By Sillicur at Monday, July 14, 2014 10:05:00 AM

PC remains the superior gaming device, crushing all the current-gen consoles with its raw processing power, the superior speed of Solid State Drives (SSD) and high class graphics cards. It is therefore no surprise that PC gaming hardware more than doubles the market value of consoles and that it delivers unmatched raw gaming power. The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is currently leading the charge against the Xbox One with over 7 million units sold compared to the Xbox One's 5 million, yet they are both fighting for a distant second place behind PC gaming hardware.

PC gaming hardware market value doubles that of consoles

I have been a firm believer that PC gaming will remain king even with the release of the PlayStation 4 (PS4) and Xbox One. Recently, my beliefs have been confirmed through Jon Peddie Research (JPR), whom reported that PC gaming hardware is valued at $21.5 billion, over double the amount of the console gaming market.

Ted Pollak, senior gaming analyst at JPR, reports that while casual console users were moving across to mobile devices, PC gamers were investing more in high-end machines, spending bucket loads of cash on a new and improved setup.

Jon Peddie, President of JPR comments: “Not only is gaming becoming an even more important purchasing influence of PC sales due to the offloading of more basic functionality to smart devices, but we are forecasting growth in the most expensive discrete graphics products. We are also impressed with the embedded graphics offerings this generation and going forward.” - Source

Ted Pollak, Senior Gaming Analyst at JPR states: “The effect that key titles have on hardware sales is phenomenal. Enthusiast PC Gamers embrace content creation and modding, so when titles like Bohemia Interactive’s ARMA 3 are in the pipeline; we start to see anticipatory hardware sales. In fact, we are estimating over $800 million of PC builds influenced primarily by this title.

A major component of this situation is that many games are placing increasing demands on the CPU. The result is that swapping out the graphics add-in board is not enough this time around and gamers are building (and ordering) overclocked PC’s from the ground up.” - Source

Building up a PC for that big next-gen game might sound like a bit of a waste to some, yet for me there is nothing like building up your own PC, hand picking every single part and putting the love and effort into your gaming rig. I have been building my own personal setups every few years since about 1996 and it has been a joyous occasion every time.

It is unclear what exactly the PC and console markets entail in the JPR report. On the PC side, it includes computers, upgrades and peripherals used for gaming purposes. From the report it is still very evident that the arrival of the Xbox One and PS4 did not slow down the growth of PC hardware sales, nor is it likely to do so in the future.

According to JPR, the PC gaming hardware market is set to increase even further, with an estimated total value of $23.2 billion by 2017. PC gaming is not just alive and well, but far superior to console gaming in raw power as well delivering the best gaming experience possible.

The best gaming experience is on the PC

The best possible gaming experience will undoubtedly remain on PC, as hardware become ever more powerful. Simply put, consoles can not be upgraded, while with a PC sky is the limit. One prime example of how PC gaming is already pulling ahead of the newly released current-gen consoles is 4K gaming.

The current-gen consoles, namely the PS4 and Xbox One, are still only at the beginning of their life-cycle. Sadly, the consoles simply do not have the power required to run games at 1440p, also known as 4K.

4K gaming is already a reality for highest-end PC gaming systems and even mass-market machines can now push out 2560x1440 resolution while maintaining decent frame rates, well beyond the 1080p resolution (1920x1080) offered by the current-gen consoles.

To run games at 4K is however extremely expensive at the moment, as building up a gaming rig that can handle 4K will cost you roughly the price of 7 PS4’s. Be that as it may, PC hardware prices will come down drastically in future, as it always has when even more powerful iterations of the hardware get released.

Jon Peddie, president of JPR, comments: “Nvidia, Intel and AMD have enthusiast CPU and GPUs that are so powerful that, when combined with SSDs and fast memory, they absolutely trounce the computing power and gaming capabilities of the newest console generation. PC gamers with good displays are able to enjoy millions and millions of pixels more than console gamers get on HDTVs. This translates into being able to see more and an overall better gaming experience.” - Source

The latest games, for example Watch_Dogs can not even run at 1080p, which is almost standard for any up to date PC. Therefore, a PC can deliver a superior gaming experience to that of current-gen consoles right now.

As the years go by and the current-gen consoles begin to show their age, the gap will grow even further. As an example of how powerful a PC can be, check out PC Gamer’s Large Pixel Collider (LPC) right here. This machine is leaps and bounds ahead of the current-gen consoles and if you can afford it, you can build your own LPC right now.

Closing Thoughts

PC gaming is not only surviving through the release of the current-gen consoles, it is actually thriving. The glorious PC master race is alive and well, sporting a vastly superior market value to that of consoles and continues to grow every year.

There is no doubt that PC gaming delivers the best possible gaming experience in terms of graphics, with 4K being readily available to anyone who can afford a gaming rig that can handle it. As a PC gamer through and through, I can simply not wait to see what the future holds for PC gaming and how powerful the PC hardware will be in the next 5 to 10 years.

Did you expect PC gaming hardware’s market value to be this high? What is your PC gaming setup? Do you prefer PC or console gaming? Which gaming devices do you own? Let us know what you think in the comment section below!

Sources: JPR, MCV

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