Stick with PC gaming?

Yosiah · 8 Jul 2015 at 04:51

Bought my 770 GTX and 4670k two yeras ago and haven't really gamed that much. Most games either run like crap - I mean, I get high FPS but it just doesn't feel smooth - or I just can't find one worth playing.

I used to really like MMORPGs, but most of them are really bad at the moment. The only one that remotely interests me is ESO, and I'm put off by how much better it 'feels' and 'plays' on the consoles.

Trying to decide whether to sell my 770 GTX and upgrade to a 970, and sell my 144hz panel and get a gsync one, in the hopes that I can revitalise my love for PC gaming. Maybe GSYNC will solve all the niggles I have with PC Games in general -- wildly fluctuating FPS, stutters and general lack of smoothness.

Yes, I'm aware that I am being picky, and that most people don't notice these issues as much as I do, but maybe I would be better off just plugging the PS4 into my monitor and just forgetting about PC gaming for a while.

That, or go back to WoW, which seems to be the only game in existence that runs like a dream...

MasterOC · 8 Jul 2015 at 06:27

Decent rig , should handle anything no problem so not sure why things are running like crap for you . wow is ancient , no real surprise it runs ok though .

770 should be more than enough to experiance games in a far better light then what the playstation can provide . If you are bouncing around framerate wise with stutters as much as you are then I'd say start troubleshooting .

What games do you play that stutter or don't play well ?

These sorts of games don't appeal to me so couldn't direct you to something worth playing in that genre . But I would say expand your horizons , as by the sounds of it your stuck in rut with gaming . Try some new things out . Jump into some games you normally wouldn't .

MatTheCat · 8 Jul 2015 at 10:54

Yosiah said:
Bought my 770 GTX and 4670k two yeras ago and haven't really gamed that much. Most games either run like crap - I mean, I get high FPS but it just doesn't feel smooth - or I just can't find one worth playing.

I used to really like MMORPGs, but most of them are really bad at the moment. The only one that remotely interests me is ESO, and I'm put off by how much better it 'feels' and 'plays' on the consoles.

Trying to decide whether to sell my 770 GTX and upgrade to a 970, and sell my 144hz panel and get a gsync one, in the hopes that I can revitalise my love for PC gaming. Maybe GSYNC will solve all the niggles I have with PC Games in general -- wildly fluctuating FPS, stutters and general lack of smoothness.

Perhaps the wildly fluctuating frame rates has something to do with that 144Hz monitor? I would suggest that a 60Hz 1080p would be a more appropriate monitor for you, and just about every other 'mid range' gamer who just wants to game, without endless headaches and performance issues. Leave 144Hz, 4K, Sli etc to tech consumer addicts (suckers). Since you already have a 144Hz screen, I would imagine that you will have the option of setting it to run at 60Hz/72Hz somewhere.

Also, this may be worth a stab since it seems like you aren't so clued up on running a gaming PC. Are you playing with V-Sync OFF? Now, I know a lot of people (weirdos) play with V-Sync OFF as a rule. But I really cannot undertstand why, as I never witnessed any game running on any machine with V-Sync OFF, that didn't look and run like puke, regardless of frame rate.

If you are running with V-Sync OFF, then set v-sync to ALWAYS ON, immediately.

Edit: and here is another issue that you may want to consider which is issue that plagued me for years before I 'found it out'. What sort of mouse are you playing with and what is it's polling rate? If you are using for example, any kind of wireless mouse that isn't a wireless gaming mouse (with high polling rate), then it is likely that the low polling rate of your mouse is causing stutter with your frame rates. Like I said, I put up with this for years before I found out that a Logitech MX1000 wireless mouse that I got as a gift was destroying my gaming aesthetics.

FoxEye · 8 Jul 2015 at 11:05

PC Gaming is super depressing, if you try to keep up with technology. A decent GFX card *starts* at £300 these days, a new CPU is £200 minimum (£300 for an i7 Skylake), mobos are £100 to £200... it all adds up to the price of two or three PS4s or XBones.

