When people hear the words desktop computer, many think of a massive behemoth. The visual gets a heaping helping of RGB when you throw the word “gaming” into the mix. But not all gaming desktops have to be massive. Want proof? Take a look at the Falcon Northwest Tiki, a compact powerhouse that can hold its own with the big boys. In the slim confines of the Tiki awaits an Intel Core Ultra 9 processor and a Nvidia RTX 5080 GPU waiting to unleash hell upon your enemies, be they computer generated or flesh and bone. It’s the perfect solution for those who want maximum gaming power but are short on space. The only problem? The price.
Falcon Northwest Tiki
The Falcon Northwest Tiki crams a load of powerful components into a seriously svelte chassis
Pros
- Excellent gaming and overall performance
- Slim, eye-catching design
- Can order custom prints
- Quiet fans
Pricing and Configurations
Despite its small frame, Falcon makes sure you’re spoiled for choice on the configurations for the Tiki. However, Falcon and every other OEM are being hit with tariffs, which means they’re passing it on to you, dear reader. At the time of this writing, it’s a 5% price increase. Which doesn’t seem like much. But if you’ve ever built your own PC, you know that sourcing components can quickly become a pricey affair.
So that means the Tiki base model outfitted with an Intel Core Ultra 7 265 processor costs $5,407. It also has an Intel Laminar RH1 Cooler, a pair of 16GB Kingston Fury Beast RGB DDR4 6,000MHz RAM, a Asus ROG Strix Z890-E Gaming WiFi Motherboard, a Kingston Fury Renegade 2TB PCIe M.2 SSD, a Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 GPU with 16GB of VRAM, and a SilverStone SX SFX-L Platinum 1,000W PSU.
The AMD Ryzen 5 9600X CPU base model is a little cheaper at $5,354. Outside of the processor swap, you also get the Noctua NH-L9a-AM5 Chromax Black Air Cooler. And there’s my actual review build, which costs $5,740, has a 2.5-GHz Intel Core Ultra 9 285 CPU, a pair of 32GB Kingston Fury Beast RGB DDR4 6,000MHz RAM, and a Crucial T705a 2TB PCIe M.2 Gen 5.0 SSD. My configuration also has an RGB-backlit Falcon emblem along with a three-sided custom UV print. Each build uses Microsoft Windows 11 Pro as an operating system and has a 3-year parts & labor warranty.
Design/Build Quality
I love a good SFF (Small Form Factor) system, and Falcon Northwest makes some of the best. The compact chassis is made from black anodized aluminum, with a thick base that ensures the system isn’t tipping over or sliding away easily. As the pictures show, I don’t have a regular-schmegular design. Falcon hooked me up with one of its custom UV prints, which are available for $149 for the front or a single side panel or $399 for all three sides. The company prides itself on having the “highest resolution UV printer in the industry” at 600 dpi. Just send over your image idea and the company can print on your system–just make sure it’s a high-resolution image for the best result.
My Tiki has one of the company’s pre-made prints. Available in several colors, the print mimics a massive circuit board. The green paint that makes up the circuits is semi-glossy, giving a cool embossed look. And of course, there’s the company’s titular Falcon mascot on both sides looking menacing and badass. And like I mentioned in the configurations section, the cut-out emblem of the mascot on the PC’s front panel is RGB backlit.
The top panel is almost all geometric vent cutouts. But there’s also a USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 port and two USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports. You also have the power and fan buttons. Take a gander around the back of the Micro-Tower, and you have the usual gathering, such as a pair of Thunderbolt 4 ports, a USB-C 3.2 port, two USB-A 2.0 ports, two USB-A 3.0 ports, and a pair of USB-A 3.2 ports. There’s also an HDMI 2.1 port, an Ethernet jack, a pair of connectors for a Wi-Fi antenna, and the AC input jack for the thick power cord.
Opening the case is a breeze. You simply unscrew the two large screws holding the right-side panel in place and slide it off to reveal the heavily feng shui-ed components. The GPU takes up the top quarter of the space leaving the rest to the CPU, motherboard, and glowing RGB RAM. Not an inch of space is wasted, and surprisingly you’ve got enough slots to increase the RAM to 96GB if you so desire.
Measuring 4 x 13.6 x 13 inches, the Tiki’s slim frame is the answer to many apartment dwellers’ prayers, or anyone who doesn’t have a lot of space to spare. It can easily slide into a tight spot and still be the epicenter of your gaming experience. Just be sure to lift with your knees, as the case starts at 18 pounds with the base. The weight can change drastically depending on what components are included in the build.
