Anyone else considering skipping a new PC build in favor of an XBOX series X / PS5?

Hi,

I've had my current PC build for half a decade. It consists of an Intel 3570k (overclocked to 4GHZ), 16GB of RAM, older 1TB SSD, and a GTX 1080 (2016 upgrade). Today I started pricing out a new build, something that would last me another 6 years. Even if I wait for Nvidia's next line of GPU's I'm still looking at a $2,000 higher end PC and that isn't including a new higher end monitor. All said and done I could be looking at $2,500 - $3,000.

I'm now considering buying an XBOX Series X and or a Playstation 5 instead of building a new PC. Hell, if you buy them both (let's say $900- $1,000) that's cheaper or about the same price as a single GTX 2080i. I already have an LG OLED TV so I can't help but to question why build a new higher end gaming PC at this point? I enjoy PC gaming and use it daily for work and web browsing but those two last times don't require a high end PC. Also, it's enjoyable to play console games on a nice 65" TV while sitting in a leather recliner with a drink holder lol.

Anyone else considering skipping a new PC build in favor of an XBOX series X / PS5?

I'm pretty with you OP. I have a graphics card that's great for sub 4K games right now, but if things progress it'll be dusted quick. And I also don't have the hard drive situation ready. I am still on an i5 processor. I would need a new monitor to get into higher resolutions. With it all it'd be more expensive for me for sure.

I will be waiting a bit to see how games look. My biggest worry is that it still won't be a big step up or change in what kind of games are possible or doing, at least for a bit. I hope I am wrong though. All this hard drive tech for example could be used to do a lot with open world games.

This gen there wasn't that feeling but it wasn't long ago that these kind of decisions were pretty easy when new consoles came out, at least for the early part of a generation of games. Jumping onto the 360 for example felt fresh and for the price, amazing even as a PC gamer. With PS4/Xbox One it really wasn't the case for people who play on PC. If all this hard drive tech and new additions really are used well it'll be another good time to get in value wise on consoles.

Yup. I'm invested in and satisfied as hell with the Xbox ecosystem now thanks to the All Access payment program and Game Pass. I'm probably going to get a new mid-tier graphics card and upgrade my RAM relatively soon for the PC games I already have and will likely continue to acquire, but unless Microsoft does something incredibly stupid with the pricing I'm definitely getting a Series X in lieu of the full system rebuild I had planned for the fall.

I'll likely buy a ps5 for exclusive games provided they've interesting looking titles.

personally, for me it's too early to tell which comes first- a ps5 purchase or a new pc build.

however my i7 930 with radeon hd 6870 is nearly ten years old now, so it's very much due for a replacement. i can only do light-ish gaming on it now- but you'd be surprised how much you can get away with despite it nearly being a decade old. it's also hooked up to my tv, so it pretty much mimics a console in use.

if sony announces some knockout games for the ps5 launch i could see that purchase coming first- but honestly i feel like the pc build makes more sense for me right now. i also bought a ps4 extremely late in the cycle (black friday in 2019), but that decision has turned out to be pretty worthwhile (i picked up a ton of great games on the cheap).

I'm not selling my 2080 Ti for either of these consoles.

Everything sounds really expensive... I'll hold out for 2...possibly 3 years until the next gen library solidifies. Until then, I think I can have fun trying to make a dent into the ol' backlog.

My PC isn't going anywhere so I'm probably going to wait and see if the new machines will have games I'm interested in and are multiplatform games performing significantly different, then it would be worth considereing.

Also if Sony gets PS4 BC right I just might sell my PS4 and replay Bloodborne at a frame rate that isn't so choppy.

I got a new PC in December so that's where i'll be, i could make use of a 4k monitor but i don't like the idea of forcing a silly amount of pixels, and i don't have room, all my friends primarily use PC too we all grew up on Counter Strike.
I'd like to play God of War but it's way too expensive to get a console for that, it's cool that what's it called with the robot dinosaurs is coming to PC so i'll check that out, i just hope the new hardware doesn't reduce the amount of PC ports we've been getting. The console game i'm most desperate to play is Bayonetta 2 i'm just waiting for a cheap Switch to happen.

