daveyfunk 2023 年 8 月 31 日 下午 3:20
Is PC gaming still more economical than Console gaming?
I have to admit I'm relatively new to PC gaming and first bought my rig in 2014 for £1268. I then updated the gpu 2018 for £440 and in 2021 updated the cpu, motherboard and ram for a total of £432.

I'm now looking at Starfield min specs and realistically need to upgrade the motherboard, gpu, ram and cpu and looking at value for money this would cost me £783

My current rig is:
mother - z490 tomohawk
cpu - i5 10600k
gpu - gtx 1070ti
ram - ddr3 16gb

My 2023 upgraded rig would be:
mother - asus tuf z790
cpu - i5 13400f
gpu - rtx 4060
ram - ddr5 16gb

So in the space of just under 10 years when I bought my first pc to my upgraded rig noted above I would have spent a total of £2923

Then looking at space for 2 modern games in BG3 and Starfield they both recommend SSD and 150GB space and 125GB space respectively. That's just two games!!!

My 1070ti has performed really well and gotten me through any game I've played with no issue since 2018 but there seems to have been a jump the last couple of years which is quickly making my current rig redundant

How often do you have to buy a new console to stay relevant and how much does a console cost? I might be wrong on this but you could get Xbox One in 2014 and it says you can play Starfield on Xbox One?
最後修改者:daveyfunk; 2023 年 8 月 31 日 下午 3:22
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目前顯示第 16-26 則留言,共 26
Start_Running 2023 年 8 月 31 日 下午 4:46 
It depends. HIgh end PC gaming. ♥♥♥♥ no!. Mid range to to moderate PC gaming. Yes.
Basically if you have to have the latest RTX, and Have to have 240 fps at 4k ultrawide. Then yeah. PC gaming is going to be expensive, the card alone will cost you more than the whole console.

Buiuuut if you're less caught up on the meaningless fluff. You can get a decent system pretty reasonably and even if it costs a little more than a single consiole keep in mind that we're in an age where titles from 2 /3rds of the major consoles tend to be cross platformed to PCs. SO basically even if a pc costs more than any one of the console, it still costs less than any 2 of them. Plus there's the backwards compatability and longer life span. A decent PC can have a good lifespan longer than most console generations.
Eagle_of_Fire 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 3:03 
引用自 daveyfunk
I have to admit I'm relatively new to PC gaming and first bought my rig in 2014 for £1268. I then updated the gpu 2018 for £440 and in 2021 updated the cpu, motherboard and ram for a total of £432.

I'm now looking at Starfield min specs and realistically need to upgrade the motherboard, gpu, ram and cpu and looking at value for money this would cost me £783

My current rig is:
mother - z490 tomohawk
cpu - i5 10600k
gpu - gtx 1070ti
ram - ddr3 16gb

My 2023 upgraded rig would be:
mother - asus tuf z790
cpu - i5 13400f
gpu - rtx 4060
ram - ddr5 16gb

So in the space of just under 10 years when I bought my first pc to my upgraded rig noted above I would have spent a total of £2923

Then looking at space for 2 modern games in BG3 and Starfield they both recommend SSD and 150GB space and 125GB space respectively. That's just two games!!!

My 1070ti has performed really well and gotten me through any game I've played with no issue since 2018 but there seems to have been a jump the last couple of years which is quickly making my current rig redundant

How often do you have to buy a new console to stay relevant and how much does a console cost? I might be wrong on this but you could get Xbox One in 2014 and it says you can play Starfield on Xbox One?
I would certainly advise against upgrading just for Starfield. I was curious too and watched Mutha stream of the early release and man... Fallout 4 is probably better than Starfield actually is. Might even be better even after they shine and nuture Starfield up, necessitating several more years and probably a healthy dose of modders too, of course.

