LogFAQs > #978939891

I've been humming and hawwing about building a new gaming PC, and I keep coming across this weird cognitive dissonance. Maybe I'm misunderstanding things, but it's like all these contradictory views are held in tandem:

+ PC gaming is more cost effective than buying a console
- A console is around 500 and don't even talk about building a PC this cheap, that's a waste of money and time

+ That hardware is trash, You should use X hardware instead.
- Actually pretty much any of the top games will run on the "trash" hardware at 60FPS on a 1440p monitor, which is realistically as good as I ever expect

+ If you want a superb gaming rig, consider spending over 1200
- as above pretty much all current AAA games will run on excellent settings at half that price

+ you should spend more on a PC because it's not just for gaming, it does all your other stuff too.
- your trash 10+ year old budget desktop will do literally all of your other tasks unless you are a CAD engineer

+ You should "future proof" your PC by buying a more upmarket version. Also wait a few months until X part comes out
- There is no such thing as "future proofing" and new hardware is coming out all the time and eclipsing whatever is on the market every few months anyway
- a basic cost-benefit breakdown seems to show that it would actually be more cost effective to just build a cheap rig every few years, rather than buy an expensive one less often

+ Build a good rig because it is an investment
- your hardware dives off a cliff in value faster than a luxury car

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It sort of makes me think that actually the whole idea of building an expensive "rig" is just entirely a hobbbyist thing. Which is fine. But I'm struggling to see the actual cost-benefit here with spendng anthing more than like...700. The diminishing returns seem incredibly steep. I keep coming back to the idea that if I really want to play the games I like at excellent settings then I should halve my budget.