NEC sells first (gaming) PC in 24 years

[williamcll]

Called the Lavie GX, it comes in two models, a mid-high intel+nvidia and a lower end intel+amd. Also comes with a xbox game pass.

Quotes

Quote

The LAVIE GX comes with a wired keyboard and mouse, an Xbox wireless gamepad with a USB-C cable and a headset for voice chat. A three-month subscription to Microsoft's Xbox Game Pass Ultimate package, which allows users to play hundreds of games, is included as purchase bonus.An Xbox gamepad, not bad. To celebrate the 40th anniversary of PC-9801, all costumers who buy the LAVIE GX before the end of October will also receive 3,000 yen worth of coupons to use at Project EGG, a platform featuring thousands of retro games, including the PC-9801.

Last but least, the first 500 buyers through August 28 will receive a copy of Capcom's action RPG Monster Hunter Rise Deluxe Kit.

My thoughts

it's very unassuming and the cooling looks atrocious. This better come cheap.

 

Sources

https://www.superpixel.com/article/118972/nec-has-unveiled-its-first-gaming-pc-product-lavie-gx

https://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/img/pcw/docs/1422/446/html/02_o.jpg.html

[IkeaGnome]

At least the render shows what seems to be a standard motherboard. Not sure how much I trust that since the GPU requires no power cables and is single slot though.

[da na]

5 minutes ago, IkeaGnome said:

At least the render shows what seems to be a standard motherboard. Not sure how much I trust that since the GPU requires no power cables and is single slot though.

GPU looks like an RX 6400, low profile...

 

 

Good to see NEC back, even if it's... this.

[Tiuqu]

https://www.techno-edge.net/article/2022/07/05/56.html
 

nice render there op, meanwhile real photos...

 

yeah, nah.

[Murasaki]

Ah yes to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the PC-9801 you release SKUs named the GX750 and GX550.... sounds like PSU names tbh.

[da na]

Just now, Tiuqu said:

https://www.techno-edge.net/article/2022/07/05/56.html
 

nice render there op, meanwhile real photos...

 

yeah, nah.

It's a nice compact form factor, I will give it that. But it's the usual approach of slapping plastic gAmEr ThEmEs on a case from 1994.

[givingtnt]

2 hours ago, Tiuqu said:

https://www.techno-edge.net/article/2022/07/05/56.html
 

nice render there op, meanwhile real photos...

 

yeah, nah.

the only difference is literally the boring case metal looks a bit darker and none of your photos show the front.
tbh I don't understand why it would need to look good on the inside other than being relatively clean and tool free.

[TetraSky]

47 minutes ago, givingtnt said:

the only difference is literally the boring case metal looks a bit darker and none of your photos show the front.
tbh I don't understand why it would need to look good on the inside other than being relatively clean and tool free.

It's not their photos, it's the photos by NEC for this product. So what you see is the legit product.

 

My issue with it, is the utter lack of IO in the back.

4 USB port, 1 Ethernet port, 1 d-sub, 1 headphone (maybe mic combo?) jack, and a black hole that may or may not be HDMI. Would've liked to see 5.1 audio support at the very least, maybe optical audio. More USB ports... Something.

 

Plus 500W PSU from a brand I've never heard of, but it's "80 plus Platinum" so surely it's good, right? And I don't know about you, but I'm not seeing a 24pin connector either. Guessing this is that new 12V standard that Intel is pushing? At least it looks to be using "off the shelf" parts for the most part (except motherboard) for easy upgradability. 

Spoiler

 

[Fasterthannothing]

I guess I'm the only one who kinda thinks it's cool but that's probably the nostalgia getting to me

[StDragon]

Looks like a Dell.

[X-System]

12 minutes ago, StDragon said:

Looks like a Dell.

It's logic. NEC = Dell = OEM = cheap

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

7 hours ago, Mel0nMan said:

Good to see NEC back, even if it's... this.

Yep. But once again...

