How we test, review and rate on PCGamesN

With new games and hardware dropping on the regular, it can be tricky to work out what’s worth your attention and where to go for expert opinions, which is where we come in. At PCGamesN, our experienced team tests hundreds of games and hardware products every year to help you decide what’s right for you. On top of our buying guides and standalone reviews, we’ll also explain how hardware stacks up against its competitors with comparison articles.

PCGamesN first launched in 2012, and its contributors have years of experience testing the latest games, hardware, and gaming peripherals. We’re also passionate about the industry, which means we’ll be entertaining along the way.

It’s important to us that you trust the way we review – we aim to be rigorous, reliable, and fair. We also want our buying advice for hardware in particular to be repeatable, making it easy for you to compare reviews and find the very best products for your gaming needs and budget.

There are so many new and exciting games and hardware releases every month, but we have to be selective about what we review. We try to reflect the exciting world of gaming while also being trendsetters and tastemakers ourselves.

In our buying guides, you’ll find a range of products to make it easy for you to make the right choice based on your budget, design preferences, or performance expectations. We consider gear in a wide range of price brackets, not just the most expensive. We want to make it possible for anyone to find the right product for their needs. Of course, PC hardware can be expensive, so if you’re spending a lot of money, we’ll always tell you when a product is worth the investment (and when it’s not), and suggest alternatives that might suit you better.

We also tailor our hardware choices to a range of experience levels, too. Whether you’re a hardcore PC gamer or a real beginner, there’s a product out there for you, and we want to help you find the right one.

Our review coverage is 100% independent and will only ever recommend games and hardware that we genuinely think are worth your time, offering the best in design, performance, or value. In short, what we write isn’t dictated by an affiliate partner or an advertiser. We do often work with game PR, developers, and publishers, as well as hardware manufacturers, to request game and hardware samples for review, but we’ll never cover a product or give it a more positive review simply because of that. All the hardware samples that we receive are issued on a loan-only basis, and we don’t review products so that we can keep them ourselves.

We may earn a small affiliate commission when you click through to buying links in our guides and reviews, but that doesn’t affect our coverage or scoring. All of our in-house team of writers and freelance reviewers are paid separately for their writing, and they don’t earn any bonus or payment for giving products a better score. PCGamesN does work with brands to create sponsored editorial content, but this is labeled at the top of the article.

Here at PCGamesN, we score products out of ten. Below, you’ll find an explanation of how we choose review scores and what they mean to us. Of course, scores are only designed to be a summary of the reviewer’s opinion, and it’s always worth reading the full review if you want to see what was said about a certain feature or aspect of the game or hardware.

Testing the best gaming PCs and best gaming laptops requires a good deal of time to make sure that all the components that power these machines are up to code.

For both desktop and portable systems, we benchmark both the CPU and GPU, noting their performance in games and if cooling or noise is an issue while they’re running. We’ll also evaluate their build quality and physical features such as ports and ease of upgradability.

We also put laptops through a PCMark 10 test that scores the battery life of each device while gaming and in general use.

When we’re testing the best gaming monitors, we begin by evaluating the build quality, design, and other physical characteristics of the display, including how easy it is to construct, and if it features ergonomic adjustments like height, tilt, and swivel.

Turning on the screen, we explore its OSD for any customization options, such as an sRGB color space clamp. Then it’s time to put its gaming performance to the test by reviewing its viewing angles, and motion clarity, and noting any ghosting or overshoot caused by overdrive.

For HDR monitors, we test to see if there are any noticeable dimming zones and how bright the screen gets in small windows and in full-screen.

To help you find the best graphics card for your system, we put their performance to the test in our benchmark suite of games. Our selection is designed to test a GPU’s ray tracing and rasterization capabilities, across the three most popular resolutions: 1080p, 1440p, and 4K.

To ensure we’re not leaving any frames on the table, we pair our pixel pushers with the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D, so there’s basically no chance of a CPU bottleneck. Our setup is rounded off with 32GB of DDR5-6000 RAM and a 2TB WD_BLACK SN850X SSD.

We use the built-in benchmarking tool in each of our games so that you’re able to replicate the tests for yourself. Each game is run using its highest quality preset, without Nvidia DLSS or AMD FSR upscaling technologies enabled. With RTX 4000 graphics cards, we also test how much DLSS Frame Generation can improve your frame rate.

In order to separate the best gaming CPU from pretender processors, we evaluate each chip’s gaming capabilities paired with the most powerful graphics cards, including the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090.

Our benchmarks include our usual suite of games with a few extra additions, including 3DMark, Civilization VI, and Cinebench R23. We observe what temperatures the processor hits under load, noting how long it’s able to maintain its advertised boost clock speeds.

To make sure we’re ready for the best SSD models of today and the future, we use an Asus TUF Gaming X670E-Plus WiFi motherboard that supports both PCIe 5.0 NVMe and SATA drives.

Our tests include 3DMark, CrystalDiskMark, and AS-SSD, which allow us to see the real-world performance of drives and highlight any thermal throttling.

We’re also keeping an eye out for games that feature DirectStorage and will incorporate them into our testing regime once they’re more readily available.

The world of PC gaming includes many hardware peripherals, such as the best gaming keyboard and the best gaming headset. Although these items are more subjective when it comes to reviews, there are still many factors that we analyze, compare, and explain to help you make the best choice. For headphones and headsets, we might cover the fit of the product and how comfortable it feels to wear for long periods. There’s also connectivity, what’s included in the box, design, and battery life, if a product is wireless.

We always make sure to tailor our review to the product at hand, sharing our real-life experiences over a number of weeks or months of use to outline all the real pros and cons.

