PC's vs. Console.

Typical pro-console argument will go something like this:
More games.
Better overall game selection.
Less configuration required.
Better early-life hardware value.
Cheaper hardware overall (where PC ownership is not taken to be independent of gaming).
(in other words, if your PC replacement cycle is much greater than 5 years).
Lack of rampant piracy theoretically reduces game costs.

Typical pro-PC arguments will go something like this:
Better first-person shooter selection.
Better real-time strategy/ MMORPG selection.
Better simulation selection.
Better/more "homebrew" games and emulators.
Games are more moddable/customizable.
Better graphics/physics/sound.
Better full-term hardware value
Cheaper hardware overall (where PC ownership is taken to be independent of gaming).
(in other words, if your PC replacement cycle is about 5 years).
Generally free online.
Lack of licensing fees theoretically reduces game costs.

The PC list is longer, mostly because I explicitly itemized the PC's software strengths, whereas for the console, I gave a more general description. Anyway, you guys can expand on this (or argue it).



I am going to expand on some aspects of PC gaming that appeal to me, personally. They are, in no particular order:

Resolution: Ever wonder what <insert game> looks like in 1080p? If you have console you'll never know!! Nearly every 360/PS3 game is 720p (sometimes upscaled).

General visual quality: There's more to graphics than resolution. For example, if there were a machine available that could render a 3D image that looked as realistic as standard definition TV, it would be a quantum leap over anything available today. While we haven't reached that point yet, modern graphics cards do offer a level of immersion not possible on a console -- and the prices are totally reasonable. Crysis is the best looking game right now.. A 512MB 8800GT can run this game on "High" in 1080p. The current price for this card on newegg is $165 after mir.

CPU: Today's PC processors have become extraordinarily powerful -- waay more powerful than the once-mighty Cell. Unfortunately, modern PC games don't really take advantage of that extra power. So why do I bother mentioning it? Well, there's a common stereotype held by avid console-gamers that it's necessary to upgrade your whole PC very frequently if you want to play the latest games in all their glory. This is not true. The principle upgrades that are of interest to a PC gamer are video cards and possibly RAM; neither of which is particularly expensive. The $165 card noted above can run the best-looking game available on "high" in true 1080p. Likewise, you can get a 2GB RAM kit for $30 (looking at newegg again). So assuming you replace your PC every 5 years anyway, you can stay on the bleeding edge of gaming with only one video card upgrade, bringing the total outlay to <$350 over a 5 year period -- much less than an early-life console (again, assuming you want to stay at the high end). It's worth noting that those $600+ video cards you sometimes read about, are very atypical. Such cards are designed to run games at resolutions far exceeding even 1080p. Though I would dream of owning something like that, it's totally superfluous, and far exceeds what a typical gamer uses.

Mouse: Personal preferences aside, a mouse provides more accurate control than a stick. First, it should be noted that both a mouse and a stick have a finite number of states. Given that, with a stick you must necessarily make a compromise between speed and accuracy. The more responsive, the less accurate (and vice-versa). Additionally, a stick's motion is broken down into angular and radius components. Again, since there's a finite number of states, you necessarily loose accuracy as you move away from dead center (think of a dartboard, where each partition is a valid state). On the other hand, with a mouse, you control both the speed and the position aspects of motion independently. And the device resolution (akin to accuracy) remains constant everywhere. There's also differences that are more philosophical. For example, with a stick, every repositioning of the crosshair requires two movements: one in the desired direction, and one back to dead center. The return to center is an automatic motion, but the round-trip delay still must be compensated for.

Okay, so clearly a mouse is more precise than a stick. But is that always a good thing? The answer to this is obviously no. Broadly speaking, the analog stick can be thought of as somewhat corrective of human error -- in many types of games (most, in fact) this characteristic is advantageous. However, in the specific case of first person shooters, the increased precision of the mouse is the dominant factor. More generally, though, the mouse is the perfect model for aiming a weapon. In real life, you don't "maneuver" your weapon into position, you just "move it" there.

I'm torn at the moment

Console or rebuild

The current pc going to be relegate top arcade emu etc and general duty. It's outdated - pci, not pci-e..APG etc

So for a ground up build I'm looking at about 2 to 3 thousand dollars for the system I want to build - to do what - play Vanguard or age of conan - perhaps the latest and greatest fps or such.

PS3 has blue ray
xbox360 has HD-DVD
Wii has amazing back catalog of Nintendo games available for a price.

each is now a few hundred bucks, though of the game only a couple grab my interest - bully, fable 2, gta 4 maybe some more.

Given the cash I'd have both and call it a day.

2-3 grand? Dude, I wish I could afford a system like that. Mine was like $700 (total) a couple of years ago -- granted I built it myself, and thus saved a few hundos, but that price includes everything from a case to PSU, and even a vid card. I just recently upgraded the vid card to an 8800GT, and I've been lovin' it. Soon, I'm going to get a Blu Ray-ROM drive, now that the format is finally decided. But the point is if I chose not to game on my PC, then I only would've saved $150 on the video card. Whoop-de-doo.

