PC Gaming Too Expensive, Switching to Consoles, so long [H]

For the people making the swap over to (or back to) consoles, hopefully you aren't framerate sensitive. The vast majority of console games are running at 30fps and there isn't anything you can turn down or configure to change that.
It's tough for me to play console games after coming from a PC. When I played Bloodborne and RDR2 (two games that actually look/run well), it takes me weeks to finally get used to the FPS.
 
The RX Vega 64 can almost match the 1080 Ti in a lot of games these days and you can still buy it. The RTX 2080 gives you a little better than 1080 Ti performance for the same price.

Im aware, i have a vega 56 undervolted and running almost as fast as a stock vega 64. Doesnt change the fact that top end GPU prices are insane.

What we really need is AMD to get back into the game and stir things up on the top end, letting Nvidia run away with it looks like its having dire consequences price wise.
 
Your definition of "low end GPU" and mine vary greatly if you believe they cost >= $200.

I'm checking newegg and Amazon now, and just about any decent GTX 1650 costs close to $200. With a wonderful 4GB of VRAM. Seems like it averages 30-45 frame rates at 1920x1080 without AA. A little better than consoles, but again, almost the cost of an entire console. Considering how old the consoles are and their replacements are around the corner that is pretty laughable.
 
I can see the psychological argument here...

That because Consoles can't be upgraded means you don't have to worry about 'keeping up with the Jones's', you can relax, since everybody is necessarily in the same boat.

Same gigantic TURD boat I might add, but the same one nonetheless. Misery loves company I guess. :LOL:
 
You can always turn your graphics down to console levels, or render at lower resolutions and upscale just like consoles. The good thing about PC gaming is that you can choose exactly how much you are willing to spend and how you want your system to perform. If you have lost your interest in gaming with mouse and keyboard or in hardware, by all means switch to a console. But arguing that it is the cost is nonsense.
 
You can always turn your graphics down to console levels, or render at lower resolutions and upscale just like consoles. The good thing about PC gaming is that you can choose exactly how much you are willing to spend and how you want your system to perform. If you have lost your interest in gaming with mouse and keyboard or in hardware, by all means switch to a console. But arguing that it is the cost is nonsense.

Eh it sort of is a valid argument. I have a professional display monitor and a work laptop at home and neither of this is "usable" for gaming. The vast majority of the stuff I play now is single player or fighting games and there is no real difference between the PC and console. So the justification of a very expensive PC just to play FPS games along with the required monitor to really use high frame rates essentially means I spent about four thousand dollars for a multiplayer FPS rig.... that's not a good return on money.

Back in the day when my "work" computer, monitor, and all of that were a simple $400 buck drop in graphics card away from being a gaming machine (in the good old days of CRTs) the PC vs console angle came down firmly on PC or both. That line has moved farther and farther in favor of consoles each year. The justification for PC gaming comes down to "it looks cool sitting on the desk and I like building them", but it's still lighting cash on fire to light cash on fire.
 
I just got an Xbox One X. I have tons of games. I went down a list of all the Xbox One X Enhanced games and most are rendered at 4k. The only one I saw that received a frame rate increase from 30 to to 60fps was Forza Horizon 4 which has the option of 4K/30 or 1080p/60. I was hoping to see more games get a boost in FPS (aside from the ones that natively run at 60). I expect that next gen (which will be next year), 4K/60 should be easy to do and hopefully common place if developers don't have their priorities in the wrong place (it usually has been graphics over frame rate, I prefer the opposite).
 
I just got an Xbox One X. I have tons of games. I went down a list of all the Xbox One X Enhanced games and most are rendered at 4k. The only one I saw that received a frame rate increase from 30 to to 60fps was Forza Horizon 4 which has the option of 4K/30 or 1080p/60. I was hoping to see more games get a boost in FPS (aside from the ones that natively run at 60). I expect that next gen (which will be next year), 4K/60 should be easy to do and hopefully common place if developers don't have their priorities in the wrong place (it usually has been graphics over frame rate, I prefer the opposite).
The Witcher 3 has options for 4K/30 FPS, 4K/Unlocked FPS, and 1080p/60 FPS. I'm sure there are others.
 
