive, enabling you to tune sound levels, employ echo reduction and even use encryption.

TeamSpeak is free for everyday non-commercial PC use, though you’ll have to open your wallet to rent a server or use the mobile app.

• Download TeamSpeak

The best free overclocking tool to wring extra performance from your GPU

MSI originally wrote Afterburner to overclock its own range of graphics cards, but the software has since been opened up to enable Nvidia and AMD card owners to push their hardware to the limit. If you have even a passing interest in making your new gaming PC’s graphics card earn its price tag, free optimization software MSI Afterburner is essential.

Think of MSI Afterburner as the way to unlock the inner potential of your GPU – the software opens up the voltage settings of your chosen bit of hardware and enables you to improve its overall performance.

Video memory and clock speed are the two areas MSI Afterburner shines the most when it comes to overclocking your machine. Be warned, though – mucking about with this settings can seriously overheat your rig, so make sure your cooling unit is set to full blast before you start cooking your GPU.

6. OBS Studio

High-end recording and streaming software for YouTube, Twitch and more

You’ve got your new PC, a stable internet connection and an unhealthy obsession with gaming. There’s only one way this is going to go: streaming.

There are plenty of options out there when it comes to broadcasting your games, but far too many constrict you with unnecessary limitations. That’s where OBS Studio comes in – a brilliantly customizable piece of freeware that enables you to stream to your own server or a variety of popular portals (including Twitch, DailyMotion and more).

Setting up OBS Studio is really easy too, so if you’re relatively new to the streaming scene you won’t get lost amid all those options. Should you want to get a little more advanced, there’s the option to adjust your webcam footage and add images/graphics to add that extra level of professionalism.

OBS Studio also supports HD streaming, so if you’re into broadcasting with a higher level of quality you can maintain your pristine image online.

• OBS Studio review

• Download OBS Studio

7. f.lux

A free app that adjusts your display automatically to protect your eyes

Away from your smartphone, gaming sessions usually mean long stretches in front of your display, straining those peepers of yours in the quest for trophies and achievements. It’s a fine old life, but it’s not going to do your eyes any good in the long run. One potential solution is a piece of software specifically designed to make your monitor that bit less damaging over long periods.

One such option is f.lux, and it’s especially useful if you like getting in your gaming hours later at night with the lights down low. This free Windows app works by dynamically adjusting the colour temperature of your display depending on the time of day and the light sources in the place you have your new gaming PC PC set up. It will help reduce eye strain and potentially improve sleep patterns when gaming later in the evening. It’s also pretty tiny, and won’t gobble up system resources better used by your favorite games.

• Download f.lux

8. CPU-Z

Get detailed info about your PC’s performance and identify ways to boost it

Much like MSI Afterburner and f.lux, CPU–Z is all about fine–tuning your beloved PC gaming machine into a well–oiled, well, machine.

It’s certainly not an attractive program, but it’s the kind of back end kit you should really try if you want to get your PC in the best possible condition (especially if you’re trying to break into the eSports scene or you’re building a career in streaming).

CPU–Z enables you to review all kinds of detailed information about various areas of your PC in a fairly straightforward format. It’s certainly not for the faint hearted, but it’s definitely worth spending some time with if maximizing PC performance is your bag. You can see what’s going on in real time, and save reports at any time in TXT or HTML format.

• Download CPU-Z

9. Piriform CCleaner

Clean out junk files to free up space, and suspend resource-hungry programs

Whether you realize it or not, your gaming PC or laptop is full of files and various bits of digital detritus you simply don’t need. All those extra bits and bobs take up valuable space, and that means said PC is going to run slower and slower as time goes by. Not the kind of situation you want with a gaming–dedicated rig. The solution: a proper cleaning utility like Piriform CCleaner.

It can delete temporary files and broken Windows registry entries automatically, and identify software your system doesn’t need. There is a caveat, though: CCleaner is very powerful, so make sure you check its settings before turning it loose on your machine to avoid accidentally deleting anything you’d rather hang onto (saved passwords in your web browser, for example). Still, CCleaner is an excellent free app for your new gaming PC.

10. Iolo System Mechanic

Analyze and optimize your PC for a noticeable performance boost

Another great option for cleaning up and optimizing your Windows PC is Iolo System Mechanic. There isn’t much benefit in running both, but this would be our preference if you’re not too confident tinkering with software settings yourself and would prefer a wizard-based program to make the decisions for you.

You’ll need to invest in the premium version of System Mechanic if you want extra tools like real-time optimization, but for clearing out the cruft from your system without the worry that you might accidentally delete something important, the free edition is hard to beat.

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20+ Must-Have Software For Windows 10-11

By admin April 8, 2024

20+ Must-Have Software For Windows 10–11, If you are a computer-savvy person, know about the must-have software for Windows 10 you should use in 2024 to make the most out of your brand new PC and laptop. Microsoft’s beloved operating system – Windows 10 – comes with an array of most up-to-date features and functionality to give you a better and personalized computing experience. From work to gaming, we rely on a bunch of Windows 10 apps to cater to all our computer needs.

In spite of that, every now and then you may find yourself on the lookout for some additional apps for Windows 10 depending upon your requirements.

To solve this problem once and for all, you should start loading your system with all the essential and useful Windows 10 programs that would create a great impact on your work and play.

Keeping all this in mind, below we have mentioned some of the essential apps for Windows 10 that you need to make a note of ASAP. Move down the list and download the must have software for Windows 10, 11, or older version devices.

What Are the Must-Have Software For Windows 10, 11 In 2024?

Here we present you our curated list of must-have apps for Windows 10 and 11 that everyone should install on their PC right away. Let’s check out the best PC programs for Windows 10.

1. Win Riser- The Best PC Optimizer and Booster

Let us introduce you to Win Riser. It is a program you will find extremely useful to speed up your computer and optimize its performance. Win Riser is among the top most-used Windows PC software for its brilliant PC cleaning and optimization capabilities. It is well-known for its deep scan and removal of accumulated junk, invalid and faulty Registry remover, integrated driver updater, and the following delightful features.

Key features of Win Riser

• Tracks and removes malware with a single click

• Deeply scans your PC for driver updates, junk files, or problems impacting its performance

• Creates a backup of existing drivers and allows their easy restoration whenever you want

• Creation of a system restore point, allowing you to restore your system if anything goes wrong

• Boasts an integrated tool to manage your device’s startup items

• You can customize the paths, apps, locations, etc., for scanning

• Allows you to ignore the registry items or drivers you do not wish to scan

• You can schedule the computer scans

2. Driver Update Software

“A must have program for Windows 10 to update outdated drivers”

A driver or a device driver is a computer program (also known as cluster of files) that allows one or more hardware devices such as speaker, printer, graphic card, etc. to build connectivity and communicate with the computer’s operating system.

Without the correct drivers, the operating system would not be able to know what kind of a device is attached to the computer and how to operate or control its functions.

Therefore, it is extremely important to keep your Windows drivers up-to-date always for a smooth and healthy functioning of hardware components.

Using corrupt or out-of-date system drivers, you may face various compatibility or driver-related issues such as no sound, blue screen of death, shuttering or crashing problems, Wi-Fi connectivity issues, or some of the devices like printer may completely stop working.

The safest and easiest way to prevent such device conflicts is to use the best free driver updater software for your Windows 10 PC. Moreover, the driver updater is also an important software for Laptop Windows 10, 11, or older versions.

It is a powerful and extremely user-friendly utility that effortlessly auto-scans your entire PC and helps users install the latest, manufacturer-recommended drivers in just a blink of an eye.

Taking all the essential features of an ideal driver update into consideration, we suggest using Bit Driver Updater that can not only takes care of all driver-related issues but also maximizes the performance and processing speed of your computer. The best software for Windows 10, 11, 8 or 7 updates drivers on your system with minimal effort.