This is a terrible time to build a PC. Right now we are actually on the end of a technology shift.

First, and least important is PCIe 4. It has just barely started so it is by nature the first generation ver 1 of these parts; i.e. the WORST of PCIe 4 tech. We all know PCIe 4 is going to be everything in 2021, nobody's going backwards on that. It is the least important reason; but even as a crap reason, it pretty good not to get caught in the past.

Second, for CPUs this is a "meh" time to be buying, given it is April 2020. Why? Well, Intel is really scraping the bottom of its rotten aged 14 nm barrel...its CPUs are not great from a tech or price point of view. Meanwhile AMD, is putting out very fine chips, but their "better chips" are coming out later this year. Zen 2 architecture is very good, but if YOU HAD wanted that the window was last year. In April 2020 you should not be buying into Zen 2 when Zen 3 at 5nm is coming. AMD's Zen 3 4000 series chips will have better instructions per cycle/clock or IPC - even if just slighly. So, it will be the first AMD chip that not only have more cores and threads, but will likely have Intel beating IPC.

Third, graphics. Let's not get crazy Big Navi won't be great. Oh, it will be 'very good' and a huge improvement over what AMD has now, but it will only hang with Nvidia - not beat it. On the other hand why buy ANY graphics cards now? Are you really going to buy a 2070 or 2080 card right now? WHY? Dudes, use you heads, the Nvidia 20-series came out in September 20, 2018; why in the HELL would you buy into it now 17th month later? Wait until people, are unloading 20-series for the new 30 Series of RTX 3070, if you want a bargain? So either way you should wait, be it for big Navi or for Nvidia 30-Series.

Fourth, storage. You might not like to hear this but Sony's PS5 is going to change how PC game developers look at SSD. And how Sony will use their SSD will actually make PC game makers start demanding faster SSDs for their games too. But how do you fix faster loading of games without fast SSDs? All you can tell gamers is that should buy more RAM and turn it into RAM-Disks? The discussion will go like this, "Hey, PC gamers we were thinking you should buy twice as much RAM so you can use half that ram to act as a stopgap to make your games run as well as a $500 PS5."https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQeezCdF4mk Wait for better tech.

It consists of an Intel 3570k (overclocked to 4GHZ), 16GB of RAM, older 1TB SSD, and a GTX 1080 (2016 upgrade).

This rig should still run pretty much everything without much of an issue unless you're trying to play at 4K and/or trying to do ray tracing. The processor is old and you're using DDR3 RAM, so maybe that's a bit of a bottleneck? Either way, you don't need to spend $2000 to get a high end gaming rig these days unless you're looking to run everything on Ultra at 4K resolutions for the next few years. You only need $2000 if you're looking to buy the highest end Intel processors and a 2080/2080ti.

The title got a bit of a chuckle out of me. I have an Xbox One, PS4, and Switch and every time I try to play a game on them, I have to get used to 30FPS again. It's hardly unplayable and it only takes a few hours to get used to it, but I really, really don't like doing that. And even games that are supposed to run at 60FPS almost always have framerate drops or hitches here and there that really hamper the experience for me. I notice and thoroughly enjoy a high, smooth, even framerate. It's one of the major reasons I got into PC gaming in the first place and one of the things I continue to enjoy today and, as far as I'm concerned, it's absolutely worth the extra cost and maintenance of a gaming PC.

Also in consideration for me are keyboard and mouse controls. It took me years to get reasonably used to KB/M, but most of the games I play these days are best played with a KB/M and when I try to play them with a controller, I always find myself missing the accuracy or smoothness or functionality of a KB/M. I'll admit, there's still a part of my head that has video games permanently tied to controllers and frequently I will play something with a controller just because that's how I grew up playing games. But that's less and less often. I'll always play side scrollers like Ori and Bloodstained with controllers and 3D action games like Dark Souls flat-out don't belong on a keyboard and mouse, but shooters and RPGs just don't work all that great on controllers.