It really puzzle me how they expect me to be excited for it, especially for the price. If anything, I find the new DLC for Mechwarrior 5 which should drop soon way more intriguing. And that's coming from someone who's a sucker for anything related to space and space games in general.
daveyfunk 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 4:09 
Hi all, first of all I just want to thank everyone for their advice above and it's really useful and at least makes me feel comfortable in thinking I don't have to upgrade

So this wasn't eseentially for me to play Starfield specifically and building a rig for that, but more judging by the specs for two recent releases - Starfield and BG3 - and asking the question how consoles can manage the game where it is 10 years old, regarding the Xbox One, and minimum specs quoted for Starfield I'd be at max capacity for my PC

Was more using them as examples where it clearly seems there's been a leap in requirements

I think the argument could be made that consoles are more solidly future proof but very static, but if you know what you're doing then PC is the way to go

Obviously PC gaming is way more flexible, but was purely around building and future proofing. I guess I'm more of Nvidea fan than AMD as I'm a noob and Nvidea just seems more established but AMD is obviously the more value for money approach
Pigeon Pecking Keyboard 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 4:24 
You should consider the software as part of the equation.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Starfield/comments/14lbd8a/about_starfield_on_xbox_series_s_vs_pc/?rdt=43545

I am no computer expert but logically, better hardware should perform better if everything else is the same. Could it be PC being gimped by the way the game was coded?
最後修改者:Pigeon Pecking Keyboard; 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 4:25
daveyfunk 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 4:34 
You should consider the software as part of the equation.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Starfield/comments/14lbd8a/about_starfield_on_xbox_series_s_vs_pc/?rdt=43545

I am no computer expert but logically, better hardware should perform better if everything else is the same.

Yeah, I think the key part is it's easier for devs to optimise a game for console as it's static whereas PC it depends how all the components work together and there are more variables and so different results.

It's very likely that Xbox will have SSD, which I'd imagine most PC users will run the game from, and so loading should be quicker, but also depends on GPU and RAM speeds

They can only really offer a ballpark figure for PC specs, I think, but I've never been able to run modern games at stable FPS on 1440p with a 1070ti and so I don't think that would be an option. If they're saying minimum specs then I think it should be guaranteed you can get stable frame rate at 1080p

Waiting for firmer benchmarks to come out as I'm sure some tech savvy person will play on different cards to find out the truth. I'd like to think that the posters above and the link you provided are right in that 1070ti is my weak part as far as games but should still hold out

Thanks for that
nullable 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 6:36 
引用自 daveyfunk
Is PC gaming still more economical than Console gaming?

It never was.

I love PC gaming. I built matching i7 12700k, 32GB DDR5, 3080 ti's with several TB's of NVMe space last year for the wife and I. But even a decade ago when I was buying more modest midrange hardware, my PC was still at least twice as expensive as a console, probably closer to 3x after you figure in GPU upgrades and whatnot over the life of the machine. Whether it's initial price or total cost of ownership I'm just not seeing PC gaming being cheaper.

I'm not a PC gamer because of cost. I just want that clear. It's just my preferred platform.

I'm sure there's scenarios where they're competitive or get close to break even. But not in such a way where I'd consider building a PC is going to be cheaper in either the long term or short term. And the scenario where it might be close are probably so shoddy on the PC side I wouldn't want to torture myself with the crap hardware and crummy experience.

Maybe if you buy a $500 "gaming PC" and only buy games on sale for $5 then sure, but that's not really the scenario anyone is trying to float is it?
最後修改者:nullable; 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 6:51
ar 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 7:53 
The idea of pc gaming is keyboard and mouse? War game on ps vs.pc and even I couldn't suck it?
It really depends I shop steam sales and humble only pretty much. I dont get to play games day 1 but I would say I have saved more on games than I would have saved by buying a console rather than a rig. But that upfront cost is a pain.
Haruspex 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 8:34 
There are a wide range of PCs for gaming, from the lowest end potato to the highest end NASA super computer. There's a PC to fit every budget.

On the lower end of things up to the mid-range, PC is more economical than console. There's typically a larger initial investment with PC, but then everything else is cheaper and you'll save money in the long run. Frequent sales, third parties sites like Humble Bundle where you can buy games very cheaply, free online play. All this stuff adds up, and over the course of a number of years of ownership you'll have spent less PC gaming than console gaming. Also depending on the game and the hardware, even an older, slower PC can offer better performance than consoles. For example, the Radeon RX 5700 XT can be had brand new for less than $200 today, and most games will run at 60 fps with higher detail while the same games on XBox Series S run at 30 fps.

At the high end, the large initial investment could potentially offset the gains made by everything else being cheaper, especially if you insist on having only the best of the best and you frequently buy games on release at full price.
最後修改者:Haruspex; 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 8:37
Muppet among Puppets 2023 年 9 月 1 日 上午 9:00 
引用自 daveyfunk
It's very likely that Xbox will have SSD, which I'd imagine most PC users will run the game from, and so loading should be quicker, but also depends on GPU and RAM speeds
If you want a meaningfull upgrade, certain games profit from an ssd. You can get 2tb ssd for around 100 $ atm.
Thats the price you once paid for hdd.

