The Myth of Expensive PC Gaming
- Thread starter tehrik-e-insaaf
- Start date
Upgrading/building (usually pretty much the same for me) I usually do once every three years or so, and I spend no time building these days, I let a store do it for me and give me a warranty on the build, maintaining I spend basically no time, maybe 5 minutes on a driver install every few months. Tweaking I spend probably 2 minutes on your average new game with settings and what not, or up to several hours with games that require me to fight my router to let me play online. Those would be the times when I really despise the platform and wonder why I bother with it.DjangoReinhardt said:
Mr Killemgood
Member
Maybe it's just me but......
You can argue whatever you like, but getting a game to play decently on a PC is far more expensive than consoles, in most every case.
If I wanted to go out.....And buy a PC to play Mass Effect...How much am I going to spend? If I want to play it on a console..How much am I going to spend?
$200 on September the 7th can get me a crapload of gaming for that price, and a ton of new cutting edge titles. What kind of cutting edge titles will a $200 PC get me? Not to mention the difference between hooking said X360 up to any TV I want, and pay nothing versus buying a monitor that will not be in my living room anything non-PC.
If your an uber-elitist on either side of the coin, you can get a cheap rig, but the consoles are always cheaper. I am still gaming on the same Xbox 360 I paid $150 on launch day, November 22nd, 2005...Can't say that about my PCs
You can argue whatever you like, but getting a game to play decently on a PC is far more expensive than consoles, in most every case.
If I wanted to go out.....And buy a PC to play Mass Effect...How much am I going to spend? If I want to play it on a console..How much am I going to spend?
$200 on September the 7th can get me a crapload of gaming for that price, and a ton of new cutting edge titles. What kind of cutting edge titles will a $200 PC get me? Not to mention the difference between hooking said X360 up to any TV I want, and pay nothing versus buying a monitor that will not be in my living room anything non-PC.
If your an uber-elitist on either side of the coin, you can get a cheap rig, but the consoles are always cheaper. I am still gaming on the same Xbox 360 I paid $150 on launch day, November 22nd, 2005...Can't say that about my PCs
McBradders
NeoGAF: my new HOME
Mr Killemgood said:Maybe it's just me but......
You can argue whatever you like, but getting a game to play decently on a PC is far more expensive than consoles, in most every case.
If I wanted to go out.....And buy a PC to play Mass Effect...How much am I going to spend? If I want to play it on a console..How much am I going to spend?
$200 on September the 7th can get me a crapload of gaming for that price, and a ton of new cutting edge titles. What kind of cutting edge titles will a $200 PC get me? Not to mention the difference between hooking said X360 up to any TV I want, and pay nothing versus buying a monitor that will not be in my living room anything non-PC.
If your an uber-elitist on either side of the coin, you can get a cheap rig, but the consoles are always cheaper. I am still gaming on the same Xbox 360 I paid $150 on launch day, November 22nd, 2005...Can't say that about my PCs
You paid $150 for a 360... on launch day?!
OK.
Mr Killemgood
Member
Bought 2, sold one, and the end result was a $150 X360 
Stoney Mason
Banned
Mr Killemgood said:Maybe it's just me but......
You can argue whatever you like, but getting a game to play decently on a PC is far more expensive than consoles, in most every case.
If I wanted to go out.....And buy a PC to play Mass Effect...How much am I going to spend? If I want to play it on a console..How much am I going to spend?
$200 on September the 7th can get me a crapload of gaming for that price, and a ton of new cutting edge titles. What kind of cutting edge titles will a $200 PC get me? Not to mention the difference between hooking said X360 up to any TV I want, and pay nothing versus buying a monitor that will not be in my living room anything non-PC.
If your an uber-elitist on either side of the coin, you can get a cheap rig, but the consoles are always cheaper. I am still gaming on the same Xbox 360 I paid $150 on launch day, November 22nd, 2005...Can't say that about my PCs
hmmm.....
Mr Killemgood said:Maybe it's just me but......