I find console gaming to be too cost prohibitive.
I have two functional gaming PCs i maintain with large steam libraries.
The idea of spending $300 on a box plus $60 each for games feels insane.
 
I find it quite interesting though that for the first time consoles with be targeting a higher reolution than PC.
 
The Witcher 3 has options for 4K/30 FPS, 4K/Unlocked FPS, and 1080p/60 FPS. I'm sure there are others.
Good to know. I just bought it on Xbox two weeks ago for $12. I have not played it yet. I did load it up last night but I was stuck in a dialog tree so I didn't get to assess the frame rate.

On a related note to the topic of the thread. The 4K monitor I have the Xbox attached to does not support Freesync over HDMI. This has me itching for a new display. Luckily, a 27" 4K Freesync are $300-350.

My son plays Minecraft and Goat Simulator and they both have unlocked frame rates that often drop below 60. I am proud to say that the resolution and frame rates on Goat Simulator are much improved on the X vs Xbox S.
 
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I find it quite interesting though that for the first time consoles with be targeting a higher reolution than PC.

They won't be. The whole "8K" thing for the PS5 is just because it will support an HDMI standard that includes it. There is no fucking way the PS5 will be natively running a single game at 8K.
 
They won't be. The whole "8K" thing for the PS5 is just because it will support an HDMI standard that includes it. There is no fucking way the PS5 will be natively running a single game at 8K.
You'll need 4-5x the graphic horsepower we have in PC video cards today to do it. Based on what was revealed about the PS5 it will be about as powerful as a Vega 64.
 
I find it quite interesting though that for the first time consoles with be targeting a higher reolution than PC.
True. I'd say a higher percent of TV watchers in the US have a 4K TV than PC users. It is hard to believe that most people are still using 1080p monitors. Once you go 4K, there is no going back. I know some people will say that 4K is a high target to game at but that should not matter. Your video card can scale just fine to any resolution. They have been doing this in consoles forever and I have my AMD card set to scale all resolutions for 4K output.

But I find the most ironic part is that Apple, you know that company that is allegedly behind the technology curve has been putting high dpi displays in almost all their products for 5 years.
 
They won't be. The whole "8K" thing for the PS5 is just because it will support an HDMI standard that includes it. There is no fucking way the PS5 will be natively running a single game at 8K.
The 8K thing is definitely baloney. Unless you were running a super wide screen, I think anything above 4K is now and in 20 years will be a waste of horsepower. 1440/60 what I hope developers target. After that resolution, I feel comfortable if they waste their resources on environmental effects.
 
They could pull 8K on retro games and remakes. Especially as long as consoles focus on 30fps. 90's games, old 3D remasters and whatnot should be feasible. Not much else, though.
It makes for a fine bullet point and it's hard to tell where the market will go, though. Remember when nobody had a 1080p TV and there was no way the PS3 could do it anyway? That changed overnight. Could happen again.
 
True. I'd say a higher percent of TV watchers in the US have a 4K TV than PC users. It is hard to believe that most people are still using 1080p monitors. Once you go 4K, there is no going back. I know some people will say that 4K is a high target to game at but that should not matter. Your video card can scale just fine to any resolution. They have been doing this in consoles forever and I have my AMD card set to scale all resolutions for 4K output.

But I find the most ironic part is that Apple, you know that company that is allegedly behind the technology curve has been putting high dpi displays in almost all their products for 5 years.

I've done 4K. I still prefer 1440p at over 60hz. 4K looks nice but it simply isn't worth the sacrifices needed and above 60hz is a much better experience anyway.
 
While I'm hoping to jump to 1440p@144hz someday, I'm still enjoying 1080p@144hz on my main gaming monitor.
While 4k looks really nice on my 4k tv, 1440 still looks very good on it and is still an option for games that struggle at 4k on my gtx 1080.
 
While I'm hoping to jump to 1440p@144hz someday, I'm still enjoying 1080p@144hz on my main gaming monitor.
While 4k looks really nice on my 4k tv, 1440 still looks very good on it and is still an option for games that struggle at 4k on my gtx 1080.

What I would recommend, if you can swing it, is to get a 144Hz monitor that is VRR. Then you get to have nice silky smooth framerates basically no matter what. 1440@144 (or even 120) is something that even high end card can struggle with in some games, but with VRR, it just smoothly scales up and down. Makes framerate dips much less noticeable and just in general makes high framerate gaming an amazing experience.