The best thing about this product is that you don’t need to shell out a fortune for it, it’s FREE!

3. Duplicate Photo Finder – Free Up Disk Space

“A must-have program for Windows 10 to clean duplicate photos”

With the rise of widespread adoption of smartphone technology, taking selfies and pictures of everything that catches our attention has become more than just a trend.

However, these identical-looking selfies and duplicate photos tend to get piled up over time, consumes up to gigabytes of disk space, and makes it extremely difficult to manage your digital collection of albums. What if you find out basic software for Windows 10 or other versions that can clear up all the clutter and duplicate data from your device automatically?

To keep your photo gallery and system optimized, all you need is a dedicated duplicate photo cleaner software.

Since Windows 10 PC doesn’t come with an in-built duplicate photo remover tool, it is important to add this utility to your list of must-have apps for Windows 10.

Quick Photo Finder is one of those nifty, renowned software available in the marketplace that can make your job much easier.

It effortlessly finds and removes the multiple copies of duplicate ones, plus also helps you recover a significant amount of lost storage space that you forgot you ever had, all in just a matter of seconds!

4. VPN (Virtual Private Network)

“A must-have software for Windows 10 to keep online identity secure”

Next on our list of essential software for PC is NordVPN. Depending on the country you reside in, there is a chance you might have to put up with geo-restricted content or your government blocking certain websites.

What if the list contains your favorite social media platforms or movie streaming sites?

So, have you ever wondered that your IP address, browsing activity, location, and online identity could be at risk? Well, cybercriminals and spies around the world can see everything you do online such as the websites you’ve searched for, the pictures you’re posting, the movies you’ve been watching, and lots more.

Therefore, it is important to use a good VPN service to hide your IP address and encrypt sensitive data to keep it secure from prying eyes.

The best thing about VPN is that it not only provides a safe passage for your internet traffic but also lets you bypass the censorship to access blocked websites from anywhere in the world along with superfast streaming and unlimited bandwidth.

Having trouble shortlisting the ideal service provider, see the list of Best Free VPN for Windows 10.

5. Cleaner Software

“A must-have software for Windows 10 to unleash its maximum performance”

Cleaner Software is another must have programs for Windows 10. You don’t even want to know the amount of junk your computer can store up and how it can make your system lag behind in its functioning. All those files, caches, and digital debris that you most definitely don’t need.

To avoid that, you need an effective cleaner software. To save you from the hassle of finding one, we have below mentioned a couple of best Windows 10 software which are a must-have Windows applications for cleaning your PC and laptop efficiently.

IObit Advanced SystemCare

When the talk is about the best cleaning apps that you must have on Windows, we cannot skip IObit Advanced SystemCare. The best Windows software is a powerful and easy-to-use software has many interesting features, such as more than 30 troubleshooters ( for example, AI Mode, firewall protection, anti-tracking, and large file cleaner) to clean, protect, and speed up your computer.

You can make a click on the link below to download this cleaner-cum-booster to get the ultimate PC performance.

CleanMyPC

CleanMyPC is a powerful tune-up utility tool developed by MacPaw Inc. to help you get a safer and cleaner PC. With the help of this tool, you can effortlessly scan every nook and cranny of your computer to delete megatons of junk files and boost the speed and overall performance of your PC.

CCleaner

This powerful cleaning utility from Piriform is one of the best PC software on the face of the earth. It automatically deletes broken Windows registry entries and the temporary files. It also detects and identifies all the software that your system doesn’t require.

Bid those extra bits and bobs goodbye, and work with a fast functioning computer.

6. File & Photo Recovery Software

“An essential app for Windows 10 to recover lost or deleted data”

It happens a lot of times that we delete some important files obliviously and then regret this action for quite a long time.

But we might just have something that would ensure that this doesn’t happen again.

Whenever you delete a file, even from the Recycle Bin, the file isn’t actually wiped off the face of the earth. Its sector is still on the hard drive, and you can use that to recover your file (Yay!).

Now, let’s take a look at some of the file/ data recovery software & programs that you must have in Windows 10.

Stellar Data Recovery

The next on our list of PC software list for most essential apps os Stellar Data Recovery. It is one of the most capable and popular software used by Windows users to recover lost or deleted data. With the help of the free version of this program, you can easily retrieve up to 1 GB of lost or deleted files from Windows PC, laptop, USB stick, hard drive, etc.

Recuva

Image source: Cloudwards

Recuva, a file recovery tool, assists the user to recover and restore her/his deleted files in the system.

After loading the software, the user just needs to choose which file she/he wishes to recover and from which location. Once the search is configured, the software will start a scan process and find the files matching the entered criterion. The user can, subsequently then, select the desired files to be recovered. There is one another file recovery software named EaseUS which also works fine.

7. Utility Software

“Must-have Windows app for managing and improving the performance”

Another one on the list of best programs for Windows 10 is a Utility software. It is a one-stop solution for maintaining your PC. The software offers many tools which can help you in managing, optimizing, and analyzing the performance of the PC. The list of tools includes a disk defragmenter, backup utilities, disk cleaners, disk compression, network utilities, virus scanner, and many others.

By reviewing Utility software we have shortlisted the best must-have software for Windows 10 and an older version which you can install for maintaining your PC.

Revo Uninstaller Pro

Revo Uninstaller is a great software that can help you in various aspects of protecting and maintaining your PC. The best part about this software is that it can be used on mobile devices as well. It moreover offers some of the best tools like Windows app remover, force uninstaller, installation monitor, advanced scanning for residuals, logs database, and many others. We would recommend you to try this software for better performance and improve the life of the PC. All these features make Revo Uninstaller as best software for personal computer to improve the performance of your device.

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Best File Copy Utility Softwares for Windows 2024

By admin April 8, 2024

Best File Copy Utility Softwares for Windows 2024, Cut, copy, paste. Sounds familiar? Millions of us, transfer and copy files almost on a daily basis. Let us find out thus, some of the best file transfer software and file copy software for Windows.

If you notice, there might be typical days when we have spent not just one but a few hours in transferring files and copying files. But, let’s say a typical file is quite large, then what happens? Of course, it takes a longer time for transfer. Several developers have come up with different data copy software applications that help you avoid the errors coming up during the transfer or copy of large files/folders from one system to another in Windows.

What Are the Best File Copy Utility Software for Windows?

Let’s look at the detailed features of each of these best file transfer tools below:

1. File Fisher

This is one of the most portable file copy software that can be used for copying and transferring the files from one system to another. This is also one of the fastest file copying apps available in the market.

The best part of using this app is that you don’t have to download the app at all; instead you have to just drag it to your desktop and then simply run it in your system. In addition to it, you can also keep the app in your pen drive or your flash drive for smooth installation into your PC anytime. The interface is highly easy-to-use and quite interactive.

Since it supports a huge number of file formats, you can copy any file into your PC comfortably with the help of this app. Newcomers and experienced PC users can all use it easily and effectively.

Features of File Fisher

• File Fisher offers a simple yet unique user interface

• This file copy tool does not require any installation as it is a portable tool

• You can easily transfer files from one format to another easily

• The software is compatible with all the Windows OS even with the latest ones too

What Are the Best File Copy Utility Software for Windows?

Let’s look at the detailed features of each of these best file transfer tools below:

1. File Fisher

Since it supports a huge number of file formats, you can copy any file into your PC comfortably with the help of this app. Newcomers and experienced PC users can all use it easily and effectively.

Features of File Fisher

• File Fisher offers a simple yet unique user interface

• This file copy tool does not require any installation as it is a portable tool

• You can easily transfer files from one format to another easily

• The software is compatible with all the Windows OS even with the latest ones too

2. TeraCopy

Use TeraCopy as data copy software to copy files comfortably within folders or into Windows desktop. TeraCopy provides a robust and interactive interface. This app is extremely flexible and is one of the most fast running apps. TeraCopy is available freely as well as in a paid version. The free version of TeraCopy also has a lot of features that help successful copying of files from one system to another.

