Last Updated on October 10, 2017
It’s time to review Xotic PC to see if their custom PCs are actually worth getting. Let’s look at the hardware piece by piece and see if the value is there.
Xotic also sells different peripherals to go with their PCs which sounds like a good idea right off the bat but maybe you’re able to get the same peripherals for a better price elsewhere…
With that, let’s get to the review.
Does A $1,000 Xotic PC Deliver?
For the first part of reviewing Xotic PC (xoticpc.com) I’d like to see if it’s worth spending $1,000 to get a PC configuration done.
I decided to look at the G4 Triton since it’s priced right at the $1,000 mark. Most people looking to have a high-end system will be looking to spend this much or a bit more to get the highest quality gaming experience possible.
After clicking the desktop it takes a while to get into the actual hardware behind it. Xotic focuses on hyping up the desktop a lot before check out which I suppose that’s what a sales page is meant to do. Oh well, might as well read up on what Xotic has to say about it.
The page explains how this PC is VR ready, is easily upgradeable and has awesome liquid cooling. Sounds like a good deal, right?
We can only know after taking a look at all of the hardware that’s really inside of it so let’s get down to it.
Here’s what you get inside the $1,000 G4 Triton:
Motherboard: MSI B350M Gaming Pro
Processor: AMD Ryzen 3 1200
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti 4GB
Memory: Kingston Fury 8GB (2x4GB) DDR4
Storage: 1TB Hard drive and 128GB M.2 solid state drive
Power Supply: EVGA 500W
OS: Windows 10
Wow…
These specs are not at all worth $1,000.
Reason is because you can literally do a build with similar specs for just a little over $500, completely built.
Where Is The Transparency?
Going through the process of buying the PC… I don’t feel any sense of transparency going on.
I figured maybe I could customize it a bit and see what else I can change around with it, see if making some changes would help with the pricing a bit or maybe the liquid cooling they talked about is top notch.
Turns out that the liquid cooling isn’t even included with the build – you have to pay for an expensive $530+ upgrade to have the liquid cooling that is pictured with the desktop on the sales page.
What’s also stated on the sales page is that the video card is “VR ready” and the PC is easily upgradeable. I can definitely see how the PC would be easily upgradeable, but that’s with any PC build really. Anyone can upgrade their PC with different parts.
But to state that the GTX 1050 Ti is a “VR ready” graphics card is kind of a joke.
Sure, I bet it could handle the lowest end games… But if you’re looking to play with 90+ FPS on bigger titles then you’re going to have a bad time.
The GTX 970 is roughly 70% more powerful than the GTX 1050 Ti and the 970 had some troubles with stuttering in VR.
I know this from trying to play with the Vive with the 970 as well as reading up on other people’s experiences. The 970 is stated as the minimum requirement for VR.
I just feel like Xotic is purposely knowing that their systems are overpriced or maybe they really don’t know what the power is actually like.
Do the math, Xotic is making roughly ~$400 profit off of this PC. That’s a ridiculous amount of profit, even with their warranty policy and employee payments being factored in.
Most pre-built PCs you find on other storefronts will make about $150-$250 profit from the build which, depending on the build, I can see where that is fair.
But for a build where the performance is exactly the same as what you’d get with a $500 build? You’ve got to be kidding…
That and at the end of customizing they have a spot where you can buy some games to go with the PC when it is delivered. The games they will sell with the PC is Battlefield 1 and Titanfall 2…
If you go on EA’s Origin store right now and look up both titles you’ll see that Battlefield 1 costs $40 and Titanfall 2 costs $20.
Xotic PC sells both of those games for $60 each…
I’m not a fan of how they are presenting this build… They show the liquid cooling inside where it says the desktop “starts at $999” but you have to upgrade to it and they are also trying to sell games for way more than what the official store sells them for.
I’ve never seen a custom PC website that costs so much while also selling accessories and games for so much more than what they’re worth… You can tell that this company is more so about the money rather than providing real value.
Alright, Can They Deliver On A $2,000 Build?
I don’t want to conclude my review saying they’re a complete rip-off without looking at the higher end as well. Maybe for some reason they have troubles with profits at the lower end so they have to be overpriced there.
There’s only one way to find out so let’s take a look at the GX13 Intruder – more specifically the one using an AMD Threadripper CPU.
It’s stated that it starts at $1,269 which includes the same exact specs as the $1,000 PC… A Ryzen 3 1200 CPU and a GTX 1050 Ti.
The differences there would be the bigger case, some more USB slots and it actually has liquid cooling included. Though it’s not the same liquid cooler shown on the page…
But let’s take a look at the Threadripper configuration to see what it’s like. Let’s see if it’s worth $2,229.
