Topic: PC Gaming

This.
So many people still think PC gaming is what it was in the 90's, when it so isn't. Sure it requires a bit of set up (depending, since you can buy something all pre-set up), but it's more casual user and couch friendly now than it's ever been. Turn on boot to Steam Big Picture Mode and you pretty well have yourself a console that's far more customizable to what you personally want.

I've never been much of a PC gamer outside of games like Myst and King's Quest, so I found it very odd when I downloaded all of those free demos that they did for the Game Awards and about half of them were completely unplayable without a controller. I thought, if the game requires a controller, why even put it on PC? I guess that's become the norm nowadays, though. It seems strange that if you want to play with a controller, why not just get a console which is a lot cheaper, but I guess there are reasons.

@Cotillion
I love big picture mode. Steam controller + Big Picture Mode = PC console on TV, playing from leather recliner. What I’ve always wanted. I still don’t like the hassle that comes along side PC gaming- it’s always something. I just upgraded to the RX 5700 graphics card (sucker beasts on the Xbox One X, it’s great, can run Witcher 3 1440p 60fps high settings), but there’s been all kinds of little issues to deal with afterward. In the end it seems to be worth it though.

Witcher 3, for example, keeps crashing as soon as I load a save. Every time. At first I got into the game and then it crashed 30 seconds later but now it just crashes as soon as I hit load save. Deleted all the save files but it still happens. Loaded my DRM free copy I’ve had for a while into Steam, runs beautifully. But my official Steam Purchased version just crashes. Ugh. Trying a reinstall now on a little 128gb m.2 SSD I tossed in (had it in the closet from upgrading my Win 2, so why not use it). Maybe that will help solve the issue.

And Mass Effect 1, couldn’t get a controller to work with it. Even Steam controller. Had to do some renaming of executables and run a command prompt and all kinds of funky stuff to finally get the controller to work. Now it beeps every time I press a different direction on the analog. So I just removed it from Steam and said screw it.

But when everything is working properly, which, for the majority of games is the case, it’s wonderful.

Hm.

Issues with my new RX 5700 graphics card. Games kept crashing. Witcher 3, Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Everything. Computer with crash and give memory management error BSOD... so I’m going to return it. Through my RX 480 back in and it’s working fine now.

In my frustration, I decided to just buy a new PC. And when doing so, I searched heaven and earth for a gaming PC with adequate cooling. Had a MyBestBuy offer for $250 off this Alienware. $1700 for 2080 Super and i7 9700K. Abundant USB and even USB-C ports, compact... but cooling would be an issue. Not enough fans. And difficult to upgrade due to compact form. Sleek size comes with drawbacks.

Finally realized Computer Upgrade King (CUK) was the only brand that had not 2, not 3, not 4, not 5, but 6 fans on the build, and in a micro sized case at that (only 15” tall, amazing). Exactly what I was looking for. 3 on front, 2 on top, 1 in back.

I could have gone Ryzen 7 3700X with a 2070 Super for $1700. But $300 more got a i9 9700KS with 2080 Super. And if I’m gonna spend that much, why not just go all the way. Make it last as long as it can. So... I did.

I got the i9 9900K with 2080 Ti, 240mm AIO water cooler, 2TB NVMe SSD, 32GB RAM, and no mechanical HDD. Didn’t want the 2TB. Rather throw my own 4TB 7200rpm HDD 2 Samsung 860 EVO 4TB TLC SSD in there I already own.

So, there it is. Wasn’t planning on splurging like that but... eh. Screw it, ya know? It’ll be nice to enjoy some 4K gaming with Gyro. And should be future proofed for 1440p well into the future, even after games get more intense.

This GPU is rated at 13.4 Teraflops- that’s more than the Xbox Series X. Gotta love it.

@JaxonH
Wow.

And yeah, that setup should be sufficient for a long time. Even my piddly GTX 970/i5 4460 rig still runs most modern games quite well at 1080p (I have my doubts about Cyberpunk, but I'll just turn down/off settings until I get the framerate where I want it; I genuinely don't care about graphics most of the time).

Hmm, sounds like you got a pretty good deal there, @JaxonH .... Let us know how it goes, then!

