Do you have a fav PC gaming brand/ecosphere?

[Keatah]

Do you have a fav PC gaming brand/ecosphere? I'm talking like Aorus, Asus Strix, MSI, Evga.. Even nVidia has their own Geforce Experience.

 

I prefer Gigabyte's Aorus, or Asus Strix. I did have (and liked) and EVGA board from some years ago - but I find their graphics card marketing to be way way too granular. For example they have cards listed at like $269, $279, and $289. With the only difference being the clock speed, something like 50MHz greater for each price step. Is that really necessary?

 

OTH, they have nicely put-together cards in the $1,800 - $2,000 range.

 

As long your product lineup doesn't make me dig through specs all day I'll be happy.

 

 

 

[Austin]

Over the last few years I have been sticking with the Asus Strix range of graphics cards and I've been pretty happy with them. I like their style and their fan designs are generally solid. Although at the mid to upper range of card, I don't really think there is a big difference between the various well-known manufacturers' brands when it comes to build quality and reliability (MSI, EVGA, Asus, Gigabyte); If you're willing to pay up, you're probably going to get a good, solid card.

[Tanooki]

I don't know if it's a favorite, but the way they did it is and for me that's the Sager Computers (clevo) format laptops. They're 100% like a DIY desktop/tower computer where nothing at all is soldered into place. It takes removing more screws clearly top and bottom, but everything much like say Nintendo Switch is 100% modular and easily once exposed swapped out for replacement or upgrade. I got this like 4 1/2 years ago now and it still keeps pace, and I could go better if it began to slack yet as I'm only at a mid tier i7 and 16 of 32GB of RAM potential as I chose to max the video at the 8GB Nvidia 980M (first gen of new mobile cores that only lose 15% of the desktop if that, so it's equal to a 970 with the added RAM over it.) I'd strongly recommend it as they have a good plain design for the exterior, and internally skies the limit since it can all be worked on with relative ease.

[youxia]

My favourite is the Second Hand ecosphere.

[zzip]

Do you have a fav PC gaming brand/ecosphere? I'm talking like Aorus, Asus Strix, MSI, Evga.. Even nVidia has their own Geforce Experience.

 

I prefer Gigabyte's Aorus, or Asus Strix. I did have (and liked) and EVGA board from some years ago - but I find their graphics card marketing to be way way too granular. For example they have cards listed at like $269, $279, and $289. With the only difference being the clock speed, something like 50MHz greater for each price step. Is that really necessary?

 

OTH, they have nicely put-together cards in the $1,800 - $2,000 range.

 

As long your product lineup doesn't make me dig through specs all day I'll be happy.

For me it's whatever motherboard meets my present needs and has reasonably good user reviews. Most seem to lack one or two features that I'll really want and I'll end up with

a rather small pool to choose from.

 

For video cards, EVGA has worked well for me.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

I tend to go with specific brands for specific things in my PC. Example is that I only stick with Intel chipsets and in fact my best motherboard to date is my still currently in use Intel DB68Z in daily use now since 2011 or so. I pretty much only use Kingston brand RAM modules. I currently have only been using EVGA video cards since my 7800GS also back around 2011 though I currently have a n EVGA GTX1070sc as my primary graphics adapter. I still use Creative labs for dedicated sound in my PCs, only use Western Digital HDDs if they have to be spinners but pretty much any brand for SSD. And I've been totally devoted to Corsair for my power supply and AIO solutions.

 

So really I don't stick with any particular brand, I stick with the brands that I've had the best experience with and thus all of my computers over the years have been multiple vendor products.

Edited May 7, 2019 by -^Cro§Bow^-

[Flojomojo]

Do you have a fav PC gaming brand/ecosphere?

 

Nope. The whole point of PC-land is to choose from a vast array of widely compatible hardware. Relying on a brand name just leads to lock-in and superstition. I'll choose the components that have good reviews from real users, at fair prices, from stores I like. "Good" vendors lay eggs sometimes, and inexpensive manufacturers aren't necessarily bad.

