Developers, Kickstarter & My Future 5 Year Gaming Budget

[Chippy]

I feel like that guy in Fallout 2 taken in by the Deathclaws at the moment (the one with the string of bad luck).  I was playing War for Cybertron and Securom assassinated my DVD drive.  It actually broke it.  The removal tool (of course) doesn't work and now it won't read DVD's, so I can't format windows unless I buy another DVD drive.

 

The twin ati 5870 cards who's fans started rattling after 6 months finally gave up.  I could tap them upwards to stop said rattling, bu now they're shot.  I could fix them by threading the spindle and adhesive/slotting a nut to the fan, but installed my brothers NVidia 8800 GTS while I summon the incentive and ... it actually performs better than those twin idiot cards in crossfire mode on certain games.

 

Then I tried to boot up KOTOR1&2 but they wont work on multiple core processors, so (instead of throwing the "latest and greatest" PC out the window) I calmly put it aside and powered up my trusty XP PC.  But the sound card was kaput.  So replacing that with the SB16 card (more than 15 years old) I'm now running my trusty PC in a hardware configuration that has seen more than 10 years of use.

 

My point?  I've spent more than £4000 over the past ten years on hardware - and it was a waste of money.  Now that I'm done with AAA games and focusing on Kickstarter titles, I plan on building a PC that is reliable.  So unless the Unity engine games - or whatever engines are used in future Kickstarter games from our favourite developers - start demanding software (e.g. shader models) from the latest and greatest cards, I should get away with upgrading ram and linking 1 > 4 video cards to handle future Kickstarter titles.  Which should leave me more money to donate.

 

 

[babaganoosh13]

But hey, look on the bright side: They could potentially have stopped a pirate somewhere, at least for a little bit, possibly.

[Monte Carlo]

I spend about £2000 on a rig. I keep it for three years, upgrading it or selling it. Then again, I am fabulously wealthy.

[Walsingham]

I spend about £2000 on a rig. I keep it for three years, upgrading it or selling it. Then again, I am fabulously wealthy.

 

Not to mention being sexier than FHM's top 100 sexiest women, bathed in a cream, brandy and monkey gland sauce.

[Monte Carlo]

Too true, Wals.

[Tigranes]

I dream of being as cool as Monty when I'm eighty-four, too.

 

When I arrived in the US I fulfilled the American Dream by using Newegg to buy parts for my computer. 2000USD and two years later it plays everything perfectly, but I plan on sticking with it another couple of years even as next-gen consoles I'm sure will push things up. I do appreciate that I could play The Witcher 2 on max settings, but games have hardly looked any better over the last 3 years.

[Malcador]

I spent $1500 on mine. Next time I build I'm just going to just not bother being frugal and build something I can brag about for 2 months. Should definitely get more RAM in my current one (maybe 16 gigs will be enough)

[pmp10]

This brings up the question of why build gaming PC at all.

If only you can get your favorite old games to run then you can spend the next decade gaming in nostalgia-land.

[mkreku]

Wait, what? My Radeon 5870 still performs ridiculously well, which is why I feel no need at all to upgrade to a 7970 or 8970 (whenever that's out). It is also surprisingly silent (bought one of those overclocked models with three turbo fans, forgot the name).

 

How can an old Nvidia 8800 GTS perform better than a Radeon 5870?

[Rosbjerg]

With electronics I've generally find that a good trick is to buy it cheap when a new gen. is launched.. So the new Radeon 6000 series launches and you can suddenly get the best of the 5000 series very cheap. Sometimes even for 1/3 of the price if you're willing to risk used.

[Gorgon]

You have to do some cleaning inside your vid cards and CPU coolers once in a while, dust will always get through. You need a set of small screwdrivers and a lot of patience and care.

 

I use a small animal hair painting brush to get the dust off, then it's just a matter of putting things back where they were. 

