Hello all. First time on this forum. Need some opinions/advice concerning my PC gaming rig (system specs below). Thought this would be a good place to ask. Here's my question: I've been a PC gamer for most of my life, rarely have I owned a console. I felt like I was missing out on some good console exclusives so I bought a PS3 and some of the higher rated games at a very reasonable price two weeks ago. The first game I fired up on the PS3 was Metal Gear Solid 4 GotP.
The game was ok but I wasn't really impressed (especially by the graphics which I found kind of dull) considering IGN gave the game a 10 across the board. So I finished that game and then started playing Uncharted 1. I definitely noticed some nicer, brighter graphics in Uncharted 1, but nothing that really outshined my PC graphics wise. After I finished Uncharted I went right on to Uncharted 2. Here's where I was really impressed.
The graphics in this game are beautiful and stunning. I was especially impressed once I got to that Tibetan town on the mountain after the train wreck. I took my time walking around the village and was absolutely stunned by the environment, such deep, rich colors and detail. Also, the PS3 seems to process and render all of this without a hiccup, I didn't notice any lag or drop in frame rate. This is when I started to think "This looks better than my PC, and runs it more smoothly (for lack of a better word.) " I'm no expert on graphics technology. I'm A+ certified so I'm pretty tech literate but never really dig into the finer, more detailed technology in gaming graphics. I just do some minimal research, buy a GPU that looks mid-range, plug my card in and play. I've played Crysis 2, Battlefield 3, Skyrim, Sleeping Dogs, Ghost Recon FS, Assassins Creed series, and just about every other new game that comes out on the PC. I usually have my graphics set to High or Ultra, running at 1920x1080p, with all the other bells and whistles turned on. These games all looked pretty good to me, I thought Ghost Recon FS was a little lacking in the graphics though. I think I will play that on the PS3 to compare it with my PC.
Most games run well on my PC but I do notice some of that lag I was talking about with certain games (Sleeping Dogs for example is more noticeable). It's not that bad but I can tell my games "hiccup" a bit more with some games. Sometimes I tune it down a notch to get better performance, find a sweet spot, and that seems to help a little. But I cant help but to think that Uncharted 2 not only looks better than anything I run on my PC, but it runs it better as well. I think maybe my PC is aging and something is bottle-necking it. I will admit some of my components are on the old side. I'm running a Intel Q6600 quad-core, 6GB Patriot PC2 6400, ASUS P5K-E motherboard, 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s Internal Hard Drive , and a few months ago I added a EVGA GeForce GTX 560 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 video card., running Windows 7 Pro.
One thing I want to point out is that my motherboard only supports PCI-E 1.0. I wanted to upgrade my video performance but didn't want to buy a new motherboard, CPU, and RAM. I did some research about plugging a 2.0 card into a 1.0 slot. At the time people were saying that games don't even utilize the full 2.0 specs. so I shouldn't have any performance issues. This was probably 18 months ago. Have things changed since then? Is my video card bottle-necked now do to having it plugged into a 1.0 slot or is something else degrading my PC performance? Also, I am playing games from the PC and PS3 through the same ASUS 24" LCD 1080p monitor. I'm kind of guessing that my PC is showing it's age. I just thought that a quad-core CPU, 6GB RAM, and a GTX 560 would be sufficient even today considering the PS3 hardware seems less powerful than my PC (except my CPU.
I'm guessing the Cell CPU is probably better). I know consoles handle resources differently but I'm no expert on that subject either. Sorry if my post was long winded and lacking better terminology. Just wanted to give as much information as possible regarding my observation and what I'm trying to ask. So basically I'm just asking is: Is it time to retire my CPU, motherboard, and RAM? If so what would be the minimum components required to build a new system that can compete/be on the same level, gaming performance wise with modern consoles? Thank you for reading this and I appreciate any helpful feedback you can offer.
System Specs
Intel Q6600 quad-core
6GB Patriot PC2 6400
ASUS P5K-E motherboard
7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s Internal Hard Drive
EVGA GeForce GTX 560 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 video card.