In any case, I thought my system was awesome, I can't even imagine what yours was going to be like.. 2-3 grand sounds like some 8-core Tri-SLI monster! What did you plan on putting in that thing?

liquid cooled, sli, quad core, 4 lcd monitors ( well 3 now that the pj is in the pic) dual 8800xxx it was last year I priced the build. by time I actually get around to saving up the cash ( which is looking like next tax season) it might only be 1 or so for the parts do to the next best thing driving prices down.

champaign tastes - root beer budget

***edit ***

I usually only rebuild when my current build is out classed by 2x. and its time

I will keep my xbox guys besides as long as there are xboxes I am paid to play games

Ill stick with my xbox also.....I'm not payed to play, but its my passion....I play a few computer games, but nothing too extreme.....and i have a 8800gt in my rig and i cant play crysis on high(not with decent framerates anyhow and this is at 1280x768...nowhere close to 1080p), along with 4 gb 1066 ocz ram and a quad core phenom 9600...maybe using a direct x 9 hack, but that takes away from the game, and I do want to play games in ALL their glory....computer games never play as smooth as console games to me.....and the mouse and keyboard are just clumsy

I just want to play a game with ZERO drops in framerate, and without a mouse and keyboard....and I will pay for online service as kick ass as LIVE....pc gaming is for the birds

I stick to PC gaming ATM mainly because I don't want to pay the extra $$$ for a console system and I already have a PC.

I don't have everything on high. Shadows and shaders are on medium; post-processing, I think, is on low. After playing around with the settings, there's really no significant loss in going to medium shadows/shaders (but going to low is murder!) Aside from that, I'm running Crysis in XP in DX9, so that must be the difference. I would strongly recommend that you do the same. The performance difference is astounding, and you don't really loose anything significant -- namely the bullet-hole effects. What you gain, though, is monumental. You get to crank up most of the in-game settings, as well as the resolution.. (without dropping frames). But even DX10, you should be able to do better than 1280x768 -- something's not right...

However I do have a few questions:
First, why is it that you're not willing to give up DX10 on the PC but you're willing to give it up on an XBOX? (the 360 is DX9). Secondly, let's forget about Crysis for a moment since there is no console version. Every multi-platform game I've played looks tremendously better on a PC. CoD4, UT3, Bioshock, NFS, etc... all run effortlessly at 1920x1200 with all the details cranked up. That's more than double the resolution (which is a big deal for projectors), more effects, more detail, etc. Why wouldn't you prefer the PC under these circumstances? Finally, if you like paying for on-line, there's always "Games for WIndows - Live." It's compatible with XBL, and you can even use your XBL account as a GFW-Live account.

Well I want to play a game the way it was made. Crysis was made to be played in DX10, and xbox games aren't. Its not about what DX the game is as much as its hacking the game to make it playable. When a new xbox game comes out I dont have to go and drop $450 on a new video card, or $900 for two(not to mention you still can't crank all the graphics up). I will stick with my 50" dlp 10,000:1 contrast ratio, native 1080p vs. my 22" 3,000:1 1680x1050. You also cant compare xbox live with windows live because they are nothing alike. Xbox live is just more convenient, not to mention a larger selection of compatible games and exclusives. Not to mention my computer is not a slow system by any means, but my xbox still gives much better performance in ANY game. I see where you are going with higher resolutions, but I can't do higher resolutions than the xbox (with decent framerates) without spending another $450, and for that price I can get a whole xbox 360...an elite at that. I don't see the point in playing at 1920x1200 at a whopping 10 frames per second just so I can say I am playing the pc version of the game. I know i have between $1500-1700 in my computer right now...what does it take to play a higher resolution with a decent framerate?

Not to mention, you are the one screaming graphics but you are also saying to play Crysis in DX9(which would also put it on the same level as an xbox game)..........you do know the performance boost you see is made possible by lowering the graphics......I'm just saying.

That being said, I have been playing Halo 2 lately on windows. If anyone wants to play my windows live gamertag is DooDooSmoke. I will say that custom map support is one way to get my attention.

I'm trying to figure out what you're saying here. Yes, today's games have extra detail options to accommodate the the wealthy elite gamers with tri-SLI setups. But you seem to be suggesting that including these extra options negatively impacts the mainstream PC gamer. I am inclined to disagree. The game will look no different on my hardware as a consequence of including these extra options.

You are also suggesting that a PC's ability to play a game at a specific level of detail somehow decreases with time. I must disagree with this as well. Even as games begin to offer higher detail options to accommodate the changing hardware climate, a given PC will be able to play tomorrow's games at the same level of detail as today's games. In fact, driver tweaks will actually improve things a bit. In other words, my PC can run all of today's games on high. In four years from now, my same configuration might only manage to run a new game on "low." But tomorrow's "low" will be graphically comparable to today's "high." The experience does not diminish. So there's no need to "drop $450" on a new video card just to play a new game. The new game will simply scale to your hardware's capabilities, just as new games are scaled to the 360's capabilities.


No, playing a game in DX9 will not put me on par with an XBOX game. The 8800GT is more than twice as powerful as the GPU in the 360. Whether running in DX9 or DX10, it will still deliver a much, much richer experience.