Here’s what you get inside the GX13 Intruder Threadripper:
Motherboard: MSI X399 Gaming Pro Carbon
Processor: Threadripper 1900x
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti 4GB (Really..?)
Memory: Kingston Fury 8GB (2x4GB) DDR4
Cooling: ICE 120
Storage: 1TB hard drive and 128GB M.2 solid state drive
Power Supply: EVGA 750W
OS: Windows 10
This is where I’m actually upset with what I see.
A custom PC that costs over $2,300 and it’s still using a video card that is more suited for a $500 build that’s meant for 1080p gaming?!
At this price point you should be able to game at 4K right out of the gate. Virtual reality gaming should run at a smooth 90+ frames per second at all times… This is one of the highest end price points for a PC yet a high end video card isn’t included.
Getting this build as is would result in you still not being able to game at 4K, I wouldn’t even want to try VR gaming with a GTX 1050 Ti since the experience wouldn’t be what it was made for anyway.
I’d also like to mention that this PC is marketed as a “gaming” PC yet they want to use the Threadripper as the CPU. Yes, the Threadripper is a great processor and it’d do fine in gaming but it’s not marketed from AMD as a gaming processor.
If you wanted a workstation PC then I could see why you’d use a GTX 1050 Ti along with the Threadripper since most rendering wouldn’t utilize the graphics card as much so you could save money there. If that’s your plan, please do a build of your own and save yourself a ton of money.
Seriously, I’ve looked over plenty of companies that provide pre-built PCs and I don’t think any of them are as much of a rip-off as Xotic PC is. I’ve always preached that, for the most part, you should never buy a pre-built gaming PC and these types of configurations proves my point.
Even looking at these configurations in a way where the video card is meant to be changed during the customization phase you’re still getting ripped off big time.
My Final Verdict
All in all, I’m not a fan of Xotic PC. Even with their 2 year warranty and the policy where you can send you PC in to get an upgrade whenever… The support the provide in general still doesn’t justify the crazy prices they are charging.
I like a company that is transparent, especially when it comes to a company that wants to sell gaming PCs. Going through these sales pages I simply felt like I wasn’t being told/shown exactly what I was getting into.
Another thing, I looked into the shipping costs and even with the $1,000 PC there was still a $70+ charge on shipping. I understand how heavier products take more money to be shipped but it’s just another expensive cost added onto everything else…
I highly suggest looking into doing a build of your own, take a look at a $500 build guide to start off and go from there. You’ll save yourself a lot more money and you’ll get the actual performance that you deserve for how much your spending.
This marks the end of the Xotic PC review, what do you think?
Do you think the builds are overpriced?
Or do you see the value in the support you get from the company?
Let me know in the comments below! 😀
Hey there! 👋 I’m Colton, founder of PC Builds On A Budget.
Whether you need help putting your PC together, finding a great pre-built rig, or want some help finding awesome peripherals – I’ve got you covered!
I share my experiences of anything and everything related to gaming PCs with you here. 👍
Xotic-PC is the kind of company that once they put their name on a product, they keep their customers’ happiness and satisfaction bundled with an unmatchable customer care experience. About two years ago, I accidentally found their advertisement on Instagram and decided that I no longer had the urge to build my own PCs. Buying parts from Newegg just seemed like too much of a hassle, so I went with Xotic. My new Avanger arrived beautifully packaged and fully functional, equipped with blinding LED lights and a fresh copy of Windows. I was impressed, to say the least. But about twenty months later, the motherboard crashed and the drive followed. Given that the PC was under constant pressure from running 24/7, I could not blame Xcotic-PC, not even could I blame myself for that matter, but my lack of time and effort to fix it, led me to the point where I decided to just place this responsibility in someone else’s hands, and trust me, even Geek Squad asked me if I wished to donate it. Then, just when I finally forced myself to take the matter into my own hands, I sent an email to the company requesting help with saving time on digging up the information for the new parts, when they just asked, “would like to ship it”. Zero obligations, 100% free. WOW, was I surprised not even two weeks later. And the best part is that the warranty wasn’t even included when I originally purchased my desktop, it was added on later as a “Limited Lifetime Service Policy” to every model ever purchased from the company that actually cares for what they sell to the masses, and if you value trust, I wouldn’t spend my dime elsewhere.
Love to hear stories like yours, Mike! Hopefully, in recent years, this is the new norm. It has always been about 50/50 – either folks haven’t had a great experience with their support or the opposite, like in your case, is what stands true.
Happy to hear that they were able to help you out, trying to figure out some of those problems with the board and other means can be pretty frustrating… A good reason to go with a company that has your back!
Thank you for sharing! ?
