Every single day, the PC Gamer team's email inboxes are packed with new product announcements, many of which are ho hum. But sometimes, a product really catches the eye, and the latest Corsair One i500 small form factor PC is one such example. Looks are in the eye of the beholder, but I'll be damned if this is not one of the nicest looking PCs I've ever seen.
For those unfamiliar, the One-series is Corsair's line of mini-PCs. They standout thanks to their high-quality design and high-end components, though as expected, they come with a hefty price.
The latest iteration comes in two versions, one of which includes no less than a liquid-cooled Core i9 14900K, RTX 4090, 64GB of memory and a 2TB SSD. OK, it'll set you back a whopping $4,699, so if that turns you off, there's a slightly worldlier option with an RTX 4080 Super and 32GB of memory instead. That one will cost you 'only' $3,599.
But that case! It's so beautiful! You have a choice of light colored maple or dark colored walnut finishes. And they're made with real wood. The dark color in particular would look right at home on my desk. Not that I could afford one, and Corsair would laugh in my face if I asked to keep a review sample. I guess I'll have to admire the pictures. Or ask if Corsair would consider releasing the case as a standalone product.
We've reviewed several Corsair One PCs over the years going back to the original Corsair One in 2017, and more recently, the i300 iteration. Both versions really impressed us with their ability to cram flagship tier hardware into such a compact area, though the faster configurations are very expensive indeed.
As for the hardware crammed into the new i500i, I'm concerned at the effectiveness of the system's cooling when tasked with taming such powerful components. It'll either be on the noisy side, or hot, or both. You might want to consider applying Intel's baseline power profile to keep things under control.
The Corsair One i500 is available to buy directly from Corsair's online store. It's available for US, UK and most European based buyers, but Australians miss out for now.