ASUS VW246H 24" LCD 1080p monitor
Windows 7 Pro
The game was ok but I wasn't really impressed (especially by the graphics which I found kind of dull) considering IGN gave the game a 10 across the board. So I finished that game and then started playing Uncharted 1. I definitely noticed some nicer, brighter graphics in Uncharted 1, but nothing that really outshined my PC graphics wise. After I finished Uncharted I went right on to Uncharted 2. Here's where I was really impressed.
The graphics in this game are beautiful and stunning. I was especially impressed once I got to that Tibetan town on the mountain after the train wreck. I took my time walking around the village and was absolutely stunned by the environment, such deep, rich colors and detail. Also, the PS3 seems to process and render all of this without a hiccup, I didn't notice any lag or drop in frame rate. This is when I started to think "This looks better than my PC, and runs it more smoothly (for lack of a better word.) " I'm no expert on graphics technology. I'm A+ certified so I'm pretty tech literate but never really dig into the finer, more detailed technology in gaming graphics. I just do some minimal research, buy a GPU that looks mid-range, plug my card in and play. I've played Crysis 2, Battlefield 3, Skyrim, Sleeping Dogs, Ghost Recon FS, Assassins Creed series, and just about every other new game that comes out on the PC. I usually have my graphics set to High or Ultra, running at 1920x1080p, with all the other bells and whistles turned on. These games all looked pretty good to me, I thought Ghost Recon FS was a little lacking in the graphics though. I think I will play that on the PS3 to compare it with my PC.
Most games run well on my PC but I do notice some of that lag I was talking about with certain games (Sleeping Dogs for example is more noticeable). It's not that bad but I can tell my games "hiccup" a bit more with some games. Sometimes I tune it down a notch to get better performance, find a sweet spot, and that seems to help a little. But I cant help but to think that Uncharted 2 not only looks better than anything I run on my PC, but it runs it better as well. I think maybe my PC is aging and something is bottle-necking it. I will admit some of my components are on the old side. I'm running a Intel Q6600 quad-core, 6GB Patriot PC2 6400, ASUS P5K-E motherboard, 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s Internal Hard Drive , and a few months ago I added a EVGA GeForce GTX 560 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 video card., running Windows 7 Pro.
One thing I want to point out is that my motherboard only supports PCI-E 1.0. I wanted to upgrade my video performance but didn't want to buy a new motherboard, CPU, and RAM. I did some research about plugging a 2.0 card into a 1.0 slot. At the time people were saying that games don't even utilize the full 2.0 specs. so I shouldn't have any performance issues. This was probably 18 months ago. Have things changed since then? Is my video card bottle-necked now do to having it plugged into a 1.0 slot or is something else degrading my PC performance? Also, I am playing games from the PC and PS3 through the same ASUS 24" LCD 1080p monitor. I'm kind of guessing that my PC is showing it's age. I just thought that a quad-core CPU, 6GB RAM, and a GTX 560 would be sufficient even today considering the PS3 hardware seems less powerful than my PC (except my CPU.
I'm guessing the Cell CPU is probably better). I know consoles handle resources differently but I'm no expert on that subject either. Sorry if my post was long winded and lacking better terminology. Just wanted to give as much information as possible regarding my observation and what I'm trying to ask. So basically I'm just asking is: Is it time to retire my CPU, motherboard, and RAM? If so what would be the minimum components required to build a new system that can compete/be on the same level, gaming performance wise with modern consoles? Thank you for reading this and I appreciate any helpful feedback you can offer.
System Specs
Intel Q6600 quad-core
6GB Patriot PC2 6400
ASUS P5K-E motherboard
7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s Internal Hard Drive
EVGA GeForce GTX 560 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 video card.
ASUS VW246H 24" LCD 1080p monitor
Windows 7 Pro
Want to move to Pennsylvania? I'll let you use my NewEgg account ;-) But anyway, thank you. I'm looking to upgrade in a few months. Just trying to figure out if my current system is still sufficient for today's PC games.