What I'm saying is that that (at least so far) today's DX10 games don't show any significant advantage over the same games in DX9, and that by taking this insignificant visual penalty, you can free up your GPU enough to raise settings that are more visually significant.

Observe: Crysis DX9 vs. Crysis DX10


But 99% of XBOX games are either 720p (or upscaled 720p). And there's no reason why you wouldn't be able to connect your PC to your TV. I run my PC off my homebrew projector (thanks again, LumenLab!).


Since I don't have GFW-Live, I'll give you this one.

Intuitively, this doesn't seem likely considering a PC with the specs you quoted is much more powerful than a 360 -- and in fact my experience supports this intuition. If you have an 8800GT (which is only $165), you should have no trouble running any of the aforementioned games (Call of Duty 4, Unreal Tournament 3, Bioshock, Need for Speed Carbon, Battlefield, Oblivion, Test Drive Unlimited, etc...) at 1920x1200 with much higher details than the XBOX can manage, at smooth-as-ice framerates. Proof

I never said the 360 has more power, but it is definately more compatible with All games on it's platform. Even though my PC is waaaaay more powerful, no doubt, I cant play halo 2 on it in resolutions over 800 x 600. Pure crap. But my xbox will upconvert to 1080p flawlessly, I would say it is more efficient at gaming. Not to mention has a much larger library of games that I like to play. As for the proof that the 8800gt can handle those games, uh, I am USING the card.... how much proof do you think I need? You dont have to throw a sales pitch, I know what this card can do because its in my computer.

I am also overclocking the card at 735/1950....maybe I will crossfire a set of 4870x2's when they come out. I should be able to get decent gameplay then. On the other hand for that price I could probably buy 5 or 6 more special edition xbox consoles. Who knows?

Also, saying the specs I quoted is like you are trying to say I'm bs'ing. Would you like some pics? I have no reason to lie about my setup. I'll even throw in some pics of my xbox collection

I'm not doubting you, I'm just saying your experience with the your level of hardware is significantly worse than typical. That's actually one of the reasons I posted the review, so you can get a look at the kinds of framerates you "should" be getting. I honestly think you're having some kind of a driver issue or something. I don't know if that's the case, but it's gotta be something. 800x600 from a 4-year old game designed to run on 7-year old hardware is downright atrocious. I know it's a crappy port, but it at least "shouldn't" be that bad. I'm considering downloading the demo, myself.

We might just have to agree to disagree about the upscaling. In my opinion, 720p upscaled video looks perhaps somewhat better than straight 720p -- for games, the difference is marginal, at best. Even with video, the difference between upscaled 720p and 1080p is night at day-- at least according to my eyes.

But you're definately right about the console's game selection. There's waay more XBOX than PC games. But there's also plenty of PC games that don't exist for consoles. Some FPS' like Crysis, rts/mmorpg's like WoW, simulation games like Flight Simulator, etc.. But in the end, the best platform is the one with the most games that appeal to you. For me, that platform is the PC. But who knows, maybe that will all change some day. I used to be really into console games back when the Dreamcast was cool. RIP, Dreamcast

What are you talking about? I still play my dreamcast all the time, marvel vs capcom 2 is one of the best games ever. When talking about console games don't forget that Crysis is suposed to get a port to PS3 sometime this year, and it is said that the PS3 version will be equivalent to the PC version on all high settings(not very high).

I do love a good FPS, but mmorpg and rts games not so much. I'm more of a FPS, fighting, action, adventure game type.

You will also have to hold off on the Halo 2 pc demo.......there has not been one released, and yes it does suck. My problem could be my new motherboard, it has the new 790fx chipset and hopefully they will get some new drivers soon to boost my performance a little bit.

That came out wrong. I LOVE MY DREAMCAST!!! Best console I've ever owned. I've never felt the same love for any console past or since. There were just so many awesome games (mostly first-party) with very few sour apples.

I'll reserve judgement for PS3 Crysis for if/when it comes out. I'm guessing they're going to do the same thing they did with far-Cry, and end up having to change most of the game to get it to run.

I picked up a Dreamcast with about 75 games at a garage sale for $30 a couple of yrs ago.
Plus, 4 controllers & some memory cards.

I had to take it apart & adjust some POT because it wasn't reading discs.
Now it works just fine & the games got some nice graphics.

Gauntlet Rocks!

I was a commodore 64 & Amiga / PC guy so I basically new nothing about latter consoles until my buddy got a PS2.

I can never come across deals like that.........some people have all the luck

I rarely find those deals myself.

To clarify, the dreamcast wasn't reading the discs.
That is why it was so cheap.
I mainly bought it for the games & controllers & figured I could ebay a unit or sell the games on ebay.

Apparantly the person selling it thought the games were worthless without a working unit.

I later read online how to adjust the speed of the motor or the tracking & it's been working great since.

$30 for 75 games, four controllers, and a couple of memory cards is amazing deal in its own right! The Dreamcast is icing on the cake.

I would have given $100 for that and thought I was getting a deal

Didn't really think about it at the time.

