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The glowing green liquid in this Razer–Maingear gaming PC probably won't kill you

The glowing green liquid in this Razer–Maingear gaming PC probably won't kill you

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Ridiculous gaming computers are nothing new. After all, half the fun of building a small supercomputer that can simulate entire universes is decking it out in glowing lights and swooping chrome accents. The R1 Razer Edition is a recently announced desktop team-up between Razer and Maingear — two of the most well-known gaming hardware companies — and it definitely fits the traditional "over-the-top" bill.

Give other people the impression that your gaming PC is highly radioactive

The most important thing I can tell you about the R1 Razer Edition is that the higher-end models include what Maingear refers to as "fully custom handcrafted liquid cooling," which is apparently assembled by hand by a single man in New Jersey. The cooling comes in the form of a series of bubbling tubes filled with glowing liquid that Maingear claims is simply distilled water, but I assume is far more likely to actually be the ichor of an eldrich god, the radioactive runoff of a Cold War-era space station, or Nickelodeon green slime that likely gives the computer excellent performance at the cost of giving other people the impression that your gaming PC is highly radioactive.

Available as a customizable build, the R1 Razer Edition starts at $999 for the most basic (read: boring) model, but can easily be amped up with the inclusion of the aforementioned custom cooling system, glowing LED lights, and bespoke power supply cable sleeves. The actual breakdown of the partnership comes down to Razer supplying the case design, while Maingear adds the hardware know-how for actually building the PC and some additional green LED lighting.

The R1 Razer Edition starts at $999 for the most basic, boring model

And of course, all the actual computer parts can be selected to your specification, with options for RAM, different graphics cards, processors, LED color, coolant color, power supply, motherboard, and more. The most expensive build I could cobble together topped out at about $13,618.99 for a computer (which, at that price, should ideally be able to run a backup copy of the simulation from The Matrix.)

The R1 Razer Edition can be ordered from Maingear's website, with computers shipping as early as the end of September, depending on the level of customization in your build. Just don't drink the coolant.

Update September 10, 6PM ET: a prior version of this post stated that Razer supplied this case with a Chroma lighting system. This is not the case, although Maingear will offer additional lighting for the case.