PC gaming hardware is currently in a phase of super un-competitiveness, as AMD has dropped the ball badly in both the CPU and GPU markets. Now they want to increase their prices and become a "premium" brand like Intel, nV. Forget prices wars of old, and look forward to new higher prices for all PC components.

That said, who wants to be limited to 30FPS at 1080p on a console? After gaming on a PC that would be a huge retrograde step. So you only buy a console for the exclusives.

MatTheCat · 8 Jul 2015 at 11:22

FoxEye said:
PC Gaming is super depressing, if you try to keep up with technology. A decent GFX card *starts* at £300 these days, a new CPU is £200 minimum (£300 for an i7 Skylake), mobos are £100 to £200... it all adds up to the price of two or three PS4s or XBones.

PC gaming hardware is currently in a phase of super un-competitiveness, as AMD has dropped the ball badly in both the CPU and GPU markets. Now they want to increase their prices and become a "premium" brand like Intel, nV. Forget prices wars of old, and look forward to new higher prices for all PC components.

That said, who wants to be limited to 30FPS at 1080p on a console? After gaming on a PC that would be a huge retrograde step. So you only buy a console for the exclusives.

PC gaming aint cheap alright. But if a gamer bought a Sandy Bridge i7 (like I did), he would have no reason to upgrade the CPU/RAM/MOBO in the last 5 years with still no real reason to do so today. That leaves the GPU...Yep, they are getting more and more extortionate... For anyone with a casual interest in gaming and/or limited funds I would recommend a console everytime.

BUT, the OP already has his PC rig, and a rig that can easily outperform the consoles and as you say, once you have sampled a smooth 60fps (v-syncd of course) over the 30 fps with lower grade textures that is par for the course for many console games, then you really don't want to go back.

The OP needs to iron out whatever bugs are causing his unsatisfactory performance, stick a gamepad into his machine if need be and then sit back and treat his machine like a rich man's console.

Vinno · 8 Jul 2015 at 11:42

Got to agree with pretty much everything FoxEye says.

After buying Shadow of Morder on PS4 and seeing how rubbish it is in comparison to the PC version I don't think I can ever play a console game again which is available on PC.

Try to get your PC sorted out. Its definitely worth it.

neoboy · 8 Jul 2015 at 12:30

PC Gaming has always been expensive if you looked at top end hardware, but you could just about always get away with a perfectly mid range machine for a reasonable amount of money.

I would also argue that there has been great strides in terms of budget gaming lately, perfectly possible to put together a gaming machine for under £400 and second hand market always been a great place to save further. Will see what Steamboxes and the like will do in the future but it is also far easier to put together a budget mATX or mITX machine nowadays too.

MatTheCat · 8 Jul 2015 at 12:44

neoboy said:
PC Gaming has always been expensive if you looked at top end hardware, but you could just about always get away with a perfectly mid range machine for a reasonable amount of money.

I would also argue that there has been great strides in terms of budget gaming lately, perfectly possible to put together a gaming machine for under £400 and second hand market always been a great place to save further. Will see what Steamboxes and the like will do in the future but it is also far easier to put together a budget mATX or mITX machine nowadays too.

yeah, it's 'possible'. But the smart money with that budget would just buy a PS4.

neoboy · 8 Jul 2015 at 12:59

Well it all depends on what it is that you're playing in the first place, not particularly smart money if you can't play what you want. There's actually a lot of games and mods that I play that are simply not available for the consoles.

Obviously if you have no PC building knowledge then it's a console all the way but then you have orangutan hands lot like me who can't bear controllers

FoxEye · 8 Jul 2015 at 13:05

neoboy said:
PC Gaming has always been expensive if you looked at top end hardware, but you could just about always get away with a perfectly mid range machine for a reasonable amount of money.

