Food for Thought…is buying high end PC videocard dumb?

For most people it makes more sense to go for a midrange setup. The cheapest stuff is usually flawed and the top end is way overpriced. This is true for almost any product in my experience.
 
I have s 4090 and I love it. Though I also understand how dumb buying a high end GPU is. I paid 1699€ for mine. The 3000€ 5090 are too much even for me though.

Although, it needs to be understood that even something like a 4090 isn't able to run the heaviest games without frame gen. I can crank every setting to the max at 4K (with DLSS on quality) in something like Cyberpunk 2077, but as soon as I turn on path tracing, I'm gonna have to turn on frame gen to be able to get high frame rates.

I'd say the most I've gotten out of the card is with modding and the high amount of VRAM these higher end cards have. Being able to throw high res texture mods at games and never run out of VRAM is pretty enjoyable.
 
It's only dumb if you can't afford it, everyone has different views on value for money, personally I think it's ludicrous to spend £2000 on a single component to play videogames when the graphics aren't that much better £££ wise than what I'm seeing and playing on my PS5... 8000fps aye of course you can notice the difference mate... But that's me, I've seen plenty of people spend way more on stupider shit
 
Depends if the enjoyment is worth the funds. For some its not a lot of money for countless hours of entertainment.

However the prices for GPU's have gotten ridiculous lately and wouldn't ever spend over £900 on a GPU. A price they should've been capped at for top end SKU's - outside Titans.

With that said this generation has been a dud so far with barely any uplift and feels more like a refresh more than anything.
 
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My philosophy for GPUs is buy what makes
sense to you.

Do you want to play games at the highest possible resolution and frames? Then buy the 5090.

I always stick with the XX80. Its generally the best compromise of power consumption, heat, price and performance.

I would pay for the XX90 if the power consumption/heat is equal to the 80 series. The price does not matter for me. I just don't enjoy my room being heated up by 4-5C in the summer lol.

Diminishing returns are real though. For 99% of people getting a XX70 Ti would give you best bang for buck. With DLSS transformer I have no reason to upgrade my GPU every time a new line is released.
 
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Being a full on PC gamer, with no other consoles or handhelds, I think it's a good investment. Not just for gaming, but for content creation, emulation, mods, work stuff as well as the hobbyist side of building the PC. You could argue that it's completely unnecessary to spend ~£5K on PC parts, but when you want to play at 4K on a nice fat OLED display, I think it's fine.

As so many in the thread have mentioned, if you can afford it and it makes you happy... no problemo. I also don't drink or smoke, so I say... To each their own.
 
If you have the money why not. high end GPUs were always for the uber wealthy to some extent so increased prices arent a big deal

The issue is that the midrange is getting fucked over too and prices for that are high as well.
 
TexMex said:
Is buying a high end video card dumb? Use this overly compressed shit quality youtube video to make your decision!
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Exactly of course low setting looks fine from a YouTube video. My eyes bleed when I have to turn down the setting to get Alan Wake 2 playable
 
It's dumb but it's no more dumb than buying a new $60k truck when you'd be fine with a $25k used vehicle, or buying a $500k home when you'd be fine with a $250k home, or buying a $300 pair of shoes when a $100 pair would do the same job, or buying a sealed copy of a game or console or figurine that you never intend to open just to add it to your "collection", or a million other things that are "dumb" to buy.


Virtually everyone buys dumb shit constantly. Who cares ? Let people do what they want with their own money.
 
I was told there'd be food.
enough of that GIF
 
Its not dumb to spend your money the way you want,

Whats dumb is to come to Neogaf and shit on consoles because you need to validate your purchases.
 
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I think some people believe it's worth buying high end because they can afford it. There certainly are differences when playing on very high config but once you're done flexing to a group of people you don't personally know on the internet, like Neogaf or to your family and friends who probably don't give a fuck about your computer, well, you are left with your shitty games you don't even play. Ended up impressing nobody but your own ego.
 
Ceadeus said:
I think some people believe it's worth buying high end because they can afford it. There certainly are differences when playing on very high config but once you're done flexing to a group of people you don't personally know on the internet, like Neogaf or to your family and friends who probably don't give a fuck about your computer, well, you are left with your shitty games you don't even play. Ended up impressing nobody but your own ego.
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Well, I can assure you that my GPU purchases is not based on trying to "impress" anyone.
And my ego has nothing to to with it either.
 
Ceadeus said:
I think some people believe it's worth buying high end because they can afford it. There certainly are differences when playing on very high config but once you're done flexing to a group of people you don't personally know on the internet, like Neogaf or to your family and friends who probably don't give a fuck about your computer, well, you are left with your shitty games you don't even play. Ended up impressing nobody but your own ego.
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The only one that should be impressed with the experience is the one playing, so...
 
