I always thrive on buying up the 'just behind the cutting edge' hardware at bargain basement prices. I just love it. To think; I just bought a new system to game on for under $1000 that absolutely spanks the tar out of my current 4-year-old system, and can hang with the latest and greatest out there too. To me, that's what being an 'enthusiast' is all about.
Same. I love buying one product line behind the best.
Awesome article, genuinely lol'd at times reading it. Makes a very valid & timely point...
From my experience, most enthusiasts fall into the latter of the two categories you mentioned. I have no love of blowing wads of cash on a high-end mobo or CPU. If I did, I'd be thinking twice about clocking it's nuts off. Yeah, I've killed the odd CPU or board, but the prospect killing an E2140, while still a shame, is a lot easier to swallow than frying a QX Turbonutterbastid.
I still get a buzz out of achieving clock speed that I thought was unattainable only a day or so earlier, if only by scouring forums and picking brains. I don't want to follow a manufacturer's buying list to achieve a given overclock - that is sounding the death-knell for the enthusiast community.
I've often been hunting for info on one particular board and have been totally sidetracked by another forum post, relating to a bit of kit I have in another PC. It's a voyage of discovery, to find that someone has managed something special with an ordinary component, and something you will not find if you just accept whats handed to you on a plate. Yes, even this method only really amounts to 'standing on the shoulders of giants', to a lesser degree, but it is still more fun than filling in a shopping list.
I do think it is better to have an industry, like watercooling, that has matured and evolved to make products that meet our needs, but I don't want to be spoon-fed the choices I make.
The money-bags enthusiast is a very rare animal indeed, do they actually exist? or are they creatures of myth and legend, like the Yeti? Regardless, I find it difficult to believe that £250 motherboards are selling in sufficient quantities to justify the efforts of the manufacturers but, while ever there are hideously expensive premium products out there, the mid range products have a much wider band within which they can be priced. So, I echo the calls to focus on producing solid mainstream products, rather than premium priced, flawed toys. Maybe then we'll see better, more reasonably priced, enthusiast-friendly parts.
Comments 51 to 53 of 53
ReplySame. I love buying one product line behind the best.
Awesome article, genuinely lol'd at times reading it. Makes a very valid & timely point...
I especially liked the bit on motherboards. I really don't look forward to getting a new one.
From my experience, most enthusiasts fall into the latter of the two categories you mentioned. I have no love of blowing wads of cash on a high-end mobo or CPU. If I did, I'd be thinking twice about clocking it's nuts off. Yeah, I've killed the odd CPU or board, but the prospect killing an E2140, while still a shame, is a lot easier to swallow than frying a QX Turbonutterbastid.
I still get a buzz out of achieving clock speed that I thought was unattainable only a day or so earlier, if only by scouring forums and picking brains. I don't want to follow a manufacturer's buying list to achieve a given overclock - that is sounding the death-knell for the enthusiast community.
I've often been hunting for info on one particular board and have been totally sidetracked by another forum post, relating to a bit of kit I have in another PC. It's a voyage of discovery, to find that someone has managed something special with an ordinary component, and something you will not find if you just accept whats handed to you on a plate. Yes, even this method only really amounts to 'standing on the shoulders of giants', to a lesser degree, but it is still more fun than filling in a shopping list.
I do think it is better to have an industry, like watercooling, that has matured and evolved to make products that meet our needs, but I don't want to be spoon-fed the choices I make.
The money-bags enthusiast is a very rare animal indeed, do they actually exist? or are they creatures of myth and legend, like the Yeti? Regardless, I find it difficult to believe that £250 motherboards are selling in sufficient quantities to justify the efforts of the manufacturers but, while ever there are hideously expensive premium products out there, the mid range products have a much wider band within which they can be priced. So, I echo the calls to focus on producing solid mainstream products, rather than premium priced, flawed toys. Maybe then we'll see better, more reasonably priced, enthusiast-friendly parts.
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