ASUS ROG PG278Q

[bulbousbeard]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236405

Got this monitor on Saturday. It's pretty fantastic. Every game in MAME runs glass smooth on it without any ---smurfy--- syncrefresh hackery or nonsense. Also, the panel is surprisingly fast. Even without ULMB or black frame insertion, there's minimal ghosting on it.

This is objectively the best LCD monitor for an arcade cabinet in the world. The only downside on it is that the blacks aren't that hot on it. That's not going to be solved until we get OLED monitors probably. Even though a CRT is better for some games, the ability to run Ultra Street Fighter IV @ 2560x1440@144hz and Street Fighter 2: Champion Edition at its native refresh rate on the same cabinet is too compelling for me to justify CRTs anymore. The main selling point behind CRTs was that you could run games at their native refresh rates, but G-Sync handles that, so the only advantage left for CRTs is the combination of low motion blur and black blacks.

I'm throwing one of these in my Big Blue in the interim. When we get a 30" OLED G-Sync monitor, it's pretty much game over for CRTs.

[Vigo]

The main selling point behind CRTs was that you could run games at their native refresh rates

The main "selling" point of CRTs has never been about the refresh rates. It has been about the aspect ratio, vibrance, and that the natural monitor glow created a much better smoothing effect than any algorithm filter could ever achieve.  That washed out black you mention on your LCD sounds like a major problem, being that so many arcade games rely on black as a major contrast color. [insert any classic space shooter]. $700 because you thought SF2 would look magically delicious? Sorry friend, but it looks like you were suckered out of your money on this one. G-sync or equivilent crap will soon be urinated out on every monitor on the market, no need to jump on any bandwagons when you could easily buy 2-3 working cabs for as much as you spent on this monitor. My advice is sell this monitor right away while you can still get your money back.

My advice is enjoy the beauty of CRTs while you still can. The newer, better monitor will always be there for you to buy in the future.

[Vigo]

Oh, and to point out that G-sync is just a flash in the pan:

http://www.displayport.org/pr/vesa-adds-adaptive-sync-popular-displayport-video-standard/

Yep. Adaptive syncing is now standardized. Any monitors 1.2a compliant and forward will have this feature, and they will be coming out probably by the end of the year. The beauty is you only need any Nvidia card within the last 3 generations. The adaptive sync is all part of the firmware.

Seriously friend, return that monitor. You were suckered. 

[SavannahLion]

When we get a 30" OLED G-Sync monitor, it's pretty much game over for CRTs.

You do realize no new 30" CRT's were manufactured since about 2007/2008?

Like the guy sounding a death knell for El Camino because Tesla is coming out their truck. 

[bulbousbeard]

When we get a 30" OLED G-Sync monitor, it's pretty much game over for CRTs.

You do realize no new 30" CRT's were manufactured since about 2007/2008?

Like the guy sounding a death knell for El Camino because Tesla is coming out their truck. 

You need a 30" 16:9 screen to have something that's roughly the equivalent of a 25" arcade monitor.

A 27" 16:9 screen is more like a 19" arcade monitor.

You lose a lot of real estate on a 16:9 monitor when displaying a 4:3 image.

[bulbousbeard]

Oh, and to point out that G-sync is just a flash in the pan:

http://www.displayport.org/pr/vesa-adds-adaptive-sync-popular-displayport-video-standard/

Yep. Adaptive syncing is now standardized. Any monitors 1.2a compliant and forward will have this feature, and they will be coming out probably by the end of the year. The beauty is you only need any Nvidia card within the last 3 generations. The adaptive sync is all part of the firmware.

Seriously friend, return that monitor. You were suckered. 

Adaptive sync is hot air at this point. I'm using a working product right now. I might not even be alive a year from now. Why would I sit around inhaling my own farts when I can enjoy it today? It took almost a year to get G-Sync monitors to market. As of today, no monitor manufacturer has even announced an adaptive sync monitor, and the VESA standard is so generic, so we have no idea what the specific implementations will be like. It's entirely possible that they'll be worse than Nvidia's implementation of G-Sync.

Adaptive Sync is an _optional_ feature that monitor manufacturers can choose to support or ignore (hint: they'll overwhelmingly ignore it for as long as possible). So, yes, I'm not going to sit around and wait over a year for something that will likely be worse than what I'm using right now.