I would also argue that there has been great strides in terms of budget gaming lately, perfectly possible to put together a gaming machine for under £400 and second hand market always been a great place to save further. Will see what Steamboxes and the like will do in the future but it is also far easier to put together a budget mATX or mITX machine nowadays too.

I'm afraid the opposite is true.

A couple years ago, a "mid range" GFX card - which would be more than enough to beat a console - would be £150, £200 max.

A "mid range" GFX card from either campe is today £250 to £300.

Come Skylake, the price of CPUs will be increasing across the range too.

A console today is really fantastic value. A £400 PC will get its bottom handed to it by either the XBone or the PS4. £400 is barely enough to buy a low-end PC, with the cheapest components you can find. In fact it's just not plausible these days to make a gaming PC with that much. You need to at least double that amount.

£800 will get you a mid-range PC.

Blackjack Davy · 8 Jul 2015 at 13:11

neoboy said:
PC Gaming has always been expensive if you looked at top end hardware, but you could just about always get away with a perfectly mid range machine for a reasonable amount of money.

I would also argue that there has been great strides in terms of budget gaming lately, perfectly possible to put together a gaming machine for under £400 and second hand market always been a great place to save further. Will see what Steamboxes and the like will do in the future but it is also far easier to put together a budget mATX or mITX machine nowadays too.

Well exactly not everyone wants a GTX Titan or 4k graphics. i5 for £180 is the cheapest I could find, an Asus z97a for £50 (auction) and an R9 290 b-grade for £179. Havn't found anything I can't play on the highest settings at 1080p yet. Having owned consoles in the past (original PlayStation, PS2 and PS3) I wouldn't go back unless I especially wanted an exclusive title. PC is just so much more flexible.

MatTheCat · 8 Jul 2015 at 13:42

Blackjack Davy said:
Well exactly not everyone wants a GTX Titan or 4k graphics. i5 for £180 is the cheapest I could find, an Asus z97a for £50 (auction) and an R9 290 b-grade for £179. Havn't found anything I can't play on the highest settings at 1080p yet. Having owned consoles in the past (original PlayStation, PS2 and PS3) I wouldn't go back unless I especially wanted an exclusive title. PC is just so much more flexible.

And do you run this magic 409 GBP PC that can play everything on high settings at 108ßp without the following:

RAM
Hard drives
Case
PSU
Monitor
Keyboard and Mouse
Speakers
Operating System (yeah, I know paying for this is an 'option')

???

FoxEye said:
£800 will get you a mid-range PC.

Precisely. And for a PC intended for gaming, it is mid-range or go home. If only low end is within your budget then just get a console. Sure, there are all the articles and YouTube videos across the net from rabid PC gaming enthiusiasts demonstrating how a low end PC with i3 and a GTX 750 ti or something can marginally outperform a PS4 in certain current AAA titles, but give it a year or so and such a low end system will be completely defunct and the AAA titles of 2016/17 will run like crap on it whereas these games will be optimised to the full for the console versions for years to come.

Raumarik · 8 Jul 2015 at 13:48

I usually get my components on the members market which is how I keep the cost down, using that and game sales typically means I spend far less than most of my friends. As long as your not precious you can keep a very respectable PC going for about £100/year and the only other cost is whatever games you buy. I have broken my rule a couple of times but that's been entirely optional, nothing wrong with doing that when I have the cash space.

Currently:

Case - bought new
CPU - Ivybridge 3570k second hand members market
GPU - Inno3d iChill 980 Ultra second hand from friend
Motherboard - Asus P8Z77-WS (news 3 years ago)
HDD - 4x second hand members market
SSD - 2x second hand members market
RAM - 16Gb Samsung Green second hand members market
Soundcard - Sounblaster FX second hand members market
Spyder 3 Pro - second hand ebay
Monitor - BenQ GL2450 second hand members market
PSU - 750W Corsair something or other second hand members market (had this 4 years and still going strong)
Cooling - H55/H100 both second hand members market
Bracket - Kraken G10 second hand members market

My CPU/Mobo/RAM are all 3 years old, still not even considering replacing as I bought a motherboard at a decent spec.