 

Micro Center (for in person pickup) and NewEgg are my preferred resellers, just because they're convenient to deal with. I'll also buy from Costco, Amazon, or even the dreaded Best Buy once I know what I want.

[youxia]

About two decades ago, I worked in a PC shop as a salesman/serviceman. There was a bunch of us all equally obsessed with the-then groundbreaking new 3D tech like Voodoo and also being extremely competitive Quake players. We were all flat broke (the wages were nothing like IT these days) but had access to all the gear so we conducted endless benchmarks trying to make Quake and other new games as well as possible. I was also sent to brand-sponsored seminars where they told you what to say and don't say to make a best sale regarding the gear.

 

The lessons from these days stayed with me, because the market works exactly the same as it did back then. The new products are extermely overhyped and overpriced and the top brands carry huge premium penalties vs performance results. One thing that perhaps has changed that back then, in regard to gaming, the performance gains from new stuff could be huge, now, not so much. When you are asked to shell out hundreds of dollars in return for 10-20 fps, either over the 60 limit or in some esoteric new resolution or tech which does not really add that much (like raytracing) then it's all a bit silly.

 

The key to PC buying is to avoid the "top" brands and concentrate on the solid ones like Gigabyte or LG/AOC. They are much cheaper and perform either on par or in a minuscule difference range. Sometimes no-brand will do as well. It does involve a lot of research though, but then the monetary savings can be huge. Especially if you buy second hand, then you can even get the top dogs relatively cheap.

[DragonGrafx-16]

My newest PC (which is funny because it's nearly 10 years old) has a Gigabyte motherboard, Athlon X4 CPU (overclocked to 3.5GHz), 8GB of Kingston RAM. 3 hard drives (250GB Samsung SSD as boot drive, 1TB Seagate and 500GB WD HDDs), XFX 2GB Radeon GPU, and all powered by an EVGA 600w PSU. I use an Echo Audio Mia MIDI as the sound card (most for recording synths and such but also used for sound in general).

 

The GPU, PSU, sound card, SSD and the 1TB HDD are not original components of the system.

 

My main monitor is a 1080p AOC and a secondary monitor, my old Samsung SyncMaster 943 is 900p... The Samsung has better contrast and colors but it's not in 1080 so it just gets used to display the mixer in Reason 10 (my music production software).

Edited May 8, 2019 by DragonGrafx-16

[Keatah]

I'm still usually impressed by any one brand's innovations or any one brand bringing a much needed feature to the PC world. I mean the 2D/3D RIVA chip from the 90's set me up as an nVidia fanboi. HOWEVER I no longer chase after the latest and greatest, I'm not jumping to get any 1st gen RTX board. There is so little software available for it. And of course it will take a coupla 2-3 years for DXR to become widely accepted and utilized. And DXR will need some revisions because as it stands now it doesn't do shadows right and something else I read about but didn't bother to commit to memory. In the meantime, the GTX 1080 can do some raytracing. So if any software absolutely needs it it will be done there too.

 

I suppose I'm a fanboi in that I follow a company's progress and developments enthusiastically. Like with intel - now - they say they are stepping up their graphics game, and that's all I kept hearing and reading about the past few months. But today I find out they are focusing on enterprise applications first. So much for any consumer benefit there.

 

I also recently hear that many people are tired of lack of innovation on intel's side of the playground. I must ask, what are YOU wanting to see? I'm personally totally happy with recent i7 performance levels, and I would be happy to see continued addition of new instructions and process shrinks and more cores and bigger cache. I would even like to see the Southbridge get integrated into the CPU. So as long as those happen I'm ok.

 

---

 

I'm impressed that our new Freesync monitors work so well with our nVidia boards. I had the chance to sit down and play flight simulator and it's buttery smooth from about 35 FPS on up to whatever the GPU can put out. Previously it all had to be locked down at 60fps, and any variance meant stuttering or tearing - however slight. Now it's all gone and no need to stay at 60fps. As Papa Jensen said - "It just works."