You can argue whatever you like, but getting a game to play decently on a PC is far more expensive than consoles, in most every case.
If I wanted to go out.....And buy a PC to play Mass Effect...How much am I going to spend? If I want to play it on a console..How much am I going to spend?
$200 on September the 7th can get me a crapload of gaming for that price, and a ton of new cutting edge titles. What kind of cutting edge titles will a $200 PC get me? Not to mention the difference between hooking said X360 up to any TV I want, and pay nothing versus buying a monitor that will not be in my living room anything non-PC.
If your an uber-elitist on either side of the coin, you can get a cheap rig, but the consoles are always cheaper. I am still gaming on the same Xbox 360 I paid $150 on launch day, November 22nd, 2005...Can't say that about my PCs
About 80$ or so on top of a fairly recent family computer, fairly recent being bought in the last couple of years. PC+video card is far cheaper than PC+console, that's when PC gaming is at it's best value. When you can't get that though, an Xbox360+more expensive games+paying for Live+expensive peripherals does a lot more to close the gap between the Xbox360 and PC upgrades than the console fans will admit.
Mr Killemgood said:
If you are only interested in buying a device to specifically play one video game (or even a handful of games), and don't care what you're connecting it to, then of course a console is going to be cheaper.
However, most people are still going to buy a PC because that device is not limited to just gaming. It should then become a decision of how much more you would spend creating (or buying) a PC that is capable of gaming over a PC that would suit whatever other needs you need it to fill, and comparing that to what you would spend getting a console set up. In that respect, PC gaming is very comparable to console gaming in terms of cost.
Historically going five years with only a video card upgrade in the middle would be pushing it. At around 4 years the cpu/mobo/ram combo would be starting to really show its age and limiting any newer card you put in. I guess it depends a lot on how serious you are about framerate and resolution, but towards the end of five years things are going to be really ugly and you are going to be missing out on some games (imagine a PC from 2002 trying to run crysis with a geforce 6800).
Thankfully developers seem to be less focused on pushing the boundaries these days and are targetting midrange and older systems a lot more so hopefully the longevity of gaming PCs will improve.
Thankfully developers seem to be less focused on pushing the boundaries these days and are targetting midrange and older systems a lot more so hopefully the longevity of gaming PCs will improve.
When PCs can be bought in fully completed form capable of being considered a high end system for under 800$, then i think this thread would be worth something. For now, the majority of people dont know how/dont have the time and patience to buy parts individually and put them together to save the money. And they shouldn't have to anyway. So blame all the premium being put on the stuff accessible for the majority and not the hardcore pc tinkering crowd.
Teknopathetic
Member
"...
and strategy games... and shooters, and flight sims... and adventure games...and do I even have to go on?"
None of those games are any good until they're rumored to get ported to consoles.
and strategy games... and shooters, and flight sims... and adventure games...and do I even have to go on?"
None of those games are any good until they're rumored to get ported to consoles.
At least that just doesn't happen to PC games.Teknopathetic said:
I mean, people who don't have 360's but have PS3's are actually started to hype Eternal Sonata of all things!
(Well, not really the same thing, ES sucks whilst most of the rumours of PC games are about the good games.)If you want to bring buying and selling into this, you realize that the same holds true for PC hardware, right?Mr Killemgood said:Bought 2, sold one, and the end result was a $150 X360
For example, I bought a 7900GS for $200, sold my 6800GT for $150. More than doubled my graphics performance for $50.
Bought an 8800GT for $200-250, sold my 7900GS for about $100-150. Easily tripled my performance, maybe even more, for a good $100.
Of course, neither of those upgrades were necessary for their time - I could have kept the old hardware and continued playing games, but hey, I have the money, and I'm more than happy to spend it for a better experience. But it didn't cost me much at all, and with consoles, if I have a shitty frame rate or resolution, I'm forced to stick with it.
