[citation][nom]pauldh[/nom]Apologies, ignoring you was unintentional. In fact, those comments shared within the last Day 4 article convinced me to re-weight the value equation within my own story, as it is something I have wanted to do anyway. Long ago I added a "Native Resolution Gaming" chart as it is such an important metric for this machine. As long as "Gaming PC" remains within my build's name, I'll strive to make it a solid gamer up to a realistic target resolution for the budget, even if that means dropping the CPU down and subsequently bowing out of the completion. I think 2/3 games, with added weight to 16x10 and 19x10 at the highest details, is a fair compromise for a $500-600 Gaming PC. I just can't drop the Application weight lower when ultimately the machine will be judged more on it's CPU than it's GPU. And when you think about it, performance within today's threaded applications may represent CPU demands in next year's games. We hope for photorealistic graphics, and accept replacing our graphics solution is par for the course along the way. As far as day 4, I'll touch on that in a bit, but overall while there have been many good suggestions, what you are asking for changes the series a lot, and may be impossible to implement to everyone's satisfaction. IMO, drop "Gaming" and a $400-500 "Entry Level PC" MAY be able to top the value charts, but at the same time would not show up for the bulk of our game settings. Drop $100 off this $600 PC's graphics budget, and your left with i5-3350P at $500, hurting at 20-30 % of the tests. Phenom II X4 965 BE could possibly do the same for less money, maybe offer a bit better gaming budget. Shoot, a well-tuned Trinity build may be able to win at $400 using the iGPU. However none of these could be called a "Gaming PC." And is there a target audience here for this? How many Tom's readers could live with such a winning machine without making upgrades?I didn't comment last time because it was in the day 4 story. That belongs to Thomas... his story, his time and energy, and his calculations. That said, we are all team players, and it's simple to express concerns if/when we have them. Thing is, the SBM series values overall performance, and I think all involved are quite satisfied with the value equation Thomas has pinned down. Real life needs of most folks seem to favor removing all platform bottlenecks, over just stuffing in the big graphics required for Ultra details with AA. (Comments wanting i3+7870 at $600 aside) And 10% storage scores representing the snappier user experience from an SSD, is fair IMO. As gamers ourselves, we understand what you are saying. And we can also understand how the series falls short for the crowd who doesn't game (anymore?). A Gaming PC shouldn't be judged on productivity, and a beastly workstation or video editing machine shouldn't be judged on gaming. Everyone's needs are different, and it's impossible to agree on a purpose at each price point, without creating a separate series of competitions. Rather the SBM attempts to tackle all things well. After all, we just think our readership leans enthusiast, and hates any visible platform bottlenecks at any price point. We'll never all agree if CPU/GPU/SSD or even aesthetics and silence deserves the bulk of our funds, which is a big part of why we build our own machines. =)The gaming community here is huge, and I took heat for not going with a pure gaming PC with more GPU. Shoot, I started the heat within my own conclusion, recognizing a potential winner isn't the best possible gamer. In fact, I think only Don pleased this demographic with his graphics budget allotment. So I will see if Thomas would consider adding the popular 1920x1080 res in his gaming chart just like he does with 25x16. Only the highest test settings should matter. That way, the SBM winner is still the most overall bang for the buck, but we should be able to also pin down a value winner rewarding builds focused ultimately on 19x10 and 25x16 gaming.[/citation]
Glad to see someone reply
Basically saying that if the name is "Gaming PC", its overall weightage should depend more on games.
For a "general purpose PC", it should do games and apps equally good.
If you want to make a gaming heavy build , why dont you name all the builds as "$600/800/1000 gaming build" and so forth, instead of "general purpose" and "enthu build" ?
I would be happy if there is an "alternate analysis" of data,(on a separate page) according to (or similar to) the method i suggested. The comments by readers can tell you if all of us like it or not.
As far as day 4, I'll touch on that in a bit, but overall while there have been many good suggestions, what you are asking for changes the series a lot, and may be impossible to implement to everyone's satisfaction.
pretty poor reason of not trying something new. (no offense intended, please)