Gaming PC Makers Take Aim at Lucrative Niche

Cymage writes "Yahoo (Reuters) reports that gaming PCs are now a high profit area, and that the bigger players (Dell, HP) are trying to get into the market: 'In an age when a new PC can cost just a few hundred dollars, an adolescent need for speed is creating a profitable niche for souped-up gaming computers at the ultra-costly end of the market.' How many people really spend $5,000 on a gaming machine? Mine cost less than $2,000, and I can play UT2k4 and others on it just fine."

Comments

No thanks

[thebra]

"With price tags from US$2,000 to $5,000, the market is luring heavyweights..."

I can't see myself paying that much for a gaming machine. I can buy a PS2/XBOX/GAMECUBE for less than 200 dollars. I could even buy all three and a decent amount of games for each system for less than 2,000. I know, they can only play games but isn't that the point of a gaming pc? I wouldn't want to put my gaming pc on the internet, because then I would have to worry about viruses, which means I have to install a firewall, virus scanner etc which would just slow down my game play. A gaming system works like it should. I don't have to make sure I have the newest video card, all games will work. It plays games with no blue screens, drivers to intall, or patches. Not to mention its easy to stick in my car and play where ever I can find a tv.

I just want my phantom console. :)

If I spend quite a bit of time, why not.

[ron_ivi]

I spend more time on my computer than in my car. Why not spend a little extra to get a good one.

I think the same philosophy goes to having a comfortable bed, chair, etc. Money's made to be spent, and what better place to spend it than on something I use most every day?

One difference being: this industry is young

[ianscot]

Any commentary about how "it's different with cars, they aren't obselete in 3 years" is pointless: the automotive industry's pace of improvement and innovation is much, much slower than the PC industry's.

A big, simple reason innovation in cars (or airplanes, or coffee makers) is slower than that in computers: computers are still a young industry. Bill Gates likes to use this sort of comparison by way of arguing that MS hasn't stifled innovation: "If airplanes had changed as much between 1980 and today as computers, they'd fly us cross-country for 50 cents in ten minutes," that kind of thing. But all those other industries changed at a vastly higher rate when they were young too. Flying machines changed an awful lot from Santos-Dumont's balloons to World War I to the German jets at the end of WWII, in every imaginable way, right?

But back to your point: Cars won't be obsolete in 3 or 5 years, and that difference really isn't "pointless." If I trick up my Civic, it'll be out-of-style in three years, but it'll get me there on the gas they sell at SA. With a gaming computer, I can spend through the nose and be below box specs for some of the games that come out next year. Partly that's just the young industry again. But you know, you can still find places to land your biplane.

Between the gaming wonks trying to one-up each other and the game studios whose idea of innovation is better texture effects in FPS titles, the lack of imagination is pretty amazing. You'd think this would be such a creative thing, games, but instead we get the equivalent of U.S. blockbuster movies over and over again. You'd think the wonks would at least show some individuality in their tastes... Car geeks and EAA airplane kit builders are a lot more interesting, for my two cents.

The Fact Is

[bannerman]

A high powered rig *will* make you perform better in a resource intensive game such as Dark Age of Camelot, where the computer must render hundreds of characters and effects simultaniously at a high framerate to keep you in the battle. I play on a 3GHz P4 with a gig of ram and a Radeon 9800 pro, and I still have some trouble in certain situations with a large number of players. And yes, my system is *very* clean.