GAMING PROCESSORS

The power of your CPU tends to have a tangible, trickledown effect on the performance of the rest of your components. You can dump truckloads of cash into your graphics card, but without an appropriately beefy processor to push it to its limit, you’re just going to end up bottlenecking your PC’s performance. A CPU isn’t the sexiest component to pick out for your high-end gaming PC build, but without the right chip, your rig is going nowhere fast. You’ll need to check the compatibility of your motherboard before diving in, and don’t forget about cooling either.

Core i9-9900K

INTEL $508

The fastest Intel processor for games, streams, more

1 For pure gaming, the Intel Core i9-9900K is overkill, unless you’re planning on an extreme build with a top-tier graphics card. For those that do more than just play games,