Walmart pulls its 'Overpowered' gaming desktop PCs from sale following quality concerns...

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Update 12/05/2018: A representative for Esports Arena -- the company responsible for designing Walmart's Overpowered desktops -- has reached out to inform us that the machines were "briefly removed" from sale in order to update their product information, but they are once again available for purchase.

In a move that likely won't shock those familiar with the situation, Walmart has pulled its new line of Overpowered gaming desktop PCs from sale online.

Though it's tough to say precisely why the company made this decision, the most likely reason is the negative publicity that's surrounded the machines since their launch.

Not only were the desktop rigs, dubbed the DTW1, DTW2, and DTW3, lambasted for their questionable value, but the low quality of some of their internal components has been called out by several major tech websites and YouTubers.

Tech personality Kyle, who runs the Bitwit YouTube channel, put together a first impressions video examining Walmart's $1400, GeForce GTX 1070-equipped DTW1 desktop.

Though he did not benchmark the machine's components in said video, he did draw attention to the rig's poor-quality micro ATX motherboard and power supply; noting that they were obvious cost-cutting measures on Walmart's part.

The cable management also looked to be less-than-ideal (though it's not the worst we've seen), and some critical cables -- such as the GPU's power cord -- were unattached when the system arrived on Kyle's doorstep.

In the end, it seems clear that for Walmart, the machines just weren't worth the bad press they were receiving. However, the company is still selling its full line of Overpowered gaming laptops.

Whether or not those will be pulled from sale as well remains to be seen, but for now, they seem to have flown under the tech community's radar.

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Have a look at Steve's review on GN, they didn't even send him the right box. Nevertheless he reviewed the system he received and came to the same conclusions. tl;dr: get IBuyPower or similar if you don't want to DIY.
 
"However, the company is still selling its full line of Overpowered gaming laptops.

Whether or not those will be pulled from sale as well remains to be seen, but for now, they seem to have flown under the tech community's radar."

Maybe that was the whole idea behind putting out the desktop.
 
"However, the company is still selling its full line of Overpowered gaming laptops.

Whether or not those will be pulled from sale as well remains to be seen, but for now, they seem to have flown under the tech community's radar."

Maybe that was the whole idea behind putting out the desktop.
Well the normal tech channels are PC only as it's all about the components. Nobody really looks inside laptops so it's not getting as much exposure. While the youtube reviews haven't been as scathing as for The Verge, some very questionable parts had found their way into the OP PCs such as the PSU and a motherboard that only supports single channel RAM. While the cabling was a mess in the front of the case, it was surprisingly tidy in the rear. Also the 3 front fans had almost no way of getting air and Steve's review showed that the temps dropped by 30 degrees C when removing the front panel.
 
I saw the Linus Tech Tips youtube review on this.

Main negatives: single stick of RAM hurt memory performance (demonstrated via benchmarks), USB 2 vs USB 3 on the front panel, GPU power cable not attached on arrival (easy for an enthusiast to fix, might be a problem for target audience though), cheap looking MoBo with little expansion opportunities, cheap looking power supply and cables (although no actual resulting issues found/documented), no filter on air intakes.

Main positives: $100 less expensive than same-spec HP Omen, and, for RGB lighting fans, abundant case lighting in many colors and patterns. He was also surprised on amount spent on case adornments which I guess some may see as a positive as well.

You call it: mobo arrived pre-configured for all-core turbo, enabling it to beat the Omen in some benchmarks. He was concerned though that since this is technically out of Intel's spec and the system did not seem designed with an abundance of power delivery, other customers with less luck in the silicon lottery might get unstable performance.

He didn't recommend these units and neither would I, but personally I wouldn't be surprised to see Walmart do better on a second attempt. I think their inexperience showed this time around but it also looked to me like they were trying. As an organization they have few rivals in supply chain clout and expertise and are certainly far beyond the boutique players in this space so far. I'll be curious to see what say their 3rd generation looks like.
 
I wouldn't be surprised to see Walmart do better on a second attempt. I think their inexperience showed this time around but it also looked to me like they were trying. As an organization they have few rivals in supply chain clout and expertise and are certainly far beyond the boutique players in this space so far. I'll be curious to see what say their 3rd generation looks like.
Agree, Walmart made a lot of dumb errors that could be fixed in future builds. They don't need to make an excellent desktop PC, an average one that is cheap and looks good (RGB helps) would sell fine given their marketing power.
 
"However, the company is still selling its full line of Overpowered gaming laptops.

Whether or not those will be pulled from sale as well remains to be seen, but for now, they seem to have flown under the tech community's radar."

Maybe that was the whole idea behind putting out the desktop.
Well the normal tech channels are PC only as it's all about the components. Nobody really looks inside laptops so it's not getting as much exposure. While the youtube reviews haven't been as scathing as for The Verge, some very questionable parts had found their way into the OP PCs such as the PSU and a motherboard that only supports single channel RAM. While the cabling was a mess in the front of the case, it was surprisingly tidy in the rear. Also the 3 front fans had almost no way of getting air and Steve's review showed that the temps dropped by 30 degrees C when removing the front panel.
Actually, that board does support dual channel RAM, the issue here was that by having the 16GB being in a 1x16 config instead of 2x8 was that it could only run in single channel without buying more RAM.
 
The 'add to cart' button is up and working again for these desktop PCs on the Walmart website.
 
I wouldn't be surprised to see Walmart do better on a second attempt. I think their inexperience showed this time around but it also looked to me like they were trying. As an organization they have few rivals in supply chain clout and expertise and are certainly far beyond the boutique players in this space so far. I'll be curious to see what say their 3rd generation looks like.
Agree, Walmart made a lot of dumb errors that could be fixed in future builds. They don't need to make an excellent desktop PC, an average one that is cheap and looks good (RGB helps) would sell fine given their marketing power.
Also agree - I'm not rooting against them. More competition in the pre-built market can only be a good thing, and I definitely concur that their mistakes this time around were a result of inexperience, and not necessarily malicious anti-consumer builds.

I mean, they could have just continued to sell the machines as they were. Tech YouTubers have a solid bit of influence, but not so much that it would have swayed the vast majority of potential buyers. The fact that Walmart has apparently (a guess) taken that feedback to heart and pulled them from sale is a good thing.

Hopefully they DO give it another shot, and hopefully it's a better attempt next time.
 
100$ savings vs. an HP Omen gaming desktop is simply not worth it. Of course HP will cut some corners, but not as much as Walmart.
 
I just checked thier website, and you can still order these...well you can still add them to the cart.

Yes, I've been informed by the Overpowered design company (Esports Arena) that they were "briefly removed" from sale so that their product information could be updated. They are now back on the site. I've updated the article to reflect this information.

It seems my optimism regarding Walmart listening to feedback was unwarranted.
 
What's wrong with the title? The PCs were pulled from sale (for 1 day) and it was following quality concerns (by many youtubers).
The article sources were low quality - one cryptic Twitter post by LTT staff, and a Walmart webpage with changes that could be due to numerous other reasons (e.g. being out of stock!). A lot of assumptions were made in this article.

Correlation is not causation
 
The article sources were low quality - one cryptic Twitter post by LTT staff, and a Walmart webpage with changes that could be due to numerous other reasons (e.g. being out of stock!). A lot of assumptions were made in this article.

Correlation is not causation

Welcome to modern day journalism.
 
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