@Ralizah
Ya my little RX 480 does 1080p on pretty much any game. Demanding ones only run on medium but, they all run. Good, cheap card.

Stable too. Idk what the deal was with that 5700.

@BruceCM
Will do

Is it possible to build a good gaming computer for $500 or less?

@Tasuki
Borderline, but ya. Have to go cheap on components and shop frugally (no bells or whistles), but if you went with a Ryzen 5 2600 CPU ($115) and a Ryzen RX 580 GPU ($160), 600W PSU ($60), 128gb NVMe SSD for boot drive ($30, but there’s a 120gb Kingston on Amazon right now for $20), with a super cheap 2TB mechanical HDD for large storage ($50), a $75 case (don’t wanna go too cheap on the case, but you can find them for $50- I’d recommend spending that extra 20 or 30 bucks because the jump in quality is pretty significant from the bare-bones $50 models), 8gb RAM for $40 and a $100 motherboard, you’d be at $630 total for case, motherboard, PSU, CPU, GPU, RAM, and SSD boot drive + 2TB HDD storage.

So $630 is a rough estimate, but I’m willing to bet you could easily go sub-$600 by shopping smart. These are just ballpark prices I grabbed off a single search on Amazon. There are videos of $500 PC builds, but I’m guessing those builds will cut corners with things like the NVMe boot drive (and I would NOT cut that corner- you don’t have to have all your games on NVMe SSD, but for $20 it is well worth it for your boot drive and operating system), and they probably have a 500 GB hard drive instead of 2 TB, which realistically isn’t going to last, etc etc.

So $500 is pushing it. $600 definitely doable though. You could hit $500 by following a YouTube video guide though. These guys specifically try to find builds for certain budgets. For example, here’s a $500 build guide.

In this price range, you’re looking at 1080p. I know because this is the kind of build I had before buying my new high-end machine and before upgrading my CPU, GPU and RAM and adding a 3rd party CPU fan. Would get higher settings on less demanding games, of course. I think was even able to run 4K on a few titles.

But if you’re gonna go that far, can always spend an extra $200 and get a better GPU that can take you to 1440p land, which is the sweet spot for PC gaming price/performance imo. 4K not worth chasing unless you’ve got the money to blow. $700-900 can get a rock solid 1440p machine, which is a significant upgrade over 1080p, and tbh, The difference between 1440p and 4K is really hard to notice. For me, anyways. And the cost goes up exponentially to achieve it. So higher cost for less return. Not saying it isn’t awesome if you can swing it though.

That's what I figured. I have a case from a few years ago that I can use I figured but I am mainly looking for something that I can do raids on World of Warcraft with. I don't plan on playing big games like Witcher III or Cyberpunk on it, that's what I have a PS4 and Xbox One for. 😁. I mainly want something that can handle raids on WoW.

I bought A Short Hike. Hope it's good.

Jedi Fallen Order is so freaking good

It's crazy how Disney/Lucasfilm have essentially pulled all the stops this year in terms of Star Wars storytelling on TV and video games, but The Rise of Skywalker happened soon after

My new PC arrives tomorrow. Woot.

Got two additional 4TB SSDs to plop into it, and it should be good to go. Grabbed a whole bunch of kit off Amazon for maintenance. Organized screw kit, SATA cables, canned air, cable management Velcro and zip ties, cheap headlamp for light when working, magnetic screwdriver set, needle nose pliers and cutter set, small riser platform to keep PC off the carpet, already have Bluetooth dongle and new wireless dongle with dual antennas... Ready to go.

My inauguration into the master race draws nigh 😁

@Link-Hero
Dang... how common is that? Was your motherboard a dinosaur, or just bad luck of the draw?

Does your new motherboard support NVMe? Most of them do nowadays. I highly recommend using an NVMe for a boot drive, even if it’s a dinky little 128gb. At speeds of up to 3500MBps (as opposed to the speeds of about 550MBps with SSD or 120MBps of HDD) it makes your OS lightning quick.

Meanwhile, I'll be lucky if I can get some more RAM so editting will go faster. Problably would help for VR stuff, too. It's looking pretty hopeful, though. Proces have dropped way down compared to the last time I looked. I might even be able to get as much as 32 GB, so then I don't have to worry about it again.

