Subj : Are you as horrified by the PS5 Pro pricing as I am? Just buy a g To : All From : TechnologyDaily Date : Wed Sep 11 2024 13:30:06 Are you as horrified by the PS5 Pro pricing as I am? Just buy a gaming laptop instead, seriously Date: Wed, 11 Sep 2024 12:28:16 +0000 Description: Let's talk about rising prices, console-exclusive games, and what a PS5 Pro equivalent PC would look like. FULL STORY ====================================================================== Judging by the absolute vitriol in the live chat on YouTube during yesterdays PS5 Pro reveal , I wasnt the only one upset by the price point of Sonys latest and greatest console. $699.99 (699.99 / AU$1,999.95) is a lot to pay for a games console, lets be honest. Seven hundred American dollaroos is just the base price, too - if you want the full out-of-the-box experience with a disk drive and stand, it'll cost you $825 (825 / AU$1,360). That makes it the most expensive home console ever; sure, inflation plays a role here, but even adjusting for that, the original 1994 PlayStation would cost you around $500 in todays money. Now, it might just be the seven zillion computer hardware reviews Ive done over the years talking here, but surely were approaching gaming PC pricing territory here, no? I generally say to people building their first entry-level custom PC that they should aim for the $800-$1000 mark. With consoles - and games, and controllers - getting ever more expensive (and Microsoft no doubt wondering if they can feasibly sell an eight-hundred-dollar Xbox right now), its time for us to collectively admit that the home console dream is dead, and we should all be buying gaming systems that run Windows instead. Getting a PS5 Pro PC equivalent Alright, Ill be totally upfront about one thing here: youre not going to get anywhere near the same level of gaming performance on a PC at that price point. Thats just a fact: Sonys tight control over the PlayStation ecosystem and the PS5 Pro s fixed-spec configuration makes it cheaper to mass-produce a powerful console capable of 4K gaming. I did some quick research (read: online shopping) and, at the $825 mark, the best youre likely to get without waiting for big discounts on every individual component is a desktop system with an Nvidia RTX 4060 graphics card and an Intel Core i7 or AMD Ryzen 7 processor - certainly a solid gaming PC, capable of playing virtually anything at 1080p and some games at 1440p or even 4K if the game supports Nvidias DLSS 3 upscaling tech. If youd prefer something a bit more portable, most of the best gaming laptops will, unfortunately, cost you more in most cases - though to be fair, they do include a screen, keyboard, speakers, and so on. You'll need a fairly beefy graphics card in your PC or laptop to measure up against the PS5 Pro in terms of performance. (Image credit: Future) If you actually wanted to build an equivalent system to the PS5 Pro, youd likely be looking at something closer to the RTX 4070 or perhaps AMDs RX 7700 XT (Ill admit that this is mostly guesswork, given that we dont know the exact GPU specs of the PS5 Pro yet), along with a fairly high-end CPU, motherboard, and RAM plus a 2TB SSD. Chuck in a copy of Windows 11 and youre likely looking north of $1200 - and thats assuming you dont want an expensive case or CPU liquid cooler. But if you ask me, the benefits far outweigh this singular price-related downside. For starters, if you choose to build a custom gaming PC (or buy a pre-built system, like the rather excellent budget HP Victus 15L ) youll have the freedom to upgrade your gaming machine further down the line - something that simply isnt an option for console gamers, beyond perhaps swapping out the SSD to get more storage. Meanwhile, my desktop gaming rig has three SSDs in it PC is best, and Im not sorry about that Being able to upgrade in a piecemeal manner can help ease the burden of cost, too; its not uncommon for PC gamers to buy a new GPU or CPU and sell off their existing one to recoup some of the cost, and once youve got a PC, thats it - youll never be left behind in the wrong console generation again, you can simply upgrade one part at a time until youve got the best gaming PC for you. If you spring for a gaming laptop instead, you sacrifice most of that upgradability but instead secure yourself portability: the ability to pack up your gaming system and take it with you on the go cant be understated. If you want something even more portable, the handheld space is no longer confined to Nintendo - excellent handheld gaming PCs like the Steam Deck and the Asus ROG Ally X let you take your favorite games anywhere, anytime. I absolutely love my Asus ROG Ally, and this year's new Ally X is even better. (Image credit: Future) Its also worth discussing the fact that in this day and age, everyone needs a computer anyway - why not roll your work-and-play machines into one device? Ive seen folks decry gaming PCs because they prefer couch gaming with a controller, but you can literally do that with a computer. All you need is an HDMI cable and a gamepad, and boom: you can be gaming on Windows on your living room TV. Oh, and that gamepad is pretty much guaranteed to cost you less than a DualSense Its all about the games Finally, Ive got to be honest with you, folks: console exclusives suck and I hate them. I say this as someone who grumpily forks out for every new Nintendo console so I can play Zelda , Animal Crossing , and Pokemon with my partner. Yes, Im a big grown-up. With a decent chunk of Sonys once-exclusive titles now making their way to PC, the platform exclusives argument for buying a PS5 is weaker than ever. Also, PC has something the closed ecosystems of console gaming will never have: a truly open indie dev landscape, where literally anyone can make their weird little dream game and sell it on itch.io , where an infinite number of titles await players, where its never hard to find exactly what you want to play. Add to that the multitude of free-to-play games and free giveaways from the likes of Epic and Prime Gaming, and its practically possible to game forever on PC without ever spending a penny on software beyond your OS. Want to play the original Deus Ex , a game that came out 24 years ago, on your PS5 Pro? Absolutely not, says Sony. (Image credit: Future) Oh, and backward compatibility! I remember buying a PS3 back in the day and being immensely disappointed that my PS2 library was now effectively unplayable. Meanwhile, over on PC, I can download and play a game from the 90s with zero problems - not to mention the fact that those games are often insanely cheap, thanks to the excellent discounts you can routinely find on storefronts Steam and GOG. And dont even get me started on paying a subscription to play online - that was the nail in the coffin for console gaming for me, personally. Look, I didnt write this article to try and convince Sony fanboys to come over to the light side - perhaps its more about vindicating myself for spending so much money on PC components over the years. But I genuinely, honestly, truly do maintain that PC is the best platform for gaming, and always will be. So if my writing convinces even one person to step into the wonderful world of PC gaming, Ill consider this a job well done; hell, if you decide to get into PC gaming because of this article, send a tweet or an email my way - it would brighten my day no end. You might also like... PS5 Pro reveal analysis - 5 things we learned about the next PlayStation console PS5 Pro enhancement patches will be ready to go at launch for around '40 to 50 games' PS5 Pro will significantly enhance PSVR 2 games according to Mark Cerny ====================================================================== Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/gaming/ps5/are-you-as-horrified-by-the-ps5-pro-prici ng-as-i-am-just-buy-a-gaming-laptop-instead-seriously --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 (Linux/64) * Origin: tqwNet Technology News (1337:1/100) .