 

[Spotty]

2 hours ago, TetraSky said:

Plus 500W PSU from a brand I've never heard of, but it's "80 plus Platinum" so surely it's good, right? And I don't know about you, but I'm not seeing a 24pin connector either. Guessing this is that new 12V standard that Intel is pushing? At least it looks to be using "off the shelf" parts for the most part (except motherboard) for easy upgradability. 

AcBel is a pretty major PSU manufacturer, they make PSUs for a lot of the large pre-built OEMs. Not at all surprising seeing it in a system like this. I'm not sure if it's using the ATX12VO standard but it's definitely not standard ATX.

 

3 hours ago, TetraSky said:

My issue with it, is the utter lack of IO in the back.

4 USB port, 1 Ethernet port, 1 d-sub, 1 headphone (maybe mic combo?) jack, and a black hole that may or may not be HDMI. Would've liked to see 5.1 audio support at the very least, maybe optical audio. More USB ports... Something.

It looks pretty barebones. The other RAM slots are missing so you can't upgrade by adding more RAM. Same with the bottom PCIe slots. Definitely built to be as cheap as possible.

 

Is that a m.2 2280 slot at the bottom right of the board next to the wifi module? That's an odd place to put it.

 

I really doubt NEC made this. Looks more like it was just made by another OEM and then they just put the NEC brand on it for nostalgia. I bet if you look through HP/Dell you could find the exact same system just with a different plastic faceplate on the front of the case. 

[TetraSky]

6 minutes ago, Spotty said:

The other RAM slots are missing

Oh wow, I didn't even see what. What in the world...

 

7 minutes ago, Spotty said:

Is that a m.2 2280 slot at the bottom right of the board next to the wifi module? That's an odd place to put it.

 

That is certainly a weird place to put these cards.

 

Looking at the specs, at least the LAN seems to be 2.5G and it has Wifi 6. So there's that.

[Lightwreather]

Can someone tell me who NEC was?

 

 

[Rauten]

5 hours ago, Spotty said:

It looks pretty barebones. The other RAM slots are missing so you can't upgrade by adding more RAM. Same with the bottom PCIe slots. Definitely built to be as cheap as possible.

Not just the bottom PCIe -- all the "standard" connectors that are usually at the bottom of the board are also missing.

 

 

The contacts appear to be there, they just didn't bother to spend the cents it would take to turn them into actual, usable connectors?

 

Also, utter "lol" at their pictures implying good airflow through the front, then you see the tiny little holes in the metal front part of the chassis.

And the also tiny fan at the bottom of the front - that thing looks like it's going to scream.

 

The whole thing definitely makes me think "Dell" when looking at it. Ugh.

 

I guess if GN wants to make another video blasting an OEM for releasing trash into the market, they now have an easy target.

[Kisai]

9 hours ago, Spotty said:

 

I really doubt NEC made this. Looks more like it was just made by another OEM and then they just put the NEC brand on it for nostalgia. I bet if you look through HP/Dell you could find the exact same system just with a different plastic faceplate on the front of the case. 

I doubt they did just on the basis that "when did they get the tooling to do so?" It's probably a rebranded Chinese market computer.

 

5 hours ago, J-from-Nucleon said:

Can someone tell me who NEC was?

 

NEC is famous in Japan for the PC88/98 computer, which was the defacto standard personal computer in Japan. Where in US, the standard was "IBM PC compatible, no sound card, VGA", the standard PC98 had full blown midi hardware as standard. Basically NEC was Japan's IBM. NEC also made clone 8088 CPU's known as the V20 and 8086 cpu's as the V30.

 

There's also a massive PC98 software library https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_PC-98_games , and pretty much had a monopoly on the Japanese computer market until the end of Windows ME era.

 

So likely anyone born outside Japan after 2000 wouldn't know or have heard of NEC.

 

 

[Forbidden Wafer]

2 hours ago, Kisai said:

So likely anyone born outside Japan after 2000 wouldn't know or have heard of NEC.

Unless they work with telecom, where NEC is pretty well known and competes with Nokia, Huawei, Ericsson, etc.