I really didn't know anything about the dreamcast.
Everyone I knew had PS2 & Xbox.
The graphics looked good on the CD cases so I bought it.

At the time, I really didn't know what I was buying.

Now, I enjoy it in my spare time or when I have parties.

Well I'm a broke teenager, so I go with consoles and add RAM and a new video card to my computer here and there.

At the moment i'm gonna have to go with consoles.
Now dont get me wrong i was a hardcore pc gamer for a long time and personally Prefer using a keyboard and mouse for most games with the exception of racing games.
The problem i see with PC gaming is that unlike consoles where games developers have set hardware with which to develop for i.e ps3 xbox 360. PC games are usually developed for the latest greatest harware which in the world of PC's is constantly changing.
Yes of course you can drop the settings down and the game will run but unless you have good hardware most of the time you will just end up with a comprimised experience. (unless of course you can afford to upgrade your hardware on a regular basis).
That is not always the case of course i have played very well developed games that run perfectly well on slightly older/lower end hardware but unfortunatelly this seems to be less and less the case with developers becoming lazy and relying on the most powerfull hardware to do the work for them.

What i tend to do is buy a console and use that for a few years, then i will upgrade my pc and go back through the best pc games of the last few years by which time the next gen of consoles is about and i start the cycle again. Best of both worlds!.

on a side note i went back to my ps2 the other day and the difference between the early and later games was incredible so it goes to show what difference developers can achieve with the same hardware. Just imagine what sort of games could be coming out in a few years once developers have got more experience with the recent consoles especially the PS3 which is seems a lot of developers are having a little trouble getting their head round.

Anyway just my 2cents.

A PC is and always will be better.

Consoles are the way to go because they have a 5 year lifespan. A computer's useful gaming lifespan will only range from 9-18 months depending on where you start that cycle.
Especially considering the mit-mart warranty & exchange policies. Ive yet to break the $300 barrier to get a 360 elite, extra controllers, webcam, afew arcade games & own/play 13 retail $65 games.

And that's doing it legally. You can't do that legally on a PC.


The problem with PC games is that at any given time building a $1500 computer, you're not going to be able to get any more than mid-level performance on the bleeding edge games you're building the computer to play. Then you're left with a complete gaming paperweight the next year. Where-as a console is a gaming paperweight to begin with. The differance being is that they're priced to reflect that from the beginning.

I only bought an Xbox 360 for halo 3. PC just has more freedom. Why limit yourself to a console which can only do things they allow you to do whereas a computer can do anything.

I use the PCs a lot (but rarely for gaming) and my kids use the consoles mostly. To a great degree it might be a question of age and usage. As the boys have gotten older they tend to use the PCs more often (socializing, online games, and doing assignment).

By the way my last build was with a 8800 GTs. Good bang for the buck. It's amazing how many other people are using the 8800 video chip. Great minds think alike, or is it fools seldom differ?

I think you're overstating things quite a bit. I built my PC for $700 (say $750 to be safe) a couple of years ago (much less than $1,500), and it was perfectly capable of playing every game at a the time with most of the details cranked up. That worked great, and I had no complaints. Last semester, I had a decision to make: I could either stick with the same hardware, and continue getting the same kind of experience (like on consoles) --OR-- I could spend another $150-$200 on a new graphics card, and get something way better. Had I stuck with the 7600GT, my experience would not have diminished. New games would not suddenly start looking worse than previous games; they just wouldn't look any better. But I wanted better, and I didn't want to wait a full 5 years to get blown away again (like on consoles). And blown away, I got..

Now let's consider that from a price angle over a 5 year period (to match a console). I spent about $700 on my PC when it was new (say $750 to be safe), building it myself. Perhaps a surprise to some, a good CPU will last 5 years in a gaming PC without issue. In fact, staying at the head of the curve for that period really only requires a new video card, and possibly some RAM -- that's it. Now, most people are aware that RAM is dirt cheap, but video cards are often misunderstood. Video cards evolve about twice as quickly as CPUs, and midrange cards tend to deliver 70-80% of the performance of high-end cards at half the cost or less. Buying a high-end card neither gets you dramatically better performance, nor does it significantly extend the card's life cycle. This makes high-end cards an exceptionally poor value. Similarly, low-end cards offer poor performance and they cost more than they should -- it's the worst of both worlds. Long story short, midrange cards are best. A good value can typically be had in the $130-$250 range, with the sweet spot being around $150-$180 (apologies for the digression). Back on point, since the video card evolves about twice as fast as the CPU, you'll need to replace it mid-cycle -- about 2.5 years. In my current PC, I spent $200, which will satisfy me for the next 2.5 years. This brings the total hardware cost for that 5 year period to $950. So that's more than a console, right?... WRONG!!! Even if I had decided to game on a console, I would still have bought a PC and kept it for 5 years, regardless!! So let's tally the numbers, shall we...

