Gaming Building a gaming PC

Any of you gotten into handheld gaming pcs? Asus ROG Ally X looks a fantastic bit of kit but the €950 pricetag is steep ://

May hold off and wait for the next generation
 
Anyone got a recommendation for a small form factor/mini PC that’s good for gaming? Doesn’t have to be the absolute top of the top but emulating upto 4k is a big thing for me
 
MiceOnMeth said:
Any of you gotten into handheld gaming pcs? Asus ROG Ally X looks a fantastic bit of kit but the €950 pricetag is steep ://

May hold off and wait for the next generation
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I do most of my gaming on the Steam Deck OLED these days. I love it especially after spending a day at work in an office chair already.

If I would use it as my only gaming device I would also be looking at competition as the Steam Deck is struggling with newer AAA games. I think a new generation will release next year as AMD's Z2 Extreme chip will be out. I would probably wait a bit if I could.

The absolute coolest thing though is Moonlight Streaming and for that I personally don't care so much about native performance as I use it at home 99% of the time. I have a pretty beefy PC and I can run Cyberpunk, Alan Wake 2 or whatever maxed out handheld in HDR, it's amazing. Made easier as the resolution is quite low even when downsampling.

Steam Deck has a couple of things over the more expensive competition currently:

- OLED HDR @ 1000 max nits - The only OLED screen and the brightest. I don't think any of the others support HDR. I find that more important than slightly better resolution and refresh rate although that would be welcome as well.
- Trackpads - Not as good as a mouse but I play some games like CIV with it without too much hassle.
- Steam OS - You can still tinker a lot (A LOT) with it if you're into that sort of thing, but Steam has done an amazing job with creating a console like experience if you want a plug and play solution and they keep improving it. This is coming to the competition as well though from what I've read.
- Cheaper

But yeah if I could wait I would probably check what's on the horizon. I kind of doubt that Valve will release a new Steam Deck for a while sadly. I will probably only upgrade if there is a big improvement to the screen as performance is fine for my use case.
 
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matherto said:
Anyone got a recommendation for a small form factor/mini PC that’s good for gaming? Doesn’t have to be the absolute top of the top but emulating upto 4k is a big thing for me
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If you want 4k in high specs playing at a good framerate, you'll likely have to opt for a top of the line machine. If you're happy with 1440p (2k) then you have a lot more options.

Otherwise your best bet is honestly building something yourself, using a small case, and a small motherboard (mini-ITX).
 
matherto said:
Anyone got a recommendation for a small form factor/mini PC that’s good for gaming? Doesn’t have to be the absolute top of the top but emulating upto 4k is a big thing for me
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If you want 4K I'd imagine you'd want a discrete GPU, and mini-PCs (as far as I'm aware) are all integrated with the CPU.

You could get a something in an ITX (or HTPC) case, but 4K is basically top end. For most, the sweet spot is 1440p.
 
matherto said:
Anyone got a recommendation for a small form factor/mini PC that’s good for gaming? Doesn’t have to be the absolute top of the top but emulating upto 4k is a big thing for me
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If you have decent internet, Geforce Now Ultimate might be the way to go to get 4K highest settings on a budget.
 
I'm gonna ask here, and probably Reddit and overclockers.

Can anyone recommend a cheap gaming PC? The youngun really only plays Minecraft, however, I'd like get one which will do a bit more, but also upgrade in future with a proper graphics card, maybe more RAM, etc.

I'd be looking as cheap as possible really incase he gets bored quickly and slinks back off to his Xbox.

Edit: https://www.ebuyer.com/2194003-alph...jM9pn6troivXSggWasgaAo9VEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

Potentially something like that, I believe I'd be able to upgrade for him in future? Not sure how far though as way out the loop in regards to motherboards and shit these days.
 
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One Night Only said:
I'm gonna ask here, and probably Reddit and overclockers.

Can anyone recommend a cheap gaming PC? The youngun really only plays Minecraft, however, I'd like get one which will do a bit more, but also upgrade in future with a proper graphics card, maybe more RAM, etc.

I'd be looking as cheap as possible really incase he gets bored quickly and slinks back off to his Xbox.
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Where are you located? UK?
 
I think it's a false economy to get something that cheap with 8gb ram, no gpu etc.
 