Also something to keep in mind performance wise is that each res step up is a 2x amount of pixels so half the framerate on given power. So something that runs at 1080@120 will do 1440@60 will do 2160@30.
 
I can see the psychological argument here...

That because Consoles can't be upgraded means you don't have to worry about 'keeping up with the Jones's', you can relax, since everybody is necessarily in the same boat.

Same gigantic TURD boat I might add, but the same one nonetheless. Misery loves company I guess. :LOL:

I bagged on consoles for a long time, but honestly there is some good gaming to be had on there, and the PS4 in particular has some fantastic exclusives.
 
I bagged on consoles for a long time, but honestly there is some good gaming to be had on there, and the PS4 in particular has some fantastic exclusives.

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I am still running a 2600k it's over 10 years old, o bought a used gtx 1070 recently for $270 that seems like incredible value to me. Games run faster than any console game

Nope


When did the i7 2600k come out?
Intel demonstrated a Sandy Bridge processor in 2009, and released first products based on the architecture in January 2011 under the Core brand. Sandy Bridge is manufactured in the 32 nanometer process, while Intel's subsequent generation Ivy Bridge (announced 2011) uses a 22 nanometer die shrink.
 
They could pull 8K on retro games and remakes. Especially as long as consoles focus on 30fps. 90's games, old 3D remasters and whatnot should be feasible. Not much else, though.
It makes for a fine bullet point and it's hard to tell where the market will go, though. Remember when nobody had a 1080p TV and there was no way the PS3 could do it anyway? That changed overnight. Could happen again.

PS3 had some full 1080p 2d games which looked glorious. I'd be royally down for an 8k 2d castlevania, contra, gradius, megaman, tetris, zelda, super metroid, street fighter, king of fighters, the list goes on.
 
I bagged on consoles for a long time, but honestly there is some good gaming to be had on there, and the PS4 in particular has some fantastic exclusives.

Agreed but honestly outside of exclusives I'd never use consoles except Nintendo mobile consoles which will their own niche. They're just slow, cumbersome PCs with less flexibility and no user fixes. And questionable backwards compatibility.
 
PS3 had some full 1080p 2d games which looked glorious. I'd be royally down for an 8k 2d castlevania, contra, gradius, megaman, tetris, zelda, super metroid, street fighter, king of fighters, the list goes on.

Most definitely. 8K seems absurd right now, but by the end of this console's lifespan (2026?) it might be the standard if not something even bigger. It's not like they can render new games in 8K, but that doesn't mean it can't be used for other things like videos, simple games, remakes, web browsing, etc.
 
PS3 had some full 1080p 2d games which looked glorious. I'd be royally down for an 8k 2d castlevania, contra, gradius, megaman, tetris, zelda, super metroid, street fighter, king of fighters, the list goes on.
The problem is that every time they release a retro game, it looks like shit because it is always the native resolution, terrible animations that are like 4 frames and 3/4 aspect ratio if not worse with bars on the side. I'd kill for them to increase the resolution and make it widescreen but that has never happened. I tried to play Altered Beast a few years ago. I thought it was fantastic at the time but it certainly does not stand the test of time. Super Mario Brothers and Sonic the Hedgehog are about the only games I find playable in the 21st century.
 
I'm pretty convinced that my body does it's best to save me money. I don't need to bother with 4k as my preferred monitor size for gaming is 27" - I don't need fancy sound headphones as I've had the worst tinnitus going my entire life. Never going to be a fighter pilot as I swear to god I can't really tell the difference in frame rate much past 80 (although unlike many with such limits, I understand that many absolutely can).

I would quite like an HDR monitor though, and I do appreciate Free/G-Sync.

The thing is that I can totally understand the feeling of "why would I get anything less than the absolute best stuff ever" that some people have which pushes the price up for them so much because I get it too. "Ooooh" I think "a 144hz monitor, that would be good", before I have to slap myself into remember that I'm literally not going to be getting any benefit out of the extra cost at all. Same as 4k resolution. Would really like a 4k monitor but there's absolutely no point in it for me. I guess my big concern is that features like HDR will get locked into the 4k screens that I don't really want to have to buy GPU(s?) to drive it. But up until now, I've found that I don't have to spend the Earth if I just sit down and decide what I want the machine to do/play and just stick to that. Don't get sucked in by the shiny shiny.