@Tasuki
Check this out. You can configure how you want which changes price. But for just over $600 you can get a rock solid PC. $609 for base build. Extra $15 gets you an AMD RX 580 with better PSU. Or stick with the Nvidia 1060. Don’t need a Windows 10 license, can use for free, but there will be a watermark on the bottom right hand of the screen. Can always grab an OEM license from cd keys.com for like $20 (but it won’t transfer if you ever upgrade, for that you have to buy the full proper license for $100).

Code YOUTUBE3 saves 3% off the order also (code they had on one of their YT vids, though it is 10 months old so maybe it’s not still valid?).

https://cukusa.com/cuk-stratos-micro-amd-ryzen-custom-micro-a...

@CanisWolfred
I got 32gb RAM in my new build for... an extra $60 premium over just 8gb? Cheap as heck. In fact, just wasted $75 on 16gb RAM (x2 8gb sticks) for my previous PC (Which is now outdated as I ordered a new one). But $75 for 16gb... and it was Corsair brand too, 3200mhz. So quality stuff too, not that cheap crap.

Glad I wasn’t buying during the Bitcoin Boom. Even now, I think prebuilts are cheaper than building, a vestige of the price hikes for retail units vs bulk purchasing.

@JaxonH Yeah, I think I remember seeing RAM alone costing ~$200 for 16GB when I looked a few years ago. It's nice to see that component prices have gone down, though I'm mostly good on components thanks to some help from my brother. I've been stuck with 8gb, which seemed fine for most things, but I dunno. It seems like I'm always using at least half of it, even if I don't have anything open...

I'm thinking I'll be building a new rig later this year. GTX 1660 Super with an i5-9400f. VERY lower mid-range, but should still be more than good enough for 1080p60fps gaming with a minimum of compromises visually.

Unfortunately, my previous mobo wasn't very future-proof, so I'll be shelling out for a new system. I should probably go for 16GB of RAM this time.

It’s a monster.

What an adventure tonight. There was no room to mount an SSD, much less TWO of them (second one in the mail now). Ultimately I figured out a way to secure both of them with Velcro under the GPU.

Then I realized the system came with built in Bluetooth but it was a weak signal, so I had to turn the computer sideways with the tempered glass in the inside facing my chair for the PS4 controller to work without any lag or spontaneous delay.

Then the Windows update broke my wifi. Thankfully I had a second dongle with two antennas and not only did it work it boosted my download speed to 220mbps! I’ve never seen download speeds that fast before on anything Ive owned. 100mbps tops.

Theeeen I realized the rear fan wasn’t spinning! Figured I must have knocked something loose when I was going through all the cables in the backside of the computer and plugging in SATA data cables to the motherboard, etc. so I had to take the back panel off and unclip all the zip ties again after I had just re-done everything, and I traced the wire from the fan to find it not connected to anything and just dangling there. But I couldn’t figure out where it plugged into. It couldn’t possibly reach the motherboard so I knew it had to connect to the PSU, but couldn’t reach that either so I knew something had to connect to it, and then to the PSU. Took me quite a while but I eventually found this little box they had taped to the ceiling in the lower cubby of the power supply area with all the cables. I noticed a 4 pin slot empty, and right then I knew that was the fan connection that had become disconnected. Put it in, and now it works!

I can’t express how fast this thing is running on a 3500mbps NVMe boot drive, 2 600mbps SSDs and 200+mbps download speed. A new era has begun.

I won’t be upgrading for quite some time. I went heavy on the front end in order to spend less later. I’m hoping this thing can last me the better part of a decade. I don’t think I’ve really felt excited about a gaming system besides Nintendo consoles in a long time. This is a refreshing feeling.

@Ralizah
I may have some spare parts for sale if you need. In my older build I just invested in new ram (16gb), CPU cooler, new CPU, PCIe SATA port expansion, etc etc (and still have the 480), and now I’m just not going to use it. Any of it. So if you need some RAM or anything else, and want it for less than you’d get it elsewhere, let me know... it’s literally brand new (well, minus 1 day of use).

@JaxonH Great. I'll have a looksee over my budget and get back to you if I'm interested.