I build my own computers, have done for over 15 years.Never had these problems.No self respecting gamer buys an off the shelf PC.

But that's illustrating the point, that whenever people see it they automatically take it as a challenge, even if the challenge isn't there.

What's an "enthusiast" gamer?

Gaming is my main hobby. I spend a few hours gaming every night in my home theater. Still I prefer to play on a console. It gives me the most time to spend gaming, the least spend on anything else. I would say anyone spending any time on a message board like this is an enthusiast gamer...

The average consumer mostly plays on laptops, tablets, smart phones, and pc ;)

@Nettles Seems I don't have any self respect either :) I will buy an off the shelf pc again down the line for OR or to go with a 4k projector. I don't mind spending a bit more. I used to mess around with pcs, nowadays my time is worth more than the extra cost. (And yes I have had problems with self builds like burned out gpus)

I game on a projector too, and on an ambient light rejecting 110" Black screen I designed and built. Mostly with help from AVS forums. This way the screen itself is Black and I can use it even if the room is flooded with light. So I have it setup in my living room. Its a beauty. Honestly I don't understand how anyone can't or deosn't jump onto projectors. My PJ cost me around $800 and the screen I made cost me around $150. I too will not be upgrading to 4k until teher is a 4k projector I can afford. 

I have a ridiculously powerful RIG that I am increasingly using less and less of every passing day. Now its basically exclusively a work machine. I just prefer being in my living room than being in an office/Pc room i guess. Now all my browsing and PC stuff is done on a surface tablet. I even use a wireless HDD that sits in the PC room downloading all my stuff and go onto access its content from a small HTPC connected to the projector. Now only if the PS4 supports DLNA or can access my HDD wirelessly too.

Yeah, I guess you're right. Maybe I'm thinking this a bit wrong. You're right that (These days at least) most people who play games, play them on mobile devices, particularly smartphones and tablets. Maybe I'm still living in 2004.

Thinking it through a bit more, consoles seem best suited to that area between casual and hardcore (I've heard people call it the "softcore" crowd): Those who want a "true" gaming experience, but aren't willing to spend a massive amount of money on their hobby. Many people will only own one console, with the enthusiasts usually owning multiple or all of them.

And if someone was raised up as a little kid console gaming (I was 6 when my mom bought me an NES in 1986), there is something abstract about console gaming that you can't get out of your DNA. I have Steam and own a few games for it but hardly even open the thing because there is just something... missing. 

Awesome! I went the other way and designed a room around the screen. We had just bought a new house with an unfinished ground floor with high ceiling, perfect time to make everything exact to measurements with all the cables in the walls. Black wooden floor, black ceiling, dark red walls to keep ambient light under control. I prefer to play in the dark, nothing but the big screen in your field of view.

I have the same thing with PC. Used to be my primary for games, but it will forever be associated with work for me, and therefore not as relaxing as playing on a console. With a 4K upgrade I'll buy a separate pc, keep it exclusive for gaming.

Anyway projector first, pc second. What's the point of all that power if you're going to watch it on a monitor :)

I'm fine with lazy enthusiast gamer :p

I do spend way too much on gaming, just not interested anymore in hunting gpus and optimal configurations. I get it, it's a fun part of the hobby too, following gpu advancements, checking weekly for new beta drivers, tweaking settings, modding, etc. It's a different part of the experience.
It's just amusing that some people seem to consider themselves better gamers because of that, like they made the games themselves... And every new game that comes out it's nothing but complaints about the unoptimized mess, followed by boasting how much better it runs than on consoles. Which is it... PC games intentionally held back to make the console version look better, that was a good laugh.

1. HARDWARE - You must add on the cost of subscription services for consoles in order to play online - such as PSN and XBL. Also consider the price of games on PC is $10 cheaper for a new release and often you can get games for half that only a few months later in steam deals. Additionally, with PC you get a more useful/versatile OS, more general purposed hardware and you also are capable of upgrading for a small price in the nearer future as opposed to waiting for a new console to release. There are advantages and disadvantages with a PC. Usually the initial cost is higher (I have a budget PC I built for $500 that plays games at a reasonably better speed than consoles.) Also, add the taxrate to your console (Newegg doesn't have taxes for most states) and the price is very similar. Some GPUs even come with free games, my R9 280x came with three free games of my choosing. 

