Topic: PC vs X1X Cost Effectiveness

@NEStalgia so you're talking about PC upgrades like the expense doesn't give you much over a console thats out for 5 years...

First of all the xbox1x doesn't even have a decent name which totally happens to be representative of what a fail xbox is with no games and you're seemingly hesitant of PC because of the price.

You are going to pay a premium for PC .. it's going to cost you more because you are going to have the best but you don't have a problem buying every console that comes to the market.. PC upgrades are going to keep you on the cutting edge of technology. When a new console comes out you already had better graphics than that 2 years ago.

And mostly it's just the video card and the video card should last years.. but you should buy EVGA or similar that's going to be warrantied if it dies anyways. With technology today you do not need more than a budget midrange card of about $200 to max out games at 1440p.. back 10-15 years ago you really needed the $300-500 card to max games out but these cards are so powerful today.

Once you buy all the speakers, monitors, etc your costs are really just a video card upgrade every couple years and you will always have the highest graphical fidelity in games.

So what do you want? Something amazing? Then get a glossy panel monitor and PC.

I abandoned my own thread! Been planning to get back to it.

I went from 95, 98, to 2k and stayed on 2k through the XP era (it was mostly the same OS and worked great for gaming despite contrary belief until around when Vista launched.) I actually liked Vista, but it had its issues. Fond memories of it and I miss certain interface elements. 7 was certainly more "business oriented." Very solid OS...like a refined Vista with less charm. 8 & 8.1 on a laptop because that's all that would run the hardware It was a step down mostly due to the stupid tile menu.....and then 10 for the same reason. I loathe 10 so horribly. Everything about it is so wrong.

I'm following XBox's sales and freebies....we'll see. Got a bunch of cool PS stuff on the weekend lightning sale which included a number of things X1 had for free over the past year.....as long as the sales are good, maybe X1 is less appealing.

@Inertiacreep Truly I'm less interested in "bleeding edge graphics" than access to discounted 3rd party games. The graphics can't hurt, but I'm so past the bleeding edge PC phase. Too much money, too many headaches. So I'd be going "midrange" anyway.

But a key is: No desk, no keyboard and mouse. Did that for a decade. Great experiences. But...that's not how I want to play these days. So PC is all for Steamlink and Steam/X1 controller. When you sit at a keyboard and mouse all day every day you don't want to go home and do it too!

@NEStalgia While there might be some truth in what @JohnBlackstar wrote, but it's definitely not as bad/complicated as described.

You can set up a strong gaming PC with less money as well, it just depends where and when you're buying your parts. I assembled my PC (Radeon R9 290, FX-8350, 8GB etc.) in its current state more than three years ago and it's still capable of running everything in 1080p with high or ultra graphics settings. And I paid something between 400-500€ (of course I didn't have to buy new drives).
It all comes down to timing and choosing the hardware that has the best value for money.
If you do that, the life cycle of a gaming PC is basically the same as for a console (or potentially longer by upgrading it).

And don't forget that games on PC are a lot cheaper than on consoles, you can get most games for 10-50% of the console price, I almost never pay more than ~30€ (and often something between 5-20€) - not even for the big AAA games.
So even if you might spend a little more on PC hardware (which in turn provides you with higher performance/graphic fidelity) than on a console, you might end up paying less depending on how many games you will buy in the long run.

I rarely have crashes or need to do some graphic driver update etc., these things happened more often in the past. But nowadays, with Windows 10, Steam etc., ease of use is arguably present in PC gaming as well.

The only times I have to spend time configuring or fixing problems is when I have some special requests, like when I bought a gaming mouse with an analog trigger and wanted to use it for acceleration in GTA V.
But if you just use the software and hardware the way it's meant to be played, without any tweaks or mods - just like you would on a console - there usually aren't any problems (compared to the past), at least not in my experience.
PC gaming has really come a long way and can be just as comfortable and accessible as console gaming.

