Gaming 4k Gaming on PC is very expensive compared to consoles ?!

Zephir1991

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My 4K pc setup was around 1600€.
- Core i7 9700K
- Gigabyte Z390 D Mainboard
- Nvidia RTX 2080 Super
- 16GB G.Skill RipJaws V
- Seas Modular Prime Focus Modular

And the usual, some SSDs and a normal 1TB storage.

So far, everything runs on max settings and 60+ fps.
 
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The Real Jdbye

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No you can't.

Why do PC elitists always lie and say their builds are cheaper then they actually are? is it because they feel stupid admitting how much money they actually spent to play video games?

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------


XB1X runs tons of AAA games at 4k native resolution, please stop spreading misinformation.
Yes, you can, actually. You'll have to get *some* parts used (the savings by buying GPU used for example are pretty significant) to get there. Which to me is a fine compromise for getting a way larger library of games, as well as all the other things a PC can do (if you didn't already have one)
If you were to buy all new parts, you'd get something capable of running 4K, but at the sort of settings you'd have to use in some games just to get them running comparably to the XBox One X would leave the game looking way worse. In other cases, the game might run and look about the same on PC, but there's no denying it would be an inferior experience overall. All new parts are really not the way to go if you're building a budget PC.

And if you already *have* a desktop PC, but it's not quite up to the task of gaming, it makes a lot of sense to spend a few hundred on upgrading it instead, and getting a way better gaming experience than any console could give you.

It's funny that you think I'm an elitist. I barely play PC games and I've been a Nintendo fan for around 22 years. My desktop is over 10 years old now save for the GPU, and struggling with couple of the few PC games I do play on occasion, which are really heavy on resources (pretty much have to have a powerful PC for those games) and the CPU is not quite up to the task.
Upgrading the CPU at this point means a new mobo and new RAM (because DDR4) and on top of that, there's probably something wrong with my PSU so that is due for a replacement as well. That's starting to get kinda expensive, and I would rather build a new rig than spend that much money fixing up and improving my old one, so I've been waiting for when I can actually afford it to build an entirely new rig, and happily playing my consoles in the meantime.

But I have been paying attention to prices, coming up with potential configurations for my next build, checking used prices on occasion, and also staying up to date with LTT videos.
I've seen many budget builds (both new and used parts), benchmarks, etc. on LTT and otherwise.

Bottom line is, I'm confident that in the US where the prices are lower than here, if you built a PC on a very strict $500 budget with the mindset of getting the best performance possible, you'd get at least equivalent performance to an XBox One X.
In effect, that means cheaping out wherever you can. Cheap out on the motherboard, cheap out on the CPU (AMD and Intel have many low end offerings and these are just fine for gaming if you're not pairing them with a GTX 1080 or something stupid like that), cheap out on the GPU by getting it used, and definitely cheap out on the case. You wouldn't have the luxury of having a TB of SSD storage and many TBs of HDD storage, you would have to settle for a small $20-$30 boot SSD and a couple TBs of HDD, which is still more than the XBox One X comes with.
The more of these parts you can get used, generally the better, although some of the parts, like the case and mobo, you don't save a whole lot on by going used.
Do the necessary checks and tests if you decide to buy a used HDD or SSD to make sure the drive is still good, that's basic stuff and not hard to do with tools like Victoria, HD Tune and CrystalDiskInfo, and gives you peace of mind. Life expectancy will be shorter than with a new drive, but storage is dropping in price all the time, and you can always replace them later.
The only thing you shouldn't cheap out on is the PSU. At least get an 80+ Bronze PSU from a known manufacturer.
It also takes some skill in knowing which parts are a good pairing (mainly the CPU, GPU, as well as the RAM speed and timings, and to a lesser degree the PSU) so that not a single dollar is wasted because of a bottleneck somewhere.

I don't think you've actually put in the effort to look around and see what you can actually get for $500. Note that those are US dollars and not CAD. CAD is worth less and on top of that, you don't have as big of a market for used hardware, so used prices are overall a bit higher, although how much, I can't say as I haven't been paying attention to the Canadian used market.

I did not actually look at OP's country when I posted originally, I have no idea what prices are like in France, and the used market might be completely different there (likely the XBox One X also costs quite a bit more over there though, as it does here), but I do have a pretty good idea of US prices even though I don't live there (just comes as part of being active on English-speaking websites which are primarily dominated by Americans) and that is what I am going off of.
 
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PityOnU

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Every time this comes up I recommend:

https://www.logicalincrements.com/

Pick your budget, and that site will show you the optimal bang-for-your-buck build.

And yeah, you are correct that you will probably never be able to get a PC that will play games at a similar level to console for a similar budget. Consoles have the advantage of economies of scale reducing manufacturing costs, as well as OEM's which are actually willing to make a loss on the sales because they will make the money back in software licensing fees.

And before anyone tries to claim otherwise, allow me to point out that the Xbox One X with two controllers was on offer for a grand total of $250 a few weeks ago. Best of luck matching that.
 
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spectral

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No you can't.

Why do PC elitists always lie and say their builds are cheaper then they actually are? is it because they feel stupid admitting how much money they actually spent to play video games?

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------


XB1X runs tons of AAA games at 4k native resolution, please stop spreading misinformation.

No it doesn't it uses Checkerboard upscaling alongside in most games dynamic resolution scaling. Almost nothing runs at native 4k, certainly not AAA games.
 
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sarkwalvein

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You can build a gaming PC capable of running 4K games about as well as an XBox One X for around the same price, if you pick your parts carefully. It won't be what you would call high end, but then neither are consoles.
In my experience, that is not true.
You can build a PC that runs 4K games like an XBone X, sure... but you will probably need to spend well above $800.
You can also, for sure build a PC that runs many times better than an XBone X, but it will cost many many times more than the console.
It's quite hard to get the same performance as a console for less than half the price.
 
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depaul

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Thank you very much guys. I've read everything.

Edit : As most members here mentioned, a better approach would be :
-To buy a normal cheaper laptop ;
-AND a high-end desktop for gaming.
They would cost the same as a high-end gaming laptop, if not less.


For example : I bought a normal laptop for 300$, and a gaming desktop i7 with RX 570 8GB for 400$. Their total amount is still cheaper than a high-end gaming laptop, and in general gaming performance on desktop GPUs is better than mobile equivalents.
 
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