2. PERFORMANCE - Not only do I get better gaming performance with a budget build PC, I also get better general performance in everything from video editing, to streaming, to youtube play. It is more reasonable to add the cost of your non-gaming PC and your console if we are discussing functionality/cost. I think it is fair to add at least $200 on the cost of the console with the performance ratio because you must consider that somebody will need a new PC eventually anyway. 

3. CONSUMER TYPE - Won't disagree much here, but with each generation consoles are getting many of the same problems as PCs (see: updates, firmware patches, online drms, etc, etc)  and PC's are becoming more friendly toward the average consumer (see: steamOS/big picture mode.) 

I'm sorry, what?
You do realise the Cell wasn't actually that powerful overall, it was a cheap CPU design with a ton a flaws, it did have some good points however, not all of which related to gaming.

With that in mind, Cell was PowerPC based design, owned by IBM, when someone generally refers to the PC they think of x86 Intel/AMD based (And in some cases Via.)
However, the graphics processor in the Playstation 3 was not a custom design, it is PC hardware, developed by nVidia, thus without the PC, the Playstation 3 would have been a very different machine, same with the origional Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Playstation 4.
Sony can't afford to build fully custom hardware for it's machines, in-fact it's proved it's not always good at it either.
Microsoft also saw the cost benefits of going with hardware that's essentially already been "subsidised" by PC gamers, who have essentially funded high-end GPU development over the decades.

So... No cost analysis then? To be expected I suppose.
Keep in mind, you brought up costs and now that there are other facets to costs, now you wish to deflect it?

Keep in mind, plenty of parents get a PC for their children rather than a console, especially in Asia.
Did you know that in the last 9 months Steam has grown in active users faster than Sony and Microsoft combined can shift their new consoles? You think those are all pimply teenage boys? The demographics may surprise you.

The ENTIRE point is (And please stop deflecting/changing the argument) was how much cheaper consoles were to a PC, well guess what? It's actually not if you cared to do a proper costing breakdown over a long term.

If I were to use that kind of logic I would be claiming how expensive the Playstation 4 is compared to a Playstation 3, plus the Playstation 4 can't have similar components as the Playstation 3 and doesn't even have 1/10th the games.

This is the kind of "logic" you're throwing at PC gamers.

Actually, when I bought my Xbox One, that would have been impossible, I was required to connect it online to patch the system first, thus I was unable to drop in and play Call of Duty. (Which I had to install to the hard drive anyway.)
Have you really not noticed the trend over the last decade or so? Games simply have less testing, always have day 1 patches. (Battlefield 4 anyone?)
And because of such, need patching, just like their PC counterparts.

And I don't mind having an Internet connection, I always have access to the internet, that's not even a first world problem anymore.

Really wan't me to?
I have: Core i7 3930K @ 4.8ghz/6-cores, 12 threads, 64Gb DDR3 Ram, Quad-Radeon R9 290's and I have four Intel 730 240Gb SSD's in Raid.
What's a load time?
SSD's are stupidly fast, four of them working together are even faster.

However, my PC doesn't ever get turned off, just switched to a "work" profile for transcoding, encoding, editing, compute etc'. - Switching between such profiles is instant, there is no BIOS (In my case, UEFI) baggage to deal with.
I am also in the process of downgrading all my other machines to more efficient platforms, which will then access the games library on my main system, also cementing the need to never turn it off. (And also never needing to upgrade my other PC's ever ever ever again, can a single Console do that?)

Tried overclocking that CPU? I saw big gains on my 3930K with Quadfire, sad reality is, allot of games are still single/dual threaded heavy.

You're blowing it out of proportion.
Lets take the Radeon 7850 as an example, which is in the same ballpark as the Playstation 4, you can run Battlefield 4 at 1080P on it.
You are given this thing... Called a choice.
No $1,000 GPU required, only common sense needed.

I'm glad it had the effect that was intended, there is a purpose to such insanity.

That's mostly your own fault rather than everyone elses as you didn't elaborate on such points in the origional post, which left room for it to be construed in other ways.

Except that PC gaming is growing at a rate faster than consoles, and also has more gamers than all 3 console platforms combined and also has more revenue floating around and more games, arguable it could be because of the "Building/Survival" genre's that have allowed the PC to see such explosive growth.
Thus, by extension PC Gamers are more prolific than console gamers currently.

I've seen children get a PC for instance, just so they could play Minecraft as it's more feature rich than the console version, yes really.