Ars System Guide: Gaming Box

I think that this article below qualifies as a pretty intensive look at the key differences between fulfilling needs and offering performance with a gaming rig.

More, more more.

People always want more. Computers are a particularly dangerous area for geeks. Component makers continuously push out upgrades to existing products and entirely new products on a regular basis, and sure enough, our computing “needs” grow to take advantage of all the extra processing power that becomes available every day. Most of us do not actually need all of this extra power all the time. But it is there, and we want to take advantage of it.

Major upgrades are often driven by software, not hardware. And one of the biggest software categories driving upgrades is games. Excitement over dual-channel memory or the NVIDIA GeForce 7800 series video cards is great, but without a compelling need to upgrade, excitement does not always generate sales. Far Cry brought many older systems to their knees a few months ago. Today, Doom 3 does the same to many almost-new systems. [Read the rest]