PC gaming – the solution to your PS3 woes

Put down the controller, and step away from the console, as Tomas Mowlam persuades you of the benefits of PC gaming.

If you fancied playing PS3 at the start of this week you would have been out of luck, as older PS3 consoles encountered a date and time bug and threw a tantrum over it.

My Facebook this morning recounted the damage, as avid PS3 players wept into their cornflakes about not being able to roll through Rapture in Bioshock 2, before work or study.

(At time of writing this has now been fixed)

Xbox 360 users may have been chuckling, but the red ring of death (Where all four segments round the power button glow red and throws a tantrum) is something no 360 owner wants to contemplate. Wrapping a thick towel around your 360 until it heats enough to be playable is not a workable solution.

PC – the solution

The answer as far as we’re concerned is PC gaming; and yes here at PC Site® we do have a vested interest to lure you away from your console.

The traditional arguments for having a console over a PC were price and size.

We can’t argue with the first point; consoles still are, and probably always will be, cheaper; then again you can’t do your homework on a PS3.

Size and form factor are no longer so important. Though most gaming PCs normally come in a heifer of a tower, with dozens of cables snaking out from them, there are plenty of options that won’t make you to rip it up from the comfort of your living room sofa, and keep it looking as minimalist as an Ikea catalogue.

There are plenty of laptops out there capable of holding their own at gaming, and while few people are willing to drop a couple of grand on a top of the range Alienware laptop, you can get a decent rig for under £750.

If a laptop doesn’t appeal then stick with a tower and hook it up using the HDMI port to a top of the range TV.

If you’re feeling the pinch:

• Dell Studio XPS 8000
• Aspire G7200
• Consider building your own, it’s not as daunting as it sounds – check out our guide.

If you’re feeling flush:

• The 27-inch iMac
• Sony Vaio F Series with all the trimmings
• Alienware Area-51 ALX

Image Credit: Fe Ilya