As always, buy once a good one. They need to have a ram cache, and should be tlc, not qlc. Watch a video about how ssd work. Its interesting, and tells you what to look out for to prevent mistakes. In short, dont fill them all up.

Another note:
You should not listen to the marketing. "Of course" every new card or cpu is advertised as the non plus ultra. That does not mean your item is obsolete.
You should only get what you need, when you need it.
For example, i dont need more than 1080, i dont need more fps than the game needs to run fine.

The question about consoles you seem to have, look how much fps the games run at on those. Is it 60? Or sometimes even 30?
You dont need a new computer to catch up with the console you once met.


If you actually went for the motherboard you said, and the 13400, if i understood right, the motherboard is for gen 12 and 13.
So, what does that mean? If the 13400 wasnt enough for the future, you would be trapped with a computer you can not upgrade without getting all new....... again. Just because you did not wait and did not buy what is best for you.
You want ddr5? Why buying it when its the expensive choice? Just wait and play with the computer you already have.

Doing it right is an entertaining way to save money.

A friend thought he needed a new computer. And when he got it, the game we played did not run better. I was surprised too, but i told him before, your computer is fine, you dont need a new one now. People over estimate a new cpu,
and they under estimate the one they have.

Ask yourself, do i need the extra resolution and do i need the extra fps? This are the pricy things.

You do not miss out on something when you wait. You will just get it in another form cheaper and likely better, and can use it with less energy.

Another way of saving money for the extra bit upgrade of the next computer, dont buy single player games when they are new. If you do that, without extra cost you can get the better tier cpu of the better generation, and you have a better computer that makes it easier to "wait" for the next really better computer in a future.

Pc can be cheaper than console. And better.
daveyfunk 2023 年 9 月 2 日 上午 7:39 
引用自 daveyfunk
It's very likely that Xbox will have SSD, which I'd imagine most PC users will run the game from, and so loading should be quicker, but also depends on GPU and RAM speeds
If you want a meaningfull upgrade, certain games profit from an ssd. You can get 2tb ssd for around 100 $ atm.
Thats the price you once paid for hdd.

As always, buy once a good one. They need to have a ram cache, and should be tlc, not qlc. Watch a video about how ssd work. Its interesting, and tells you what to look out for to prevent mistakes. In short, dont fill them all up.

Another note:
You should not listen to the marketing. "Of course" every new card or cpu is advertised as the non plus ultra. That does not mean your item is obsolete.
You should only get what you need, when you need it.
For example, i dont need more than 1080, i dont need more fps than the game needs to run fine.

The question about consoles you seem to have, look how much fps the games run at on those. Is it 60? Or sometimes even 30?
You dont need a new computer to catch up with the console you once met.


If you actually went for the motherboard you said, and the 13400, if i understood right, the motherboard is for gen 12 and 13.
So, what does that mean? If the 13400 wasnt enough for the future, you would be trapped with a computer you can not upgrade without getting all new....... again. Just because you did not wait and did not buy what is best for you.
You want ddr5? Why buying it when its the expensive choice? Just wait and play with the computer you already have.

Doing it right is an entertaining way to save money.

A friend thought he needed a new computer. And when he got it, the game we played did not run better. I was surprised too, but i told him before, your computer is fine, you dont need a new one now. People over estimate a new cpu,
and they under estimate the one they have.

Ask yourself, do i need the extra resolution and do i need the extra fps? This are the pricy things.

You do not miss out on something when you wait. You will just get it in another form cheaper and likely better, and can use it with less energy.

Another way of saving money for the extra bit upgrade of the next computer, dont buy single player games when they are new. If you do that, without extra cost you can get the better tier cpu of the better generation, and you have a better computer that makes it easier to "wait" for the next really better computer in a future.

Pc can be cheaper than console. And better.

Thanks for this and for the people who commented before. I feel safe with the knowledge I don't need to upgrade at least :) I'm not looking for 4k graphics and not even 1440p, so my rig should be able to manage decent fps at 1080p which is enough for me
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張貼日期: 2023 年 8 月 31 日 下午 3:20
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