With TeraCopy you can comfortably evade those files that seem to be troublesome and still continue copying rather than stop for some corrupted files. If you’re wondering how would be the transfer over a network then let me tell you with the use of TeraCopy it is a lot easier and faster. You can drag and drop files that can prevent moving folders accidentally.

Features of TeraCopy

• It is one of the simplest file copy utilities

• The software automatically skips corrupted or problematic files

• It even repairs the corrupt file and recovers data

• You can easily drag and drop files from one drive to another

Reasons to use TeraCopy

• Skips corrupted files: With TeraCopy at your disposal, corrupted files cannot block the file transfer as the application skips them instead of halting the entire process.

• Fast and easy to use: The options like drag and drop, high customization, etc. make this app fast and friendly enough for both beginners and advanced users.

• Useful shell integration: TeraCopy boasts individual plugins, i.e., shell integration support to save your time and effort.

3. Fast Copy

The interface of Fast Copy is not one of the most efficient ones but the app is definitely one of the most efficient fast copy software for Windows. Fast Copy is freely available as a program and helps you move the files rapidly from one network to another.

To ensure enjoying the best speed, it employs multiple threads to read, write, verify and also uses the overlapped and direct I/O systems.

Due to the interface not everyone can use the app comfortably especially if you’re a novice, however, for an experienced PC user; it is indeed a wonderful copy software for Windows.

Features of Fast Copy

• It is one of the fastest file copying tools

• The software supports UNICODE and over MAX_PATH file pathnames

• It supports UNIX wildcard

• It uses multi-threads to bring out the best speed of devices

Reasons to use Fast Copy

• NSA File Wiping Support: One of the best things about Fast Copy is that it supports data sanitization methods approved by the National Security Agency (NSA) to keep your confidential information safe.

• Resource-friendly: This application does not bug your computer with unnecessary pressure on the resources as it is lightweight.

• Command-line: For the techies out there, it has command line and UI wrapper support.

4. ExtremeCopy

ExtremeCopy can help copy files from one system to another quickly. It can enhance the speed of the machine based on the physical structure of the machine. There are a lot of user-friendly features in the app. However, it would not support copying files from the network.

The program is capable of integrating with the Windows Explorer making it easier to use. Extreme Copy is not a software that supports file syncing but is one of the best file transfer software available.

Features of ExtremeCopy

• The software offers the freedom to pause and skip any file easily

• You can easily resume the interrupted process

• It comes with a built-in error management feature

• It is one of the best file transfer software for PC

Reasons to use ExtremeCopy

• Fast copying: It lets you copy files much faster (20% to 120% speedier) than the native Windows copy tool.

• Optimizations: ExtremeCopy can be a perfect choice for you, as it optimizes the copying speed and its resource consumption automatically.

• Efficient free version: We agree that the free version of this software has no high-end features. But, it does not reduce its functionality, and you get the same fast copying speed for free.

5. Unstoppable Copier

This app has been in use for a very long time. This file copy software functions at an enormous speed. Unstoppable Copier is a recovery solution that copies and transfers all your files from the directory.

The best part of it is that they also try to repair the faulty and damaged files. It works on any of the Windows operating systems except Windows 10. This is one of the best interactive Windows copy software that one can obtain.

Features of Unstoppable Copier

• The software lets you copy, recover and repair files easily

• It offers great speed transfer

• Being one of the oldest software it offers the best tools and speed

• It is compatible with most of the Windows OS

Reasons to use Unstoppable Copier

• Command-line support: If you are a techie who is not a fan of those graphical interfaces, you’ll be glad to know that this application supports command-line UI.

• Backup tools: There are backup options available such as creating and saving transfer lists for future use.

• Blazing fast: Unstoppable Copier is among the most high-speed copying tools available currently to copy files.

6. GS RichCopy 360

With GS RichCopy 360 copying many files from one system/folder to another is swift and quite easy.

In fact, there is a backup software with GS RichCopy 360 for MS Windows operating systems. This backup software can allow you to synchronize through the servers, Windows OS and also through various networks. You can always know and see all the copied tasks through a special Wizard interface available only with this tool.

Features of GS RichCopy 360

• It can be considered as the fastest file transfer software for Windows 7,8 and 10

• To help you check all the tasks it offers WIzard Interface

• It can easily transfer data between network

• You can share files, directories, or even drives effortlessly

Reasons to use GS RichCopy 360

• Byte-level replication: One thing that you might find highly useful in this application (that many other similar programs lack) is its ability to replicate files at the byte level.

• Supports long path names: Some files have really long path names (over 260 characters long). But, you don’t have to worry, as this software supports them all.

• Simultaneous file copying: It does not take a long time to copy files using this software as it copies files (up to 255 threads) simultaneously.

7. Perigee Copy 1.7

You can use this tool to copy the files from one system to another in the shortest amount of time.

If there are many files to copy from one server to another, then you know very well how long it takes to copy, if you use the default Windows copy function. Therefore, the Perigee Copy tool can offer a quicker solution.

It is an easy-to-use software with an interactive interface that is effective in so many ways. However, the drawback with Perigee is its incompatibility with Windows OS versions 8 and 10.

Features of Perigee Copy 1.7

• It offers a very easy to adapt interface which can be used by any user

• Apart from just copying files, you can delete them too

• You get many features like archive bit, overwrite, and others.

• It works perfectly for the Windows 7 and older versions

Reasons to use Perigee Copy 1.7

• Shell integration: With this software’s integration with the Windows menu, you can perform copy-paste tasks much more easily.

• Security: You get a confirmation message whenever you perform any action to inform you about the files that are going to be affected to take care of their security.

• Feature-rich: If you are looking for software that is a complete package with all essential features, like overwrite, etc., this program can be your best choice.

8. Copy Handler

For those users who are always transferring multiple files from one system to the other, Copy Handler can help immensely in transferring bulk files in less time.

It is a free to use app. Copy Handler operates at a faster rate, and aids in pausing, resuming, restarting and cancelling the different functionalities. It supports many languages at a time. You can transfer files between drives and computers in quite a less amount of time.

Drag and drop functions are also supported by the copy handler. To note, Copy Handler would resume the paused and unfinished copying of all files with a system restart. It is an extremely easy-to-use app and its effectiveness and flexibility is worth applauding.

Features of Copy Handler

• You can easily copy files in bulk using this best file copy software

• Easy drag and drop functionality for copying and moving files

• Even when the PC shutdown it pauses the process and can be easily resumed

• The software offers detailed statistics to help you understand better

Reasons to use Copy Handler

• Open source: One of the best things that make Copy Handler a perfect pick is that you can examine its code if the techie in you wants to do it.

• Complete control: You get full control over the entire copy/paste process and its speed.

• Queue support: Copy Handler has a unique feature that allows you to carry out multiple tasks at once in a specific order.

9. Robocopy

Robo Copy is not an app in actuality but rather a command-line utility to copy and transfer files from one server to another many times. Robo Copy replaces XCopy and has more offerings as a data copy software. If you have to run this utility, your command would be called Robo Copy.

It can work on Windows Vista and also on Windows 8. Robo Copy does not work on all PC’s as it does not have an interactive GUI.

Features of Robocopy

• Robocopy requires no additional tool for copying or transferring files

• Even when the network is interrupted the software performs great. It resumes when the connection is better

• Using the software you can skip files that are already copied

• You can easily transfer files and data from one server to another

Reasons to use Robocopy

• Error-free copying: Robocopy is a Windows command that does not make any error even when copying paths with over 259 to 32,000 characters.

• /MT feature: With this command, you can perform file copying in multithreaded mode.