Point is, you can buy/sell hardware no matter what platform you're on. The argument is irrelevant.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
The problem there is that if you don't even know how to replace your GPU you're not going to be able to keep up with advances in PC hardware without buying a brand new computer. So your choices would be to either buy a new one and complain about how costly PC gaming is or fall behind and complain about how you need a supercomputer to run everything. Which is the type of behavior that inspired this thread in the first place.Vaporak said:
Gully State
Member
~Kinggi~ said:
news flash... you don't need to be in some super secret PC tinkering society in order to build a computer. Go to your bookstore and look in the magazine rack, chances are there's a magazine there that gives you a step by step (with PICTURES) on how to build a computer. Just like everything else in real life, if you do the research, you'll save some bucks.
ymmv said:
Umm, coming out soon, and already out?
Anyone who does keep up with PC hardware knows when to expect new GPUs to launch (we are given roadmaps by companies), so we can time our purchases if we're in the market for new hardware to this.
Also as for buying a pre-built PC, many places in Australia, which deal with parts (MSY/Umart etc here), allow you to purchase all the parts in a specific place, and pay an extra $50AU to have them build it for you.
Stoney Mason
Banned
Won said:
C'mon now.
The other myth of PC gaming is the resolution difference is never accounted for. Like 99% of PS3/360 games are 720p OR LESS.
Now cheap gaming cards like the 8800GT (~$120) and HD4850 (~$150) can run even Crysis on High everything smoothly at 1280x720 at 40+FPS avg. Any other game could be run maxed at 60fps avg or better, probably with 2xAA as well. For example, Call of Duty 4 maxed out with 4xAA @ 1680x1050 can be run at 75FPS avg with an HD4850, while the consoles are running it at something like 1068x600 to get it to 60FPS. Bioshock can be run at 100FPS avg with 0xAA at 1680x1050 on an HD4850, while it was 30fps on 360 at 1280x720.
The problem is the "standard" resolution of PC gamers has been moving up, and a ton of people game at 1680x1050 due to the wide appeal of cheap ~$200 22" LCD monitors (which are like $20 more than 1440x900 19" and 1280x1024 20" monitors) and since 1680x1050 is roughly double the pixels of 1280x720, it naturally requires more powerful hardware.
If you built a PC with the intention of sitting it under your TV and using it like a dedicated gaming console (Windows XP SP3 + games, Steam, nothing else installed), you could build a PC that performs much better than a PS3/360 would at the same 720p resolution for like $500. The games would also be $10-20 cheaper.
Now cheap gaming cards like the 8800GT (~$120) and HD4850 (~$150) can run even Crysis on High everything smoothly at 1280x720 at 40+FPS avg. Any other game could be run maxed at 60fps avg or better, probably with 2xAA as well. For example, Call of Duty 4 maxed out with 4xAA @ 1680x1050 can be run at 75FPS avg with an HD4850, while the consoles are running it at something like 1068x600 to get it to 60FPS. Bioshock can be run at 100FPS avg with 0xAA at 1680x1050 on an HD4850, while it was 30fps on 360 at 1280x720.
The problem is the "standard" resolution of PC gamers has been moving up, and a ton of people game at 1680x1050 due to the wide appeal of cheap ~$200 22" LCD monitors (which are like $20 more than 1440x900 19" and 1280x1024 20" monitors) and since 1680x1050 is roughly double the pixels of 1280x720, it naturally requires more powerful hardware.
If you built a PC with the intention of sitting it under your TV and using it like a dedicated gaming console (Windows XP SP3 + games, Steam, nothing else installed), you could build a PC that performs much better than a PS3/360 would at the same 720p resolution for like $500. The games would also be $10-20 cheaper.
Gully State
Member
Won said:What? You push something in there, grab the old card and put the new in. Thats like toasting.
Of course it was exaggerated. Let's say it is as easy as...replacing a HD of a X360, because that was hard. -.-
It really is that easy. The only part that's intimidating is seating the heat sink+fan on your CPU.
Gully State
Member
Zzoram said:
I remember Kosma's $399 PC played everything COD4, Bioshock etc.. at those settings.
$399 PC Thread
Won said:What? You push something in there, grab the old card and put the new in. Thats like toasting.
