PC Build - Flight Sims
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Been a very long time since i've looked at Gaming PC's 5-6+ years.
Been asked by a colleague to recommend a PC build to be able to play X-Plan 11 or maybe M$ Flight Sim. He's been quoted £1700 by local PC shops, but i think that's a bit OTT.
So starting simple does anyone here play flight sims?
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So first off.... no one plays flight sims.
That said, £1700 isn't far off. You need a decent rig and a local shop is always twice the cost of just buying a rig because you are paying some local kid to assemble something by hand that you should just buy off of the shelf. Here in the US you need a good gaming PC which most people will say is about £1000 but if you watch for sales you can get for half of that if you shop wisely and aren't paying someone else to shop for you. We got a killer rig in December for £500 off of Amazon that would play those games easily. Then you need like £200 - £400 in special controllers.
If £1700 included monitors, it's pretty spot on.
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@scottalanmiller said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
So first off.... no one plays flight sims.
OK
not "play" RUN 
X-Plane -
@scottalanmiller said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
If £1700 included monitors, it's pretty spot on.
Yeah the more i look into it that seems to be a good spot when you include monitors.
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The new MS Flight Simulator sounds like it will be pretty awesome.
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@stacksofplates said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
The new MS Flight Simulator sounds like it will be pretty awesome.
That's what I've heard.
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I always look at pcper's hardware leaderboard for new or even upgrade plans. They update the leaderboard regularly, too.
The only difference between a regular gaming pc and one for flight sims is how realistic you want to get, which speaks to peripherals (you can get entire dashboards for IFR emulation), including pedals and more. One of the cooler items to get might be an ultra wide monitor (https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1457462-REG/lg_49wl95c_w_49_class_32_9_ultrawide.html) though that's likely outside the price range -- I did see a smaller one for $350 -- and you'll need to see how far this client wants to go. You could save a bit if you skip the flashy lights and/or water cooling.
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@stacksofplates said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
The new MS Flight Simulator sounds like it will be pretty awesome.
From some of the stuff i've seen pop up on my news feed it looks like a beast.
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I've advice my friend to look at sign up for the X-Plane forum and see what people that actually use it for advice to get him up and running.
But from what i can see is CPU Core speed is important, 4-6 cores. The a good mid range GPU should be OK, 4GB vRAM+
Found this good sheet showing FPS from hardware
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15rNa7_naUM8a4YzzrzwrxvWSl4X8SHesshZGm7H54AI/pubhtml# -
@scottalanmiller said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
Here in the US you need a good gaming PC which most people will say is about £1000 but if you watch for sales you can get for half of that if you shop wisely and aren't paying someone else to shop for you.
Yes, it's pretty much always cheaper to buy a computer on sale than it is to build from components.
The only reason to build something custom is when you want something that is better or higher quality than what you can buy. Or in some cases when you already have some of the components you need.
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@Pete-S said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
Yes, it's pretty much always cheaper to buy a computer on sale than it is to build from components.
For sure. They get higher volume and more incentives. Building is fun, but it's not financially smart except in extreme cases. (Pun intended.)
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In my case, my entire PC was about the same cost as the GPU alone would have been!
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@scottalanmiller said in PC Build - Flight Sims:
In my case, my entire PC was about the same cost as the GPU alone would have been!
I remember one time when we bought a simple tower server from HP and it was the same price as just the Xeon CPU alone. Hard to beat that.
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Will get him to keep an eye for clearance sales, and offers.