• Wide availability: Being portable and compatible with almost all Windows versions, this tool is widely available.

10. EaseUS Disk Copy

Are you planning to copy an entire drive?

You can call it more like a drive cleaner since it copies a drive to another drive. EaseUS disk is quite fast as a data copy software and the best versions for file copy are available for Windows 7, 8 and 10.

It is an extremely precise app and can clone the entire disk with perfect precision and accuracy.

Features of EaseUS Disk Copy

• The software is compatible with all major Windows OS

• It is a fast software for copying or cloning the whole disk to a new location

• You can easily create a bootable disk with this software

• The software is accurate and performs copying with 100% accuracy

Reasons to use EaseUS Disk Copy

• Ease of use: To copy/paste files with this software, all you need to do is follow a simple three-step process.

• One-click migration: Using this software, you can migrate your data, apps, and complete OS to a new hard drive safely with just a click.

• Easy replacement: You can get EaseUS Disk Copy to use SSD instead of an HDD effortlessly.

11. UltraCopier

UltraCopier is an open source file copy software used to copy files. UltraCopier is very simple to use and has a multitude of premium features at your disposal for free. No matter how less versed you’re with a computer, you can always use this particular software without any difficulty.

There are some features like start, stop, resume that you can navigate through comfortably. You can perform a multitude of copy tasks from one server to another. It is also compatible with Linux and macOS.

Features of UltraCopier

• The software offers advanced features like speed limitations, pause, resume and stop

• You can easily perform multi-copy tasks

• It is compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux

• UltraCopier has a built-in error management feature

Reasons to use UltraCopier

• Useful features: It offers some of the high-end features, such as speed controls and functionality to search in the copy lists.

• Customizations: If you are looking for a straightforward and customizable (with the plugin support) file copy utility, UltraCopier can be the best choice.

• Multilingual: UltraCopier boasts support for multiple languages and a portable form of the software.

12. MiniCopier

MiniCopier, a super-fast utility to copy files very quickly. It is a completely automatic utility for copying files. All you need to get started is – just drag and drop the files that you want to copy, in the red basket presented in the software’s window. And, then it will begin the rest procedure automatically. It has the standard buttons as well such as Pause and Start.

Though the user interface of this application is very simple, at the same time, it is very effective and productive too. Apart from this, it also keeps records of those transfers as well which gets dismissed. Overall, it is the best way to copy or paste files and folders in no time.

Features of MiniCopier

• You can queue all the transfers easily on this software

• The transfer speed can be set easily with MiniCopier

• You can pause and resume the process anytime

• Using the software you can easily change the name of the file

Reasons to use MiniCopier

• Queue support: The software supports queuing, where you can add a transfer to the queue when current transfers are ongoing.

• Greater control: With options like limiting the copy and transfer speed of files, MiniCopier lets you be in charge of the process.

• Behavior setting: MiniCopier allows you to specify a default target file behavior.

13. FF Copy

The next best file copy utility software for Windows in our list is FF Copy. It is a file transfer utility for Windows users. With this, you just only need to copy or paste the file to a transfer queue and then it will be copied in the sequence. Comparatively, it is way faster than other such kinds of utilities. FF Copy lets you transfer multiple files or folders simultaneously.

Just in case, if the source becomes unavailable then FF Copy automatically re-generates the source and starts transferring the files after a while. It allocates the disk space and eliminates disk fragmentation. FF Copy is highly capable of boosting the speed of the entire process. Undoubtedly, if you are searching for the best way to copy files pretty instantly then you should rely on this amazing utility.

Features of FF Copy

• The software offers a feature to add files in queue for ease

• You can easily pause and resume the process as per requirements

• During file transfer issue you can easily skip to the next file transfer

• It offers a detailed description of the process

Reasons to use FF Copy

• Portability: FF Copy is a portable software, hence no installation is required to run it.

• System friendly: This software does not burden your system unnecessarily, as its memory and CPU utilization remains low.

• Fast speed: With features such as queue support, this software lets you copy/transfer multiple files really quickly.

14. KillCopy

KillCopy is an excellent and fastest file-transferring software available for Windows PC. This utility tool makes the overall process of file copying much easier with a drag-and-drop feature. In order to ensure an error-free file-transferring process, KillCopy utilizes a high-speed verification mode.

Features of KillCopy

• It comes with a KillDelete option to erase the source file, once the copying process completes.

• Has a feature called Auto Resume functionality that automatically starts the file transfer process when the process abruptly stops.

• It’s Turbo Mode enhances the copying speed of large files.

Reasons to Use:

• Parallel: This mode boosts copy speed when copying files between different physical devices.

• Speed Limit: This feature lets you limit the maximum copy transfer speed in Kbps units.

• Turbo Mode: This mode can improve the overall speed of the file copying process, especially when copying large files between local disks.

15. NiceCopier

The next on our list of the best utilities to copy files and folders with NiceCopier. It is a quick and easy-to-use software that allows you to copy and paste data hassle-freely.

Moreover, it boasts many outstanding features, such as pausing and resuming the copy/paste process, an option to change the settings like running at startup, and much more.

Furthermore, below are its other features, pros, cons, and reasons to use it.

Features of NiceCopier

• A single window displays all the running tasks

• Calculates the best file copying speed

• Task queue creation to improve software performance

• Allows you to perform check-sum-based verification of files after copying them

Reasons to use

• Portable: One of the top reasons you should use NiceCopier is its portability. You can carry it in a flash drive and use it without downloading anything on the computer.

• Lightweight: NiceCopier does not pressurize your system resources and consumes very little space on the device.

16. Total Commander

Allow us to conclude this entire list of the best file copy utility software with Total Commander. Total Commander is not merely a copy utility but a smart file manager. With the help of the tool, you can run two windows side by side and use them to copy and move the data within the system and its storage. Let’s know more about this tool from the information below.

Features of Total Commander

• Custom columns

• Quick View panel

• Tabbed interface

• Built-in FTP client

• Thumbnails view

Reasons to use

• Thumbnail: One of the main reasons why you should download the Total Commander tool is that the tool offers a preview of the files in the form of thumbnails for ease of decision-making.

• Supports Multiple Archives: Total Commander supports various extensions of Archive files like CAB, ACE, TAR, GZ, RAR, UC2, ZIP, 7ZIP, etc.

17. Copywhiz

Copywhiz is another best file copy utility software that you can try. Just like any other software on this list, Copywhiz is a very advanced and a great utility to enjoy copying data smartly.

Features of Copywhiz

• Easy copying

• Handles multiple files

• Integration is possible

• Smart UI

Reasons to use

• Recent Files: The software allows you to copy and manage recently modified or added files with ease.

• Personalized: Copywhiz allows you to look for files and copy them according to the name or extension of the file.

18. SuperCopier

The next name on this list of the best file copy utility software for Windows 10/11 is SuperCopier. This is a simple tool that makes it feasible for you to copy data from one location to the other.

Features of Copywhiz

• Simplest file copying

• Smart UI

• Personalizable interface

Reasons to use

• Effective Performance: The software allows you to move or copy multiple files at once. Moreover, you also get lightning-fast copying speed with the tool.

• Smart UI: The user interface of SuperCopier is quite simple yet smart. Even a beginner can get the most out of the tool with ease.

19. OrganizerMaX

Here’s another addition to this list of the best file copy utility software for Windows. OrganizerMaX is multiple levels better than the traditional copy utility of Windows. Using this tool, you can add tags, copy and paste, search for files, and do a lot more with ease.

Features of OrganizerMaX

• Simple interface

• Modifiable

Reasons to use

• Reliability: The software offers some of the most advanced features for a copy utility.

• Fast: OrganizerMaX is quite fast as compared to any other tool offered in this list.