[Bartimaeus]

I, uh, I spent around $500-600 on my computer. It's been running strong for about 4 years now...though I do clean the entire thing about once every month, though I'm not sure if that actually makes a difference...

[Chippy]

Wait, what? My Radeon 5870 still performs ridiculously well, which is why I feel no need at all to upgrade to a 7970 or 8970 (whenever that's out). It is also surprisingly silent (bought one of those overclocked models with three turbo fans, forgot the name).

 

How can an old Nvidia 8800 GTS perform better than a Radeon 5870?

 

True the raw power is greater, (I think you have the top of the range model, I've got the cheaper model, but it still had 1gig of ram compared to the GTS @ 512mb) but in crossfire mode playing Skyrim or War for Cybertron it isn't 'compatible' and the game stutters.  So I'm better off with the GTS, which is also quieter than the ati model I've got.  I'm very particular about hearing damage as it's the dosage of noise you recieve over the course of a week that contributes to it, not just a single massive decibel amount of noise - and those cards are LOUD.  So really they were a waste of money as years later this old card can still run these games well.

Edited June 3, 2013 by Chippy

[alanschu]

I have a 5850 (solo) and it's still playing games fine....

 

I can't crank it all to the max, but could play games like BF3 and it still looked great.  The 5850 was pretty much universally regarded as the best bang for buck at the time, as it had a price point for a mid range, but was only like 10% slower than the top end cards.

 

I don't know how loud a card can truly get if it threatens hearing damage, however.  I never buy dual cards though so I don't know.

 

 

I actually had the pleasure of going from a 8800 GTS to a 5870 at work.  The 5870 *trounced* the 8800 in everything (and was more feature rich while playing games like BFBC2 and BF3).  You probably would have been better off not running games in crossfire mode (although it sounds like the card is borked in general), as the solo 5870 annihilates the 8800 GTS.

[LadyCrimson]

I'm not fabulously wealthy ( ) but this current rig I spent a lot more than I usually might, over the past few+ years. $1000 for the initial parts, $200 for the first cheap monitor, a hundred here and there for HDD space (external and internal), more RAM, $1000 for a GPU later (wanted to do that just once at least...), $400 for a bigger monitor later.

 

Outside of the GPU (which is great, just not sure $1000 great), I felt like I've had my money's worth. Couple years from now I'll  probably spend another $1500 on something else that'll last me another 4-5 years. Except I'll stick with the $500 or so GPU instead.

[Gorth]

This brings up the question of why build gaming PC at all.

If only you can get your favorite old games to run then you can spend the next decade gaming in nostalgia-land.

 

A good point, why build a gaming PC?

 

Maybe that's why consoles are so popular, they require less effort to set up and get running.

 

I don't have a console, but I use my PC for occasionally significant workloads, so I build them to work hard. Not the biggest and most expensive of each component (because you pay like 100% for the last 15% gain), but the second best of each. Lasts me 4-5 years.

 

That it also happens to be a good gaming machine is a significant fringe benefit, but not the main objective.

[Gorgon]

I'm pretty sure sound is nothing like radiation and accumulated decibel equals hearing damage. Only decibel over X ammount does damage. That said I got the most silent of the HD7950, the Asus one, and I'm quite glad I didn't get one 5% faster and 25% more jet plane.

[Gorth]

Liquid cooling FTW

[LadyCrimson]

Liquid cooling FTW

I keep thinking about using that next build, but then I remember I'd run the A/C most of the time anyway, for myself.

 

But it'd be nice for the GPU sometimes, at least. Stupid things can have moderately high temps even when I don't have all the bells and whistles turned on in a game. Or just playing a video.

[Rostere]

Buying the custom fans, heat sinks and chassis is one of my favourite parts of building a new PC.

[Agiel]

Still kind of amazes me the same console that played Oblivion back in 2006 can still play Skyrim of 2011 (albeit in a much more diminished capacity than if you were on the PC). Makes me think the engineers in charge of optimisation for game companies are being lazy.

