As a console gamer, I tried a master race PC rig recently, and now I have a dirty eyesight. I want!!

[Cyan]

I am going to wait a year or so to build a new PC, when 14nm become a standard, but in doing so I will have to be very patient for now. My laptop's sound chip doesn't work well, the sound cuts off after a while. The issue has been discovered, and it's a hardware problem, so the fix is not straightforward. I use audio a lot and this bugs me off, I will never buy a laptop from the company which made the model I have:

http://forums.toshiba.com/t5/Audio-...ound-Solved-Hardware-fix-required/td-p/625359

Thankfully I have a really great hardware synthesiser, the Roland SD-50 and it fixes all the problems I have with the sound, but I didn't buy it to be a soundcard, it is not, I bought it to compose MIDI and stuff. Plus when I move the laptop around to show videos to family and friends, the problem persists because I have to use the internal audio chip.

 

[Davros]

My laptop's sound chip doesn't work well, the sound cuts off after a while. The issue has been discovered, and it's a hardware problem, so the fix is not straightforward.

Creative Soundblaster Play
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Creative-...acdbfe&pid=100338&rk=1&rkt=28&sd=301602858184

or if you want higher quality
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-Creat...acdbfe&pid=100338&rk=5&rkt=28&sd=301602858184

 

[homerdog]

'Entry' and 'Modest' are about console price.

Does anyone know how they compete in performance? Especially wrt CPU?

Just about any of those CPUs are better than the console CPUs (except the AM1 CPUs lol). But the GPUs don't get to PS4 level until the Good range (R7 265).

It seems you could spend about $650-$700 and have a PC that is quite a bit better than PS4 (i3 4160, R9 280, 8GB RAM, 1TB 7200RPM HDD, 120GB SSD etc.), although they don't include Windows in their pricing... maybe with Win10 being mostly free that isn't a huge issue any more.

 

[Malo]

although they don't include Windows in their pricing... maybe with Win10 being mostly free that isn't a huge issue any more.

The cost of Win7/8 is still required for W10 though, you can't count W10 as a free OS.

 

[Cyan]

Creative Soundblaster Play
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Creative-Soundblaster-Play-USB-External-Sound-Card-EAX-HD-CMSS-Alchemy-Support/271854283662?_trksid=p2141725.c100338.m3726&_trkparms=aid=222007&algo=SIC.MBE&ao=1&asc=20141212152715&meid=49b2722fd2f94ee09742033549acdbfe&pid=100338&rk=1&rkt=28&sd=301602858184

or if you want higher quality
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-Creat...00338&rk=5&rkt=28&sd=301602858184[/QUOTE]Many thanks for the suggestions. Had I to choose one I'd go with the cheaper of the two, taking into account my needs.

Still, the Roland SD-50 does that, although it has very basic audio settings -it's about music creation, less about sound software, of which it has very little, it only comes with a playlist player and Sonar 8.5 LE (great program btw)-, although it costs 400€.

So in that sense I have what I need, with the limitations of the SD-50, it plays sound but doesn't add effects and options are very limited, but it gets the job done and the sound quality is superb.

Just about any of those CPUs are better than the console CPUs (except the AM1 CPUs lol). But the GPUs don't get to PS4 level until the Good range (R7 265).

It seems you could spend about $650-$700 and have a PC that is quite a bit better than PS4 (i3 4160, R9 280, 8GB RAM, 1TB 7200RPM HDD, 120GB SSD etc.), although they don't include Windows in their pricing... maybe with Win10 being mostly free that isn't a huge issue any more.

Now that you talk about it I would love to see a DF article using a PC with the same price of PS4, and probably a G3220 CPU. Most of the PCs using a i3 processor inside usually cost around 600$ and up.

On the pricing issue... provided that you already have a PC with W7/W8 that sounds about right.

The cost of Win7/8 is still required for W10 though, you can't count W10 as a free OS.

Yup, for those of use who religiously paid for an OS the advantage are the security updates and so on, but still pirated versions of Windows 7/8 will get the upgrade.

http://techpp.com/2012/10/26/upgrade-to-windows-8-from-illegal-windows-7/

Windows 7 non legitimate users still could get the security updates though. Dunno if that changed as of recently.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/windows-pirate-bootleg-security-patches,7666.html