Gaming/Graphics
In many ways, the Tiki has a lot in common with boxing legend Tommy “The Hit Man” Hearns. They both have smaller frames but pack a hell of a punch. Armed with a Nvidia RTX 5080 Founders Edition GPU, there isn’t much that the Tiki can’t do. Despite that slim frame, it’s not to be trifled with. And while I was really tempted to spend inordinate hours playing through the new Hades 2 update, I was an adult and played some more taxing fare. Then I went and played inordinate hours of Hades 2.
I started things off with another game that I’ve died in time and time again: Black Myth Wukong. For these benchmarks, I kept the game running at its highest setting, Cinematic, and adjusted resolution and effects accordingly. So when I ran the game at 1080p, I saw an average frame rate of 76 frames per second. Turning on DLSS raised the frame rate to 116 fps, while bringing ray tracing in the mix dropped it to 89 fps. Compare that to the CyberPowerPC Gamer Supreme I recently reviewed which also has a RTX 5080, only its an MSI Ventus 3X OC card. On that same run of tests, I saw results of 83, 127, and 92 fps, respectively.
The Falcon continues having a good showing at 4K with 69 fps without DLSS, 108 fps with the feature, and 84 fps with ray tracing enabled. Those are great numbers, but not a match for the Gamer Supreme, which gave me 74 fps sans DLSS 118 with and 95 fps with ray tracing.
Next up, I ran the Cyberpunk 2077 benchmark on Ultra settings, which is notoriously taxing. But the Tiki, powerhouse that it is, handled it gracefully. For our 1080p results, I got an average 189 fps with no effects, a ridiculous 371 fps with DLSS, and 361 fps with ray tracing. This was a closer race with the Gamer Supreme, as it only reached 187 fps without effects, 211 fps with DLSS, and 202 fps with ray tracing added.
At 4K, the Falcon Tiki got 143 fps on the non-effects run, 270 fps with DLSS, and 267 with ray tracing on top. Meanwhile, the Gamer Supreme produced 114, 143 and 139 fps, respectively.
And finally, I ran the Hitman 3 Dartmoor Benchmark on High at 1080p. Sans special sauce, the Tiki notched 122 fps, which rose to 327 fps with DLSS enabled and only gained a frame with ray tracing added to the mix. The Gamer Supreme chewed up the benchmark, starting with 190 sans effects, launching into an unheard of 427 fps with DLSS and 420 fps with ray tracing.
Cranking things up to 4K, the Tiki produced 159, 190, and 191 fps to the CyberPowerPC’s 121, 225, and 224 fps.
Performance
There comes a time in every gamer’s life when they have to put down the controller and use that mouse for something other than headshotting their foes. When that time comes, know that Tiki has you covered with its 2.5-GHz Intel Core Ultra 9 285 processor and its 64GB of RAM. The svelte system seemed to give a sarcastic snort as I unleashed my 70 Google Chrome tabs with an unruly mix of G-Suite apps, social media pages, news sites, and videos. It even kept its cool when I started editing loads of videos. Did the fans get a little loud? Sure, but not so much it was a distraction.
So let’s get into some synthetic benchmarks where the Tiki’s Intel CPU duked it out with the CyberPowerPC’s AMD Ryzen 9800X3D processor. It was a close fight on the PCMark 10 test, but the Gamer Supreme inched out a narrow victory at 9,981 to 9,819. The fight continued on the Geekbench 6 tests, with the CyberPowerPC snatching the win on the single-core round 3,142 to 3,045. However, the Tiki staged a comeback on the multi-core 21,753 to 17,148. The Tiki earned decisive wins on both aspects of the Cinebench 2024 benchmark.
And when it comes to transcoding video, the Tiki is your huckleberry, taking only 2 minutes and 31 seconds to transcode a 4K video to 1080p. The Gamer Supreme took 3:07. The Falcon was also faster on both the CPU and GPU portions of the Blender tests, with times of 1:19 and 1:29 compared to its competition (1:45 and 1:42).
Verdict
Thin’s been in for a while over at Falcon Northwest and with good reason. The company has consistently managed to gracefully fit some of the most powerful components into a seemingly impossible space, without sacrificing power. And while you might be tempted to shuffle the SFF PC off into a tight space never to be heard from again, I implore you to treat it better than that. I got so many comments on how good it looked from the Gizmodo staff, you’d be doing yourself and the Micro-Tower a disservice.
My configuration performed above and beyond expectations and reminded me that everything doesn’t have to be massive to be good. I just wish the pricing were as slim as the Tiki’s dimensions. The Tiki was already expensive, but adding tariffs on top means that only the deepest pocketed gamers can enjoy this slim fatale’s allure. But if you can afford it, the svelte Falcon Northwest Tiki is an awesome pre-built system just waiting to turn heads and kick ass.
