Precious few shopping days remain before Christmas. Good thing there are plenty of sweet deals on PC hardware.
- Need a new GPU for all the games you've acquired from the Steam Holiday Sale? Newegg has a hot-clocked Gigabyte Radeon R9 290X selling for just $279.99 after a $30 mail-in rebate. The card's 1040MHz core clock isn't a huge step up from the stock frequency, but the triple-fan cooler looks like a substantial upgrade. Unfortunately, there are lots of negative user reviews complaining about glitches and BSOD errors. Buyer beware.
- There are loads of good SSDs deals, so I'll just list them off. Other World Computing has Crucial's M500 960GB for only $339, which is the lowest price I see for a terabyte-class drive. (Thanks HardForum.) If you don't need quite that much storage, TigerDirect has PNY's Optima 480GB for $169.99 after a $20 mail-in rebate and Crucial's MX100 512GB for $189.99 without any strings attached. Meanwhile, Newegg is selling Intel's 730 Series 480GB for $199.99. At the cheaper end of the spectrum, Newegg has OCZ's ARC 100 240GB for $79.99 after a $20 mail-in rebate and Crucial's M550 256GB for $109.99 with promo code EMCWHWA28.
- Asus' VN248H-P IPS monitor is on sale at Newegg for $134.99 after a $20 mail-in rebate. This 23.8" display has a 1080p resolution, narrow bezels, and dual HDMI inputs. The panel specs are decent, and the user reviews are generally positive. Looks like a nice option for an inexpensive triple-screen setup.
- XFX's TS Series 550W PSU is on sale at Newegg for only $25.99 after promo code EMCWHWA34 and a $25 mail-in rebate. This unit lacks modular cables, but it has three 8-pin PCIe power connectors, 80 Plus Bronze certification, and five-year warranty coverage. The Newegg user reviews are mostly positive, as well.
- RAM prices remain high, but Newegg has a nice deal on G.Skill's Ripjaws X Series kits. 2 x 4GB DDR3-1600 combos are down to $60.99, and upgrading to DDR3-2400 costs only $4 more. The DDR3-1600 modules run at 1.5V and have relatively tight 9-9-9-24 timings, while the faster sticks call for 1.65V and looser 11-13-13-31 timings.
Those are the deals that jump out at me this morning. I probably missed a few, so feel free to add any that you spot in the comments below.