I do not know if you still look at this, but for whatever reason when I tried to search gaming laptops, the “cheapest” was from this company. I would like search for say 1070, 970, 2070, etc and even went to other build sites and just seemed this company offered the best value.
I am at 5 laptops now and each one had some kind of problem, the first 3 being just outside warranty. They never tried to work with me and try work out some kind of deal it was telling me too bad you have to cover full cost of repair. I shrugged it off thinking maybe that is normal for the industry. (every other type of industry i had problems like that, I was able find some kind of deal with them)
then comes my 4th, the boot SSD died around 1 year having the laptop. So I told them the problem and knew it was the SSD so could I ship the SSD? they said yes but I need cover shipping (this is bs, they should cover that cost for something being so newish, esp when it is a hard drive) I then asked can I get a small upgrade. It took them like a week to give me a quote only to see amazon list it for cheaper. I had a chat with dissatisfaction with taking to long for such a quote and trying work out something with me, and I need this laptop to be working order again. So I rejected the offer and just went with a replacement. I was out a laptop for nearly a month because they even refused m request for parallel shipping, they demanded to get the broken one first.
now my 5th…
get it first day sound is bad, complained a 1800 dollar laptop should sound better then it, after like a week or 2 of going back and forth of drivers, i concluded it is not worth my time to ship it back for a “review” that will prob find nothing anyways.
I just ended up buying a sound bar, cheaper (because I am not paying for shipping and insuring a 1800 laptop) and less headache and wait.
2 months later the secondary hard drive had problems
2 months after that the y key poped out
I had enough, if your reading this, I like you to encourage everyone with an issue to file a FTC report. I want action on this company. I am currently fighting them to get a full return for selling me a 5th lemon. I am filing complaints with the BBB, ftc and my CC, trying to find a way to get my money back for this 5th laptop.
(oh for the record, my first had issues with the wired Ethernet port, but I did not figure it out till after the warranty expired, I thought it was my isp. Who would of suspected a high end new laptop be the problem?!????)
I hear ya, Richard. It’s almost 50/50 that I hear about issues or praise with this company. Some say they have had great service while others cannot fathom how they are running their operations (sort of what you’ve experienced over and over again).
I’ve been away for quite some time but yes everyone, do take note of these other types of experiences as well and be mindful of what you’re trying to get and from who… Sorry to hear that you have had to go through this with them man, that blows.
I am now trying to write a review on the BBB site, they told me I cannot reference the 4th laptop (i went back and counted i think i got 4 from them not 5) regardless I started out in the review stating I cannot remark on the 4th laptop due to reasons ( was trying keep it very breif to uphold the BBB’s request for the review) then an attempt to save light, said my laptop was over 6 months old and nothing can be done (they only addressed the BBB report, something the BBB told me NOT TO DO!) so now i am trying to figure out how reply to that with me telling the BBB that was extremely offensive (at at the making of the reports to exotic, the laptop in question was 5 months old not “6+” god this company.
update:
https://gyazo.com/894f1a4acffc8cbaece14abfc5fed1e7
I took a picture since the BBB told me they will remove the comment since it did not address the 3 laptops in question. I wanted to point out here that xotic actually had a comment removed off the BBB site for trying to save face for making a comment they shouldn’t of been making.
another update. I do not know if my credit card will accept Xotic’s rebuttal or what is going to happen but as of right now, my credit card company has honored my complaint and currently has credited me the charge. We will have to see how this plays out after they try to rebuttal my credit card complaint.
I have gotten nowhere as of now trying to contact my state’s state Attorney and Nebraska Attorney General’s office (the BBB directed me there)
https://protectthegoodlife.nebraska.gov/file-consumer-complaint
maybe spread the word to people that have problems with this company to write up BBB complaints and inform people they can also contact Attorney General’s office. maybe if enough people complain something can be done to this company by law enforcement, no its not ok to sell lemons and not properly honor RMAs and try force people to pay for shipping on days old to 6 month old products.
In comparison, other companies offer a 1 year or more warranty for their computers… Granted, if you were out of your warranty then it is what it is in that sense (though I believe you, you have had COUNTLESS problems with multiple devices at this point…).
Thank you for making these comments and sharing your overall experience, others are definitely taking note and noticing these comments. As far as their laptops, it’s obvious to take note of these consistent issues… I’m sorry that you have had to go through this man… I hope that the credit for the charge stays intact for you.
update:
leadership team contacted me and after email exchange I am hanging on
” am working out a solution with the credit card company since they are involved now. It will take a bit of time. I am sure we can get it worked out.”
during this I told them even if they should get it reversed, the Attorney and Nebraska Attorney General’s office said they can step in, they actually called me since the last update, no word from my state though.