And hell, look at the diminishing returns we're getting on hardware these days - chances are the upgrade cycle is going to last even longer, or become dependant on people trying to push ever more insane resolutions. I love reading about people high end stuff and all the cool things people do with cases and cooling, which is why I come to these hardware sites (and this one specifically) - but personally I'm pretty happy just pootling along at 1440p, on a 27" monitor at 60-80fps.
 
The problem is that every time they release a retro game, it looks like shit because it is always the native resolution, terrible animations that are like 4 frames and 3/4 aspect ratio if not worse with bars on the side. I'd kill for them to increase the resolution and make it widescreen but that has never happened. I tried to play Altered Beast a few years ago. I thought it was fantastic at the time but it certainly does not stand the test of time. Super Mario Brothers and Sonic the Hedgehog are about the only games I find playable in the 21st century.

There are plenty of remakes or moving forward games that worked amazingly well. Hard Corps Uprising brought Contra forward by leaps and bounds Bionic Commando Rearmed was amazing Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix was also great

Your'e just wrong here. Though it would make sense if you are PC centric because great remakes don't really end up on the PC. You have to get off the PC and onto consoles if you are looking for this sort of thing.

I'm pretty convinced that my body does it's best to save me money. I don't need to bother with 4k as my preferred monitor size for gaming is 27" - I don't need fancy sound headphones as I've had the worst tinnitus going my entire life. Never going to be a fighter pilot as I swear to god I can't really tell the difference in frame rate much past 80 (although unlike many with such limits, I understand that many absolutely can).

I would quite like an HDR monitor though, and I do appreciate Free/G-Sync.

The thing is that I can totally understand the feeling of "why would I get anything less than the absolute best stuff ever" that some people have which pushes the price up for them so much because I get it too. "Ooooh" I think "a 144hz monitor, that would be good", before I have to slap myself into remember that I'm literally not going to be getting any benefit out of the extra cost at all. Same as 4k resolution. Would really like a 4k monitor but there's absolutely no point in it for me. I guess my big concern is that features like HDR will get locked into the 4k screens that I don't really want to have to buy GPU(s?) to drive it. But up until now, I've found that I don't have to spend the Earth if I just sit down and decide what I want the machine to do/play and just stick to that. Don't get sucked in by the shiny shiny.

And hell, look at the diminishing returns we're getting on hardware these days - chances are the upgrade cycle is going to last even longer, or become dependant on people trying to push ever more insane resolutions. I love reading about people high end stuff and all the cool things people do with cases and cooling, which is why I come to these hardware sites (and this one specifically) - but personally I'm pretty happy just pootling along at 1440p, on a 27" monitor at 60-80fps.

144hz vs 60hz is night and day and you won't go back once you experience it. HDR is locked into 4k premium displays. When 4k/144hz/HDR/DCI P3/AdaptiveSync becomes the defacto standard and affordable things are going to be great. But right now that's really way out of reach.
 
Nope


When did the i7 2600k come out?
Intel demonstrated a Sandy Bridge processor in 2009, and released first products based on the architecture in January 2011 under the Core brand. Sandy Bridge is manufactured in the 32 nanometer process, while Intel's subsequent generation Ivy Bridge (announced 2011) uses a 22 nanometer die shrink.
2011 so not quite 10 but you get my drift lots of parts in PCs can be used for a very long time and maintain decent performance because of the modular nature of pcs.
 
I don't game often, but when I do it's on an xbox. The game quality is fine for me as I sit on the couch, playing on a 1080p television. A nice option is I have played my xbox streaming to my PC for surprisingly good results. There are many down sides though. The games do judder and often crash. Recently had a game that refused to load ever again. A very nice Microsoft help desk person tried to help but I ended up having to abandon the stored cloud data and start over. When I play television (HDMI in) through the xbox the sound is out of sync with no way to correct it in the xbox. Bottom line, if I was more serious about the gaming experience I would have to say going the PC route is a must.
 
