What Makes a Gaming PC Modern?
In order to answer the question of the day, we must first define what we’re calling modern. For the sake of simplicity, we’ll consider “modern” to be the newest/most powerful hardware. This way, we have a specific place to draw hardware from: the line that marks what is the newest/most powerful. This will cover some of the most important hardware for performance, specifically how much/what kind of RAM, a useful amount of memory, CPU, and GPU.
Starting with something that isn’t hardware, and the only thing we’ll mention that isn’t, is Windows. Generally, gaming PCs will run the newest version of Windows, which is currently Windows 10. This isn’t always the case, as some people still use Windows 7 or even a version of Linux, but, to keep things simple and efficient, we’ll go with Windows 10.
Moving to the processor, we have Intel’s i9-9900K. According to PC Gamer, this is an 8-core processor with a base speed of 3.6GHz, and a turbo clock of 5.0GHz. This is a beast of a processor today, and will be nearly necessary in order to keep up with the GPU that would go into this “modern” (very powerful) gaming PC.
Next, we’ll move onto RAM, which is essential for running games well and multitasking on a PC. While DDR5 Ram is right around the corner, for right now, we’re taking techradar’s suggestion on the best RAM, which is speedy, efficient, and pleasant to look at.
Moving on from RAM, which, while being a form of memory, is not the storage they we need to save a collection of games to. Once again using techradar, we have the Samsung 970 Evo Plus. This is fast storage with a nice price. In order to maximize our storage as well as our speed, the 2TB version is suggested.
Now we move on to the final piece of hardware that we will cover today: the GPU, or the graphics card. This is exceptionally important for modern gaming, and as Tom’s Hardware shows, Nvidia’s RTX 2080 Ti, with 4352 GPU cores, a boost clock of 1,545 MHz, and 11GB GDDR6 14 Gbps video RAM, this is the GPU for the modern gamer (assuming they have the cash to dish out). This card provides ray tracing that aims to making gaming more realistic and beautiful than ever.
With these pieces of hardware out there, we can get a start on building what we have defined to be a modern gaming PC. Sure, there are other things to consider such as a power supply, motherboard, cooling, case, and more, but this is a sort of starter guide for a modern gaming PC. The future will certainly bring advancements and this will likely be outdated within a few months, but, for now, this is some of the best hardware on the market.
Fun Facts: Moore’s law essentially claims that technology will double in power on a yearly basis. This was seen to be true for many years, but has slowed down lately, as tech becomes more and more powerful. However, breakthroughs can happen at any moment, and Moore’s law could become obsolete as we surpass its rate of technological advancement. (At the very least we can dream of having flying cars by next year)
As a second fun fact, while it wasn’t included, RGB lighting is definitely modern in gaming PCs, though it is unnecessary and not for all people.
Gaming Cafe image from: Kotaku
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