It is a dumb idea, unless you actually have the cash for it and can burn the money. Rich folks here who put down 4k+ for graphics will tell you otherwise.

I have been having a great time with 1080p displays, tvs and its been fine. My 3060ti that I got in 2021 after a step up from a 2060 and a 1060 before that, has been superb. I haven't played anything that has given it trouble, let alone something that drops frames in the 20s or 30s.

I come from the OG days of graphics cards. Back in the 3dfx Voodoo 2 - Voodoo 5 days where $400 was the top end, and shit even in 2008-2016 $500 would of gotten you in the top end for gaming cards. I remember cards that were top end struggling with Quake 3. you don't see that type of thing today. Of course, we don't have many top end AAA pc exclusives pushing boundaries like back then either. Too me back then it was the growth of the 3d platform, and it made sense to spend a bit more, now not so much. We aren't seeing the technical leaps like we did.

The titan brought in the $1000 card and everyone thought that was a rip-op, now people here buy 2k+ 3090, 4090, 5090 cards like its chump change. Lets not even get into the amount of heat and energy is required to run them just to get a 4k image. A jump from 1080p to 4k on a small screen is way less noticeable than going from 640x480 to 800x600 -> 1024 x 768 or widescreen resolutions of 1280 x 720p

How much better is that 4k image on a 22"-27" screen. I doubt it's that noticeable. A oled or 1440p screen may actually look more pleasing and require less horsepower to run properly.

People on here talk about pc gaming being expensive to get into. It's really not.
I can go upgrade my pc right now for all components and bring over my monitor, kb/m and gpu and i can get away with spending under $500 for that. Which would be like buying a console. If I didn't have that i could spend another $400-500 for the XX60 series gpu and monitor. $900-1000 for mid range gaming pc is not a bad deal and falls in line with what it cost back in the day too. A XX80 or XX90 series card is not needed, unless you absolutely have to have 4k resolutions, or multiple monitors spanning games. Sweet spot is really the xx60ti or xx70 series cards.

It also depends on what you play too. I play a lot of 4x strategy, city builders and roguelikes on pc, none of these games need the graphics power to run. more cpu than anything. Still if I want to play cyberpunk, BG3 or elden ring, my rig runs them no problem.
 
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It's not dumb if high end provides enough of a perf/price uplift - which Nvidia GPUs has been doing since 2080Ti then there was a gap in 30 series and then with 4090 and 5090 it makes sense again.
 
Danjin44 said:
If you have money to burn then why not. I'm not tech geek enough that I'm willing spend that much money for graphics but there are people who are and more than happy to spend lot of money to get latest tech.
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The problem is , them being willing to spend, does that raise the prices for everyone? Does nvidia and AMD see people spending 2k and think well "we can get away with it"? In the past they would of questioned putting out a high end card breaking $800, and mid range was in the 200-300 range. Now everything is more and they can't keep stock.
 
Shadowstar39 said:
How much better is that 4k image on a 22"-27" screen. I doubt it's that noticeable. A oled or 1440p screen may actually look more pleasing and require less horsepower to run properly.
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Most folks who want 4K play at 32" or larger monitors.
The difference between 1440p and 4K on a 32" oled screen is pretty big for my eyes at least.
I had a 27" 1440p OLED earlier and a 32" 4K OLED now. The difference is pretty clear.
 
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Unknown Soldier said:
Food for thought:

Is buying a Porsche dumb?

The answer is no, if you can appreciate what a car that is amazing to drive feels like
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It's not enough to just buy the Porsche. The Porsche also requires a lot of money to maintain. This means it always has to go to a Porsche workshop since there are no parts available on the secondary market, meaning from other manufacturers. There are only original parts, and they are expensive. Additionally, insurance and taxes are also costly.
 
I don't think PC gaming has anywhere near the value it used to. The biggest issue is the games. The unique high-end PC game that you need great hardware to play doesn't exist anymore and hasn't for a long time. You really only get better looking versions of console games, except the gap between PC and console is not what it used to be graphically, while the cost gap has grown enormously.

I just don't see it anymore and I say this as someone who has been playing PC games for a long time. I primarily use my PC to play strategy games.
 
I rode the wave from 1070 to 1080 to 1080ti to 2070 to 3080 to 4090. Then I switched over to playing consoles more, just due to personal preference, simplicity, and riding the economies of scale wave for performance. Somewhere along the line having max framerate/resolution/ textures wasn't a priority for me.

