2 days ago
The Omen Max 45L is the star of HP's latest PC gaming update
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Prior to IFA in early September, HP is looking to get ahead of its rivals with a substantial update to its PC gaming portfolio headlined by the new Omen Max 45L desktop alongside a full slate of peripherals.
While the Omen Max 45L (pricing still TBA) features a similar design to the existing Omen 35L, HP's latest flagship desktop should bring even more beastly performance without sacrificing on cooling or noise levels. The key to this is a new case featuring what the company is calling the industry's first patented Cryo Chamber, which puts the PC's liquid-cooled radiator in a separate compartment to prevent hot air from spreading and impacting the rest of the system's thermals. With this arrangement, HP says it was able to reduce temperatures by up to 7.5 degrees Celsius at full load. Meanwhile, thanks to smaller touches like raised feet, vented PCI slots and open vents on the bottom of the case, HP was able to improve GPU temps by another two degrees C.
But to me, the best thing about the Omen Max 45L is that HP says it's using industry-standard components across the board instead of proprietary parts and fittings like we sometimes see in pre-built systems from major vendors. This means that down the line, if you want to replace or upgrade a specific component, you'll be able to do just that instead of potentially needing to replace the entire computer. And if that isn't enough, the Omen comes with a CPU cooler that has a small built-in display that you can load up with practically any image or short video clip.