Ohlawd *faints* 

I would say go with upgrading GPU. This is the first generation I can think of where the Next Gen consoles are already way behind high spec gaming PCs before they have even been released. Both will only fall behind even more much quicker, much more so than any previous gen.

Think about it this way. When the Xbox 360 was released in 2005 it had a top of the line custom GPU with features not available to PC users at the time and a tri core CPU when PCs were using single or dual core. The 360 held it's own against high spec PCs of the time and was a respected piece of tech.

Fast forward today. PS4 features a custom GPU derived from the 7870 which came out March last year. That's 20 months ago by the time the PS4 is released, a fairly long time in PC world. The CPU is far behind mid to high spec PC ones partly for cooling purposes.

The 'Next Gen' consoles will start to look long in the tooth much more quickly then 360/PS3 did. Current gens's unusually long life cycle is partly to blame for that.

now is a really shit time to upgrade GPU though.
youre in the middle of a spec war between AMD and Nvidia, wait for them to get tired from battle and snap up a much higher spec GPU for a lower price, even if you dont buy a console i would recommend at the very least holding off till Q1 2014.

Watch dogs doesn't get to be played on PC until April 2014, so there goes the obvious option.

Let me get this straight. You can currently play games on max and high settings, and that is not good enough..?

Upgrade your PC if you don't think you'll use your PS4 that much.

PS4, the gpu will be outdated in a years time while PS4 will last you 10 years.

Do you mean outdated in sense that it cant give MSAA x8 at 1080p with 60FPS for more than a year?

Or you saying that PS4 can increase it's maximum graphics way past the system specs for 10 years? Because 7970 is on a completely different level to the PS4  allready.

As I see it 7970 will pretty much guarantee the OP atleast PS4 level visuals all the way until PS4 dies. Propably drastically more depending on how mantle API pans out.

as for the PCI-E 2.0 vs PCI-E 3.0 some of u have talked about

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Ivy_Bridge_PCI-Express_Scaling/23.html

The difference with a 7970 running at 2.0 16x and 3.0 16x is about 1% performance. That likely won't even translate to 1FPS in most games. All the other gains aren't very drastic either.

Remember that this site is mainly focused on console gaming, I feel this site is mostly playstation dominant from what I've been following the past few years. Lot of people also aren't very computer savvy so naturally the choice to recommend is the console. I highly doubt any games are going to be crossplay, it's not a good idea to mix two platforms. One side usually ends up with some control scheme handicap.

I really think getting a great GPU especially AMD GPU now is a good bet, even if mantle doesn't pan out as it's expected. You would still have a very very powerful GPU for 1080p gaming. You will also have the whole PC library to play on. Consoles will just get more games as time passes by and u will ahve lot more potential games to buy for cheaper later on.

Though wish we knew what ur mobo is, would see exactly what it's capable of. I think it might have atleast PCI-E 2.0 x16 cause it comes with an i7. :)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883107989 this one ur setup? It comes with some same parts also would be DDR3 capable and it will come with 2x PCI-E 2.0 x16 which means crossfiring works great :)

Though having other card on a 4x/8x isnt gonna hold u back by much especially if u aren't playing on a 120hz monitor, ur not gonna even see the difference.

Yeah I'm pretty sure I bought a model very similar to that.  I custom ordered mine on HP's website through my companies corporate discount site.  But that seems to be spot on as far as specs go.  The monitor i'm using is here.   if I do get a new GPU between $300-500 and i'm sacraficing the fact I won't be able to play on my 50' TV and co-operatively with my friends (at least until I purchased a PS4 which wouldprobably be at least a year out) I want to make sure the GPU  I get is going to make my games look noticebly better then PS4 games, futureproof myself you could say.