All they did was submit to my credit card their policy, despite me having a complaint on record that i complained about it on day 1, fully charged me back. The head rep for xotic did not even bother to tell me 4 days ago he was able put the charges back on my card for xotic. the physical letter was sent out on apr 30th, and I last got a email message from him 4 days ago. That is really scum. I hope I can win this though legal matters or something, the FTC said to submit something though the credit card company and that they do not address individualized reports.
it also said i could file a report to MY state attorney general, who did not contact me, but xotic’s attorney general did contact me. Now that the charge is reposed, they can do something… i hope anyway. I really hate how much power these corporations have and how much they get away with though bullying the individual. Action is only taken when mass number of people complain, not if they eat it and move on. I really wish more can be done.
I am writing as, what started out, a satisfied return customer to XOTICPC. Sadly, this is no longer the case. The company has slipped under its new management. The slips include but are not limited to quality control and customer service.
XOTICPC advertises a testing program for each computer which involves repetitive testing of each component under high stress. However, this testing somehow didn’t reveal a glitch involving the video card and missing software that I discovered upon my first use.
I spent the next seven weeks trying to work with the XOTICPC service department over emails and phone calls to troubleshoot this machine. BTW, XOTICPC also advertises email customer support 7 days a week. This is NOT true. When I sent an email even minutes after 5:30pm on a Friday, it would be sometime Monday before I would get a reply.
After the seven weeks, the XOTICPC service representative admitted that the machine needed to be sent back to their facility, I was then informed that I was responsible for the risk and cost of shipment. This was because XOTICPC managed to delay this action well outside the 15-day warranty window, per XOTICPC policy.
I brought this issue up to the current general manager, Seth Montecuollo, asking for exception. He wrote back, “These are terms that are upheld whether you are purchasing for the first time, or a return customer; whether you have reported a potential warranty issue on day two, or on day 45. The same terms would also apply if you were troubleshooting an issue at the end of your warranty”.
In other words, XOTICPC can and does control the customer’s ability to receive or lose warranty benefits by simply delaying the issue of a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA). In the case of Seth Montecuollo, it seems like a point of pride.
Seven weeks without coming to a conclusion on getting it sent to them and getting everything fixed up? That’s crazy!
You’d think they’d purposely help out if it took that long to keep you as a happy customer… It’s unfortunate to hear that you had to go through this struggle with them.
Hi Colton, Are there any stores that you would recommended to have do a laptop build? Thank you
I’m not aware of anywhere that does custom laptop builds Lynn, though I wouldn’t recommend going that route anyway. What kind of laptop are you in the market for? I could probably find a good one for you?
Let me know! 🙂
These computers are definitely way too expensive for what they claim they can do.There are cheaper versions out there so you have to look around. I suppose you have to take into consideration if you are using the machine for gaming or just general internet surfing as the specs can be modified depending on what you want.
Right, even with the modifications that you can do you’ll still be overpaying by quite a bit. I have no doubt that the build quality is good but when it comes to a pre-built from a company like this you’re going to be paying a whole lot more versus what it’d cost to build a similar PC yourself.
Hi Colton,
Thanks for a good review of Xotic PC. This is like a PC Build with upsells and it shouldn’t be like that.
I tend to agree with you that they shouldn’t be using that CPU, especially since the price is high-end.
I don’t like how they are not being transparent here and also charging $70 for shipping? It’s like they are trying to squeeze every last drop.
What would you recommend as a better alternative in the $1000 range?
Right, I’m sure that the PCs work just fine and what not but it makes a lot more sense to have the right amount of power per dollar spent…
I’d recommend going with a PC build of your own, I can help you as you get it put together! Check out the $1,000 build guide here on the site!
Hi Colten, although I have never heard of the Xotic PC, it is good to know they are not a recommended site, as I have been thinking about building my own PC in the back of my mind for quite some time now.
I’m not very mechanically inclined, always have been working with cars and such. Do you think that due to this, I would struggle to build my own PC? I know that someday if I really want that gaming experience I have always dreamed of that I would have to build my own PC, but have always kind of backed off due to the expenses. I mean, $1K is a lot of money to for me to spend, although I have also heard that spending just $300 will net you a PC that is just as powerful as a PS4/Xbox One.
What do you think I should do if I were to start learning the components and all the other variables I need to know to start learning how to build a PC?
Right, it’s good to be aware of the performance power per dollar spent. You can optimize it with a build of your own much better than most pre-builts like what is shown here.
With my first build I had no idea what I was doing but putting a PC together isn’t as hard as most think. I’d recommend checking out this page to get an idea of what budget point you’re wanting to use and then there is plenty of material to help you out, as well as me!