One Night Only said:
Prefer pre built, but I am comfortable building myself if that's much cheaper
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PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 3.7 GHz 6-Core Processor (£114.89 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Gigabyte B550 GAMING X V2 ATX AM4 Motherboard (£92.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory (£55.93 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: MSI SPATIUM M371 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (£54.99 @ AWD-IT)
Video Card: XFX Speedster SWFT 210 Core Radeon RX 6650 XT 8 GB Video Card (£227.40 @ Amazon UK)
Case: MSI MAG FORGE 100R ATX Mid Tower Case (£43.98 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: Corsair RM650 (2023) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£69.98 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £660.16
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2024-10-24 18:28 BST+0100

I'd probably look for something along those lines. You can get a slightly cheaper 6600 GPU (still plenty fast for what it sounds like ud use it for) or find a cheaper bronze rated PSU to save cash. Maybe even find an even cheaper case too. Similarly you can save some on the SSD on a cheaper model or brand or less capacity. RAM you can probably find cheaper too or drop down to 16GB. In other words. If you want to go below 600 and closer to 500 thats very doable.
 
Iron Stove said:
I do most of my gaming on the Steam Deck OLED these days. I love it especially after spending a day at work in an office chair already.

If I would use it as my only gaming device I would also be looking at competition as the Steam Deck is struggling with newer AAA games. I think a new generation will release next year as AMD's Z2 Extreme chip will be out. I would probably wait a bit if I could.

The absolute coolest thing though is Moonlight Streaming and for that I personally don't care so much about native performance as I use it at home 99% of the time. I have a pretty beefy PC and I can run Cyberpunk, Alan Wake 2 or whatever maxed out handheld in HDR, it's amazing. Made easier as the resolution is quite low even when downsampling.

Steam Deck has a couple of things over the more expensive competition currently:

- OLED HDR @ 1000 max nits - The only OLED screen and the brightest. I don't think any of the others support HDR. I find that more important than slightly better resolution and refresh rate although that would be welcome as well.
- Trackpads - Not as good as a mouse but I play some games like CIV with it without too much hassle.
- Steam OS - You can still tinker a lot (A LOT) with it if you're into that sort of thing, but Steam has done an amazing job with creating a console like experience if you want a plug and play solution and they keep improving it. This is coming to the competition as well though from what I've read.
- Cheaper

But yeah if I could wait I would probably check what's on the horizon. I kind of doubt that Valve will release a new Steam Deck for a while sadly. I will probably only upgrade if there is a big improvement to the screen as performance is fine for my use case.
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Do these things have any battery life to them? Long distance flights, are they fit for purpose?
 
Fortitude said:
Do these things have any battery life to them? Long distance flights, are they fit for purpose?
Click to expand...

The Steam Deck OLED I believe has the the best battery life, while the stronger systems sacrifices some battery life for raw power although I think the latest Ally improved some in that regard as well. You can get around 2- 3 hours of heavier games like Elden Ring on a Steam Deck OLED from memory, while lighter games like Indie games, Slay the Spire and the like can give you much longer. Like 7-8 hours or so, it depends on the game. Valve claims 3-12 hours officially. A lot of people also limit fps, screen brightness max TDP (watts) and so on to maximize battery life. It's easily changed in the settings.

Of course you can also get a powerbank. I believe you are allowed to bring 100w on a flight, the battery is 50w.

When streaming games from a computer that does all the work I get like 8 hours battery life.
 
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Iron Stove said:
The Steam Deck OLED I believe has the the best battery life, while the stronger systems sacrifices some battery life for raw power although I think the latest Ally improved some in that regard as well. You can get around 2- 3 hours of heavier games like Elden Ring on a Steam Deck OLED from memory while lighter games like Indie games, Slay the Spire and the like can give you much longer, like 7-8 hours or so, it depends on the game. Valve claims 3-12 hours officially. A lot of people also limit fps, screen brightness max TDP (watts) and so on to maximize battery life, it's in the settings.

Of course you can also get a powerbank. I believe you are allowed to bring 100w on a flight, the battery is 50w.

When streaming games from a computer that does all the work I get like 8 hours battery life.
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Cheers for that. Always toyed with the idea, but haven’t been following their development. I remember the gens I looked at had awful battery life, so it’s nice to hear about the improvements.
 
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