Gaming on your PC is not the same as it was a few years back. There was a time when games like GTA Vice City and Max Payne were easy to run on a regular desktop PC. PC gaming has evolved over time and now you need a PC with powerful hardware to run AAA games. But is it still possible to game on a regular PC? Let’s find out in this article.
Yes, you can game on a regular PC, however, you cannot expect higher frame rates and stunning visuals in your gameplay. The thing is, most regular desktops in the market are equipped with integrated graphics and weak processors. For playing entry-level games like PUBG Lite, these lower-end specs could be enough, but for AAA and Esports games, you need to upgrade your system or go with a prebuilt gaming PC.
Why Regular PCs are Weaker at Handling AAA Games
The answer is simple, a regular PC is equipped with low-budget peripherals that are good to handle lighter tasks like browsing, using MS Office, photo-editing, etc.
As most of the AAA games of today demand more resources, a regular PC doesn’t have enough resources for smooth gameplay. Therefore, a regular computer struggles to play demanding titles like Battlefields 5, Resident Evil: Village, Call of Duty: Warzone, etc.
Higher the requirement of a game, the more resources it utilizes from your PC. The most vital resources that a game utilizes are the Ram, CPU, and GPU.
Less demanding games like Minecraft, GTA San Andreas, Counter-Strike: Source, etc need entry-level graphics cards and CPU to run. Below are the minimum requirements of the games that can be played on a regular PC without any lags.
Minimum Requirements of Some Games That Are Easily Playable on Regular Desktop
| GTA San Andreas | Counter-Strike: Source | Civilizations V | |
| CPU | 1 GHz Pentium III or AMD Athlon Processor | 1.7 GHz Intel or AMD Processor | 1.8 GHz Quad-Core CPU |
| Graphics Card | 64MB | 64MB | 512 MB ATI 4800 series or Nvidia 9800 |
| Ram | 1GB | 512MB | 4GB |
| Operating System | Windows 7 | Windows 7 | Windows 7 |
In the above table, we have listed some of the famous games that do not need a high-end PC to run. However, keep in mind that these are specs on which at least the game is playable at the lowest settings. To get the most out of your gameplay, it’s better to meet the recommended requirements.
Is Gaming PC A Better Choice?
PCs that are specifically meant for gaming are packed with higher-end specs. The most deciding factors in a gaming PC are CPU, GPU, and Ram.
CPU is the heart of a gaming PC. Modern CPUs are packed with multiple cores and threads to run the most demanding PC games. Also, the gaming processors come with faster single-core performance for higher frame rates.
Most custom-built or pre-built gaming PCs are armored with high-end graphics cards from Nvidia or AMD. Most of the time, it is the GPU that gives an edge to a gaming PC over a regular PC. No doubt, powerful gaming GPUs let you scale the resolution up to 4K without stuttering or lags.
Unlike a regular desktop, a gaming desktop has more room for an upgrade. Where PC games are becoming more hardware intensive, a gaming PC gives you more freedom to install the latest hardware as time passes. Most often, a gaming PC comes with a full ATX or Mid-Tower PC case, so there’s plenty of room inside such PC cases to install bulky gaming hardware.
All in all, going for a gaming desktop over a regular desktop is a great decision if you want to play demanding AAA & Esports games.
Choosing a Gaming PC
There are two types of gaming PCs to consider at the moment, the prebuilt & custom built. If you don’t have enough knowledge about the compatiblity of gaming hardware, then it’s worth going after a prebuilt gaming computer. This will save you a lot of time doing research to get the one that meets your need. Also, the pre-made gaming desktops come with at least one year of warranty. So if anything goes wrong, you can claim that rightaway.
On other hand, if you have a little know how of the gaming peripherals like CPU, GPU, and Ram, then we recommend you build your own gaming computer from scratch. It’s more of a fun learning process and it lets you save more money as compared to a prebuilt machine.
Winding up
Finally, you can play entry-level PC games on a regular computer at the lowest settings. But if you need to max out the settings and performance of your gameplay, you should go for a gaming PC or upgrade your current regular PC with powerful hardware. Before doing an upgrade, make sure that your PC supports the latest hardware that you intend to install in it.
