this post was submitted on 04 May 2025

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155

Chips aren’t improving like they used to, and it’s killing game console price cuts (arstechnica.com)

submitted 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

63 comments fedilink hide all child comments

"These price increases have multiple intertwining causes, some direct and some less so: inflation, pandemic-era supply crunches, the unpredictable trade policies of the Trump administration, and a gradual shift among console makers away from selling hardware at a loss or breaking even in the hopes that game sales will subsidize the hardware. And you never want to rule out good old shareholder-prioritizing corporate greed.

But one major factor, both in the price increases and in the reduction in drastic “slim”-style redesigns, is technical: the death of Moore’s Law and a noticeable slowdown in the rate at which processors and graphics chips can improve."

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 17 hours ago (4 children)

Is it Moores law failing or have we finally reached the point where capitalists are not even pretending to advance technology in order to charge higher prices? Like are we actually not able to make things faster and cheaper anymore or is the market controlled by a monopoly that sees no benefit in significantly improving their products? My opinion has been leaning more and more towards the latter since the pandemic.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 17 hours ago (7 children)

This has little to do with "capitalists" and everything to do with the fact that we've basically reached the limit of silicon.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 18 hours ago

The consoles unless you root or jailbreak them are too restrictive anyway. For older games you can just use an emulator on your PC or mobile.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 19 hours ago (4 children)

Consoles are just increasingly bad value for consumers compared to PCs.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 19 hours ago (8 children)

I mean, for the price of a mid range graphics card I can still buy a whole console. GPU prices are ridiculous. Never mind everything else on top of that.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah but remember to factor in that you probably already need a normal computer for non-game purposes so if you also use that for games you only have to buy one device not two

[–] [email protected] 8 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

I just built a PC after not having a computer for about 5+ years.

Built it for games, did not feel like I was missing out on anything in particular except games by not having a computer. There's a lot of things I'd rather use a computer for but these days most of what I used to do on a computer can be done just fine from a phone or tablet.

During those 5 or so years, I maybe needed to use a computer about a dozen times, and if my wife didn't have a computer I could have just swung by a library for a bit to take care of it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 18 hours ago

To me tablets feel like the most useless devices ever invented. Too large to carry around with you but just as stupidly limited as a phone compared to a real computer where you can actually automate some of your tasks and type on a decent keyboard and have a decent sized screen that doesn't ruin your wrists with the weight of holding it up.

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[–] [email protected] 41 points 19 hours ago (3 children)

Are they tho? Have you seen graphics card prices?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 17 hours ago (9 children)

You don't need a graphics card. You can get mini PCs with decent gaming performance for cheap these days.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (7 children)

2060 super for 300, and then another 200 for a decent processor puts you ahead of a ps5 and for a comparable price. Games are cheaper on PC too, as well as a broader selection. https://pcpartpicker.com/list/zYGmJn here is a mid tier build for 850, you could cut the procesor down, install linux for free, and im sure youve got a computer monitor laying around somwhere... the only thing stopping you is inertia.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 19 hours ago (3 children)

Tbh the only consoles I’ve been really interested in lately are the switch and steam deck, simply because they’re also mobile devices.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 17 hours ago (4 children)

The Steam Deck is basically a PC. You can get mini PCs with APUs of a similar performance for very low prices these days. That won't perform like a current gen console but it's a cheap gaming machine with a huge selection of low cost games and you won't have to pay for multiplayer.

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