Final Words

These are some of the best file copy utility software available for Windows in 2024. Most apps are quite efficient in handling the speed with which the files are transferred from one server to the other or from one network to the other.

Bulk file transfers and copying is possible with some of these apps as well. Some can also help you transfer an entire folder from one server to another. With some apps you can avail many premium features whereas with other open source platforms you can enjoy splendid features free of cost.

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Games

The Best FPS games on PC 2024

By admin April 2, 2024

The Best FPS games on PC 2024, FPS games are a classic PC gaming staple, and whether you’ve been playing them since the 90s or started your journey more recently with the boom in battle royales, there are plenty to choose from when it comes to the all-time greats. To help you narrow down what to play next, we’ve created this list of the best FPS games to play right now, from single-player epics to team-based shooters you can play with mates. Heck, some don’t even necessarily have guns in them at all, and you may find the odd boomerang or bow in here too.

The 25 best FPS games on PC

You can find our list of the 25 best FPS games on PC below, which you can either browse in one big gulp, or jump straight to individual entries using the links below. And if your favourite FPS isn’t here, let us know in the comments below. It was number 26, honest.

25. Severed Steel

Kicking off with a newbie to the list, Severed Steel is all about sick stunts. Wall runs, somersaults, dolphin dives, slick slides: if you want it, Severed Steel has it. As you run around each mission while pulling off stunts and completing objectives, you shoot voxel dudes with their voxel guns that you pick up on the go. As you shoot your guns and arm cannon, bodies and walls will explode in a glorious shower of destruction. Oh yeah, you have an arm cannon! It does big damage, and Severed Steel’s destructible voxel arenas (am I saying “voxel” enough?) become your playground when you start blasting through walls.

Severed Steel can feel disorienting at first, but it’s rather forgiving. You won’t take damage as long as you simply keep moving, so it’s all about chaining stunts together to close the distance between enemies and take them down before they land a single shot. It’s the complete opposite of Superhot’s near-constant slow-mo, but it makes you feel equally badass.

24. Resident Evil Village

Resident Evil Village continues the journey of Ethan Winters and his unlucky hands. As he explores the titular village, you’ll fight lycans, zombies, and more with all sorts of guns. If, like me, you were also petrified by Resident Evil 7 and couldn’t muster the courage to defeat the Baker family, then rest assured that Village is a far less terrifying experience. The first run will still feel tense, and there are some horrifying moments, but overall the atmosphere isn’t as unsettling. A big reason why? Village leans into the chaotic action of Resident Evil 4 and 5, handing you plenty of powerful guns that you can use to pop heads with ease.

Village thrives on that action, and while the first half is a slower, more horror-focused experience, the latter half gives that up for an action game that fires on all cylinders. There are big boss fights, even bigger explosions, and hordes of enemies to slaughter as you see fit. If you’re hankering for more, the Mercenaries mode offers action-packed time trials that rank your combat abilities, while playing the campaign with cheats is an absolute treat. Trust us when we say infinite ammo grenade launchers are the best.

23. Boomerang X

It’s safe to say that I was blown away by Boomerang X. As I said in my Boomerang X preview, it’s the DOOM game I’ve always wanted and it may have ruined FPS games for me. Gun are overrated – boomerangs are the new hotness.

Boy does the boomerang feel good to fling, and you’ll quickly get access to a handful of superpowers that’ll only make the wooden spinner even more fun to use. Like the ability to teleport to it mid-air, or the ability to slow-time to a crawl as you line up that perfect shot. Combat is remarkably fluid and there’s barely any downtime. It’s fast, frenetic, and a whole heap of cool. String together a flawless succession of moves, and trust me, the feeling is unrivalled.

22. Titanfall 2

Titanfall 2 could have been the best singleplayer FPS of 2016, if it hadn’t been for the new Doom. Nonetheless, if you want straight-up action thrills with a whole lot of flash, some particularly glorious movement and impressively stressful mech-based boss fights, this is going to make you very happy. And hey, there’s a robust soldiers vs giant robo-suits multiplayer mode in there too, building on what the multiplayer-only Titanfall 1 already established.

That is, assuming you can find opponents. Titanfall 2 suffered from something of a failure to launch, having resolutely lost the marketing wars of late 2016. It may stay alive over time thanks to word of mouth, but even if it doesn’t, definitely check it out for that singleplayer campaign. It is, however, on the brief side, so we strongly recommend playing on Hard difficulty – as well as making it last longer, it makes the mech fights particularly feel that much more satisfying once you finally claim a steel scalp.

21. Halo Infinite

Halo Infinite landed out of nowhere with a surprise multiplayer launch in late 2021, but it disappeared equally as fast. That’s a shame, because it’s one of the best free to play games on PC right now. Sure, the progression system wasn’t great at launch and improvements were slow, but that core loop of running and gunning around arenas is Halo at its finest. With the campaign dropping a few months after (paid or on Game Pass), Halo Infinite quickly became a full Halo experience – and it might just be the best one in decades.

If you’re after something a bit bigger than Halo’s multiplayer arena shooter, then check out the sprawling open world campaign. Sure, an open world Halo might not have been on your wishlist, but careening around huge spaces in a Warthog while gunning down grunts and hoovering up collectibles is like a bigger and better version of Combat Evolved’s infamous Silent Cartographer level. If you simply miss the Halo of old, then don’t panic. Halo Infinite still has plenty of linear levels sprinkled throughout that feel like traditional Halo.

20. Deathloop

In Deathloop, a puzzling plot sends you back through a repeating timeloop while you figure out how to assassinate eight visionaries. They’re a bunch of nasties on an island, and if you manage to kill all eight in one night, you can free yourself from the timeloop. The day is split into four sections – morning, noon, afternoon, and evening – and you can only enter one of four areas per chunk. The visionaries move between the four areas throughout the day, so the puzzle is finding a routine that lets you kill all eight. That usually involves finding the moments when they pair off, so that you can execute a sneaky double assassination.

Only, Deathloop isn’t actually that sneaky. Unlike its predecessors in Arkane’s Dishonored franchise, Deathloop seems to focus heavily on action, relishing in the FPS joys of headshotting a bunch of enemies. Time is a weird soup, after all, and death doesn’t really mean anything when you’re trapped in a loop. So, kill, die, and kill some more. It’s a liberating cycle that allows you to really go wild and experiment with playstyles, as you don’t need to worry about future repercussions of your actions if you never make it past today.

In that chaotic action, you’ll meet Julianna. She’s another assassin, but her target is you. Julianna can be controlled by an AI, but the real fun begins when another player takes on the role and invades your world. When Julianna invades, you become trapped in your current area until either one of you dies, or you manage to hack an antenna that allows you to escape. Invasions often result in a tense game of cat and mouse, followed by a huge firefight in which both players use every weapon at their disposal. It’s an explosive end to most missions that delivers frenetic action and memorable multiplayer moments.

19. Rainbow Six Siege

Rainbow Six Siege does what Battlefield games have thus far only pretended to do: provide a multiplayer world which is destructible at a granular level. Instead of buildings collapsing when scripted levers are pulled, in Siege almost every door, window, wall, ceiling, and floor can have a hole poked in it via gunshot, grenades, battering rams and breaching charges.

It feels like technical wizardry and the consequences ripple throughout the entire experience, creating tension from the ability to be attacked from any angle, encouraging teamwork through asymmetric missions which force one team to defend themselves against the other’s attempt to breach their compound, and forcing traditional Rainbow Six tactical awareness without a planning phase by requiring you to hold a perfect mental map of the building around you at all times.

It’s equally impressive for being a team-based multiplayer shooter that feels fresh, offering something different from the Counter-Strikes and Call of Dutys while staying true to the spirit of the Rainbow Six series.