Total cost of ownership for going the console route over a 5-year period
$400 for the XBOX 360, plus $750 for the PC (which I would need anyway), minus $150 credit for sticking with integrated graphics = $1,000

Total cost of ownership for going the PC route over a 5-year period
$600 for the base PC, plus $150 for a discrete mid-range graphics card, plus $200 for a video upgrade in 2.5 yrs = $950

Bottom line: If you're going to build a PC and keep it for 5 years anyway, the PC route will not only deliver better visuals, it might actually cost less. BTW, PC games themselves, are usually a bit cheaper since the developers don't have to pay a licensing fee.

Before it starts... This is in no way advocating the insane prices of any bleeding edge hardware in the last 30 years. It is setting out the truth that you will simply never get a great experience with a mid-range graphics card for more than one computer gaming generation. Said generation has been 12-18 months since the dawn of modern 2d/3d gaming. The point is to say that IF you are going to buy mid-range products, you must be aware of their low life span, and low ability to be upgraded.
Understate? The only thing understated is the fact that you're trying to pass off a two and a half year old junk card as good at modern games and a $250 card as a great experience. PLEAAAAAASE LMAO!!!!!!


I swear to god. There is not a single thing in that entire post that is accurate. You must have just gotten out of JR high school because you display a complete lack of all industry history, trends, pricing and KNOWN WIDELY BENCHMARKED PERFORMANCE... Ignorance! Pure Ignorance!

Start typing that after some heroin??? A five year old budget range CPU as of February 2006 when you video card was first released was a AMD Duron 850mhz. Yeah... A Duron... I had a 750 duron at 933 in 2001 as an early in-car MP3 player...

Obviously referring only to yourself...

In what way is that??? You somehow expect $150 low range and $200 low mid-range video cards to perform well in games on otherwise antiquated hardware... You can also stuff an LS1 into a miata, but you don't see them showing up to any track days anywhere now do you? Or honda engines in a semi-truck???

TELL THE ENTIRE TRUTH. They can't for more than one generation, and you're not pricing out true mid-range full feature cards. You're pricing castrated sheep-cards like a bad pimp!

Kid do it once and do it right. It doesn't have to be an ultra bleeding edge card. But spending $350 to get a true mid-range card is better than spending $450-500 buying a pair of $200-250 cards, and gives enjoyment an ass load longer. You just don't get it... Trash is trash is trash. Crap cards of your example 2006 era can't even push frame rates on games from that era that stout cards from 2001-2002 could. WHY IS THAT!?!?!?! Because the new crap cards have no processing power. Sure all the feature is the world, but they just can't handle it. The old cards have more raw power and dont waste time with fickle fanged crap.
So what's the difference? In a game that supports them both, the new junk card has to loose everything just to maintain a playable frame-rate while the old card does the same... Yet they both look like my dog's matted hairy constipated butt & are a complete slide show frame-per-second wise.

Satisfying someone that has low standards with low end cards is one thing. Satisfying someone that likes their video card to deliver actual medium frame rates, post processing, useable resolutions and maintaining the all important 60'ish frames a second is something completely different.

How in the blue cow flying hell do you figure that??? How long have you BEEN playing computer games two weeks? Son new games on the same PC platform are in a constant state of deminishing graphics and with every new release you are STRUGGLING TO MAINTAIN FRAME RATES.
There is no frame-rate loss over time because new titles are more complete on a console... There is no dropping details and resolutions & post processing and such BS on a console as new titles come out.

Here's a funny fact! Your POS computer couldn't have possibly given a playable rate of any Unreal Engine 3 game ever sold for PC without jacking everything down to look like crap. Yet either console can take the title and with no change play them at higher resolutions with aliasing! Like magic! Even when the console is on year 5 of a 5 year cycle. When a new game comes out it doesn't look like degas in any way. Yet guess what happened to a PC game! Regardless of any possible variable. It's still going to run slower than anything new!

Alcoholism, yay!
Let's look at the best 2006 titles.





So explain to me how you're going to be getting a nice enjoyable experience with a new video card on old hardware. It's not... You simply lower your standards and dont admit it.
If you're going to tell people to buy budget products you should tell the thehonest to god consequences of their purchase... That at best case within 12 months they are going to be playing games at no more than a 1024*768 resolution with zero antialiasing & post-processing niceness, and the lowest detail ranges in the game.

That crap flew just fine until 1997, but it's 2008... There's no real excuse for playing modern games at joke resolutions, details and post-processing only to STRUGGLE TO HIT A HARDLY PLAYABLE 30FPS


This is exactly why gaming on a PC is a money pit. The hardware does not last long enough, and the markup for bleeding edge good hardware is worse than new-car markup. You're throwing money at something that will never be more than low-mid ranged AT IT'S MAXIMUM. What about when it's not at it's maximum... Right...











And how about you go over the costs legit... Tell me how many $15-$20 price differences between games Im going to be able to get between buying a $300-400 console, and your $1000 worth of PC hardware that is never going to be more than low-midrange. Can't??? Beyond that, I can trade any console games I want too LEGALLY at any walmart in the world for any other console game I want. That's not going to happen on a PC!!! If I buy a $60 360 game tomorrow and two months from now I want the next $60 console game... Tada - no money spent. What if my console game is only worth $40 12 months from now??? Then I pay the $20 difference. Boo-ya.
What do you get on ebay for your PC games? Absodamnlutely nothing because everyone downloads it for free...