[bulbousbeard]

The main selling point behind CRTs was that you could run games at their native refresh rates

The main "selling" point of CRTs has never been about the refresh rates. It has been about the aspect ratio, vibrance, and that the natural monitor glow created a much better smoothing effect than any algorithm filter could ever achieve.  That washed out black you mention on your LCD sounds like a major problem, being that so many arcade games rely on black as a major contrast color. [insert any classic space shooter]. $700 because you thought SF2 would look magically delicious? Sorry friend, but it looks like you were suckered out of your money on this one. G-sync or equivilent crap will soon be urinated out on every monitor on the market, no need to jump on any bandwagons when you could easily buy 2-3 working cabs for as much as you spent on this monitor. My advice is sell this monitor right away while you can still get your money back.

My advice is enjoy the beauty of CRTs while you still can. The newer, better monitor will always be there for you to buy in the future.

The blacks aren't as major a problem as you'll run into with 99% of CRTs in existence today. Well, let's get real. 100%. Name a CRT I can buy that will run SF2, Rayman Legends, Guacamelee, and Ultra Street Fighter 4 well.

Yeah.

[SavannahLion]

When we get a 30" OLED G-Sync monitor, it's pretty much game over for CRTs.

You do realize no new 30" CRT's were manufactured since about 2007/2008?

Like the guy sounding a death knell for El Camino because Tesla is coming out their truck. 

You need a 30" 16:9 screen to have something that's roughly the equivalent of a 25" arcade monitor.

A 27" 16:9 screen is more like a 19" arcade monitor.

You lose a lot of real estate on a 16:9 monitor when displaying a 4:3 image.

Amazingly, you actually managed to miss the point of that. 

Keep spouting your professed love with your monitor and enjoy your "Bugatti" dude.   

[yotsuya]

The blacks aren't as major a problem as you'll run into with 99% of CRTs in existence today. Well, let's get real. 100%. Name a CRT I can buy that will run SF2, Rayman Legends, Guacamelee, and Ultra Street Fighter 4 well.

Yeah.

The thing here is that you want to play new games on your cab. Us old guys are cool noodling around with Mr. Do! and other games of that era.

I mean, whatever, bro. Let me know when they make these in 4:3. In the mean time, enjoy your monitor.

[yotsuya]

Oh, and Scott, please use your new powers to move this to the correct forum. Kthxbai.

[Vigo]

I can't prevent people from making stupid decisions, but this guy obviously doesn't know what he is talking about, and I feel bad if anyone actually wastes their money because this guy tells them that this magic monitor will make arcade games look better. This is Kanada style overspending/pretentious justification of a product that doesn't add any significant worth.

Adaptive sync is hot air at this point. I'm using a working product right now. I might not even be alive a year from now.

Yeah, if you are not alive, it is probably due to the aneurysm that you will have when you see every new monitor that comes out next year has adaptive sync. And if you are seriously worried you are not gonna be around in a year, why waste your time fiddling with setting up an arcade machine?

You obviously are completely clueless about VESA standards as well. They are not options, every VESA DisplayPort feature is part of a package deal they have to take to be compliant to the current standard. Name 1 LCD company worth their salt that will refuse to comply with the VESA DisplayPort standard. Every major brand will offer this in a year. And in 5 years, where will your G-sync monitor be? Will geforce still be making graphics cards that will link to your monitor? Probably not when the feature is free for everyone else to tap into at no additional cost. So you will be stuck using an archaic graphics card simply to drive your monitor. Bravo.   

[Vigo]

Oh, and FYI. AUO is already manufacturing ActiveSync monitors to be released this fall. AUO makes panels for Samsung, Sony, NEC, Lenovo, Panasonic, LG, Dell, Apple, Viewsonic, Acer, Toshiba.

[yotsuya]

Good job, Scott! 

[bulbousbeard]

It's not Active Sync. It's Adaptive-Sync. You don't even know the name of the technology, and you're accusing me of not knowing what I'm talking about?

Yeah, just confirmed that there isn't a single company that's announced an Adaptive-Sync monitor. You can create a Display Port 1.2a monitor that doesn't work with Adaptive-Sync. It still requires additional hardware. It also requires specific AMD GPUs. It doesn't work with just any GPU, so it's just as "proprietary" as G-Sync. The display port spec is also really vague, and monitor manufacturers could implement this in any number of (inferior) ways. This monitor also has ULMB, which is awesome. Will your mythical, unannounced monitors have something similar? Nobody knows. The difference between Adaptive-Sync and G-Sync is that Adaptive-Sync is currently vaporware and you can buy a G-Sync monitor today.