I don't game often, but when I do it's on an xbox. The game quality is fine for me as I sit on the couch, playing on a 1080p television. A nice option is I have played my xbox streaming to my PC for surprisingly good results. There are many down sides though. The games do judder and often crash. Recently had a game that refused to load ever again. A very nice Microsoft help desk person tried to help but I ended up having to abandon the stored cloud data and start over. When I play television (HDMI in) through the xbox the sound is out of sync with no way to correct it in the xbox. Bottom line, if I was more serious about the gaming experience I would have to say going the PC route is a must.
I had the loading issue with Forza 5, of all games. Deleting all save data locally and in the cloud did indeed work, but let's just say that I no longer played that game after that happened.
 
My computer vapor locked the other night and I have not checked to see what’s wrong don’t know if I will for a while.Just bought Xbox S and will play with that.For me it’s to damn expensive.if and when I do rebuild will go all out one last time and see what happens.
 
I don't game often, but when I do it's on an xbox. The game quality is fine for me as I sit on the couch, playing on a 1080p television. A nice option is I have played my xbox streaming to my PC for surprisingly good results. There are many down sides though. The games do judder and often crash. Recently had a game that refused to load ever again. A very nice Microsoft help desk person tried to help but I ended up having to abandon the stored cloud data and start over. When I play television (HDMI in) through the xbox the sound is out of sync with no way to correct it in the xbox. Bottom line, if I was more serious about the gaming experience I would have to say going the PC route is a must.

Ya game streaming is neat, but I've always had issues. I've used Steam Link personally to do it and it works ok, but still, gremlins sometimes. My solution is just to get a long fiber optic HDMI cable and roll it out to the TV when I want to play on the couch (wireless Xbox controllers work fine). Little more work to set up, but then works flawlessly since it is just a normal wired connection.
 
The reason I spent $3,000 is cause I refuse to compromise when it comes to PC gaming. If I'm gaming on PC, I'm trying to max out settings and enjoy PC gaming in all its glory.

Refusing to compromise on matters that make little to no difference is stupid. Chasing "the best" is for fools. There's no such a thing. It's like poor guys buying outrageously priced phones, shoes and stuff.

I am still running my 2500k. Besides a couple of SSDs, and a 1070, nothing really has changed in my machine. I am even running the original board which died 5 years ago but someone fixed it with a heat gun or something.

While many others "upgraded" to 3 or more generations of quad cores, I stayed with the same setup wondering what the fuck is wrong with people.

Still running my ancient 120 Hz monitor, too.

I, for one, won't miss you. You came to the party kind of late (Far Cry... haha) and are leaving early. You never was what I'd call "for real".

I am still running a 2600k it's over 10 years old, o bought a used gtx 1070 recently for $270 that seems like incredible value to me. Games run faster than any console game

Interesting. Did you happen to bring a sports almanac on your way here?
 
On a related note to the thread, I bought the Handsome collection for Xbox One X a few days ago and played it last night. Pretty good. 4K/60. When I played BL2 on PC, I used a game controller so this for me at least is a similar experience.
 
My computer vapor locked the other night and I have not checked to see what’s wrong don’t know if I will for a while.Just bought Xbox S and will play with that.For me it’s to damn expensive.if and when I do rebuild will go all out one last time and see what happens.
Make sure to save the magic smoke trapped in the plumbing. That is expensive to replace.
 
Refusing to compromise on matters that make little to no difference is stupid. Chasing "the best" is for fools. There's no such a thing. It's like poor guys buying outrageously priced phones, shoes and stuff.

I am still running my 2500k. Besides a couple of SSDs, and a 1070, nothing really has changed in my machine. I am even running the original board which died 5 years ago but someone fixed it with a heat gun or something.

While many others "upgraded" to 3 or more generations of quad cores, I stayed with the same setup wondering what the fuck is wrong with people.

Still running my ancient 120 Hz monitor, too.

giphy.gif
 
I love my PS4. I got every penny’s worth out of it from finally getting to enjoy God of War, Spider-Man, The Last of Us, and The Uncharted collection. But am I about to ditch pc gaming because of it? Lol no. Why would I? In what world do people live in where they can only have one?

I noticed OP hasn’t logged in for a while. Probably made a new account after seeing what 30fps on 720p with crazy motion blur is like all the time.
 
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