Btw you don't need to be desk-strapped with something like a Roccat Sova, for example. I have it myself and it's wonderful, for gaming or for just watching/surfing the web on the couch.
And you can use the Steam Controller for any game on your PC (except for FIFA, apparently) if you add that game to Steam (as a non-Steam-game). E.g. I have used it with Overwatch with motion controls. There are even Splatoon-controller-profiles for Overwatch in Steam!
And finally, with Steam Big Picture, it won't even feel like a PC anymore but more like a console. ^^

Also, I don't see how an Xbox adds anything if you already have Playstation. There just aren't many worthwhile exclusives to justify having both IMHO.

That rokat thing is cool but that's definitely not where i want to go. No keyboard, no mouse, no lap desk. That's not entertainment, that's productivity told getting in the way of entertainment. Useful, but I've done the makeshift laptop thing with wireless keyboard and gaming laptops with lap desks etc. Nah, if i go pc it had to work headless with just a controller. Lap desks are to uncomfortable. The actual desk is actually more comfy.

@NEStalgia Somehow, I imagined that you would say something like that in reply to a lap desk contraption...

Meanwhile, just look at the wonderful deals available through Games with Gold again...

@ThanosReXXX hmm not a bad list. Better than Sony's this month..... Though not quite enough to convince me to dive into a new console. I envy the elite controller but it seems discontinued... And had reports of severe build quality issues. I'm looking my Razer for ps4. Wired only unfortunately but really nice feel.

@NEStalgia Games with Gold is always better than Sony...

EDIT:
Come to think of it, it's actually no joke at all: Games with Gold IS better, for a fact, and not even just because of the games themselves, but more so because of the fact that they remain yours and remain playable, even if your Xbox Live Gold subscription expires. Far as I know, Sony's service for their free games alternative is considerably more limited in comparison.

But all joking aside: as an arcade racing fan, I think that Crazy Taxi and Split Second alone are already worth it this month. Two wonderfully entertaining games.

As for the Elite Controller: I haven't heard anything about that being discontinued, and from what I can gather, it's still quite easily available, although it isn't for me. I don't have any need for a controller with all kinds of weird additional prongs and levers on the backside, let alone one that costs triple of what a standard Xbox One controller costs.

A controller which is now by far my favorite, so the pack-in controller really is more than good enough already.

But here are some links:
https://www.amazon.com/Xbox-One-Elite-Wireless-Controller/dp/...
http://www.techradar.com/news/xbox-one-controller-deals-cheap...

Even if you ultimately choose to be a PC gamer once again, the Xbox One controller is still the best controller to have.

Truthfully the free games on both are hit or miss. PS I think has had some big winners (Deus Ex:MD last month....didn't matter to me, I was a day-one edition buyer for that, but a crazy good freebie, and once they had MGSV:TPP (I missed that ) and one of their big first parties once. I don't see anything THAT good on GwG, but it's rare on Sony too. GwG has more ok ones overall I think, but nothing I'd buy into a system just to collect the freebies. OTOH, Deals with Gold has some AMAZING prices. Way better than Sony's sales, generally, but balanced by the fact far FEWER games go on the sales, while Sony tends to have piles of stuff on sale...but the prices are quite lower on Gold when they line up.

Still can't quite get myself to jump in. Might depend on if Sony wants a CC to sign up for Vue or if they can use my on file PayPal acct. If they want a CC I'm not sure I"m willing to give it to them again since they compromised it last time they had it. Might do YouTubeTV instead.....and then I'd need a Roku or XBox to play it. Trouble is 1S would be WORSE than my PS4 and WAY worse than my Pro so I'd have to step up to the X to make it seem viable.... And the PC junkes have me considering waiting a few months to see how the market shakes out post Bitcoin implosion (Plus with the recent PSN sales...what would I really use the XBox for? PC may be wiser...)

