News Xbox One price cut to £399.99, with free copy of Titanfall

I had a big discussion about this on t'Twittorz when the review was published. Simply put: no, a £120 graphics card *doesn't* run Titanfall better than the £450 (now ~£370) Xbox One. Do you know how many frames per second you'd get on Titanfall using the pictured card? Zero. You can't play a game on a graphics card alone.

If you read the review, you get a clearer picture: the £120 GPU beats the Xbox One in Titanfall performance when paired with a £170 CPU, £130 of RAM, £100 motherboard, £120 PSU, £25 cooler, and £90 SSD. Oh, and £80 OS. Plus you're going to need a case for that, so you can add on a fistful of tenners for that. Basically, the machine that beat the Xbox One also cost twice as much - and didn't include a controller (that's another £30 pleas, sir) or Kinect (which may or may not be a problem, depending on your personal preference for a device that SEES ALL AND HEARS ALL.) Or a free game.

The discussion then took a sideways turn into total cost of ownership (TCO). Even there, the case for a PC isn't as clear-cut as you might think: using the specifications for a mid-range PC (build cost, including an Xbox for Windows controller but excluding Kinect, around £600), we worked out that the overall costs are very similar. That's even allowing for buying eight new-release games at the full £50 rip-off Xbox Marketplace cost compared to the same games at £40 for PC via Steam, basically 'cos you're going to have to keep upgrading the PC roughly every three years to stay on top of the latest titles. (Three-year figure reached by having a shufti at how similarly-priced components from three years ago fare in today's games. By contrast, in March I could buy Titanfall for the Xbox 360, a console now nine years old, and it'd play fine. T'won't look as good as the PC version, true, but the PC version won't run on nine-year-old hardware no matter how far I dial down the settings.)

I even did a graph. No, really. Here:



That's TCO for the PS4, Xbox One and the aforementioned PC, tracked over a seven-year lifespan (and assuming no hardware failures in that period - if only that were true!). Both the Xbox One and the PS4 include the cost of annual membership to their respective online services, at full bought-through-the-console price.

In short: you might save money buying a PC instead of a console, but you won't save much.

Think I've gone off on a bit of a tangent now. S'amazing what I'll do instead of the work I'm actually supposed to be doing, innit?

 

It's a simplified financial model, yes. There are too many variables otherwise. You point to things like the Humble Bundle and Steam Sales? Well, when you're doing your own financial model remember to take into account the 'free' games you get as part of the Xbox Live and PlayStation Plus subscription fee. Sales aren't exclusive to the PC, either: just before Xmas, Morrisons was selling off sealed, brand-new, physical copies of Deus Ex on PS3 for £3. £3! That's cheaper than the PC version!

Remember, too, that my model compares new-release titles 'cos that's where the biggest difference is.

If you find otherwise, please let me know - but my prediction is that although the final figures may be different, your graph will be very much the same shape as mine.

Oh, and no - my model doesn't account for pirates. Mostly because they're scummers who should be strung up by the danglies as a warning to others - and there are pirates on every platform, not just PC. (Although the PS4 and Xbox One haven't been cracked yet, I'll bet it's only a matter of time.)

 

Sorry to be 'that' guy, but the word you're looking for is 'moot.' 'Mute' means 'silent,' 'moot' means 'subject to debate' but in the Americanised colloquialism you're attempting is interpreted to instead mean 'of little or no relevance' - in other words, not worth debating. Language, eh? What're you going to do?

Same. I own a PS3 (and about three games - it's mostly just a media streamer and Blu-ray player) and an Xbox 360, but I have no desire to upgrade until both can offer me an actual improvement. Graphics a bit better? My favourite games are character-based; that, to quote a certain Shania Twain, don't impress me much. As for the PS4 - no DLNA support or MP3 playback, Sony? Really? That's about 80% of what I use the PS3 for dropped by the wayside. Thanks, but no thanks.

I'll review my position in the Xmas 2015 sales, see if the prices have come down to sub-£200 with a game bundle and the inadequacies patched out. Might - might - be tempted then.

Actually, I didn't: look at the review. Those prices are current market prices for the exact components used in the benchmark system, as per Google Shopping. Go ahead - price it up yourself. You'll see I'm right.

EDIT: Here, let me help. "We tested the GTX 750 Ti on our trusty Ivy Bridge test rig, which features an Intel Core i5 3570K @ 3.4Ghz, 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM, an ASUS P8Z68-V Motherboard, Corsair HX850 PSU, Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 Pro, and a Corsair Force GT SSD." Go on. Price those components up. I'll wait here.

Now, if you'd care to read on and not just "hurr, durr, PC master race, consoles blow," you'll see that I then base my financial model on a considerably cheaper PC build.

Care to apologise?

 

Amazing. That is completely different to the PC in the review. I mean, it's not even the same processor manufacturer. Bravo.

If you meant that as an alternative to the PC from my financial model, as opposed to the system you claim I overpriced - an accusation you have yet to prove or apologise for, by the way - then you're still missing some key components. A console comes with a game controller, so add on £30 for an Xbox Pad for Windows. You'll also need an operating system for the PC, which you haven't included - that's another £80. And if you want a proper comparison, you'll also need a Kinect for Windows kit. Oh, and you'll need a Blu-ray drive and some playback software - another £40 and £25 respectively - if you want to match the Xbox One on features.

Care to recheck your sums?

(Incidentally, the priced-up PC from my model - which included a cheap Intel Core i5 and an AMD Radeon roughly equivalent to the GPUs found in the Xbox One and PS4 - wasn't provided by me; it was provided by the chap providing the pro-PC side of the argument. Just so's you know.)

 

Who says the modelled gamer is playing an FPS? They might be into FIFA.

EDIT: Here's the specification on which the model was based, provided by the pro-PC side of the discussion. Here's his own TCO estimates, based on slightly different assumptions, along with justification for why each component was chosen.

See the MASSIVE GREAT IMAGE from the post you replied to? That review. The one I provided costings for, and you claimed I'd over-priced. Here.

Still waiting for that apology.

Then you're making it badly. Once you've added on everything you'd missed from your £430 build, you're up at £600 without buying Kinect - and then you'll still have to buy Titanfall itself. Contrast that with an Xbox One, which can be bought for £370 with a copy of Titanfall. I wouldn't exactly call that "the same price or close."