Allied Patriot-A Gaming PC Review

When it comes to buying a gaming PC, it can be easy to get lost in endless specs, numbers and features if you don't understand them—or care to. Some people just want to play games. Still, it's important to choose a PC with a balanced specification, and when it comes to gaming, by far the most influential component is the graphics card.

Allied is an Australian based PC manufacturer that clearly puts a lot of thought into what goes into its PCs. Like the Allied Stinger-A we reviewed previously, the Allied Patriot-A comes with a powerful graphics card. 

The RTX 4070 of the Patriot-A is more than capable of holding its own at 2560 x 1440, but a strong graphics card is just one part of what makes up the Patriot-A. It's other components provide a good balance, and its classy aesthetic, accessories and Australia based support team combine with one another to make up an impressive overall package.

The Patriot-A is available directly from Allied's Australian webstore. It's priced at AU$3,199. That's decent but not stunning value for an RTX 4070 based PC. However, at the time of writing, Allied was discounting the Patriot-A by a full AU$1,000, bringing it down to AU$2,199, and that's a real bargain. Our friends across the Tasman can pick up for NZ$2,849. With the Boxing Day sales still to come, it's highly likely the Patriot-A will continue to be discounted for some time to come.

The Patriot-A arrives double-boxed with a value-adding bundle of accessories including a good quality Allied Shuriken RGB mouse, backpack, large stickers and a lanyard. The PC itself is securely packed with internal air pillows to protect against damage during transit. A simple set of instructions makes setup a breeze for those not well versed in the intricacies of a modern PC.

Upon firing it up for the first time, it becomes clear that the Patriot-A is a well built and attractive gaming PC with clean cable management and attention to detail. It's a compact white themed rig featuring white cable sleeving. If you're a fan of RGB, you'll love the Patriot-A. It includes seven RGB fans and RGB memory too. Lighting effects can be adjusted via a button on the front of the case.

The included RTX 4070 graphics card is the star of the build. Considering it costs nearly AU$1,000 to buy one separately, it's a very smart choice for a build in this price range. It's partnered up with AMD's six core Ryzen 5 7500F. It's AMD's entry level 7000-series Zen 4 CPU, but don't let that worry you. It can boost up to 5.0 GHz and it's not a bottleneck for gaming. If you plan to do lots of productivity type tasks, Allied gives you the option of selecting a higher core count processor. It's cooled by Allied's own Sidewinder 120mm cooler. It's rated to handle 180W processors, meaning its more than enough to keep the undemanding 7500F cool.

The motherboard is a fairly basic Gigabyte B650M K model. There's little to complain about though as it's got a good spec and power delivery system that's perfectly adequate for the 7500F CPU. It gives you a spare M.2 slot, 2.5Gb LAN and 4x SATA ports if you ever want to add more storage on top of the included 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD.

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The rear I/O is better than I expected. You get eight USB ports including 4x USB 2.0, 2x USB 5Gbps ports and two 10Gbps ports, one of which is Type-C. There's a BIOS flashback button, a PS/2 combo mouse/keyboard port and a DP and HDMI ports, though these cannot be used with a 7500F processor as it doesn't include onboard graphics. WiFi is not built in, but Allied do bundle an 1800Mbps WiFi 6 adapter.

If there's anywhere Allied held back a little, it's the RAM and power supply. 16GB of DDR5-5200 is nothing to rave about. The inclusion of 6000MHz RAM would add a little bit of extra performance in some apps and games. The 650W PSU is best described as adequate. It's perfectly fine for this spec, but a little bit of overheard for a future upgrade would be good.

The Patriot-A's cooling is top notch. It's got three intake fans and three outtake fans with dust protection. They all feature RGB lighting as does the CPU cooler fan. A tempered glass side panel lets you show off the RGB goodness inside. The dark colors of the motherboard and graphics card contrast really nicely with the system's white cable sleeving.

The front I/O of the case is very solid. You get three Type-A USB ports, one of which supports USB 3.0. Power and reset buttons are joined by a headphone and mic ports. Pressing the LED button cycles through the various RGB colors and effects of the system.

It's a classy build with a capable spec, but how does it perform? Pretty damn well, all things said. The Patriot-A's RTX 4070 will easily dispatch systems with RTX 4060 class cards, while the 7500F, being based on AMD's current Zen 4 architecture, should stand up well against older generation hex-core processors.

System performance

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Synthetic and 1080p gaming performance

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1440p gaming performance

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The Ryzen 5 7500F easily beats the older Ryzen 5 5600 and Intel i5 12400 CPUs in heavy productivity tasks, and it stays cool while doing it.

The RTX 4070 is perhaps overkill for gaming on a 1080p screen, but if you plan to enable demanding effects like ray tracing, performance can quickly fall back. Cyberpunk 2077 is brutal on any card. But if you enable Nvidia's DLSS and Frame Generation, every single game on the market right now, and surely for a few years to come will hum along above 60 FPS, while less demanding games and competitive shooters will happily max out a high refresh rate 1080p monitor.

At 2560 x 1440, the RTX 4070 remains more than capable. You can even make the jump up to 4K with many titles. It's a major step ahead of an RTX 4060 or 4060 Ti system. I'm very confident is saying the RTX 4070 won't be a problem with a game like Grand Theft Auto 6. If it is, Rockstar screwed us all! Though, it seems like we'll have to wait a couple of years before we get to play it on PC's. D'oh!

The SSD appears to be the same as the one found inside the Allied Stinger-A, and it performed well in our SSD test.

The Patriot-A is another Allied system with a spec that's built for gaming first and foremost. We've seen other examples around this price with silly things like 360mm AIOs, 32GB of DDR4 or a fast CPU - but with a lesser graphics card. Systems like that might look good on paper, but they'll come up short unless they also include an RTX 4070 class graphics card. The Patriot-A get's the balance right.

Ideally I'd like to see faster memory, or more of it, and a bit beefier power supply, but they are things that aren't critical. I'd much rather see Allied stick with the RTX 4070 over moving up to faster RAM or an 850W class power supply, but drop down to a 4060 Ti.

At its full price of AU$3,199. The value isn't bad but it isn't stunning. But its current discount of AU$1,000 brings it down to AU$2,199, making it superb value. With the Boxing Day sales coming up, I can't see it going back up in price in the short term, but once we move into 2024, perhaps it will. Do keep an eye out for discounts in the future. As a reminder, our New Zealand friends can pick one up for NZ$2,849.

A gamer on the lookout for a gaming system in the AU$2,500 to AU$3,000 range, should absolutely consider the Patriot-A. But its not all about a classy and high performing system. Allied has a well established history, the systems are built locally and you get Australian based after sale support. Allied is well worth considering if you're planning to buy a high performing gaming PC. it's got serious gaming chops that delivers where it counts.