Poll: Gaming PCs Cost vs Performance?

[migo]

Im really not going to get too deep into posting about parts and pcs cause I could cause a war with every word.

Im just going to say that when you choose bleeding edge top of the line you get to a point of diminishing returns.

I'm also finding that to be the case at the lowest end. For instance, if I look on NewEgg and budget $100 per component, I can put together a system that easily handles Civilization V's hefty system requirements, but if I drop down to the cheapest I can possibly go I'm only saving $40/component and it only meets the minimum requirements. It's $120 total difference, but with that I'd rather spend just a little bit extra up front and get quite a bit more for my money.

With a Netbook I go for the bottom that gets me what I need (so I paid $224 after tax), since there's no way performance will ever be enough, but for a gaming PC, just slightly above the base price does it.

It's also rather hard to go second hand right now thanks to PCI-E, all the second hand systems run on AGP which is a dead end.

 

[Treblaine]

Price/performance is the king as long as you have monetary constraints.

This is true, but everyone is different, in both budget and preferences.

Indeed. But according to very basic microtheory of economics, people use money to satisfy different needs and wants. These needs and wants have different weight. Having a top-of-the-line gaming computer is rarely among the top needs or wants ; people would rather use money to buy a car, a better apartment, go for a holiday etc. And that means, for those of us who aren't obscenely rich or among the very very top of the PC-gaming enthusiasts, we try to see if we are getting good price/performance for our computer. Because as we start improving the build, we are seeing less and less increase in performance for a steep rise in cost. ANd as long as the build does what we want it to, we can be quite unwilling to pay those almost exponentially increasing prices for the absolute newest stuff. Because components that are 6-12 months old are more than sufficient (from our point of view) but are simply incompareable in price/performance ratio.

And once we have the computer, many of us are unwilling to upgrade it within the year, or three or even six. After all, you don't buy a new TV every few years. In return, we are more than prepared to accept that we aren't having the top-of-the-line stuff. Because we'd rather spend our hard-earned money elsewhere.

Funny you should say that as I started this thread:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.224268-Challenge-1000-on-Gaming-entertainment-from-scratch?page=1

That's a moderate sum of $1000 for ALL of your electronic gaming and entertainment needs.

See I notice a lot of people saying "oh consoles are so much better value" tend to be teenagers living at home using either their parent's HDTV or a HDTV that was bought for them. HDTVs are SOOO EXPENSIVE and playing a console on a cheap + small monitor... well... you might as well be playing on a PC in that case.

I found in the thread the majority of respondents would rather get a gaming PC + monitor + old console than a HDTV + console + old computer, when there is a limited budget and they aren't casually excluding major components from consideration (like a HDTV).

I'd like to start another Poll asking people would they rather live without a TV or without a PC?

Which would you choose? I know which I'd choose.

But ultimately I thing more people choose console gaming because they are Lazy Idiots. They can't look at costs of things overall and they are too lazy to bother any more than a ready made PC using ready-installed programs.

Hell, the reason Internet Explorer is the most popular browser in the world is it is pre-installed on every windows machine and hundreds of millions of people can't be bothered to find an alternative or they "don't want it to be different".

 

[TerribleAssassin]

I'd build my own if I could fund it, so I'll settle with a bog-standerd normal market PC.

 

[Treblaine]

Also, Name change. ^^

I don't get it

 

[Noobstick]

Better value to buy one step off the top of the line. 90% performance for 60% price? Hell yes.

Agreed 100%. I built the rig (mobo, GPU, power supply, everything that goes in the actual case. 4850 with a beefy dual core and 2gigs of RAM) I'm currently posting on for <500 euros 2 years ago and it still runs most games on medium-high settings at 1600*900 just fine so I really have no idea what people are going on about when they drop over a grand on their machines and expect everyone else to do the same.

Building a computer is really all about picking components with a good quality-to-price ratio that will be easy to replace later on. I guess it's fair game if people really can't be bothered to learn how to build a machine or even find someone who can do it for them, but it'd be really great if we could finally get over this nonsense about gaming PCs costing an arm and a leg.

 

[darth gditch]

I suppose I would build my own pc if I knew how to. But seeing as I don't, I went with an Alienware. I'm happy with it, it was expensive, but better than buying, say, 1000 USD worth of RAM, motherboard, graphics card and what have you and then not being able to put it together. So I would say that a gaming computer is worth it if you have no real way of building your own.

