Mwave Respawn Ninja Beast Mode Alpha Gaming PC

A gamer in the market for a pre-built gaming PC might head off to Google and be drawn to the likes of an Alienware or HP Omen. They’re not bad systems, but they tend to come with proprietary parts or lack upgradeability. Buying a ready-made PC from an actual PC retailer means you get off the shelf components. That gives you options and upgrade potential.

Mwave is one of the biggest PC retailers in Australia. It sells systems ranging from business machines and NUCs, all the way up to high end gaming machines. And that’s what I’ve got on hand today. The Mwave Respawn Ninja Beast Mode Alpha gaming PC sure does come with a beast of a spec.

If you’ve checked out our Intel Core i9 13900K and GeForce RTX 4090 reviews, you’ll know that they’re the top choices for a high-end gaming PC. You’ll also need serious cooling to tame it all, a big case to house it, a quality power supply and a big SSD to hold a large game library. The Alpha has the lot.

Of course, you can expect to pay a pretty penny for the privilege of owning this aptly named beast, but at AU$7,699 it’s not an unreasonable price given the caliber of components it includes. However, if the price is a bit off-putting, you are more than free to swap the components you want, and Mwave’s PC configurator is one of the best in the business. For instance, if the 4090 is overkill for your needs, you could choose an RTX 30 series card, or a lesser CPU. It’s an excellent system and well worth a look.

But, I digress. I’m here to look at the Respawn Ninja Beast Mode Alpha (I think I’ll call it the Alpha for short). Is it worthy of your hard-earned dollars? On paper, that’d be a yes, but let’s see how this top spec machine performs first.

This Mwave build comes with the aforementioned Intel i9-13900K CPU. It's a great gaming chip, but it's good at everything else too, including multitasking, streaming, content creation or anything else you want to throw at it. It's a hot and power hungry CPU though, and it requires every bit of cooling the EKWB 360mm liquid cooler can give it.

The system comes with an Asus Prime Z790-A motherboard. The board looks great. It includes four M.2 slots and a capable 16+1 phase VRM, which is more than enough to power the 13900K without unduly stressing the heatsinks of the board.

The I/O of the board can't match that of top shelf boards. You don't get USB4 or 10G LAN, but for a board in its price range, it’s good enough. Key features include Wi-Fi 6E, 2.5G LAN and a USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 type-C connector.

The graphics card is an Asus TUF GeForce RTX 4090, and this thing is a beast. It’s got a massive cooler, and when its used with all of the surrounding fans, it stays cool at all times. We saw a maximum GPU temperature of 65 degrees, That’s excellent for a 450W graphics card.

You get 2x16GB of memory, specifically Corsair RGB DDR5-5600 C36, and it's a good value for money kit. You can add more if you like, but going to 64GB or 6000MHz or higher won’t have a tangible impact on gaming performance.

The SSD is a Seagate FireCuda 520 2TB. It’s not the fastest drive available currently, and it’s perhaps one of the weaker links of such a high spec system, though it’s not a tortoise. A decent NVMe SSD is essential for speedy system booting, game loading times and general system responsiveness. The 520 might appear slower in synthetic testing but it’ll blow away any SATA SSD, and at 2TB it's big enough to store all your apps and a sizeable game library. 

The case is an absolute beauty. The Lian-Li O11 Dynamic EVO is perfect for holding a high end system. Note the positioning of the front USB and audio connectors. Their bottom placement means the system is better placed on a desk rather than underneath it, where they will be pretty much out of reach.

Mwave has decked the system out with seven Lian Li SL-Infinity 120mm fans with another three attached to the EKWB 360mm AIO radiator. This means you have high  airflow that's essential for the heat generating 13900K and 4090.

Check out the gallery below. If you love RGB and customising it, you'll love the Beast Mode Alpha. I downloaded the Lian Li app and had a quick play with the RGB settings. Or if you prefer, you can use the Asus Aura Sync app.

Image 1 of 8

So, on paper the Mwave Respawn Ninja Beast Mode Alpha Gaming PC has an awesome spec. Given we know the capabilities of its core hardware, we pretty much know how it will perform. 

We're comparing it to a few other systems, though they are all RTX 30 equipped systems with lesser spec 12th Gen and Ryzen 5000 series processors. In fairness, they are much cheaper too. The exception is the Alienware Aurora R13 which was tested with a 12900KF and RTX 3090 and was priced at up to $7,999. It's a good indicator of just how much of a leap the 13th Gen and the RTX 4090 have made.

System performance

Image 1 of 5

Yep, the Alpha is a fast PC! It blows away the 12th Gen 12900KF and the Ryzen 5800X3D of the Aftershock Ultracore in system benchmarks, but it has a major weakness. The CPU easily hits 100c, and though it remains quiet at all times, it's a little too quiet. 

I needed to install the Lian Li control app to get fan speed control. This gave me full access to fan hysteresis control, allowing fan speeds to ramp up when required. It really is a must-have app as I could not control the fans using the Asus AI suite or via the BIOS.

Synthetic and 1440p gaming performance

Image 1 of 7

Make sure you have at least a high refresh rate 1440p or ultrawide to get the best out of the beast. A game like Metro Exodus with all of the ray tracing settings on still gets over 120FPS. And its nearly twice as fast as a 3090 in Cyberpunk 2077. Nice!

4K gaming performance

Image 1 of 5

This system is built for 4K gaming. Cyberpunk 2077 is actually playable at maximum settings with DLSS. RTX 30 cards delivered a slideshow in comparison. And if you don't mind dropping the ray tracing settings back, then every single game will deliver 120+ FPS. And it's hard to see this system struggling in any game for at least a couple of years, at least until the RTX 50 series arrives and perhaps even next gen consoles.

The games of 2023 will be right at home with the beastly Alpha, no doubt about it.

The Mwave Respawn Ninja Beast Mode Alpha costs a lot, but when compared to RTX 4090 equipped pre-built from the likes of PC Case Gear and Scorptec, it delivers solid value. You do get a lot for your AU$7,699, but that's still a lot of money, and building a similarly specced system yourself is a cheaper option.

But a DIY build vs a prebuilt is like comparing apples to oranges. This is a system for users who want a top spec PC and just get to gaming without having to assemble it and troubleshoot. It looks like a PC you built yourself and not just another off the shelf bespoke Alienware system from Harvey Norman. Such systems work, but they lack a personal touch.

As someone that's built a lot of systems, I'm really impressed with the build quality and component choice of the Alpha. It's a superbly built PC with immaculate cable management and attention to detail, and that alone will be reason enough for a well-to-do gamer to splash the cash and get Mwave to build it for them.

No system is perfect. Personally, I'd be tempted to drop to a 13700K for easier cooling and a higher spec motherboard would be welcome, but with a 13900K and RTX 4090 in a system plus all the other goodies for a highly competitive price, I have no problem recommending this system. The Respawn Ninja Beast Model Alpha is an aptly named machine for PC gamers who want a top end PC to play games without worrying about the hassles of building your own PC.