Of course it was exaggerated. Let's say it is as easy as...replacing a HD of a X360, because that was hard. -.-
Ya, building a computer isn't hard at all, the instructions are in the manuals. There are guides online with pictures. Everything only fits in the slot they are supposed to go into. Chances are, the only screws you will ever use are to hold the motherboard to your case, and to open/close the case, and to keep the HDD and DVD-RW from sliding around (these screws go into pre-made holes and are included with the case, so it's not hard to figure out).
It is scary the first time, and putting the CPU and it's HSF on is probably the scariest part, but other than that it's easy.
If you're lazy, just get a Dell XPS 420, it's not really much more expensive than building your own computer. There is an US$899 model that comes with a Q6600, 4GB DDR2, 9800GT 512mb (basically an overclocked 8800GT), 500GB harddrive and 16x DVD-RW. No monitor though. It's a great buy for a gaming PC if you are afraid to build it yourself, and probably only costs $100 more than it would to build it yourself. For that, you get it pre-made and customer support and warranty handled through Dell (which is easier than individual part manufacturer support, which can be ok to bad).
Stoney Mason
Banned
Won said:What? You push something in there, grab the old card and put the new in. Thats like toasting.
Of course it was exaggerated. Let's say it is as easy as...replacing a HD of a X360, because that was hard. -.-
I think a lot of people would have a hard time with that...
A lot of you guys really are over-estimating casual consumers. Open a computer. Installing a video card. Installing a new power supply as the case may be. Installing the software. And properly setting up the video card is a major job for average joe. That's not to mention what happens once you install the software and getitng that to work properly.
I'm not saying it's rocket science but it's also not like operating a VCR or toasting toast. It's an acquired skill and you have to have a lot of preknowledge before you do these things.
Gully State
Member
Stoney Mason said:
no...it's more like putting together a bicycle or a piece of furniture from ikea. You don't need to understand how a computer works in order to put it together.
Stoney Mason
Banned
Gully State said:
But it's not. There are more interactions going on especially on the software side even after you do the installation. That's why the common joke is that it's hard to put together a piece an ikea furniture. (See the Wire).
And putting together a computer is even more difficult than that and requires more knowledge.
Stoney Mason
Banned
Zzoram said:
There's a 360 dig in there
And that is at least almost like putting in a piece of taste as mainly it's hitting a button. Removing a piece and inserting another one. No wires. No connecting it to a power supply. No figuring out which slot it goes into. And no software to handle on the other side.
Stoney Mason
Banned
Zzoram said:
Once again my argument isn't that it's a mystic science or it's impossible. It's that once you start factoring in issues that's why some (alot) of people make the choice to game on a console. That $900 dell is a bigger outlay of money initially. It takes more knowledge and dedication to use that Pc correctly. The argument isnt't is the PC better than a console. That's an individual call. I love both. It's trying to explain why for Joe Six Pack an average PC is both more expensive and more complicated for him to game on. You have to put yourself in his shoes.
Gully State
Member
Stoney Mason said:
the computer I'm currently typing on is/was my first build and I took the plunge myself without any prior experience. I pieced everything together using the Asus mobo manual as a guide. Software side was just as simple as once I was able to boot it up, just pop in the windows disc and you're golden. I have heard stories though that building a computer more than 5 years ago was difficult as you would have to fudge with things like jumper settings and etc..
I'll agree that most people don't want to/are intimidated by the prospect of building a computer but actually doing it is a fairly simple project. But then this really has nothing to do with price of PC gaming. I'll always concede that consoles are more convenient for gaming than PC's.
Gully State
Member
SRG01 said:
I've never done any maintenance on my car...