The Elite controller, they haven't said it's discontinued, but it's not displayed prominently, or at all either, and there was a rumor there's a sequel in the works. For now, Amazon, Best Buy, Gamestop, and even MS Store itself is all "out of stock" (Amazon is 3rd party sellers overcharging right now.) It was regarded as the best controller ever, BUT it had serious build quality issues (the classic stick drift that plagued XBox controllers since the 360) and very thin clips breaking the shoulder buttons despite minimum wear. It might be under redesign. X1 stock controller definitely has the best ergonomics. But I have to say playing PS4 with a Razer controller...the smooth responsiveness of the sticks is AMAZING. It's almost like playing with a mouse. Buttery smooth camera control unlike any console controller I've used. And their OAXN buttons use actual mouse microswitches instead of rubber domes. It's addictive. (D-pad is pure steaming poop in a bag though.) I've heard Elite is even better feeling overall, so yeah, I'm keeping an eye on it either way I go

@NEStalgia Hm, seems I have to correct myself: the free games forever and free games without Xbox Live Gold subscription apparently only counts for Xbox 360 games. For Xbox One titles, it is the same as on PSN, so you can only play them if you have a premium subscription and they won't work without.

@NEStalgia Ah, my bad on those titles, then. But the big, Microsoft-owned titles ARE there regardless. As for the change in policy going from last gen to this one: apparently, from what I've read on Eurogamer (old article by the way, so I don't know what is up with the apparent goal for Xbox One titles only being "rent for free" so they could supposedly also offer newer titles) Microsoft decided to also do the same as Sony on the Xbox One, because they noticed that publishers gave more recent titles to Sony (imagine my surprise when I just told you that I couldn't imagine such a disparity happening) because of their "rent games" policy being more safe for them, because it's more restricted.

Here's the whole article. Don't worry, it's short:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-05-14-xbox-ones-games-...

As for the hard drive thing: don't know about Sony, but Xbox literally has three layers/modes: OS, media and game, and each one of them is ONLY activated when needed, so no OS is running while your game is, UNLESS you interrupt your game by pressing the big X button to literally call the OS into action. And consoles are of course WAY closer to the metal than PC's, so the benefit is obviously still there.

The drive in the Xbox One also isn't a cheap one, so don't know where you got that from.
According to the guys at iFixIt, who did a tear down of the console:

"The Xbox One S features a SATA III hard drive — specifically a Seagate Spinpoint M9T ST2000LM003 2 TB 5400 RPM with 32 MB Cache — a slight upgrade over the SATA II drive in the original Xbox One."

In my PC, I use Western Digital Blue desktop HDD's, which are also high quality drives, which are specifically geared towards extensive use, but I still have to swap them out every other year or so. But like I said: my PC is running 24/7, so that's also a factor...

And that D-Pad is indeed quite good. Microsoft or not, I honestly can't say anything different, and I'm actually quite fussy where it concerns button and stick "feel".

As for those Xbox 360 games looking better: that's of course true, since the list is longer and the catalog of games is bigger, but also because you might see a lot of games that you've played and/or liked. And except for the odd Xbox One bombshell, it's actually STILL better, even with the latest releases on Games with Gold. I mean: Split Second, Crazy Taxi HD? Love em and played em to death, both of them.

But not to worry: because of the backward compatibility, 360 games on Xbox One will remain a thing, and they are upscaled, and run better and load faster. They even have a custom splash screen at the beginning (if that's not going to win you over, then I don't know what is, lol)

Yesterday, I even tried some original Xbox titles, such as Black, one of the best FPS'es, back in the day. And it also looked and ran beautifully, image crisp and clean. Regardless of some things they're doing wrong, mostly by copying Sony's behavior, they're also doing a lot right, especially with their online and backward compatibility efforts.

I'd say, take part of the advice and wait a year or so, and then get an Xbox One X at a reduced price. They're $499 now, but next year, they'll probably have their first price reduction, much like the One S has now had. I got the 1TB Forza Horizon 3 bundle for $288, with another extra game of choice for free as well, while only a year before that, it was still $399.

