X360 or Souped up PC?

Todays events have made me decide not to buy another next gen console:

I just bought a new Toshiba Regza telly (our old one karked it a while ago and we've only just been able to get a new telly.)

So, I figured, 1080p. I need something to plug into it.

Firstly I tried my laptop, which failed, I had to go buy a DVI to HDMI cable, which worked wonders.

So, I tried Test drive unlimited. This ran alright, though my poor lappy (7600Go graphics, 256mb) overheats after 15 mins... Picture quality is pretty good as the Telly seems to upscale it.

AT this point, i'm starting to wonder, do I need a ps3 or xbox?

I had a server upstairs with a slightly better gfx card (7600GS) so I pulled it out, plugged it into the telly and hid it out of view. The game ran pretty well and now I KNOW I don't need an x360 or Ps3.

So tell me, what advantages to I get out of buying another new Xbox or a PS3? There doesn't seem to be any good games on either platform. I can get decent games on PC as is.

I figure instead of buying an Xbox, I should just buy a new 8800 card and have do with consoles for good? Maybe even design my own box and put everything in there.......

Well, like most will probably say, it's all about the games, so if you're content with what's available/to-be available on PC, you're pretty much set, long as you can live with games that will more or less ship with bugs, and as of recently, online-activation and DRM seeping into titles.

That, and the thing with the 360 is that Microsoft has released another revision of them recently, sporting an HDMI connector on standard 360 models (where-as it was previously exclusive to the more expensive 360 Elite), personally, I'd just wait it out if I were you if you were to ever take that direction.
(still waiting on the 65nm processors before purchasing one with my own cash)

If it were me I'd look at the console and games available and see which shouts out "I must play that".

I pretty much gave up playing PC games a while back due to the constant upgrading every 6 months so I had the latest uber kit to play games as they should be played. I estimated I was spending over £1000 a year keeping up to date. In one year I spent over £3000 which was very stupid of me.

About 3+ years ago I decided to ditch PC gaming and instead go down the console route. I bought a PS2 and have not regretted that choice since.

Simple reason is I can go into a shop and any game marked PS2 will work perfectly, no upgrading woes, no worrying about frame rates with the current specs on my system etc.

When I eventually buy a HDTV I'll definitely get a XBOX 360 or PS3 depending on the games I really want to play at the time. Reason is I know I'll get years out of a console and not have to worry about upgrading the damn thing six months down the line.

I love my 360. I am anti Sony though, so my opinion may be jaded. :)

It really does depend on the games.

I will say that I've all but given up on PC games though for the following reasons.

1. Protection schemes. If I buy a product, I don't want to put up with this crap. Stop treating me like I'm stealing from you when I want to buy your product. I refuse to buy software with these liscensing scemes, and I'm passing up more and more these days.

2. Not playing the upgrade game. I buy a new computer every 4-5 years now, and that means I don't get to play the latest and greatest. I like to play older games once I finally do upgrade, unless of course they have a protection scheme I don't like (see #1)

3. Total and utter lack of anything new. This is true for both consoles and PC's. We really need more small studios making fun games, instead of EA making another blockbuster that is exactly like the one they made last year.

4. MMPORGS, or any MMO game for that matter. I like playing a good single player game. An MMO is only as good as the people you get to play with, and I've not had much fun online since the early days of Diablo 1.

well pongo, for the point 3 you have to agree that you have more chance to see a small studio's develloped game on pc (let see.. hmm blitz coded game :p ) than on the ps3.

*shrug* I see nothing on x360/ps3 until next march/june that i would play.

my PC handles everything i can throw at it, might upgrate to an 8000 range gfx card soon, just to keep it running a bit longer, but i see no reason to buy an x360/ps3 anymore.

MMOs dont come into it, i dont buy or play them

Here's another plus: all my old nes/snes/n64 games... upscaled. (the n64 emus seem to render at high res modes properly, no jaggies...) without having to hack firmwares.

SO i have access to everything I need on this PC.


Whats next? I'm going to write an auto-launcher. Insert TDU CD and TDU launches... etc....

One thing to note is that if nobody supports PC gaming, then how are people here that write games going to sell them?

XBox360. For GTA IV and Mass Effect. No contest.

I think that for people to start buying PC games, they have to be written to support lesser systems. The vast majority of people are not upgrading continually. I still consider my PC to be a fast machine, but I don't even bother with new releases because I *know* they won't run on it. If they do manage to run it is so clunky it is not fun.

Yes, certain games will always try to push the envelopes, but EVERYTHING does not need to do this. I'm currently building an arcade cabinet to play my old classics, and if that's the only games I ever play again, I'd be ok with that.

If you plug your PC into your telly, you'll find that there's a whole load of 'social computing' made available to you. Having some mates round with a few beers watching crazy YouTube clips is a good laugh!