How about about illegal games? Son you can get them for a console as quickly and easily as you can a computer.

Okay. So at worst case Ive got a brand new console that'll play games perfectly for 6 1/2 years if I choose to with zero trade-offs (unlike a PC-bawahaha) Say I toss $400 for one and rotate three new games at Walmart... Im out $580 and I'm legal. That's STILL cheaper than your budget computer, and your computer is outdated long before the hardware was even first sold!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Five year product cycle... Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

By your rules of 5 years budget PC's. 5 years ago (quarter 3, 2003) that means people would still be trying to play on:
2.4-2.6ghz, 800mhz fsb Pentium IV, and an ATI Radeon 9600 pro, upgraded in Q1, 2006 to a GeForce 6800 GS 256MB / Sapphire Radeon X800GTO2 256MB (which incidently are worse than the card that was so bad you just upgraded it...)

So what would such a system do now a days??? Well for one, there are a good number of games in the last year and a half (that's signifigantly LESS than your 5 year PC cycle btw) out that wont even run to their menu screen with this old hardware. In the world of PC gaming, five year old hardware is less useful than an abucus.

Toysrme,

First, calm down.. I can see that you are very passionate about your consoles, but relax -- there's way more important things in life.

This is a big post, so here's what I'm going to do. For the opinions that I disagree with, I will simply state my disagreement, rather than present new argument. I will, however, correct things in your post that are factually incorrect (you can even verify them yourself).


My experience disagrees with your opinion. If that were true, then I would agree with you that PC gaming is pointless.

I have a Pentium D. It was not expensive (~$200, if memory serves me).


Not only do I expect it to work, but I actually did it, and it works remarkably well, and I've been doing this for years! Again my experience disagrees with your opinion. Stuffing an LS1 into a miata will indeed make the miata go faster. Mission accomplished.



Not so. At the time of that review, the 7800GT cost twice as much as the card I bought, yet as you can see, my card is almost as fast. So as a matter of scientific fact, buying the higher-end card would have cost me much more, it would not have improved my experience considerably, and it would not have lasted substantially longer. This was moreso the case with the 8800GT. When I bought this card, it was almost as fast as the fastest card on the market, at less than half the price!


Again, my experience disagrees with your opinion. Crysis on Low looks actually better than FarCry on High, with the same framerate. This is true of PC games in general: Today's Low is yesterday's High. It's the same setting; only the name has changed (normalized to newer hardware). Observe:
FarCry at Max
Crysis on Low


The developer does all that for you, beforehand.


Irony. I upgraded my card; I don't have to stare at 360-era graphics anymore.

I ran Bioshock on my 7600GT; looked like the 360 version, once you lower the settings. On my 8800GT, this game flies at Max settings @ 1920x1200, 8xAA, 16xAF, etc.. Again, my experience disagrees with your opinion.


These games are all at Max detail. If you threw the XBOX in with those tests, and jacked up the settings to Max (assuming you could do this), it would perform similarly to the 7600GT, if not slower. I know this because the development platform for the 360 (pre-launch) were PowerMac G5s with 6800 Ultra video cards. If you attended any game events at the time featuring XBOX demo units, you might've thought you were playing on a 360 -- but underneath the empty XBOX shell, buried inside the kiosk, you would've found a PowerMac G5 with a 6800 Ultra -- This is the card Microsoft spec'd as comparable to the 360's GPU, and it's slower than the 7600GT.

Not true; Quite the contrary, in fact. Again, my experience disagrees with your hypothetical opinion.

This is actually true. Good point.


I don't pirate games.

Further debunking myths of needing Quad SLI to play games well, EA has put together a $700 PC that runs Crisis Warhead rather awesomely.

The analogy about swapping an LS series v8 into a Miata isn’t about a horsepower increase. It’s about the fact that you’ve added more than 300lbs to the front end of what was PREVIOUSLY a 50-50 weight distribution car that only weighed 2100-2200lbs. That’s a 15% increase in curb weight, and a whopping 64% of the weight on the nose.
A once great handling Miata now has the weight distribution of virtually every full sized, 4 passenger front wheel drive car on the planet… You every drove one? I have, they don't get tracked for that very reason.
My bad on using an analogy you can't comprehend before saying something.

!? Okay to begin with that 9800 GT can't even remotely break 15 frames a second in Crysis at high (NOT VERY HIGH) and a typical 1680x1050 resolution. God forbid anyone owns a 1080p, or a halfway descent $175 dollar monitor. So how you are calling that performance level "awesomely" Ill never know. Seriously... And that's WITH a good processor. It's going to cost your video card upgrader yet afew MORE precious frames a second (they dont have to loose) to drop to a $100-200 processor from back in the day which is fine... But the point is that you're cutting 10-20% of your already SLIDE SHOW SUB 30 FPS video card off by pairing it with a budget setup.
Please back up EVERYTHING from now on up with benchmarking facts because you are blatantly wrong far too often You can't prove a statement you've touted yet that shows a $200 video card is now, or ever has been a good choice for an entire two year span (24 months) of gaming. Let alone the 18 months generations that I say.

