When should I get a new gaming PC?

[Hramzyn]

Hello, I got my current gaming PC (9600 GT, Phenom II X3 710 and 4 GB of RAM) in 2009. It served me well, and still does, since I've been able to max out every game on 1440x900 except a few newer games (Far Cry 3, Metro 2033 etc) and some older (GTA IV for example) and still get reasonable frame rates.

But soon we will get the PS4 and the new Xbox, so I guess my PC isn't goint to be superior to them and even next generation console ports will run poorly on it, not to mention next generation PC games.

Also, I live in Bosnia, so I can't really afford a new PC every year or two. That is why I have to make sure that my new PC lasts for as long as possible.

So, when should I buy a new PC? I was thinking about waiting for the new GTX 700 and HD 8000 series or whatever is top of the line when the new consoles come out. What do you think? Also, remember that I want this build to last as long as possible, just like what I am using right now.

 

[g-unit1111]

That's a good question. I look at it this way - if you're going to buy now, buy now. If you're going to wait, wait. However, if you keep waiting for something better to come along, you will never be satisfied with what's out now. The thing you have to understand is that it's a principle of Moore's Law - no matter how good a piece of hardware is now, something better is always going to be coming down the pike. Which is why I say there's no such thing as future proofing a rig. That's my two cents.

 

[Hramzyn]

That's a good question. I look at it this way - if you're going to buy now, buy now. If you're going to wait, wait. However, if you keep waiting for something better to come along, you will never be satisfied with what's out now. The thing you have to understand is that it's a principle of Moore's Law - no matter how good a piece of hardware is now, something better is always going to be coming down the pike. Which is why I say there's no such thing as future proofing a rig. That's my two cents.

I'm aware of that, but what worries me is that if I buy a nice rig with a GTX 660 or an HD 7870 for example, it will be pretty nice right now, but when the new consoles come out along with all the games optimized for hardware newer than that my build will be outdated. What if the PS4 and the new Xbox have GTX 700 or HD 8000 series GPUs? But, if I wait until the new consoles and buy whatever is top of the line at that time (about 2x the performance of the new consoles) It will stay high end (compared to the consoles) for longer, since console hardware doesn't change, thus I will be able to max out pretty much everything until the next consoles come out because almost all games are made to run on console hardware.

 

[g-unit1111]

I'm aware of that, but what worries me is that if I buy a nice rig with a GTX 660 or an HD 7870 for example, it will be pretty nice right now, but when the new consoles come out along with all the games optimized for hardware newer than that my build will be outdated. What if the PS4 and the new Xbox have GTX 700 or HD 8000 series GPUs?

No matter how hard they try, the console graphics will never, ever top their PC counterparts. I mean if you search on Google for "death of PC", you'll probably get like 1,000,000,000 hits. But the truth is - desktop PCs will never die, and they just keep getting better. Console hardware is similar to laptop hardware in that even though the numbers might be the same, they'll never be the same in terms of performance. Desktop PCs will always come out ahead.

It will stay high end (compared to the consoles) for longer, since console hardware doesn't change, thus I will be able to max out pretty much everything until the next consoles come out because almost all games are made to run on console hardware.

No that's kind of a myth - the PS3 is old, but the hardware has been around longer than the PS3. Future consoles will probably never catch up to PCs in terms of sheer graphics performance and CPU power. Consoles may get SSDs, but they'll be five year old models. The PC has the latest and greatest hardware no matter how you look at it. Console manufacturers have to meet a certain price point, and they'll water down the hardware if it means that they'll turn a profit. The PC hardware makers don't have that limiting factor so if they make, say a $1K GPU like the 690, there will be a market for it.

 

[Hramzyn]

No that's kind of a myth - the PS3 is old, but the hardware has been around longer than the PS3. Future consoles will probably never catch up to PCs in terms of sheer graphics performance and CPU power. Consoles may get SSDs, but they'll be five year old models. The PC has the latest and greatest hardware no matter how you look at it. Console manufacturers have to meet a certain price point, and they'll water down the hardware if it means that they'll turn a profit. The PC hardware makers don't have that limiting factor so if they make, say a $1K GPU like the 690, there will be a market for it.

So what you are saying is that the next consoles will not have the latest high end hardware? They will have something like GTX 480 or HD 5870 instead of whatever GTX 7XX or HD 8XXX is top of the line when they come out? That is weird since I think the PS3 had a modified version of a 7800 GT, which (as far as I know) was pretty much top of the line back when PS3 just came out in 2006.