If you opt instead for a 360, all you can do is play games.

Seriously, PC on TV is a good thing. You will enjoy.

Hmmm X360 = US$350 Good PC = US$1500+

No contest financially.

And I'm sorry but spending a lot of money for a PC to hook to a TV to watch youtube or go on MySpace ...ugh ...

Oblivion doesn't run optimally on a pc. eg. Get an Xbox

ps3 are overpriced (now that i think of it their kinda like a iphone)

I watched some porn using tv-out from the radeon and it fried my RGB port. For the past year I have been watching tv via composite because of it.

True story.

Hambone.... um, I already HAVE a PC. thats where i'm SAVING! :)

I have oblivion running on my PC with everything on Max.

and $300 is lot just to play GTA IV haha.



Anyway, i'm all hooked upnow and laying Bioshock on mah telleh. The Xbox3 and George Forman Grill 3 can wait.

PC+TV is good option..as for me, sometimes im playing my PC games over projector so whole wall is one big screen and its really scare me to the pain, when I use to play Fear..whoa..it was really different experience rather than PC monitor..

do newer projectors do a good job with the white and dark contrast and brightness? I've not seen a good one in a properly darkened room.

I always thought a 1080p TV would make a good monitor, Allthough I'm not sure how practical it would be for apps like 3dsmax. Maybe if you sit far enough away.

I expect the super high res is the one problem with playing games on one. Otherwise you don't need a high end puter to play the latest games. Have no problems at all with a 4 year old CPU and a 7600GS even with oblivion, stalker and bioshock demo with all the details up. But I play between 1024x768 and 1600x1200 only

Personally id take a PC.
For my favorite types of games (*real* RPGs, FPS and Strategy) no standard console controller can beat a mouse.
(except mabe the wii-one :/) Although each to their own.

Heh! Wiimote + bioshock is awesome!


I have a problem though now guys....

my graphics card burnt out yesterday whilst playing Bioshock. Looks like a glitch in the nvidia drivers clocked the thing wrong. shoved it to 1920x1060 and it just went multicoloured and turned off haha...


So now I need a new gfx card... and apparently a new power supply to run it (I only have a 500w and no wierd connector that modern gfx cards seem to need?)

I have a 40inch Samsung LDC 1080p TV set up as a second monitor. It's connected via HDMI and does 1:1 pixel mapping. I'm using it for game development but it works amazingly as a monitor. It makes my real monitor look quite poor (white looks very yellow compared to the TV).

Both companies have good video cards out at the moment, depending what you want to spend. ATI put out drivers recently that have greatly improved the performance of their new HD line of cards, so make sure to look for recent benchmarks.

Apparently nVidia are releasing a new chip around November, so if you can hold off until then you should get some good value on the current generation.

You need an ATXv2 power supply for those little PCI-E power plugs. Most cards come with adapters for the 4-pin molex plugs, but you're better off getting a solid power supply with the actual connectors on it.

Cheers Craig.

I just found out- my 7600gs is faster than the 8600gs in areas I need it to perform, so I just screwed my system fan into the 7600 heatsink and overclocked it by 35% :O

Well, I'd have to say that a good 64-bit Vista gaming rig may be something to consider... Wonder how that would handle? Are there any advantages of Vista x64 vs. the x32 versions when it comes to games?

Cygnus, I don't know the specifics of your video cards, but looking at a general comparison between those two cards, I can't see how the 7600GS could be better at anything than a 8600GS.

Here is a comparison:

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=387&card2=533

I'm sorry, i got confuddled! i was talking about a comparison of the 7600GT and 8600Gt.

It's wierd: http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=637&p=2

I would assume the difference between the 8600 and 7600 would be similar.

(note: on pages before the one shown the 8600 is better but I will be playing games such as fear and don't want to *lose* performance...)

My biggest beef with consoles are the prices of the games.

I remember when I was buying tomb raider legend, the xbox360 version was £49.99! and I picked up the PC version for £17.99.

There's no way I could justify spending 50 notes on a game, no matter how good the virtual bottom is.

> My biggest beef with consoles are the prices of the games.

True, but the console games have a very healthy secondary market, where PC games generally do not, at least outside of ebay and half.com

More importantly, on later pages, they've updated their review with statistics from a more recent driver version which showed the 8600 has all but wiped out the losses and has a few new big improvements. Even then, those are old drivers now too so it could be even better by now.

Also, you can rent console games. Which is great when you want to play one, but are not sure it will hold your interest.

I rent quite a few games, you can get them for 2 weeks at BlockBuster here in the US now.

I've gone with that review site posted recently. I want the 7950gt rather than the 8600 for now, price for buck and i'm not going to move to vista (or DX10) any time soon.