[Walsingham]

Still kind of amazes me the same console that played Oblivion back in 2006 can still play Skyrim of 2011 (albeit in a much more diminished capacity than if you were on the PC). Makes me think the engineers in charge of optimisation for game companies are being lazy.

 

I think that's pretty well established, isn't it?

[Chippy]

I have a 5850 (solo) and it's still playing games fine....

 

I can't crank it all to the max, but could play games like BF3 and it still looked great.  The 5850 was pretty much universally regarded as the best bang for buck at the time, as it had a price point for a mid range, but was only like 10% slower than the top end cards.

 

I don't know how loud a card can truly get if it threatens hearing damage, however.  I never buy dual cards though so I don't know.

 

 

I actually had the pleasure of going from a 8800 GTS to a 5870 at work.  The 5870 *trounced* the 8800 in everything (and was more feature rich while playing games like BFBC2 and BF3).  You probably would have been better off not running games in crossfire mode (although it sounds like the card is borked in general), as the solo 5870 annihilates the 8800 GTS.

 

Hearing damage can be estimated by not being able to communicate (normal level of voice) verbally with someone 1m away, 2m to be on the safe side as they've changed the decibel levels a few years ago.  If I had any kids I'd regulate the amount of noise they were exposed to:

http://www.hse.gov.uk/noise/calculator.htm   by estimating the average.  With noisy games and the constant hum of the PC I suspect it really adds up. 

 

It seems that Securom won't let me change my DVD drive either, as another one installed still can't read DVD's, and changing the drive letter/boot priority under the bios is the same.  So I've got to connect the hard drive to another PC and format that while it's running on another system.  If I didn't have my brothers PC to bridge the tech gap with my old XP system and newer WIN7 system and hardware I would be ummm .... quite upset now.

 

Nowhere on the box for the game was it advertised that Securom was installed with that game.  The only positive from this is that I have now made my mind up to never buy a physical copy of a game anymore.  If plans work out for Obsidians Star Wars game, I think I'd only get it on Steam.  Which hasn't raised any alarms.  Yet.

Edited June 4, 2013 by Chippy

[alanschu]

 

 

Still kind of amazes me the same console that played Oblivion back in 2006 can still play Skyrim of 2011 (albeit in a much more diminished capacity than if you were on the PC). Makes me think the engineers in charge of optimisation for game companies are being lazy.

 

Or they don't immediately know the answers to all the problems.  Heck, we recently had a guy effectively do a malloc call on an SPU for the PS3, something Sony didn't think was actually possible (note, it's not just a simple "malloc" call) through some creativity.  Sony actually made a shirt for him and gave it to him.

 

 

 

 

With noisy games and the constant hum of the PC I suspect it really adds up.

 

If you computer is breaking 72 dB in volume from its fans, there's something wrong or you have gone entirely overkill with your cooling.  A normal conversation 1 foot away from you is 60 dB (and registers a 0 in exposure points per hour on your link).  You don't start getting any exposure points until 72 dB, and it's important to note that the decibel system is logarithmic, with the intensity doubling every 10 points, so going from 60-72 is actually quite a bit louder.

 

Sometimes my PC fans get quite noticeably loud, but they have never gotten close to undermining my ability to have a conversation with someone.  A vacuum cleaner clocks in at 70 dB, which still grants you 0 exposure points per hour.  Now there's clearly some rounding involved as 24 hours of being exposed to normal conversation grants 1 exposure point.  Curbside of a busy road (80 dB) for 24 hours straight gives you 95.

 

For reference sake, working a chainsaw (110 dB) for 15 minutes gives 988 (24 hours is 94868 - I think we can all imagine being stuck beside a chainsaw for 24 hours would suck).  Soooo, I'd wager that the exposure your computer gives is pretty insignificant.

[Monte Carlo]

Alan, for the benefit of us civilians, what is a 'malloc call' pls