Is Buying a PC from Costco a Good Idea?

TL;DR

Buying a gaming PC from Costco is genuinely good value thanks to warranty perks, competitive pricing, and a standard 10% floor-model discount.

Key Points

• 1.They purchased an open-box iBUYPOWER gaming PC at Costco (Canada) for roughly $1,300 CAD (~$1,000 USD) after a 10% discount (~$75 off), and found it ~$140–$300 cheaper than comparable self-built systems even before the discount.
• 2.Costco advantages include a 90-day return policy, 2-year warranty (vs. typical 1-year), and free tech support — meaningful perks over buying parts independently.
• 3.Internal specs surprised them positively: MSI motherboard with Wi-Fi 6E and 2.5G LAN, an 80 Plus Gold-certified High Power 600W PSU, and a Gen 4 SSD (AGI brand, no DRAM cache but acceptable for gaming).
• 4.Major gotcha: the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT in the unit turned out to be the 8GB VRAM version, not 16GB — this wasn't clearly labeled on the Costco product card, reducing the value advantage by ~$80.
• 5.Gaming performance at 1440p was solid in Expedition 33 (FSR upscaling, medium-high settings, ~50+ FPS), but Cyberpunk 2077 showed VRAM-limited stutters at 1440p; dropping to 1080p resolved smoothness issues.
• 6.The AM5 platform makes it a strong upgrade foundation — future CPU and GPU upgrades are viable, though they recommend replacing the PSU before installing a more powerful GPU.