 

[e2density]

According to Steam statistics, my PC is one of the top 10% PC's out of all Steam Users...
And I payed around $900 for it.

 

[black-magic]

Being of that not-so-special persuasion that takes glee in building their computer, I build for the top-o-the-line.

 

[Sebenko]

Better value to buy one step off the top of the line. 90% performance for 60% price? Hell yes.

Agreed 100%. I built the rig (mobo, GPU, power supply, everything that goes in the actual case. 4850 with a beefy dual core and 2gigs of RAM) I'm currently posting on for <500 euros 2 years ago and it still runs most games on medium-high settings at 1600*900 just fine so I really have no idea what people are going on about when they drop over a grand on their machines and expect everyone else to do the same.

Building a computer is really all about picking components with a good quality-to-price ratio that will be easy to replace later on. I guess it's fair game if people really can't be bothered to learn how to build a machine or even find someone who can do it for them, but it'd be really great if we could finally get over this nonsense about gaming PCs costing an arm and a leg.

Agreed.

If you're paying more than £850, maybe £900 for a PC, you're doing it wrong.

Yes, you can pay £2000+ for a PC. Like you can pay extra for a car with shiny wheels. Except it's more expensive for a PC (over all cost wise. Shiny wheels probably don't cost the same as the rest of that car, unless it's a really bad car)

 

[RobfromtheGulag]

Given my current disposable income I generally shoot for above average but not cutting edge. ~300/400 on video card(s), but not the $800 one that was released yesterday.

 

[GBlair88]

I would probably take the time to build a gaming PC rather than buy prebuilt. But it would be above average towards high end without being into the thousands. That said my current PC cost me £700 in January '09 which seemed pretty good to me considering it wasn't a home build.

On a side note Alienware are overpriced and all you're doing is buying a brand. You can get a same spec PC from another firm for maybe £100-£150 cheaper. That's my opinion anyway.

EDIT: These are as close as I can get as some parts cannot be changed on the Alienware system.

Spoiler: Alienware @£2,392.99

Included in your system:
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit- English
Intel® Core? i3 Processor 540(3.06GHz,4MB)
English Microsoft® Office Home and Business 2010 (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, One Note)
No Security/Anti-Virus Protection
3Yr Next Day Hardware Support
1GB ATI® Radeon? HD 5670 graphics card
16GB 1333MHz (4x4GB) Dual Channel Memory
500GB (7200RPM) SATA Hard Drive
24X DVD+/- RW Optical Drive (DVD & CD read and write)
Display Not Included
No Keyboard
No Mouse
Soundblaster XFi Titanium PCIe card
Alienware Aurora (P55) Standard Cosmic Black Chassis
Accessories
Alienware 3D
Astral Aqua
Steam® Client and Portal? Game - Factory Installed
Services & Software
Also Includes
No Accidental Damage Support
Alienware Aurora Resource DVD
English - Documentation with UK/Ire Power cord
D08AWV01
Alienware Aurora (P55) DT Order - UK
No Speakers (Speakers are required to hear audio from your system)
AutoMatic Updates : AutoMatic updates - On
One free Dell Expert call to help with your PC queries within 60 days of purchase
1 year Next Business Day Hardware Support included with your PC

Spoiler: PC Specialist @£1201

Case
COOLERMASTER COSMOS 1000 SILVER SILENT CASE (£159) (Most expensive on the site)

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core?i3-540 Dual Core (3.06GHz, 4MB Cache) + HD Graphics

Motherboard
ASUS® P7H55-M SI: MICRO ATX VALUE MAINBOARD,USB 2.0 & SATA 3.0Gb/s

Memory (RAM)
16GB SAMSUNG DDR3 DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (4 X 4GB)

Graphics Card
1GB ATI RADEON? HD 5670 PCI EXPRESS - DirectX® 11

2nd Graphics Card
NONE

3rd Graphics Card
NONE

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
500GB SERIAL ATA 3-Gb/s HARD DRIVE WITH 8MB CACHE (7,200rpm)

2nd Hard Disk
NONE

1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM

2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NONE

Memory Card Reader
NONE

Power Supply & Case Cooling
350W Dual Rail PSU + 120mm Case Fan

Processor Cooling
INTEL SOCKET LGA1156 STANDARD CPU COOLER

Sound Card
Sound Blaster® X-Fi? Titanium PCI Express (£69)

Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT

USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD

Modem
NONE, I WILL BE USING BROADBAND

Floppy Disk Drive
NONE

Firewire & Video Editing
NONE

TV Card
NONE

Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)

Office Software
Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2010 (1 License Product Key Card) (£77)

Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE

Monitor
NONE

2nd Monitor
NONE

DVI Cable
NONE

GeForce 3D Vision
NONE

Keyboard & Mouse
NONE

Mouse
NONE

Speakers
NONE

Webcam
NONE

Headsets (VOIP)
NONE

Surge Protection
NONE

Printer
NONE

External Hard Drive
NONE

Home Installation
NONE

Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, Lifetime Tech Support)

Data Recovery
NONE

Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)

Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 7 to 9 working days

Quantity
1

 

[johnman]

Mine is 4 years old now but this stil a top of the line beast. Well not really but I wouldn't call it mid range either, theres nothing it cant run without problems. IN that time all I have touched is the Graphics card sicne my old one blew out so I got a GtX 260, which to be fair is the reason it still kicks ass.

According to Steam statistics, my PC is one of the top 10% PC's out of all Steam Users...
And I payed around $900 for it.

I know alot of people who use steam for the indie games and have very bad Pc's, but what you say is true, an excellent gaming PC should cost no more than £800. I do builds for friends that come to £650 and they are cutting edge. (Core I5, GTX 260's etc)

 

[Jobbie]

You can build a pretty sweet rig for 500 bucks, given not having to buy a case/keyboard/mouse/monitor/and OS. I dropped 700 bucks on an AMD 955 x4, Asus MoBo, 8gb's of ddr3, 700watt PSU, and Antec server case. I didn't have to buy a video card or OS because I already had those items.

My buddy spent close to 450 for an entire setup. It's whatever you want. Hardware prices are pretty decent at this stage of the game.

 

[FlashHero]

I always go threw the web once a month and build a dream realistically priced computer..my latest Faux Build came out at $1300 for a Dual SLI 460 SC with an i7 and water cpu cooler..in fact the total build was only missing monitors and peripherals cause i all ready have that.

 

[Owlslayer]

I'm currently trying to get someone build me a PC for about 800 bucks. The thing is, the prices of parts differ quite a bit in my country, at least i think so.
The best i can get for that price from a shop (full -built) is at least in my opinion, not good enough.
Too bad i can't understand a thing about PCs and what's inside them, maybe i could build one myself.

 

[theriddlen]

I bought my PC for about 3000PLN = about 1000USD (prices in my country are higher, in USA it would cost many hundreds less) two years ago. It still kicks game's asses, i always play on highest settings, even in crysis. And it does not seems that any new game will be challenge for my PC, as consoles do not evolve, and developers willing to release game on both consoles and PC's can't pack too much awesome in their games, otherwise consoles would not be able to run it.

 

[veloper]

"Top of the line" more often than not mean 4x as expensive for only 50% improved performance.

Like GTX 480 is TWICE the price of the Radeon HD 4890 ($450 vs $225) yet gives only 25% better performance with game like Crysis. So you can see how if you aren't very smart PC gaming can be a lot more expensive than is really needs to be.

But ATI is ATI, and not everyone is willing to deal with the driver problems that come with it.

Also, Name change. ^^

ATI is AMD now.

Their drivers have been superior to nvidia's, ever since they worked with M$ to make GPUs for the xbox360.
Back when I still had my old nvidia gf6800 I could compare it to ATI cards (1950pro back then) and less popular and old games would have more problems with the 6800.
Medieval TW would frequently crash. Rainbow six was always stuck in 640x480. Swapping it with the 1950pro immediately solved those issues.
When the 1950pro had a problem it was always the way it rendered shadows in some games (or didn't).
New and popular games would (and still do) run great on nvidia and ati gpus.

The non-enthusiasts are always stuck in the past, but the industry is always in motion. ATI drivers had been poor, back in days of the radeon8500 in 2001 and improved since then.
For a long time nvidia also had a big lead in OpenGL games, but OGL had been pushed out of the PC gaming scene by M$ d3d since then.

Nowadays benchmarks and pricing are the only important factors left.

 

[Deadlock Radium]

Average, electronics gets outdated fast and then I can buy more powerful hardware for a cheaper price over time.