18. Warhammer: Vermintide 2

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 is all about killing rat people. Slicing them with swords, whacking them with maces, chopping through them with an axe – anything goes when you’re fighting the vermin hordes. Most importantly, though, it always involves bloody carnage that feels oh-so-good. If you’re in the mood for some simple, yet chaotic melee action, then Vermintide 2 is the game for you. And, for those of you screaming about how it isn’t an FPS, every class has some kind of ranged option to try. The bow is a personal favourite of mine, but there are also spells and guns that you can use to blow the rat people to pieces.

Cutting through rat folk might seem easy at first, but when elite enemies start picking your allies off, isolating them from the group for an easy kill, you’ll realise that teamplay is the key to survival. By forcing you to stick together, Vermintide 2 perfectly captures the feeling of being part of a fantasy party. Even if you’re unfamiliar with Warhammer lore, fans of Lord of the Rings or Dungeons & Dragons should find a lot to love here. Sure, Warhammer is a little more grimdark than Middle Earth or Faerun, but when you’re cleaving through rats with an axe while your mate unleashes a volley of arrows on an incoming horde, your fantasy-adoring spark is sure to ignite.

17. Turbo Overkill

Turbo Overkill is a retro-inspired FPS following in the footsteps of Quake and DOOM, albeit with a techno twist. You’ll charge around arenas slaughtering all sorts of enemies, but along the way you find augments that you can install to gain new powers. That could be a subtle boost, such as extra armor on getting a chainsaw kill, or something a little more chaotic, such as massive explosions whenever you hit the ground. Traversing the map to find those upgrades is a treat, too, as Turbo Overkill constantly propels you forward with incredible speed through its neon-filled streets.

We gave Turbo Overkill a bestest best when it launched in early access in late 2021. But, to reiterate one of the most salient points: you have a chainsaw for a leg. Fun times follow, as you can use that chainsaw leg to skid and slide around while tearing through baddies. They explode in violent bursts of blood, but there’s no time to stop and look at your victims, as Turbo Overkill is all about delivering that huge damage with speed and style.

16. Neon White

Carrying on from Turbo Overkill, here’s another game that’s about running fast. Neon White is a speedrunning FPS in which you use cards to either kill nasty demons, or launch yourself towards the goal in hopes of shaving off half a second.

It’s that second part that’s really fun, as each of Neon White’s levels quickly become complex puzzles to solve. It’s easy to get stuck in a loop of just running the same route over and over again, sure, but taking the time to step back and wander around the level to see every avenue and secret passage will give you insight into other potential paths. And then you run it and complete the mission an entire second faster. A second! Few things feel better than that.

15. Hunt: Showdown

Hunt: Showdown‘s this mixture of PVP and PVP, underscored by serious tension. You take on the role of hunters with the express aim of assassinating an AI “boss” tucked away somewhere on the map. Trouble is, there are other squads also attempting to do the same thing. Die and you lose your equipment forever. Survive, and you’ll not only keep your stuff, but get some of the spoils too. That’s the tension for you – every single foray into the dark could spell disaster.

The audio design’s also sterling in Hunt: Showdown too, with gunshots that ring out from miles away, and the clang of chains could help you locate an enemy that’s stalking you nearby. Even swapping your weapon or reloading in quiet moments might give away your position. It’s an FPS that’s unlike anything out right now.

14. Call Of Duty: Warzone 2

Warzone 2 may not be battle royale king like its predecessor once was, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t any good. Far from it! There’s a brand new gunsmith which lets you tinker with weapons in even greater detail, which makes for even spicier metas. The new map Al Mazrah is – in my opinion – better than Verdansk, in the way it facilitates fights and removes a lot of boring grey in favour of some actual colour.

Warzone 2 isn’t perfect by any means, but what it offers is a free-to-play, triple A shooter with COD’s brilliantly smooth FPSing. It’s also worth noting that the game often receives free updates to keep things fresh, so it’s unlikely you’ll get bored quickly.

13. Team Fortress 2

That Team Fortress 2 is a sequel and a remake of a sober-as-a-nun multiplayer mod seems almost irrelevant now. But it’s part of what makes the game so important. Valve took years and years to settle upon a model for what has become one of the firmly-entrenched favourites of the PC gaming fraternity, and that they did so allowed it to prove that a multiplayer first-person shooter can be funny, even witty, and that constant experimentation and progression can keep a game alive and evolving long after it should have ground to a halt.

Team Fortress 2 felt like an experiment, and it still feels like an experiment, and that experiment was a success. A move to free-to-play and a hat-centric economy has kept TF2 thriving. The cost of this is that something of the original spirit was perhaps lost in this translation to gimmee, gimmee, gimmee, but we can forgive that.

12. Devil Daggers

2016 was in many ways a vintage year for first-person shooters, and the reason for that was because they understood their past. DOOM, obviously; Overwatch returned to Team Fortress rather than COD; Titanfall 2 was the big sci-fi silliness of the noughties again and Devil Daggers… well, Devil Daggers is from an alternate timeline where Quake changed everything and was never forgotten in favour of military men and careful plots.

A beautiful hellscape of big square pixels against a midnight backdrop, monstrous things looming at you from the darkness, and the dance, the endless dance. A pure test of everything that first-person shooters ever taught us. Reflex, awareness, movement, practice, true grit and no surrender. It is about your own time and only about your own time, because that is all that matters – everything else that shooters ever added is mere fluff.

11. DOOM Eternal

DOOM 2016 was a bloody and brilliant reintroduction to the demon-slaying franchise, but DOOM Eternal takes it to new heights. It doesn’t waste any time making you wait around, opting instead to hand you a shotgun and force you out into the demon crowds. Within moments, you’re platforming around chaotic arenas with an upgraded shotgun, machine gun, and a chainsaw doing what that DOOM guy does best. Namely, rippin’ and tearin’.

Sure, you might have done that just a few years ago in its predecessor, but Eternal pushes you to get faster and more ferocious. It has some new platforming elements that not everyone will appreciate, such as wall climbing and swinging from poles, but when it comes to tearing through arenas filled with hulking demons, DOOM Eternal does it best.

10. Left 4 Dead 2

Zombies: in 2008 they were still very exciting. They still are today when blessed with Valve’s magic touch, which in a few, brief, cyclic co-op skits adds more life, wit and hinted-at history to its characters and its world than most of the 8 hour+ singleplayer campaigns in this list stuck together. Including Left 4 Dead 2 in the list was complicated, however, given most of what makes it to strong was work done by the previous year’s Left 4 Dead.

It’s a sequel not that different to the original, and not a game that I felt, on its first outing, really changed anything. However, it’s clear with time that Left 4 Dead 2 was a major under-the-hood upgrade, both closer to what was intended for the zombie-blasting horror game, and also a bigger move in the direction of pure co-op, which wasn’t something that even seemed possible before the let’s-all-die-together first Left 4 Dead came along.

Another strong reason to choose this over L4D1 (which still has a more memorable cast of Survivors, to my mind) is how much it’s been expanded by mods. You can stick Deadpool in there, expand it from a 4-player game to a 16-player one, turn everyone into a dinosaur or recreate pretty much the entirety of L4D1 within it. Get thee to the Steam workshop and indulge.

9. SUPERHOT / SUPERHOT VR (2016)

There ain’t nothin’ new under the sun – a miserable claim that SUPERHOT Team disproved twice in one year. First there was SUPERHOT itself, a shooter in which time only moves when you move (or shoot) (or throw something) (or punch). Then there was SUPERHOT VR, which singlehandedly redeemed the whole concept of virtual reality and easily made it into our pick of the best VR games.

SUPERHOT is both maximum-adrenaline thrills and highly tactical – transforming the first-person shooter from a game about precision aiming and reflexive movement into one in which every twitch counted. The world is super-slow-mo until you do anything, which grants you the time to plan the move but leaves you subject to a devious puzzlebox construction in which one action leaves you vulnerable to some other threat. It is sublime, and it is impossibly cool.

