Is PC gaming economically comparable to console?

[Bofferbrauer2]

Wman1996 said:

Coming from a guy who has never had a Gaming PC (my brothers have, but I haven't heard a lot from them about it)
-Digital games can be as cheap, often cheaper than console storefronts. Plus, there are even more free games.
-You don't need a subscription for online multiplayer.
That is some of the cheaper side. The actual hardware itself is more expensive. I know PC is an open platform, but what $750 PC is comparable in specs to a PS5 Pro? What $550 PC is comparable in specs to a PS5? Even if PS6 is around $1000, it will likely outperform PCs of a similar price point. It's not just consoles going up in price, some PC components have been for a while as well.

I'll be quoting my post from before where I made a calculation about a PC that cost 882€ or 925€ with a RAM upgrade, and should easily be able to keep up with, if not outright beat, a PS5 Pro. Keep in mind that the PS5 Pro is sold here in stores for about 790€, so not much less than my config below. And, like I mentioned, I could easily gotten 50€ cheaper by picking the cheapest option each time instead of a imo more sensible one.

Bofferbrauer2 said:

Unlike previous generations where consoles and hardware got cheaper over time, now the consoles get more expensive and hardware just barely cheaper over time. At the same time PC hardware had some hefty price hikes in the 2017-2023 timeframe, which raised the prices for a PC equivalent to a console much more expensive.

However, while in 2021-2023 it was pretty expensive to build a PC that was equivalent to a PS5, now with new, cheaper hardware and the price hikes for the PS5, buying a new PC with similar capabilities as a PS5 isn't much more expensive than the console now. I just made the test, and even added a Playstation controller additional to the mouse/keyboard for good measure (though I left out Windows for Linux).

The price tag: 882€ (1031€ with assembly and testing): 

Keep in mind even the weakest Zen 4 CPU and RDNA4 GPU eviscerate what's in a PS5, with a bit more RAM (35GB kit for 105€ bringing the price of the system to 925€) it could easily compete with a PS5 Pro. Please note that I could have gotten about 50€ cheaper if I always took the cheapest option (and entry-level components like an A620 board or old PCIe 2 SSD). Also, with the RAM upgrade this system should easily be playable for the coming years.

So yeah, for the PS5 Pro, building a PC in the same price range is absolutely possible.

For the PS5 proper, it's not easy to do so due to a lack of entry-level GPUs these days. A PS5-equivalent GPU, if produced on today's architectures and nodes, should cost well below $200, but there ain't any GPUs on the market right now that cost less than $249 MSRP, and APUs with a capable GPU are too expensive to consider. If they would produce entry-level parts again, then a PS5-equivalent would be very possible nowadays, too.