I don't know anything about gaming. The last time I regularly played video games was on my Atari. Yes, a million years ago.

  1. Basic question: I'd like to get into gaming. What's better a console or a gaming PC? My PC is super old so I have to buy a new PC anyway.

  2. I'm considering buying a renewed PC from Amazon. From what little I know - it seems like a good deal. If I buy something like a renewed Dell XPS 8940 for - I dunno up to $1,500 is that good enough for gaming? I'd prefer a boring PC case.

  3. What's the minimum I'd need to spend to get a gaming PC that plays most games?

  4. What are common mistakes people make when buying a gaming PC?

  5. Can most games be torrented?

  6. What's easier to torrent? Games for consoles or PC games? Ideally torrents will be my gaming store.

I'm giving myself until the end of the month to buy a new PC. So it's time for me to decide.

Amazon example...

Dell XPS 8940 Tower Desktop PC)

There are two PC setups on the page. Both are $1,000. Here are the specs for one of them.

[Edit: It's missing a useful graphics cad. I know I'll need the best graphics card possible because without that I'm buying a brand new car with a puny, nearly useless engine.]

  • 10th Gen Octa-core Intel i7-10700 2.9GHz Processor

  • 32GB DDR4 Memory

  • 512GB PCIe M.2 SSD +1TB SATA 7200 RPM HDD

  • DVD-RW Drive

  • Windows 10 w/ Accessories (Renewed)


Edit

I'm not interested in building one. I'd screw something up. It's just the way I am.

  • TrudeauCastroson [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    I wouldn't go with that prebuilt, it doesn't have a graphics card, and you probably can't add one easily because the power supply probably isn't beefy enough. For $1000USD I think you can make a better gaming computer. Also Dell/HP prebuilts suck because the parts are non-standard, so if you want to replace a motherboard or power supply, you are at the mercy of buying only Dell or HP parts.

    The new graphics card market kinda sucks right now, and used cards you have to be careful to not buy an improperly treated mining card.

    If you want to find a build that makes sense, look up something like "2023 PC Build". It's hard to pick parts that don't hold each other back (if you spend $1000 on a graphics card (GPU) and $100 on a CPU, obviously you won't get the full performance of the GPU).

    You probably want 16GB of ram. Your graphics card depends on your budget, and then to choose a processor you look up something like "2023 *graphics *card PC build" to find a CPU that makes sense for the GPU.

    Your monitor also matters, because depending on if you want 1080p, 1440p or 4k resolution, it will change how much you spend on GPU.

    The motherboard isn't super important unless you need certain features, all that matters is it works for the CPU you choose. You don't need to worry about overclocking probably, but you do need to worry about if wifi/Bluetooth is included on the motherboard.

    The motherboard size you need depends on the case size. ATX, mATX and ITX are the sizes of motherboard from big to small, probably don't bother with ITX because you pay more to get small parts that fit in small cases.

    PCpart picker makes sure your CPU and motherboard are compatible, and it tell you how big of a power supply you need based on the CPU and GPU.

    • Lovely_sombrero [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      The new graphics card market kinda sucks right now, and used cards you have to be careful to not buy an improperly treated mining card.

      IMO the new GPU market is quite good. Especially all the discounted Radeons are great value.