Stoney Mason
Banned
Gully State said:
If most of you guys have a wide range of friends (a lot whom aren't tech saavy) you must have the experience of being the go to guy for these people when something goes wrong on their machines. And generally it's something relatively simple and I'm certainly no computer expert myself but by comparison I'm Bill Gates. These people like to play games. But there is a lot of ways for them to screw it up on the PC or for things not to work. That just isn't the case with a console for the most part. And that's the key difference. Often times the cost of a computer alone makes them even less likely to want to dig around in one. They don't want to break their $1000 dollar investment.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
It's not that it's hard. It's that the risk is intimidating. PCs are costly and have sensitive components that can be destroyed by something as minor as static electricity. Any decent how-to guide will inform the consumer of that right from the beginning.Won said:
I'm thinking the opposite, but only for cultural reasons. I'm sure someone capable of one is physically and mentally capable of doing the other (but lacks the confidence and motivation to learn how).SRG01 said:
Stoney Mason said:
It's funny but I've got some Joe Six Pack friends (hyperactive, work out a lot, went to school for police foundations and works as security guard) that want to blow tons of money on gaming PCs because they enjoy stuff like Company of Heroes, Supreme Commanderm STALKER and Crysis. They also loves playing FPS, both on Xbox 360 and PC. I think they just have more awareness of the positives of PC gaming, while not really being any more knowledgeable about computers than your average Joe.
SapientWolf said:
I know that can happen, but back in the day, I transferred a stick of 128mb SDRAM from one PC to another, across a carpetted house, wearing socks, with no anti-static anything, and nothing happened. We have pretty humid air though, and I think static is more of an issue in really dry environments.
Gully State said:
Pretty much seals the thread. With access to the internet and dozens of PC forums. It's not hard to learn and do it yourself. Yeah, you do not want to screw things up but there are many people nice enough to guide you through the process if need be. I learned more about PCs than I ever did in the last year by going to several sites. While I still have lots to learn, I'm much more confident in doing things myself. No more having to buy cases of beer for guys at work for putting together builds for me.
Stoney Mason
Banned
Zzoram said:
Both versions of Joe Six Packs exist. It really isn't an argument where my generalization or your generalization accurately describes everybody. They both exist. The debate probably is closer to which Joe Six Pack is more common.
If anyone checks the PC thread, I am obviously with the PC crowed, and PC gaming.
However building a computer isn't easy for someone who knows nothing about it. Some people can just pick up a book and figure it out, others can't.
There is a lot to know to really understand what you are doing, or fix problems if they occur. It can be as easy as reading online for a week, understand the layout of a motherboard, then snapping everything into place. However it can also become a time consuming nightmare, which turns into one of the most frustraiting ordeals of your life.
This is why many of the popular computer forums are filled with questions from people who are having issues.
It takes lots of reading, and learning to pick all the parts yourserlf, and build a good gaming computer. It also takes a lot to ask a person to just copy a list from the Internet.
So I can understand console gamers having a problem with that.
However what I can't understand. Is why it's so hard to go to a LOCAL PC shop, not bestbuy or any other major chain. Just go to a local PC shop, tell them what you want, and they will build you something for the same price you can order it online for. They make money on the Vendor discount, just like Newegg or Ncix does.
Plus a computer is far more useful then a console, it servers many different purposes, and will have paid for iteself in no time.
However building a computer isn't easy for someone who knows nothing about it. Some people can just pick up a book and figure it out, others can't.
There is a lot to know to really understand what you are doing, or fix problems if they occur. It can be as easy as reading online for a week, understand the layout of a motherboard, then snapping everything into place. However it can also become a time consuming nightmare, which turns into one of the most frustraiting ordeals of your life.
This is why many of the popular computer forums are filled with questions from people who are having issues.
It takes lots of reading, and learning to pick all the parts yourserlf, and build a good gaming computer. It also takes a lot to ask a person to just copy a list from the Internet.
So I can understand console gamers having a problem with that.
However what I can't understand. Is why it's so hard to go to a LOCAL PC shop, not bestbuy or any other major chain. Just go to a local PC shop, tell them what you want, and they will build you something for the same price you can order it online for. They make money on the Vendor discount, just like Newegg or Ncix does.
Plus a computer is far more useful then a console, it servers many different purposes, and will have paid for iteself in no time.