In something of a surprising move, Amazon is now offering PC components under its Basics brand. Well, one component in particular -- a CPU air cooler -- but it’s likely this is just the start of a new move from the e-commerce giant, and one which is likely to worry component manufacturers everywhere.
The CPU cooler itself seems a rather (sorry) basic product. Amazon hasn’t provided a full spec sheet, but we know it has a PWM fan that runs at up to 29.38 dB, and with an RPM of between 600-2000. Interestingly, it has RGB lighting, and an LED controller as well, just in case your motherboard doesn’t have a controller of its own. Amazon says it’s a compact product for space-starved builds, and that does seem accurate.
Closer inspection reveals that this is extremely similar to the Cooler Master Hyper H410R RGB, with even the model numbers seeming very similar: RR-H410-20PC-AS vs. RR-H410-20PC-R1 respectively. The price of the Amazon model is over half that of the Cooler Master product though, and we’re not sure what cuts were made to reach that particular price point, so it’s tough to recommend it at this stage.
For those not in the know, the Amazon Basics range is Amazon’s own series of products. As a brand, it revolves around offering well priced, reliable, and basic products across an enormous variety of products. You can get Basics vacuum cleaners, rechargeable batteries, cables, and more, and apparently Amazon is expanding into PC components too, so you can expect to start seeing more of these popping up on Amazon in the foreseeable future.
You do have to wonder where Amazon will stop with this particular drive, though. For instance, would it be possible for Amazon to package up its own GPU units for sale, or, like the cooler fan above, would it be more likely it would repackage an existing GPU and ship it under the Basics brand? Really, this might not be a terrible idea, and having an Amazon Basics RTX 4070 Ti on the market might allow for even lower price GPUs. However, we would worry that cooling and other extras might be cut to keep prices down, so it would be something to approach with caution.