Mods are occasionally a thing for me. I loved playing Subnautica earlier this year, but I would never have made it very far in that game without a mod to expand quick slots past 5. I can't think of any gameplay balance reason why I couldn't use 1-9 and I found a mod that let me use 1-=, which made the game vastly more enjoyable. I also used a map mod, which is cheating a bit but I have a terrible sense of direction and cluttering the UI with beacons wasn't really my thing.

All of that said, there are times where I do wish for the simplicity of a console again. Turn it on, start playing. With PC games, it's "turn it on, thumb through the options menus for the common options that I always change, then start". Or any other number of things, like dealing with Windows or the very occasional incompatibility issues. But then I look at my Xbox One's framerate on some games and I remember why I never actually want to go back in the first place.

I don't think I could ever bring myself to not upgrade my PC over sticking with a certain console. I need to have both. I will likely upgrade my CPU and all the other essentials at the end of this year or early 2021, when the next stuff comes out. I usually get the newer PlayStation system 2 years after it's been out, I did that with the PS3 and PS4, I plan on doing the same for the PS5.

My PC's only a couple of months old and I'm still planning on getting at least one next-gen console. I've learned over time that there are games I'll always want to play on PC and games I'll always want to play on console and I don't see that changing anytime soon.

I'm waiting on all of it... This is a bad time to build a PC as big shifts and strides in tech are coming in the next year.

However I'm also going to wait on the new Xbox and PS5 because I can tell already they will be very pricey here in Canada and I really need to be smarter about tackling some of this multi gen backlog I have built up.

I might hold off on buying a new PC for a while. I have a decent PC now (Ryzen 2600x / GTX 1080), which is good enough to play the multiplayer titles I'm interested in playing on PC.

I already play all single player games on PC on my TV so I might as well just buy a PS5 and/or xbox. The problem is that pretty much all console games runs on 30fps (if even that), with very few games running in 60fps. If having a 60fps performance mode becomes standard on all consoles I would be very happy, since 30fps is almost unplayable.

I'm trying to wait one more year before a new PC build and will buy at least one of the consoles.

My current build is from 2011 and I upgraded it in 2016. It still plays games like Doom Eternal fine at 1080p and I can see no PC-exclusive games in the horizon that would make me want to upgrade desperately. I'm also going to get a 4K TV this year, and building a very 4K-capable PC still feels prohibitively expensive. I'd also like to wait for HDMI 2.1 graphics cards to come out before starting the new build.

So yeah, new TV and consoles this year. New PC and monitor next year if my finances allow for it.

I've been wanting to do put some new parts in this for years, to be honest. New card and maybe a CPU but I cannot get the fan off for the life of me. I'll be grabbing a PS5, though.

I am in the same boat as you, OP. I built my computer in 2015 and was considering building another one once the new cards come out this year. But my current PC still plays games well (i5-4690K, GTX 970, M.2) and I always like to get the new consoles. I prefer to play on my couch so PC games usually take a back seat to console games. I'm leaning towards building a new PC next year and getting the consoles at release.

Kind of? I built a Zen 2 system a couple of months ago mostly for video encoding, but I didn't replace my video card.

I'm waiting to see how the next Nvidia generation is priced, and how the new consoles actually perform in the real world.

lol Im seriously thinking about skipping next gen altogether because my backlog for 360, 3DS, Wii & PS4 is huge.

My PC really struggles with most high end games even on low now, with tweaking I can get Division 2 at a constant 30fps but it certainly saps the enjoyment out of it. We have a Switch but no other current gen consoles, so I was seriously considering an Xbox Series X as an 'instead of' a PC upgrade - especially as I am still invested in the ecosystem via still using the 360 and PC Game Pass. I've not really played a PlayStation exclusive game since the very early days of the PS3 so despite feeling I am missing out a bit during the end of year discussions I'm probably not tempted by a PS5. However, as much as the prospect of a new machine is something to look forward to given the current state of the world, I might hold off for a wee while after release to see if there are any 'wait until the second iteration' kind of problems.

I'm right there with you, i7 4790k with a 2016 upgrade to a GTX 1070 that's now exclusively hooked up to my TV.