Interesting about the games! Figures the publishers are involved though I really wonder how it's safer for them if someone can only play the free game while they're giving money to MS/Sony. That brings me back to Nintendo paid online thinking the big publishers are DEFINITELY getting a cut of that and that's half the point.

HDDs: M9T....a 5400RPM laptop spinner. As I said, cheap drive Those little laptop drives in 5400RPM cost less than toilet paper these days. I mean it's not poor quality for what it is, but the whole product class is pretty low tier at this point. (Same for Sony of course.)

I've gone all SSD for productivity machines. Intel and Samsung only for that matter. Can't stand general computing from a spinner anymore. I'm too impatient. Bulk storage I usually run WD Reds or Red Pros in raid, used to use some Seagates.....despite their bad rep they actually lasted me years before a failure.

Custom splash screen? Ohhh, why didn't you say so. (Add X1X to Cart....) Seriously, though I do have a large X360 library, so that's a thing....not sure how much of it I'd go back and play....but I have it. Mostly because PS3 was a dog for 3rd party last gen I wanted to make it work and it just didn't happen.

I don't know who's copying who. PS4 is literally a clone of the X360 ecosystem....Sony copied a lot of what MS did, for better or worse (I personally don't think that's a good thing based on where pre-Phil XBox was going), MS then copies some of Sony, of course....and I realize, like with Switch, Sony didn't really have much ability for backward compat due to the absurd Cell processor. I noticed Sony's copying MS with PS Now, though. It was originally their $10/mo PS3 compatibility solution. Now they're making it more like Game Pass with current(ish) PS4 games too. Of course it's nasty OnLive streaming....so....

One S is now like $200-240 here. They were $180 around Black Friday. But X is still $499 and rarely a penny less. Yeah, thinking of that year wait or so....see where PC is, see where X pricing is....

@NEStalgia Is that One S a bundle price or console only? Difference is rather big.

As for the copying: I only meant in regards to the free games initiative. Microsoft copied Sony's policy on that, at least on Xbox One games. I literally just watched a video showing that even on Xbox One, Xbox 360 games that are free to download WILL work with or without Gold, so it's only restricted to Gold for Xbox One games.

Unless you have them on disc, of course.

I can relate to not wanting to play the entire 360 catalog again (got about 200 - 250 games myself, including backward compatible OG Xbox games), but indeed they're there, and once you've installed them, they reap all the benefits from being on a better system, so visuals are cleaner and frame rates are better, making for a better experience for those games that you DO want to play again, or which are just fun to play whenever. For me that's arcade racers, beat em ups and games like Sniper Elite V2.

EDIT:
And another nice thing, (although coming from the Xbox 360, I actually expected it) is that X360 games don't require disc verification, so once installed, no more disc in drive necessary.

P.S.

Just out of curiosity concerning your whole array of display solutions:
Do you play the PS4 Pro on a PC monitor or on a beamer?

@ThanosReXXX I think the $200-230 is console only, but I've seen $215-250 for various bundles listed as discontinued. No idea what the current running bundle is that's not discontinued (assuming there is one, maybe it was a holiday thing.)

Yeah, I'm trying to think of what last gen games other than exclusives I'd be interested in revisiting that don't have an enhanced current gen port. Dragon Age: Origins comes to mind.

Sniper Elite V2. Meh. WiiU was the definitive version

Oh that's cool not requiring the disc for X360...that's.....really shocking actually....that is a neat plus that would encourage playing them! (Seems wrong to buy a $500 console to play 8 year old games.... )

PS4 Pro & Switch are both played on the PC monitor. I've used it on the FP a few times, of course....but I'm too darned nearsighted to enjoy gaming even at 100" that far away. For movies it's fine. 4k projection would be sadly wasted on me

@NEStalgia Most current bundle is the one I got, on the 28th of December: 1TB Xbox One S, Forza Horizon 3 download + Hot Wheels expansion download + free game of choice (choice out of 4 titles, I chose COD WWII).