 

Ironically the announcement of them supporting the open standard cost them a short term sale of a G-sync module. I did the open standard. And IIRC they make $140 profit on each that is sold. In the longer term I was (I will be) pleased that they did such a thing and it's all likely I'll get another nVidia board, 2nd hand of course!

 

In my recent builds I maxed the rigs out with Kingston memory. I recall about 6 years ago I had a bad module that was already 4-5 years old. And they replaced it without giving me a hard time. So bonus points there.

 

In other peripherals such as hard disks, I simply got used to one style and therefore prefer that. Drives and monitors are also things I like to buy brand new unless I can see them in person.

[Tanooki]

The lessons from these days stayed with me, because the market works exactly the same as it did back then. The new products are extermely overhyped and overpriced and the top brands carry huge premium penalties vs performance results. One thing that perhaps has changed that back then, in regard to gaming, the performance gains from new stuff could be huge, now, not so much. When you are asked to shell out hundreds of dollars in return for 10-20 fps, either over the 60 limit or in some esoteric new resolution or tech which does not really add that much (like raytracing) then it's all a bit silly.

 

The key to PC buying is to avoid the "top" brands and concentrate on the solid ones like Gigabyte or LG/AOC. They are much cheaper and perform either on par or in a minuscule difference range. Sometimes no-brand will do as well. It does involve a lot of research though, but then the monetary savings can be huge. Especially if you buy second hand, then you can even get the top dogs relatively cheap.

 

I approve of this and relate. When I started researching 5 years back what to do as I knew I hadn't the space for another desktop beyond my work machine in my area here I had to go with a laptop, but I didn't want another compromised craptop basically, so I started selling things, flipping, set a bigger budget and did 6mo worth of semi-casual research before I stopped at what I have. You're dead on about the name brand vs the more understated brand stuff. I found that I could have paid a disgusting hit for the same parts through the scammy Dell Alienware brand, many hundreds more. I then found others that were a bit less or around the same, but then you had compromise, soldered in parts, or some reviews saying (like from Tom's Hardware etc) that while the specs say this, the game (let's say Starcraft II) ran down at this space instead. I started tooling around annoyed by this as I felt trapped, didn't know you could get a DIY laptop frame, started to peck away at comparable desktops and again, space, power jacks available it wasn't good. Then I stumbled upon the DIY laptop style and found like 3 makers at the time and investigated them all. When it came down to the handpicked parts and also quality warranty coverage since unsightly repairs were not easily budgeted, I went with a Sager branded computer and through xoticpc.com as they had the best price and also as a second, reward for it too. Until this thing can not properly run an OS and games at a mid-tier level without being crappy, or it breaks, I'll just keep on trucking. The only issue I have now is a rub hole on my N key which due to the backlit keyboard pops out a bit, and before that a wonky HDD that failed under warranty twice, and that hasn't happened since I paid for a SSD after that coverage quit. That's why I like what I got, and get that there are liars out there and you need to dig, not just look at the stupid star ratings on the card or whatever hot trendy PC magazine on/offlne tells you to think.

 

I worked in a college computer lab so we got the pretty good PCs from both Dell and the Macs from Apple too, so I get the part checking and the rest, and I used to love building my own. It was always a rise finding that next stupidly out of control tech demo or benchmark toy and throwing the computer at it to see how far it would go or choke, and then again after tossing another bit of RAM or a nicer video card at it too before saying screw it and going with a new CPU/MB combo and the works. I recall that old FF11 demo back in the day was a real kick in the teeth for PCs and I recall getting some wonky values, but after an update I did some months/year later it just was night and day and would fly.

[Keatah]

One thing that has gotten annoying is when searching for a certain product - an online retailer, more and more frequently, inserts special items that are only remotely related.