Particularly in VR, where you are making those movements yourself – the ducking, the punching, the throwing, the shooting. The Matrix fantasy without any of the bilge – just superhot action. A glorious, glorious reinvention of first-person violence.

8. Deep Rock Galactic

Deep Rock Galactic combines drunk dwarves with some complex tunnel systems and lots of nasty subterranean bugs. The result is often sheer chaos, as four players charge into the depths to mine whatever they need for the big corporation in the sky. You pick a role, each of which has a unique weapon and traversal mechanic, and zip through the caves at incredible pace, collecting ores as you head towards a main objective.

The chaos comes when you’re trying to wrap your head around these main objectives, connecting winding pipelines or powering huge machines, while fending off those blasted bugs that just won’t stop. As you go, hordes of creepy critters will charge in your direction. A rational team might fight them together, deploying traps and getting into a strong defensive formation, but I find the fun in panickedly running away and screaming. But, whether you play Deep Rock Galactic as a true co-op shooter or as a wild romp in the caverns, it’s sure to be a good time.

7. GTFO

Hurtling down into the dark depths of GTFO‘s Rundowns (levels) is a terrifying start. What’s even more terrifying, though, is when teammates don’t work together. We tend to quickly designate a leader when I play with friends, but someone always wanders off a little too far or fails to follow orders. Lots of screaming, shooting, and swearing ensues. It’s pure chaos with a horror-filled flair, and it’s a great time online. It demands teamwork and precision if you want to survive, but that fills every encounter with a level of tension that few other FPS games reach.

That tension is only heightened by the enemy variety crawling around every level. You never know what might lie behind each door, but spotting a Scout’s tendril as you enter a new area could spell the end of a run. The thrill of needing to adapt to whatever you find, and often sneak past enemies to preserve resources, makes GTFO the best co-op survival horror on PC.

6. Half-Life: Alyx

Alright, yes, you’ll need a VR headset for Half Life: Alyx, alongside a powerful enough rig to run it nicely. But, if you’ve got both of these things, then you’re in for a treat.

Graham said in his Half-Life: Alyx review that this is “the Half-Life game you’ve been waiting for, even if it’s not the one you were expecting”. And this is because the game’s been designed with VR in mind. You’re now able to reach out and touch City 17, and the motion control shooting “feels better than Half-Life’s combat ever has”.

And Half-Life: Alyx embraces horror too, with moments where you’re cowering in corners or chucking objects to distract enormous monsters. You’re even able to cover your mouth with your actual hand, and have it replicated in-game. It’s very much been lifted by VR, and not harmed by it.

5. Half-Life 2

Of course. So much is in Half-Life 2, from an unprecedented level of architectural design to facial animation which rendered anything else obsolete overnight, to a physics system which transformed shooter environments from scenery into interactive resource, to some of gaming’s most striking baddies in the Striders and a huge step forwards in making AI companions believable and likeable.

It’s also a long, changeable journey through a beautifully, bleakly fleshed-out world, and although of course you are on the hero’s journey, it’s careful to keep you feeling like a bit player in a wider conflict. That this, plus the cliffhanger ending of Episode 2, left so much more to be told leaves PC gaming in a perpetual state of frustration that the series has, publicly at least, ground to a halt. I don’t think all of it is as striking as it once was – particularly, much of the man-shooting feels routine and slightly weightless now – but Half-Life 2 gave us more than any other first-person shooter before, and maybe even since.

4. Dusk

DUSK is a retro-styled FPS that’s retro, but doesn’t get stuck trying to mimic retro. It has the gut-spilling impact of the genre, yet mixes it with modern twists: like picking up items to create impromptu climable routes to hidden areas, or just slinging saw blades and soap at foes.

There’s a lot of coloured-key collecting to open doors in DUSK, but it’s spread across loads of complex, batshit maps that only get better as you barrel through through its campaign. There is, of course, a metal soundtrack paired with a level of spookiness designed to make you both enjoy the riff and jump out of your chair within five seconds of one another. Please don’t skip out on this.

3. Valorant

There’s no elegant way to put this: Valorant is Counter: Strike but with wizards and ninjas. One team wants to plant a bomb, the other needs to stop this from happening. How? By inching around corners, having decent aim, and making strong callouts in the team chat. Patience is rewarded here, as is coordinating with your team to control each map.

If Valorant sounds like Counter: Strike, that’s because the gunplay is pretty similar. However, where it differs is in ability usage. You can choose from a roster of Agents who each have special powers that’ll let them do stuff like teleport across short gaps, flashbang around corners, or heal allies. If this sounds aggressively unbalanced, don’t worry, almost all of these abilities feel like useful tools, as opposed to pain-bringers.

I’d say I prefer Valorant to Counter: Strike nowadays, purely because it feels more current. There’s regular updates and some invaluable tools – like an aim training map – are baked into the game, as opposed to being buried away in a “community creations” section of a store.

2. Apex Legends

Oh my, Apex, what excellent bumslides you have. What solid shootsing you offer. What a delightful bunch of canyons and swamps you’ve plonked us in. We should have known better than to doubt the makers of Titanfall 2’s robot antics. Since its launch Apelegs has added plenty of new characters, new maps, and even a new Arenas mode.

It’s a solid murder hike every time you dive into Apex Legends, and there really is nothing that matches its pace in the Battle Royale realm.

1. Destiny 2

Destiny 2 is an incredibly fluid MMO FPS with some of the best shooting around, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Whether you want to team up with others to topple big bosses, turn on your fellow players and slug them with a shotgun in Crucible’s PvP modes, or play through epic stories that span the solar system, Destiny 2 has something for everyone.

Whichever activity you prefer, you can easily sink hundreds, if not thousands, of hours into it, and the brilliant gunplay makes it a constant joy. Not only is the best FPS around, I’ll wager that Destiny 2 is also the best superhero game right now. There’s something I love about swinging electro swords and firing off a golden gun imbued with solar energy to kill massive raid bosses in a bid to save the solar system.

Destiny 2 has so much to love, but that doesn’t mean it’s without fault. The onboarding experience is incredibly awkward for newbies, with the removal of the original Red War campaign and subesquent Forsaken expansion making the story completly incomprehensible without watching oodles of lore videos. That proves a chore for even the most dedicated of Guardians, and it’s a roadblock that’s almost guaranteed to alienate new players who try to hop in for a new expansion.

However, it’s a testament to Destiny 2’s strengths that we still recommend it so highly. It’s a masterful FPS with so much fun to be had, regardless of whether you prefer PvE or PvP. And, with so much content available for free, there’s no really no reason not to give it a go. So, off you pop, go decrypt some engrams, get some snazzy armor, and start shooting aliens. Eyes up. Guardian.

Source : Rock Paper Shotgun

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Android

Best Android Launchers in 2024

By admin April 1, 2024

Best Android Launchers in 2024, Android launchers are one of the most useful apps for customization. It can entirely change the look of your home screen and how it behaves. It can even change things like icons and themes and offer a variety of other personalization features for your device. Most legacy Android launchers have the same stock Android theme, which may seem a bit too cluttered. But now, many newer launchers are going for a minimal aesthetic. Here are the best Android launchers available right now.

We’d also like to give an honorable mention to Flauncher (Google Play). It officially launched in 2022 and is easily one of the best Android TV launchers on Google Play.

AIO Launcher

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($0.99 – $9.99 per item)

AIO Launcher does it differently than many Android launcher apps. It does away with the standard home screen in favor of an information-packed list of stuff. It shows things like your latest SMS and missed calls, your media player, your system info (RAM, battery, storage, etc.), and even stuff like news, Bitcoin price, Twitter, and more. The list is actually quite extensive.