The best gaming VPNs allow you to change your geographic location, which can give you access to easier lobbies and regional exclusive games content, among other benefits (which you’ll find in our How to use a VPN for gaming guide). There are so many VPN providers out there, including the best free VPNs, and we want to ensure that we are recommending services that you can trust. Here’s how we test those criteria:

We also test VPN apps to determine their ease of use, the quality of their applications, their value for money, and the distribution of their servers.

Beyond testing gaming hardware and VPN software on PCGamesN, we also review all the best PC games. Our process for reviewing games is somewhat similar to physical products – we are rigorous in our testing, we assign reviews to those with genre experience, and what we say is based on real gameplay from a range of experts.

We will always spend as much time as we feel is required to experience the breadth of what a game offers, whether we’re talking massive RPG games or huge multiplayer hits. While we do endeavor to roll credits on the games we review, there will be cases where we don’t feel this is a necessity to deliver an informed, thorough, and decidedly expert analysis.

We also strive to bring you reviews on the embargo, though in cases where we have not been given a sufficient lead time, we will instead delay publication or create a review-in-progress, which we’ll then add a score to once we’re confident that we’ve spent enough time with the game.

We test if natural products are better for your hair

by LIZ STOUT, femail.co.uk

Everywhere you look these days, people seem to be turning to products which contain only the most pure and naturally grown ingredients - and that applies to beauty products too.

Since the arrival in the UK of US environmentally-aware haircare brand, Aveda, other cosmetic companies like Boots and The Body Shop, have jumped on the botanic bandwagon, formulating products using fresh and naturally farmed plant-derived products.

Shampoos and conditioners which contain natural mineral and plant extracts are all the rage, but are they any better for your hair?

They don't work any better than many of the man-made popular brands which you'll find at your local supermarket, according to leading Trichologist, Philip Kingsley.

'Healthy hair is down to lots of different life factors like environment, scalp health and diet and I'm afraid the wonder shampoo that instantly transforms your hair just doesn't exist' he says.

'The most important factor when buying a shampoo, is choosing the right one for your specific hair type, ie. flyaway or dry and frizzy. A product won't necessarily be better just because it has a long list of plant ingredients on the label.

'I also feel that labelling hair products as organic is a great marketing tool, but terribly misleading for the public'.

'For a product to be totally organic it would have to be bereft of any chemicals, including chemical preservatives. In fact, the majority of these 'natural' shampoos and conditioners all contain preservatives to make them last longer

'It's also hard to be sure that each bottle of product is exactly the same as the next - in the same way as you won't find two plants exactly alike in terms of size, colour and scent.

'That's not to say that brands such as Aveda aren't good, they often can be,' concludes Philip, 'but then so are many of the man-made chemical shampoos out there.'

Marcus Allen from the Aveda Concept Salon at Harvey Nichols, is quick to defend the botanic revolution.

'Natural hair products are always going to be better because they work with the hair, rather than masking its existing problems.

'The obvious difference between supermarket shampoos and ours, is that many cheaper manufactured brands contain ingredients like wax, that gradually build-up on the hair until it loses its vitality.

'Aveda shampoos are soluble, so you are starting with a fresh palette everytime you wash your hair.

'We use only pure plant and flower essences, alongside a small number of chemical ingredients to keep the products fresh.

'Because the natural plant extracts are all distilled on-site and regulated before being shipped anywhere, we can be confident each batch will be consistent.'

We went in search of some super-natural shampoos and conditioners...

Nuxe Soothing, Repairing Honey Shampoo (£8.50/200ml)

Although it's infused with the delicious fragrance of lime-Blossom, rose and orange flower, the overriding tone is of wild honey.

If you love the smell of honey, you're bound to love this product - just resist the temptation to spread it on your toast!

Available mail order from Space NK.

Neal's Yard Rosemary and Cedarwood Hair Treatment (£6.50/75g)

Massage thoroughly into the hair and scalp and leave on, using shampoo and a warm water rinse after 30 minutes.

This is the perfect product for a Friday night pamper session but make sure you rinse the hair thoroughly afterwards or it could feel quite greasy.

Body Shop Palmshine range (£3-£4)

Its secret is the combination of natural palm oil, vitamins A & E, Jojoba and pro-vitamin B5 which helps strengthen the hair from the shaft. One of the most tempting things about the range is the delicious fragrance. Each product has a delicious scent, at it's at a budget price.

Aveda Cherry Almond Bark Reconstructive Hair Conditioner (£20.50/225g)

The wild cherry, bark and almond extracts combine to create a fantastic moisturiser for dry hair, that you only need to use around once a week (depending on the condition of your hair). Gently massage a small amount into the hair - paying special attention to the ends - lie back and breathe in the aromatic scent of cherries and marzipan.

Dr Haushka Pure Shampoo (£11/100ml) and Herbal Hair Conditioner (£11/150ml)

<_3br>Used together, Dr Haushka's shampoo and herbal conditioning formula help to rebalance the hair, whether it's dry and brittle or excessively oily.

The conditioner claims to help restore the scalp's healthy pH levels and rids hair of residue, so it feels lighter, brighter and full of shine.

These very natural-smelling hair products aren't recommended for anyone with permed or colour-treated hair.

Test & Measurement

USB instrument maker Pico Technology has re-written the host software for its head-less vector network analysers to run on PCs, Macs and Linux computers, and Raspberry Pi. Dubbed ‘PicoVNA 5’, and replacing the Windows-only PC-only ‘PicoVNA 3’ software, it “will run at speed on Linux, Windows and macOS, and PCs, Macs, and embedded systems, including Raspberry Pi 3”, according to ...