Once again it's come around to that time of year where you decide which products we reviewed in the last 12 months have been your favourite. You may have liked them due to their raw performance, extensive feature set or our of this world styling, but there has to be a winner for each of the ten categories shortlisted this year.

If 2011 was a markee year for performance milestones and huge innovation, 2012 will become known for refinements to excellence, where product ranges have been tweaked to near perfection after listening to customer and reviewer feedback. Once again there are some clear winners, with some surprises and disagreements along the way, but without a doubt they are idiosyncratic to the Vortez community.

Best Of 2012 - CPU: Intel Core i7-3770K



A bitter struggle between two Intel CPUs was finally won by the Quad-core unlocked i7. Intel's Ivy Bridge Architecture was released in late April and built on the immense instructions-per-clock improvements seen in the Sandy Bridge generation of CPUs. The new 22nm architecture reduced TDP and tweaked IPC upwards, but the largest gains were seen in the graphics modules, which saw huge strides for integrated graphics to be built on in 2013. Paired with the latest Z77 motherboard, there is surely no faster enthusiast level gaming set-up on the market right now.

Best of 2012 - CPU Cooler: Corsair Hydro Series H100i



In a dominant performance the Corsair H100i takes the mantle of Best CPU Cooler from its predecessor the H100. Released in November, we initially wondered if the H100i was a mere cosmetic update to already exceptional H100; it would have been difficult to be more wrong. David stated outright that it "outperforms anything we have yet tested," and that covers a substantial number, but air and liquid. With the radiator mounting limitation swiftly ceasing to be a factor thanks to the latest range of PC chassis, voters could not be put off. It achieved a Gold Award in testing, and goes on to win Best CPU Cooler 2012.

Best of 2012 - Motherboard: GIGABYTE X79-UP4



Designed for Intel Sandy Bridge-E CPU's, this Socket-2011 motherboard was one of the most affordable in the range. It's designed to be very much a workhorse in the theme of Sandy Bridge-E as a whole, but has top-notch black and grey aesthetics usually seen on much more high-end models. The UP4 was also supported by GIGABYTES Ultra-Durable 5 technology, promising durability and longevity as well as excellent stock performance; new BIOS updates have also improved overclocking potential following our review. The X79-UP4 is a great starting point for a more affordable Sandy Bridge-E system.