 

An example, while searching for 16GB USB 3.1 Gen2 JumpDrives, Amazon and ebay have the gall and gumption to tell me about laptops and hubs. A laptop is not a JumpDrive. A hub is a not a jumpdrive.

 

And that's another thing, why the fuck is there USB 3.0, 3.1 Gen 1, and 3.1 Gen 2? USB 3.0 = USB 3.1 Gen1 while USB 3.1 Gen 2 is the 2X faster speed in the first place. Fuck'em all!

 

And speaking of fucking'em all. I get great satisfaction ramming it up the tech industry's butthole (fast and hard) by buying second hand. I just got an Elgato capture device (used) for like half-price.

[Tanooki]

I don't care much for those tactics so I stopped even looking at those suggestion spaces almost entirely, though amazon has been ok on showing me stuff when they're like A+B=C towards the top because if anything it keeps me aware of stuff that exists and is related since I'm not an everyday shopper so it's not off the wall weird stuff.

 

And upgrade hoops are awful when they come fast and almost combat each other in naming and quality, it sucks. Plus as you said to the screwing them, I do the same, I mostly these days buy much of anything second hand if possible given what it is I can use and the condition is excellent or ignorantly dumped new stuff. It can be wood objects, a nice non-stick pan to cook in, to entertainment stuff, or parts, whatever. No reason to over pay when you don't have to.

[youxia]

 

And that's another thing, why the fuck is there USB 3.0, 3.1 Gen 1, and 3.1 Gen 2? USB 3.0 = USB 3.1 Gen1 while USB 3.1 Gen 2 is the 2X faster speed in the first place.

 

I was recently connecting a new monitor and discovered there are about 4 or 5 different versions of the DVI socket. The hell's that all about?

[Flojomojo]

 

I was recently connecting a new monitor and discovered there are about 4 or 5 different versions of the DVI socket. The hell's that all about?

You just reminded me of reason 372 of why I am not into old computer hardware. The variety of video connectors on old Macintoshes was pretty ridiculous. At least most PCs kept things fairly standard, even if that usually meant an analog VGA connector.

[TheCoolDave]

As for video cards, Nvidia all the way, I had AMD in the past and had issues, moved over and will never go back. CPU INTEL only and motherboards, ASUS is my preferred brand.

 

This time around (about 3-4 years ago) I built a new machine, I was shopping around for mother boards and decided, let's give MSI a shot. I picked up a MSI MPOWER X99a motherboard ($350+ board). Plenty of overclocking features, specs seemed pretty awesome of a board. Grabbed a Intel 5820 (i7 3.3ghz 6 core CPU), and 32gb of DDR4 ram and built a system. Worked great till I needed to update the bois. Every time I updated the bios, the system board would fail (followed everything step by step, there is no way I could of screwed it up). This required gutting the board, sending to MSI and wait about 2 weeks to get a replacement board. Nothing but nightmares with support. When it works, it seems to work good but, support, FORGET about it... I also had 2 memory chips go bad and the memory OEM blames the motherboard...I was not overclocking at the time and even though the memory was designed for overclocking

 

I also grabbed a lower end MSI motherboard for my Home theater PC, that I filled with a i5 2.9ghz quad core and 16gb of memory. A bios update on this resulted in the system not booting. I was able to FIX it but, most non tecky people would not be able to do the complex command lines to re-apply the old bios to get the system booting again.

 

MSI's video cards I have never had a problem with and other products over all, no problems.

 

My advice, avoid MSI for main boards. I always used ASUS in the past and they were always rock solid and none of the issues that I had.

 

I've been working in IT for over 20 years,, Trust me, I am not a NOOB when it comes to computers and even hacking bios, if i need to but this was a real PIA..

Edited May 9, 2019 by TheCoolDave

[Punisher5.0]

Ive only used ASUS motherboards. Im not manufacturer locked down on CPUs and GPUs though. My last few computers have been Intels though and my last non Nvidia GPU was an ATI so its been a while. I am totally down though for a power mobile Ryzen set up. Im just waiting for the right platform to use them.