The premium version also includes integration for Telegram and your regular widgets from other apps. Not everything has to look like stock Android, and AIO Launcher certainly shows that it can be done effectively. Luckily, most of the features are free, and the free version doesn’t seem to have ads.

http://andauth.co/gKjXPn

Launcher iOS 17

Price: Free

If you like the look and feel of the iOS UI, this app’s for you. This launcher gives your Android phone a look similar to iOS 17. This includes a lock screen, a control center, many animations, different wallpapers, and widgets. It has a ton of customization options. There are some features, like lock screens, notifications, a control center, and assistive touch, that you need to download separately. It does require some time to configure everything perfectly, but once everything is set up, Launcher iOS 17 makes your Android look a lot like iOS. There are a few bugs, but it works great for a free app.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.luutinhit.launcherios&gl=us

Best Android Launchers in 2024

Before Launcher

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($1.99 – $5.99 per item)

Before Launcher is one of the few minimal-style launchers on the list. This one claims to help reduce interactions with your phone by up to 40%. There is also a notification filter that reduces notifications by about 80%. Some other features include a clean, easy UI and the ability to pin important apps or hide unimportant apps. It’s a bit light on customizations, but that’s pretty typical for minimal launchers. You do get support for icon packs, though.

You get the vast majority of features in the free version, which also doesn’t contain advertisements. The developers also state that the app can’t capture any data and requires no permissions to run. That’s fairly standard for Android launchers on this list, but we thought you’d still like to know.

https://andauth.co/KYHSK5

Square Home

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($1.99 – $5.99 per item)

If you like the Windows UI, then you’re going to love this app. Square Home brings the old Metro UI of Windows Phone to your Android device. It has a user-friendly interface that is both simple and visually appealing. With features like vertical scrolling within a page and smooth horizontal transitions between pages, it faithfully replicates the metro-style UI. It’s a bit different from the default Android experience. It utilizes tiles to display your notifications, calls, SMS, e-mails, and more. Square Home also boasts a smart app drawer that intuitively organizes your apps, which it sorts by usage.

Additionally, it offers quick access to your contacts and tons of other customization options, making it a great launcher choice. The developers address user-submitted complaints and work on them to update the app frequently. You need to pay for some premium features like animated tiles, a media controller, infinite scrolling, 3D effects for horizontal scrolling, and others. There are monthly subscription plans of $1.99 and a lifetime subscription priced at $5.99 too.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ss.squarehome2&gl=us

Olauncher

Price: Free

Olauncher is a great choice for minimalist lovers. This launcher offers a clean, clutter-free experience with its extensive customization options. It’s also open source. The most basic features allow you to do everything, from resizing text to renaming apps and even controlling the visibility of the status bar. It has gestures, wallpapers, dark and light theme support, dual app support, work profile compatibility, automatic app launch, and more. The best part is that it’s completely free and has no ads.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.olauncher&gl=us

Lawnchair 2

Price: Free

Lawnchair Launcher is an excellent Android launcher for fans of minimalism. It’s an open-source project that mimics much of the look and feel of the Pixel Launcher. The app features adaptive icons, a fun icon pack, an “At a Glance” feature that uses notification dots for quick access, and a drawer category function to neatly organize your apps. You can also choose between a light and dark mode for your system. It integrates with Google Feed and Homefeeder to provide a comprehensive Android launcher experience. It’s also completely free. This app used to be one of the most popular launchers, but now it has many bad reviews because the developers have stopped updating the app.

http://andauth.co/iCaojv

Total Launcher

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($1.99 – $5.99 per item)

Total Launcher is an older launcher app. It offers a lot of customization options and is suited for both those who prefer a clutter-free experience and those who want tons of widgets. It has a simple UI, so it’s really easy to use and setup. It features various themes, wallpapers, icon packs, and much more.

Total Launcher is free to use, but you’ll need to pay for premium features like folder search and hidden apps. There are monthly subscriptions of $1.99 and a lifetime subscription of $5.99. It’s a worthwhile investment considering the rich customization and functionality it brings to your Android experience.

https://andauth.co/dOgy1y

Microsoft Launcher

Price: Free

Microsoft Launcher is one of the most popular launcher apps available on Android. The app features custom icon packs, daily Bing wallpapers, and a dark theme for low-light use. It simplifies phone transitions with Backup and Restore, enabling local or cloud backups. Intuitive gestures, like swiping and tapping, streamline navigation. Plus, it ensures accessibility with screen lock and recent apps view gestures. It also has integration with many Microsoft services, including their calendar, email, to-do list app, and direct integration with Microsoft PCs.

http://andauth.co/rTRNtX

Niagara Launcher

Price: Free/ In-app Purchases ($0.99 – $29.99 per item)

Niagara Launcher offers a user-friendly, ergonomic experience for Android users. It has an adaptive list layout that shows you essential information like messages and calendar events, and it even has support for media players. It has unique wave alphabet navigation with embedded notifications. The app is ad-free, lightweight, and embraces Material You Theming for customization. The developers are still frequently updating the app.

https://andauth.co/2V0ciL

Nova Launcher

Price: Free

It doesn’t get better than Nova Launcher. Nova Launcher has been around for quite some time, but it is still one of the best Android launcher app options available. It has a laundry list of customization features that include gesture support, the ability to customize the look and feel of the app, icon pack support, themes, and much, much more. The app also gets updated at a breakneck pace, which means bugs generally get squished quickly and new features are added consistently. It also comes with the ability to backup and restore your home screen layouts for when you eventually switch to a new phone. It’s the one we’d recommend you try first.

http://andauth.co/RtzXmc

Wide Launcher

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($2.99 – $49.99 per item)

Wide Launcher is a newer app that offers a unique Android experience with a home screen that’s three times wider than standard launchers. It allows you to place items anywhere and provides a wide range of palettes and mini-apps for enhanced smartphone use. You can personalize your home screen with a variety of selected wallpapers, stickers, app icon styles, and picture frames. The launcher features intelligent organization and smart widgets called applets. There’s a fun feature that allows you to have virtual pets running on your screen called Hellopets. It’s also ad-free.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.shouter.widelauncher&gl=us

Rootless Launcher

Price: Free

Rootless Launcher is a decent, stock Android-style launcher from 2018. It’s actually a fairly basic experience. You get a stock Android look and feel with some additional customization elements to complete the look. Some of the features include icon pack support, adaptive icon pack support, an icon shape selector, themes based on your wallpaper, and the ability to change the location of the search bar. You can also get Google Feed working on this launcher, but like most, it requires an extra plug-in download and installation. The website with the instructions for that is in the Google Play description.

http://andauth.co/HHDUTB

Smart Launcher 6

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($0.99 – $26.99 per item)

Smart Launcher is another famous and quite old launcher app for Android. It has features like automatic app sorting and an ambient theme that dynamically adapts to your wallpaper. There’s an option to hide the navigation bar, and you can even protect sensitive apps with a PIN. Its UI is designed for one-handed use, and essential elements are conveniently placed at the bottom of the screen.

The launcher provides responsive built-in widgets and extensive customization options, allowing you to personalize themes and fonts. It also has a smart search bar, which simplifies tasks like finding contacts or searching the web. The problem with this launcher is that it feels like some of the features are forced; there’s no option to disable them.

http://andauth.co/wDhePH

Lynx Launcher

Price: Free /In-app purchases ($3.99 per item)

Lynx Launcher is a new launcher app that offers a clean and distraction-free Android experience. The app supports theming, allowing you to change icons and even the entire theme, with the option to toggle dark mode based on your preferences. It has tons of customization features that allow you to tweak everything from the dock’s position to text size and notification dots. It also lets you hide non-removable apps. There are gestures that give you quick access to apps, contacts, and settings. A favorites screen shows your most-used apps and contacts for easy access.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.n277.lynxlauncher&gl=us

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