I dumped the 4090 and put the 3080 that I had held on to back. While I did enjoy being able to throw everything I could at a 4K tv with the 4090 I figured that holding onto it wasn't worth it to me as it wasn't getting the use to warrant it and I might as well sell it while I could recoup the cost.

But is paying a lot for high end gaming worth it, sure if PC gaming is your main platform, you enjoy the PC gaming environment and you can afford it then why not. Overall though something along the lines of the 60 rtx series provides good value at 1080/1440p.

As for myself, I kind of see myself not getting dedicated pcs anymore after the one I have now. I figure keeping up with the best hardware options for consoles and something like a Steamdeck device for PC only titles is the way forward for me.

At least for now 😂
 
Gaming is possible on these but people also forget the tasks that are more demanding can also be run on them.

Folding@home.
Mining crypto before things changed.
rendering films and other things.
Running AI models.
Prolly a load of other simulation and science stuff.
 
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After the (very short) honeymoon period wears off, you'll grow accustomed to the experience (like most purchases). Soon it won't feel so special, but you'll be down the $2k regardless.
 
Even if you have the disposable income, my answer is that it is dumb, but with a caveat that buying GPUs at all right now is dumb. The reason I say this is that NVIDIA is one of the greediest companies on the planet, and these GPUs are only being sold at the price point they are at because people keep buying them. I don't begrudge you your 4090 or 5090, OverHeat OverHeat , but you are contributing to the astronomical price for GPUs, and NVIDIA is only going to be able to sell them at greater and greater prices as long as people keep buying them.

I thought the 3090 price was ridiculous, and the only reason I bought it was because I was able to sell my RTX 2080 TI for $1300 of the $1600 MSRP, and I was able to find the 3090 at MSRP. That was when the GPU shortage was in full-swing, and I probably could have got even more out of it if I hadn't included a Buy It Now option on the eBay listing. Without that, I would have stuck with the 2080 TI because $1,600 is a retarded price to pay for a graphics card.

Having said all of this, my solution (that people stop buying GPUs until NVIDIA gets their shit together and prices them at a reasonable value) is unreasonable as there is no way that enough people are going to band together against NVIDIA to make them reconsider their prices. People are impulsive and selfish, and almost everyone thinks something along the lines of, "My purchase doesn't matter. If I don't buy it someone else will, so my boycott is meaningless. I may as well just buy it now."
 
I do think it has become dumb. Hobbies are usually expensive but some hobbies are beyond my ability.
It has become like the auto brands.
Toyota Corolla all the way up to Lexus
Nvidia has become like Hundai
Cheap modes all the way up to high end but then they saw they had an ultra luxury buyers and made an even higher brand Genesis.

edit-Rather Nvidia is like Toyota with the super Lux Century brand. :)
 
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If lighting 3k on fire would have no discernable impact on your present and future financial situation, and you want it go for it.

If you're putting in on a credit card that you won't be able to pay off at the end of the much, not so much. Everything in between, well, it depends.
 
Yes.
If you can't tell the difference with your own eyes, if the game you like to play the most don't really take full advantage of it, if the most expensive cards are also the most prone to high level failure, then yes, it's as dumb as you could be. Just because you usually need to spend more to get a better experience, doesn't mean the most expensive is the best. It gets to a point of diminishing returns, and if you go beyond that curve, you are just a sucker for shit companies trying to exploit the dumb are pushing on the market.
 
Mister Wolf said:
I bought a RTX 4090 on Dec 15, 2022 when it was at the top. As of right now it's the second most powerful GPU available.
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And I assume that it will still be upper middle class when the 60X0 class of GPUs gets released.
So one could play on it for at least 6, maybe 8 years and still get great graphics. Probably one of the few excuses to spend so much is that you can keep it for longer...
 
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Crayon said:
Most of us splurge on something, and most cant splurge on everything. For me, the more exspensive cards were never too enticing. I feel like i got the last decent deal in a long time and im not buying anything at the current prices. Even at msrp, $400 for a 4060 is not attractive at all. the performance level is fine for me but that price is steep for nothing special.

9070 for $550? eehhhh.... a $600 9070 xt only looks as good as it does because the situation seems bleak. idk if amd can make enough and downstream effects of tariffs are up in the air.

$1000+? yeah i'm out. That's diminishing returns territory, for my taste.
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For me it's similar, anything above the best console available price wise enters the diminishing returns territory, and I think this is more and more noticeable as years pass due to developing budgets, reconstruction techniques etc.

But hey, if some people want to spend 3000 and 600W/h of power to play "the best experience" (ie some extra resolution, path tracing and frames) it's their money, it's just not for me, life is very expensive right now.
 
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