Maingear Revolt review: The world’s most powerful shoebox
DexertoMaingear has collaborated with Hyte to create their very own line of small form factor PC’s using the Revolt case, and we’ve been testing one out.
When it comes to prebuilt computers, Maingear is among the most popular companies available today. They’ve built their brand massively over the years, but in November 2022 were joined by esports legend shroud as co-owner.
We were able to go hands on with shroud’s custom PC in February of this year and absolutely loved the build. Now, we’ve been able to put their newest small form factor PC through our tests – complete with Intel’s latest i9-14900k chip.
Key Specs:
- CPU: Intel Core i9-14900K
- Motherboard: ASUS ROG Strix Z790-I Gaming ITX
- CPU Cooler: BeQuiet Dark Rock TF2
- Ram: 32GB T-Force Delta RGB DDR5 6000MHz
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition
- PSU: CoolerMaster V1100 SFX 80+ Platinum
- Storage: 2TB Gen4 M.2 NVMe SSD
- Operating System: Windows 11 Home
- Price: $4,499
Design
The Maingear Revolt might be the cutest computer build I’ve ever seen based on size alone, but it’s overall not very flashy. Partnering with Hyte, Maingear has built this line of computers inside of the company’s Revolt case.
DexertoHyte’s Revolt is made up of five mesh panels that are perfect for airflow, and they’ve added a few features that make it perfect for traveling and moving the PC around your house.
On both the left and right sides, there are pop-out headphone hangers which give you the perfect place to hang up your headset when not in use. At the top, there’s a pop-out handle that is sturdy enough to confidently move the PC around with it.
The bottom of the front panel is where you’ll find the IO, which includes a USB 3.2 Gen 2 USB-C port, two USB-A ports that are USB 3.2 Gen 1, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a power button.
On the Maingear Revolt, they’ve placed their full-text logo on the side panel and it doesn’t look bad at all. Maingear doesn’t appear to offer their custom printed front panels as we saw on the MG-1, but that’s to be expected considering the design of the case.
Each panel can be removed from the case if you need to make any changes to the computer in the future, and they’re paired with a filter to help keep the internals clean.
DexertoBuild quality
Something that I’ve noticed with Maingear is that they focus on build quality. Both the MG-1 and Revolt are built inside of high-quality, sturdy cases and the cable management is also absolutely stellar.
The Revolt 3 case is just shy of 10 inches deep, seven inches high, and around 16 inches tall — making it quite the tight fit inside of the case. Space didn’t stop Maingear from building an absolute beast, as this review unit has an RTX 4090 Founders Edition GPU and Intel’s i9-14900k processor.
Maingear opted to go for an air cooler with this release, using the BeQuiet Dark Rock TF2 instead of opting for an AIO like many would probably expect to be paired with the 14900k.
The wires are neatly tied up on the bottom of the build, which is good considering that the motherboard’s IO panel is right beside them. It definitely could have been a bit better but given the space available, it’s hard to be super picky about the cable management.
DexertoI’m pleasantly surprised with the overall build quality of the Maingear Revolt, as they’ve managed to do a heck of a job with less than half the space of a standard PC build.
Gaming Performance
With an absolute monster of a CPU — the Intel i9-14900k — alongside Nvidia’s RTX 4090 GPU, the Maingear Revolt plows through even the toughest of games.
I tested it out with Forza Horizon 5, Cyberpunk 2077, and Overwatch 2 to give a great idea of the full capabilities of this machine and it absolutely knocked it out of the park on all of them with Ultra settings at both 1440p and 4K resolution.
Cyberpunk 2077 hit 161 FPS with DLSS and ray tracing enabled. Cyberpunk is heralded as one of the most difficult modern titles to run, and this smaller system managed to perform incredibly well. You do lose quite a few frames by pushing 4K, but it’s to be expected with such a resource-heavy game.
DexertoForza Horizon 5 is buttery smooth with our version of the Maingear Revolt, pushing 184 FPS at 1440p with DLSS and ray tracing off. Turn DLSS 3 on, and you’ll see a hefty 50 FPS boost to 213. Bumping it up to 4K resolution did push it down to 164 FPS with DLSS on, but it only dropped to a respectable 136 FPS with Nvidia’s DLSS 3 turned off.
It’s no secret that Overwatch 2 is an absolute breeze to run on most computers, and the 14900k/RTX 4090 combo blew it out of the water. Blizzard maxes your FPS to 600 in the settings, and I was just 20 shy of that at 1440p. I’ve posted the full benchmarks below.
| Games | 1440p | 4K |
|---|---|---|
| Forza Horizon 5 (Ultra, RT Ultra, DLSS 3 Performance, Frame Generation) | 213 FPS | 164 FPS |
| Forza Horizon 5 (Ultra, RT & DLSS off) | 184 FPS | 136 FPS |
| Cyberpunk 2077 (Ultra, RT Ultra, DLSS 3 Performance, Frame Generation | 161 FPS | 100 FPS |
| Cyberpunk 2077 (Ultra, RT Ultra, DLSS off) | 98 FPS | 53 FPS |
| Overwatch 2 (Ultra) | 580 FPS | 510 FPS |
Synthetic Benchmarks
To put it through the most extreme tests, I put the Maingear Revolt through 3DMark’s most popular synthetic benchmarks: Time Spy Extreme, Port Royal, and Speed Way.
It scored 17,881 on Time Spy, which the company claims is better than 98% of users, and a very respectable score given the fact that Maingear opted to slap an air cooler on the 14900k.
DexertoMy Port Royal benchmark came in a bit lower than average at 25,420, although it’s still quite respectable. You can feel the heat coming from the massive RTX 4090 sitting in the front of the build, with the top of the Hyte Revolt 3 getting pretty warm to the touch.
The Speed Way benchmark came in at 9,992, which is still among the best scores according to 3DMark.
| 3DMark Tests | Scores |
|---|---|
| Time Spy Extreme | 17881 |
| Port Royal | 25420 |
| Speed Way | 9992 |
Maingear told me that they did quite a bit of testing before choosing the BeQuiet Dark Rock TF 2 on the mini heater that is the 14900k, and I’m wholeheartedly impressed with its performance while throwing these massive game and synthetic benchmarks at the computer.
It didn’t prevent it from thermal throttling at all, but it seemed to only do so when I pushed it to its full 6Ghz boost clock while benchmarking Cyberpunk 2077. When the computer is running lesser games like Forza Horizon 5 or Overwatch 2, there are no signs of thermal throttling.
Should you buy it?
The Maingear Revolt is well worth checking out if you’re after a prebuilt gaming PC that’s going to handle everything without issue. Maingear is providing computers with high-end parts and fantastic cable management for great value.
It’s more expensive than building it yourself, but the quality and warranty alone are well worth the extra cost.
Verdict: 4/5
If you’re not interested in building a computer and instead want to invest in high-quality support and warranty, the Maingear Revolt small form factor PC is well worth the money.