Chasing the white rabbit...

lastplace09

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This post is not meant as flame bait...this is a legitimate question for PC gamers.

Where does it end in terms of having to upgrade your PC to play the latest games?

It seems like my nephew is always needing something new for his PC he got a couple of years ago.

It seems like every 3 months...its 'I need more RAM or I need more GPU.'

Is this the cycle typical for a PC gamer to play the latest stuff?

He can play GTAV just fine...after he upgraded his RAM, but he can't play the Witcher 3 at more than 15 fps.

Does this make any sense?

I used to game on the PC but I don't remember it ever being this bad.

Everyone says that a solid rig can cost as little as 500-700 bucks, but does that mean it has to be updated every 3 months?

As a 35 year old man...this just sounds too damn expensive to have better graphics than my console for $400.
 
Sounds like one of two things, possibly a combination. One, he is getting the bare minimum each upgrade and/or buying the cheapest in whatever category to try to make it work. Two, he is full of s*** and just wants the biggest/baddest of the moment.
 
I think it's more of a "I want" rather than an "I need". If PC gaming is his hobby...then cranking out Ultra max settings and upgrading / playing with hardware is just something to do - kind of like how car guys always want to tune / tweak their cars more and more, even if they don't really need to. They just want more performance and newer/bigger toys.

The "A 500-700 rig" is very true, actually. And if you go with slightly older parts, you can get same quality as consoles for the same price ($400), but still have the same functionality as a normal PC (i.e. mutli-use).

I'd say that's not really typical at all for every 3 months - that just goes back to my car-guy analogy. You can go several years just like console with the same hardware. Even then, the only thing you'd really need to upgrade is the GPU, which would be less than a new console ($300 for the 2nd tier nVidia cards usually, such as the 970 - cheaper for AMD cards usually).

You'll of course start to not do Ultra High graphics on the newest games after a few years, but you'd still be able to do Medium to High (or if you customize the settings, still get high/ultra textures if you lower things such as AA, shadow, etc.).
 
To add on to what's said, if you play your cards like I do (pun intended) I buy the biggest and baddest and sell each gen getting most if not close to all of my money back. This gen I'm 1300 down and will probably get 1600 back which I'll use to spend 2k on 2 new Pascal GPUs. I just put 20 bucks aside each month every year. I've had the same CPU and basic setup for 3 almost 4 years now.

If he buys a GPU that's 100 bucks new then yea he's going to have that issue. As an adult you can see that adds up and makes no sense. Us older PC gamers play the game and do research before purchasing. Honestly one could get a 300 dollar 970, add to a rig that's a couple years old and paid for itself and last another 3-4 years. As a hobbyist and an extreme enthusiasm for hardware I like to have the latest and greatest just because. There's no reason to have 3 grand in video cards, hybrid cooling, 4k, or any of what I have. It's just what I enjoy, like car guys want turbos, superchargers, or a guitarist wants that 3000 dollar guitar when a 300 dollar guitar will theoretically do the same.
 
Yea it sounds like he knows how to play more than his games, MOM I can't play this $60 game the way it NEEDS to play.... I need a new *(&%^&% ....OK Honey I'll order it right now.
 
I run GTAV on a mix of high/very high on my 960 at a pretty solid 60fps. My gaming laptop that has a 770m in it can do a mix of Medium/High/Very high and stay 45-60fps pretty consistently.
 
The thing is that you dont need top notch hardware for gaming and its rather foolish to spend lots of money on a high end GPU as they would be obsolete within a short time.
The best thing to do really is go down the midrange route, you can always upgrade later but at half the price.
I plan on buying a midrange GPU next year and wont buy another one for at least two years and by that time most of the top line GPU's right now will be knocked down to where I can afford them
 
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