I do believe that the extra free game (physical copy) was only over here, and a specific offer from a chain of stores over here in the Netherlands, but the Forza Horizon 3 bundle is official from Microsoft themselves, so I suppose you'd be able to verify/compare the price for that.

Playing on the monitor then, aye? How close are you sitting then, or how big is the monitor? I've got a 42" plasma screen, which by today's standards is already considered small, and I'm sitting about 8 - 10 feet away when playing. A monitor would probably be considerably smaller, so that would potentially mean tying yourself to a desk to be able to play in a way that allows you to see everything clearly enough.

And here I was thinking that you wanted that couch gaming option...

As for Sniper Elite V2: I already finished it, but I keep playing the arcade part of it, because I enjoy the X-Ray kill shots...

As for the Wii U version being the best: considering the outraged responses from many a Wii U owner buying that version, I'd beg to differ. It was seriously gimped compared to the other two versions.

Oh, wait: you were joking, weren't you?

And hasn't anyone slightly shady in your circle of friends/family ever told you that wrong is actually so nice that it becomes right again? It's like adult interaction...

And another nice thing about the One's interface is that with every potential download or install, there's also an option to go to the game's own page, and that has all info, screenshots and video clips, that show you how it looks on the One, so you can make up your mind about installing them or not.

Right now, I've installed Commanders: Attack on Genos, Military Madness: Nectaris, Split Second, Sniper Elite V2, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Hydro Thunder Hurricane, Medal of Honor Airborne and The Force Unleashed 1 & 2.

And while I have all the previously collected free games in my Xbox One download list, including all the Xbox 360 titles, you don't have to install all of them. Once you've acquired them through Games with Gold, they remain in your download list, albeit with the previously mentioned exception that Xbox One titles always require you to have a Gold subscription, which thereby takes the whole Games with Gold pretty literally.

But ultimately, chances are, that all these free PS4 & Xbox One downloads will become obsolete once these consoles won't be supported anymore, so you either have a hard disc filled with useless data, or you remove all the "free" stuff so you can install your retail games from a disc, and the free Xbox 360 downloads, which will keep working forever, and work much better than they ever did before on the original hardware, even without Gold...

@NEStalgia @ThanosReXXX I love how both of you are discussing the free games offered on PS Plus and XBL Games with Gold, when later this year we'll see Nintendo enter the fray ... with free NES games! How kind of them to give us 25 year old ROMS for free with the online service!

@shadow-wolf lol, TWO nes games. And we can play then as much as we want to for a whole MONTH! Eat that, Sony!

To be fair Sony and Microsoft are charging 300% more so it doesn't sound as bad that way. And we don't know for sure what Nintendo is really offering yet. For all we know it's the entire vc Netflix style. It maybe pokebank and flat digital discounts or something are included. Or dedicated splatoon servers.

I'm laughing with you but honestly laughter want my reaction when Sony told me they wanted $60 instead of $40 to pay for usually sucky free games. I quite prefer $20 and I'll buy my own darned game with the change.

@NEStalgia Actually Nintendo changed that policy, it was originally like that but they changed it a year ago. Now, when you get the games offered for the month, you keep them until you cancel your subscription. At least that's good, the whole "only keep it for a month" was ridiculous. But because Nintendo thought this was too generous of them, they said that "they are considering whether they should add SNES games for free" as if giving SNES games for free for the duration of a subscription would be too much to ask for.

But you're right, Nintendo could add stuff like Pokebank servers to make it more valuable. We'll see. I do wish Nintendo would add SNES and N64 games as free games per month, that'd make the service seem much more valuable.

@shadow-wolf Yeah... that's probably going to be another internet outrage, once it's actually here. Maybe they'll change it before that happens, or after the outrage...

It's the Nintendo Difference. Sometimes NOT for the better...