[Tanooki]

I've never been specific either though I did for a good time favor Diamond. Eventually though they got snapped up by AMD and it went downhill. So about that time I popped for a Geforce2 card, first nvidia I had and while it was amazing for 3D, I was strongly still doing 2D games and emulators too at the time and their driver package was a flaming pos. For all it did nicely for 3D on 2D it would force this filtering much like a mudding effect almost to the pixels in 2D games and emulators. If I removed their drivers and used generic Windows VGA, an then later when I decided to update I went back to Diamond (now AMD) and the problem resolved itself too. Eventually they declined horribly about the time I need new parts again and I've used nvidia ever since on desktop stuff and now this laptop, but prior that laptop was an ASUS one with an i5 sandybridge intel HD 3000 setup which was shockingly good other than it's unusable hardware T&L stuff that would make a COD game run at 5fps yet more advanced stuff between 30-60. I still have that laptop as a backup if this ever fails for a stretch.

 

I see no reason to have loyalty to parts makers as they rarely stay consistent over longer stretches of time, even somewhat known reliable stuff like hard drive makers eventually seem to buckle too or even various RAM makers as well. It just means you research, it's all you can do. Back on video cards I was even fine going with the odd maker who had a good run of it for a time as I rolled with a voodoo2 card for awhile and also a matrox mystique which was fantastic.

[MrMaddog]

Nvidia has always been my go to brand for GPU cards and they never fail me. I used to have AMDs for my custom builds in the past but current PC is Intel i5 which was an emergency buy after my old PC died. It's very solid but needs serious memory & video upgrades to play any game made after 2015.

 

Next year though I'm considering getting an AMD Risen setup so I can have a PC that has the same type of tech as the upcoming consoles. Also looking at getting a Radeon for Vulkan & DX 12 based games, but I'll keep my Nvidia cards for the older games (good thing Windows 10 can use different GPUs and even run specific games to on each one).

[Clint Thompson]

When it comes to NVIDIA cards I just always go straight to the source and they've never let me down. My last purchase of (2) RTX 2080 Ti are only off in serial numbers by about 100 and since they're founders editions, overclock well and perform like the little monsters that they are. It's almost like you can hear the time space continuum rip slightly, even just a little, every time I start a new render.

 

On the flip, I was almost lured to go with an EVGA or MSI setup because of their lighting garbage but the NVIDIA reference design is classy in itself and is a solid brick!

 

If BFGTech was still in business, I would most likely be buying from them... there were badass. Since NVIDIA absorbed 3Dfx, I'm good with NVIDIA.

[cuda_man]

I'm partial to ASUS or Gigabyte motherboards, Nvidia video, and Corsair cooling.

 

Back in the mid-late 90's when I worked in tech before getting into teaching technology, I preferred Rendition video cards and Aureal A3D sound, since many of the Papyrus racing sims utilized them. I wish someone would find out a way to make a Rendition Verite wrapper, then I can play SODA Off Road in it's best state!

[boxpressed]

I'm partial to ASUS or Gigabyte motherboards, Nvidia video, and Corsair cooling.

 

Back in the mid-late 90's when I worked in tech before getting into teaching technology, I preferred Rendition video cards and Aureal A3D sound, since many of the Papyrus racing sims utilized them. I wish someone would find out a way to make a Rendition Verite wrapper, then I can play SODA Off Road in it's best state!

Rendition Verite cards are cool. I had to find a Sierra Screamin' 3D just to play 3D accelerated Descent from DOS.

[Oleg Raven Moiseyev]

Sorry to bump such old thread , Rendition Verite wrapper now in development you can get it here. SODA works excellent

https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9NRCQJ8VLGTK

 

[+Zeptari]

November bump...   Any www.digitalstorm.com fans here? Someone at work suggested them, and I'm thinking of upgrading in the next year, or so. My current PC has a Geforce 210 1MB video card. So anything I get will be a massive upgrade.Any feedback is most welcome.