Baboonanza · 8 Jul 2015 at 13:59

This is a silly argument anyway, the cost of PC is not directly comparable to the cost of a console. PC games are considerably cheaper for a start, especially if you're happy waiting a few months to buy a game, and if you are going to be buying more than a few games the expense adds up. Then you have the added utility of a PC: try writing your CV or editing a video on a PS4.

But I own a PC primarily for the incredible diversity of games I can play. Yesterday I was playing Invisible Inc. and Dirty Bomb and I'm about to start on Gal Civ 3 and Ethan Carter. None of which are available on consoles.

But that's all OT anyway. The OP should get his issues sorted because if you're finding the console games smoother than a decent PC there is something badly wrong.

BuffetSlayer · 8 Jul 2015 at 14:04

You don't necessarily have to keep up with technology - just buy the best (or close to it) that is availbale at the time. I am running an i7 CPU that will probably outlive the rest of my setup. So will my 16GB of RAM because most stuff still only uses 6-8GB. My motherboard will run and run and my PSU is a quality one so should hopefully last a good 7-8 years like my last one did.

My graphics card still plays most new releases on very high/ultra and knocking down a few options in future to improve performance on newer games is no biggie.

All being well I will still be using my PC in 7 years time (I have already been using it for just over 18 months). True it will be very dated by then - so I will likely build a new one. I built a completely new rig, including headphones mouse and keyboard. If it lasts 8yrs, that equates to £300 a year so not the most cost effective if you look at it in those terms but personally I am happy with the situation.

Others may not be.

I also own a PS4 and I think it is a cracking bit of kit. I switch between the two. I play CoD on PS4 as well as some other titles (FC4, Alien Isolation, Diablo 3, Bloodborne, Trine2, Abes Odyssey et al). I mainly play multiplayer on PC - Tribes Ascend, BF4, CSGO etc, as well as the more demanding titles like GTAV and Witcher 3.

Overall if you can do both - I would do both because both have their benefits and drawbacks.

It is horses for courses a the end of the day.

Oh and as for people playing at 120/144hz being 'suckers' I used to feel a similar way. Till I tried it. There is a massive difference in FPS titles (which is what I mainly use the PC for). That said - I quite happily play on a PS4 with far lower FPS. Your eyes soon get used to it

BuffetSlayer · 8 Jul 2015 at 14:10

Baboonanza said:
But that's all OT anyway. The OP should get his issues sorted because if you're finding the console games smoother than a decent PC there is something badly wrong.

+1

Most definitely the spec the OP has should be running most things smoothly if it is achieving high FPS.

If it isn't - it could be setting issues or drivers.

Spuddy · 8 Jul 2015 at 14:11

Stick with PC gaming, I used to be a console fanboy but could never go back now. Also thinking of selling my PS4 and somehow running my PC on the main tv for certain games where I just wanna flake out and unwind.

You just need to sort out whichever bugs are currently hindering your experience and performance of PC gaming. People moan about costs but its easy enough to buy 2nd hand parts at a fraction of the cost if you really wanna keep prices down.

MatTheCat · 8 Jul 2015 at 15:54

Spuddy said:
Stick with PC gaming, I used to be a console fanboy but could never go back now. Also thinking of selling my PS4 and somehow running my PC on the main tv for certain games where I just wanna flake out and unwind.

An HDMI cable may come in handy for that one!

And if you have the audio equipment and a good sound card, an SPDIF cable as well.

theaterix · 8 Jul 2015 at 21:17

I was hit with this one time, spent £1000< on a rig (cant remember exactly) a couple of years ago, and never really used it until this year, was close to downgrading hardware at one point and getting a ps4/XOne but im glad i didnt

theaterix · 8 Jul 2015 at 21:17

Also, if it helps, try get a friend or 2 to play with, always makes life more fun