Going to get a PS5 at launch, "hot rod" my PC to stretch it further (a fun repaste/fan swap/OC) and most likely an RTX 3060 to push more pixels to a new 4K TV (and to get newer feature support like HDMI 2.1's VRR, accelerating newer video formats, etc since it's basically a multimedia box at this point)

I completely skipped consoles this gen because their awful Jaguar cores can't hold 30 FPS steadily in many games. I might actually do the complete opposite this time!

I'm thinking about it, but then I take a look outside and have to really think about keeping my finances under control more and more. Have to stop making the occasional dumb eBay purchase, etc.

Still undecided as to what I'll do. I may do a TV or monitor upgrade first. My monitor is 1080p, and my TV has an annoying dark spot in the center of the picture. It has a lot to do with the stimulus bill too, and other external factors currently out of my control. I'm leaning towards a PC upgrade, but need to do more research on that front.

I’m currently building my cousin a gaming PC, and holy hell its bananas that a Series X/PS5 equivalent build would be 2-3 many times more than the (likely) price of the consoles. My cousin’s budget is $1000 CAD (taxes in), so I’m building a Ryzen 3, GTX 1650, 16 GB RAM, and 1 TB SSD system (with a grey market eBay windows license). That’s not a bad build, but it’s going to get smoked by the next gen consoles. Which leads me to wonder why everyone is so hung up on current gen consoles holding next gen back when even a reasonably priced PC build can’t even get close to what Sony and Microsoft are building.

Yeah I'm with you on that. My rig is quite similar to yours. I also have a 1080 and the rig is from 2016. Getting a bit long in the tooth too but still totally decent.

My main issue is that I do most of my gaming in the living room these days on the nice big TV with the fancy 5.1 audio and such. To do that I use a Steam Link. Now I think that the Steam Link is a fine way to play games in the living room and it is a fine piece of tech. That being said I think it is a subpar gaming experience for a couple of reasons:

1. Everything looks like a compressed video, because..it is. You get bad banding sometimes especially in shadows and smoke.

2. The input lag is bearable but still no good.

3. There is considerable performance overhead when using the Steam Link

4. It is limited to 1080/60

5. If I want to play a non-steam game I either have to add it to Steam and launch it through big picture mode OR use a keyboard/mouse to launch it

6. The best way to use a controller on the Steam Link is to have it connected to the PC and not the Steam Link itself. That way you don't risk the game not being supported. But that means that I now have to have TWO controllers. One to start the steam link with and the other to play games with.

Now, most of this can be solved by running an HDMI cable through the wall. That is certainly an option for me. There are a couple of other reasons why I would prefer the consoles though:

1. I like the super fast savestate/resume of my current PS4 and the new consoles are promising even better support for that. Instead of starting the PC and then the Steam Link, grabbing both controllers and so on I can be gaming before my beer gets warm.

2. This is kind of a bummer but I'm getting lazier with age. I really don't have the patience to fiddle with settings to find the optimal ones. Is TXAA the thing? Should I do super resolution instead? No that dropped FPS to 55...should I...maybe go on Youtube to find good settings? I know that I can leave it on default but if the option is there my brain will certainly go there.

3. We are upgrading the TV by Christmas as well so we'll have a top of the line 65 incher with HDMI 2.1 support and all that stuff.

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So, my current plan is to buy both the new consoles and use the Xbox as the main gaming device and the PS5 for the exclusives. My main issue is that I have such a huge library on the PC already and all the console games I currently own is a handful of PS4 exclusives.

Nope, in fact, I'm building a new PC because of the lackluster showings of both consoles. Well, moreso it's because I don't really fuck with Playstation's first-party exclusives much anymore and the third-party exclusives wind up on other platforms eventually. On top of that, all the Microsoft stuff is coming to PC day-and-date soooo that's cool. I've always been a big console person, but there's just fewer and fewer reasons for me personally to get one, especially one on release at full-price with no games out.

Once they become cheaper, I'll probably pick up and Xbox. I'm heavily invested in that ecosystem already and it'll be a good blu-ray player and/or system to throw on when guests come over.