System Builder Marathon: Low-Cost System

[Guest]

Over the week we build and test low-, mid- and higher-cost systems at standard and overclocked rates. Then we compare them and look at price-performance. Today, it's our under $1,000 low-end build.

System Builder Marathon: Low-Cost System : Read more

 

[romulus47plus1]

Paying $230 for a 3870?
Get the 8800GT for that price!

 

[Retrogame]

The $500-$700 system is more important than you realize: it's an extremely important price point in the "Consoles vs. PC wars"

For about $500, you can buy a top of the line current generation PS3 or XBox 360 with a few accessories.

Of course, there are always games better on one platform than the other; and naturally, your PC is a lot more versatile; i.e. it's a "REAL COMPUTER!" Even so, it's nice to know that you can actually put together a low cost machine, overclock it a smidgen, and still run this games representative of this year's crop of PC titles... and if you were to actually scale down the graphics settings to the same level that the consoles would be running things at, probably end up with better frame rates and the advantage of using a nice monitor instead of a TV.