60 frames a second is what you shoot for. 30 is a bare minimum for a game. If you can't hit 30, you're suffering severely. And please continue proving every point Ive made by pointing out more and more cards and games where you are REQUIRED TO DROP THE DETAIL AND RESOLUTION TO UNACCEPTABLE 1997 LEVELS.

Toms hardware reviews of current games. Reviewed at 1680*1050, Medium AA/AF High quality (Or one below the highest listed when two are given... That's spotting you...) reviewed. Frames Per Second:
$200
GeForce 9800 GTX 512MB 256-bit Mass Effect 45.50, Assassins Creed 39.00, Crysis v1.21 14.80, World in Conflict v1.05 22.70
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 256-bit Mass Effect 43.60, Assassins Creed 34.00, Crysis v1.21 12.80, World in Conflict v1.05 20.70
Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit Mass Effect 32.40, Assassins Creed 42.20, Crysis v1.21 17.60, World in Conflict v1.05 28.90
$250
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB 256-bit Mass Effect 38.90, Assassins Creed 27.50, Crysis v1.21 12.30, World in Conflict v1.05 19.10
Dual Radeon HD 3850 1GB 512-bit Mass Effect 39.90, Assassins Creed 45.10, Crysis v1.21 11.50, World in Conflict v1.05 22.90
$300
GeForce GTX 260 896MB Mass Effect 70.60, Assassins Creed 45.30, Crysis v1.21 23.50, World in Conflict v1.05 31.00
Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit Mass Effect 48.30, Assassins Creed 43.70, Crysis v1.21 20.80, World in Conflict v1.05 37.70


Yeeaaaaaah.... $200 cards suck. They struggle to play CURRENT GAMES at good settings NOW. So what happens when the next games come out??? Everything is represented... Crysis sucks for a game but is a good tech-demo. WIC is filling in for Supreme Commander and another game is following it for RTS's... Mass Effect uses the current, most popular (and likely most popular for the next 18-24 months) game engine. Unreal Engine 3. Like my point said. A $200 card gets you nothing more than low detail and low resolution. That is a waste of time and money as if you struggle with dropping features in CURRENT games to get acceptable frame rates. As Ive said for the umpteenth time the next generation of game engine that comes out is going to DESTROY your framerate making it a total unplayable slide show.

Where are the good 60fps cards at $200??? They don't exist because there is no such thing as a $200 card. There never has been since $200 went mainstream price. Mid-range starts at $275+ now-a-days...
Love the mention on sub-$200 cards too, especially after Anandtech said last year that anything short of the current video cards above paired with the best processors at that time were not good at Decoding HD, nor playing casual games. That they should only be used for office work. Bawahahaha Especially considering the cards that DID decode the HD ok (the now $200 cards) still scored poorly in HD image quality. ***CLASSIC***

From Tom’s Hardware:
Talking about CPU VS the highest end video cards, “To really get the best from the new cards, you need a lot of host processing power... If you want to realize the true 3D potential of the GTX 260, GTX 280, and HD 4870, you will soon need to start using a quad-core chip. A slightly faster dual-core CPU isn’t going to buy you a lot of extra scaling…”.
So you’re wrong… CPU power is critical to the video card performance from top to bottom, and the lower the video card the more important it is for the CPU to NOT offload work onto the slow video card.

Tom's CPU review's Supreme Commander (Only 1024*768 to stress the CPU)
So for your own frame of refferance the fastest Pentium D (960): 19.92
$75 - AMD Athlon 64 X2 5400+: 32.13
$100 - AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ Windsor: 37.52
$150 - AMD Phenom 8650 Toliman: 44.12
$200 - Intel Core 2 Duo E6850 Conroe 3.0GHz: 50.27, Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 2.33GHz: 47.10

Small bits of money go along way... Yeah, something beyond junk resolutions and settings expect to toss $200'ish for a CPU and $300'ish for a video card and you're fine.







Moral of the story is... $300 video cards go along way more than </= $200 cards over the card's life span. That's backed up by every legit benchmark taken since the introduction of the mid-ranged $200 mainstream cards in 2000-2001. So when you want to give people bad advice saying "oh but I did and its okay". How about you explain your opinion VS what the reality and benchmarking FACTS are... The detail is horrendous, the resolution is low, the frames per second is significantly less, and the cards last a shorter amount of time.

You're absolutely correct. Adding a beefier card will absolutely increase the curb weight of my PC by about 15%, thereby canceling any potential gains in framerate. You're logic and deductive reasoning skills are in a class all their own. Likewise your apparently innate competence of PC gaming gives you a clear edge over mere mortals who live in the world of empiricism. Take a game like Grid for example. My real-world experience tells me that this game runs effortlessly on my PC at Ultra settings at 1920x1200. Compared to my friend's 360 version, my PC has visibly sharper texture and shadow detail, richer effects, higher resolution (the 360 version is capped at 720p), and a smoother framerate. Basically, it just looks a lot better. Thankfully, you know better. Your innate wisdom tells you right away that I must be lying, or "lowering my standards," as you put it. No need to see both in action to make a qualified judgement: My experience disagrees with your purely theoretical concept of PC gaming, therefore I must be "lowering my standards." And you're right, too.. My standards are so low, that I spent more than the cost of an XBOX 360 on an "inferior" graphics card, just so I could lie about how awesome it is. Plus, it's a well known fact that Microsoft's circuits are infused with the power of granulated unicorn testicles. This breakthrough technology allows the XBOX hardware to kick PC ass years after its inception -- Unicorns, who'da thunk it? (My sarcasm is in response to your personal attacks).

Believe it or not, I do have a point in all this. You're advocating a blatant double standard, and I don't think you realize it. You are very critical of the fact that midrange cards can't run some PC games on ultra-high settings, but what about the 360? You think the 360 is running on "ultra high" settings? Really? The fact is, the 360 is physically incapable of running these games even on Low settings. A side-by side comparison would make that point obvious, but since you don't have access to both, I'll have to explain why this is true using known facts about the 360. The basic problem is Moore's law. The XBOX 360 has 232 million logic transistors in it's GPU. A couple of years ago, this was a big deal, and the XBOX actually held its own against high-end PCs at the time. But here in 2008, a few Moore's cycles later, we've reached a point where low-end PC hardware literally blows the 360 out of the water. A $100 9600 GT has 505 million logic transistors, or 2.2 times as many as the 360 (my card has 754 million). And it's not just the transistors. These chips are made on smaller dies (55nm to the 360's 90nm) allowing them to achieve higher clock rates as well. The PC holds a similar advantage over the 360's CPU and RAM, and for the exact same reason. In point fact, modern low-end PC technology is literally more than twice as powerful as the 360. So while today's midrange cards may struggle on Ultra high settings, the 360 would struggle on Low, and sometimes, not even. That's why there's no 360 version of Crysis. If it ever does show up on consoles, it'll be a completely different game with smaller maps, lower quality assets, etc. This was the case with Far Cry (last generation) and Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 (this generation).

So yeah, if you want to dis the PC, do it right. Here's a good one... A-list titles you CAN'T get on a PC: Madden '09, GTA IV, Force Unleashed. Some games I'm personally interested in but can't play are the new Sonic games, Virtua Fighter 5, and Virtua Tennis (I'm a Sega fan). As a matter of fact, as soon s the 360 dips below the $150 mark, I'm thinking about getting one to supplement my PC. Here's another legitimate gripe against the PC. Some people don't do whole system upgrades every 5 years. Hell, my best friend is using a PC I found in the garbage. For him, PC gaming would involve an investment in a new PC that he wouldn't otherwise have made (so he'd have to spend way more than he would with a console). There's other, less important gripes. With the PC, you have to adjust the settings that best match your hardware, whereas with consoles, the developers do that for you. There's plenty of good arguments you can make.. Instead, you've taken the PC's greatest advantage, and erroneously portrayed it as a fault.


I agree, but I won't comment on PC framerate data without XBOX data to compare it to. Even qualitatively, you can't really know what 60fps looks like without seeing something you've measured to be 60fps, and you can't do that on the XBOX. On the other hand, as someone who has gamed on every generation of PC and console, I can qualitatively say that the average framerate among 360 games looks around the mid 30's, with some occasional slowdown depending on the game -- which I consider acceptable. But in some cases, I would consider the console framerate to be unplayable -- The GTA series for the PS2 is a shining example of unplayability at its zenith. I've also done recent comparisons of games I've played on both the XBOX and my PC:
(1) CoD4 -- very smooth on both platforms, but my PC looks better with the higher details and resolution
(2) Grid -- generally smooth on the XBOX, with occasional stutter; Zero stutter on my PC and it looks a lot better with the higher details and resolution.
(3) Bioshock -- generally smooth on the XBOX once you disable the frame limiter; smoother on the PC, and looks better with the higher details and resolution.


You have a valid point about World in Conflict. Based on those benchmarks, that is one game I will not be playing. But I'm not really into RTS anyway. Your mistake is falsely generalizing this to all or most games. This is the most strongly CPU-bound game on the market right now, and not even remotely typical of PC gaming in general.

I'm not going to respond to the midrange graphics card thing except to note again that, compared to the BEST available cards on the market at the time of purchase, my two most recent midrange cards were no more than 30% and 20% slower, respectively, yet cost less than half as much. This is not my opinion; this is a fact. Anandtech agrees.

I'm 50-50 myself. I like the fact that immediately when a console comes out it can play all the games it's supposed to, and will for the life of the console. I know that console games will never keep up with pc games in terms of quality, but the simple fact that you don't have to tweak settings to make them run right sells it for me.

On the other hand, I am a budget pc gamer, and i've found that older generation hardware will still deliver satisfactory (to me) performance on newer games with the graphics lowered a bit. Just to add, I'm using a pos hp from walmart with a geforce 6600 video card, and it runs what games i play (C&C 3, BF2142, Halo, Warhammer 40k) just fine. The thing that swings me for pc is that RTS games on a console SUCK!!!!

oh, and btw, I can still have fun playing games on the original nintendo, so that says something about me.