Regardless, I think it's hilarious that you actually think $800 is a lot of money. It's a drop in the bucket for eliminating stuttering and tearing from every program.

As we've seen with other "proprietary" technologies such as PhysX (which is far less useful than G-Sync), Nvidia will let go of them sometime around the day after never.

[yotsuya]

I think it's hilarious that you actually think $800 is a lot of money. It's a drop in the bucket for eliminating stuttering and tearing from every program.

$800 is a lot of money. I'm sure the trees have $100 bill leaves in San Jose, but in the rest of the country...

[bulbousbeard]

I think it's hilarious that you actually think $800 is a lot of money. It's a drop in the bucket for eliminating stuttering and tearing from every program.

$800 is a lot of money. I'm sure the trees have $100 bill leaves in San Jose, but in the rest of the country...

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

[yotsuya]

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

I've been playing videogames at home/in the arcade since 1980. I don't need someone like you validating my gamer cred. 

Maybe I don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing because I don't give a ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- about Street Fighter games.

[bulbousbeard]

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

I've been playing videogames at home/in the arcade since 1980. I don't need someone like you validating my gamer cred. 

Maybe I don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing because I don't give a ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- about Street Fighter games.

You realize that this impacts _all_ games, right? In fact, older vertically oriented games are probably impacted the most since a lot of them tended to run at 60.60hz, so you could never get them to run at 100% speed on 60hz LCDs even if you flubbed them with syncrefresh.

[Vigo]

It's not Active Sync. It's Adaptive-Sync. You don't even know the name of the technology, and you're accusing me of not knowing what I'm talking about?

I can call it Elf-Fart-Sync and yet I can still sound much more intelligent than you.

Needs special hardware? Um. By special hardware you mean a graphics card? Any AMD graphics card from the past 3 generations will work, and it is not a proprietary technology so anyone, including Geforce themselves can make graphics cards compliant with Triforce-Sync.

Wait 3 weeks. The announcements for new Kitchen-Sync monitors will start then. Feel free to mark it on your calendar and call me out on it.

[yotsuya]

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

I've been playing videogames at home/in the arcade since 1980. I don't need someone like you validating my gamer cred. 

Maybe I don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing because I don't give a ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- about Street Fighter games.

You realize that this impacts _all_ games, right? In fact, older vertically oriented games are probably impacted the most since a lot of them tended to run at 60.60hz, so you could never get them to run at 100% speed on 60hz LCDs.

You realize that the Samsung SyncMaster 21.3" monitor I have in my MAME cab does a superb job and I have a great time playing all the games in my cab, including SF2, and I don't notice/don't care about any speed issues because they are non-existent, right?

[bulbousbeard]

It's not Active Sync. It's Adaptive-Sync. You don't even know the name of the technology, and you're accusing me of not knowing what I'm talking about?

I can call it Elf-Fart-Sync and yet I can still sound much more intelligent than you.

Needs special hardware? Um. By special hardware you mean a graphics card? Any AMD graphics card from the past 3 generations will work, and it is not a proprietary technology so anyone, including Geforce themselves can make graphics cards compliant with Triforce-Sync.

Wait 3 weeks. The announcements for new Kitchen-Sync monitors will start then. Feel free to mark it on your calendar and call me out on it.

Why are you flinging personal insults at me over a monitor? Are u mad, bro? 

Yes, Adaptive-Sync does require additional hardware in the monitor as well as DP 1.2a compatibility. It's on AMD's FAQ about Adaptive-Sync.

[Vigo]

I made no personal insults. You are doing a fine enough job insulting yourself.

[Le Chuck]

Tesla is making a truck?!?!!?!

[yotsuya]

Tesla is making a truck?!?!!?!

[Vigo]

[SavannahLion]

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

Right..... Fifteen years ago, yeah, I probably wouldn't bat an eye at spending that kind of money on that kind of hardware.

I came from an era when overclocked Celery/BP6/Voodoo2+SLI was KING, water cooling was still in its infancy and everyone had to carve their own aluminum blocks and bend their own copper tubing. Yeah, like you I dropped that kind of cash on pretty much anything that I thought would give me an edge. My set up was always in a state of flux. RAM upgrades, larger and faster HDD's. Industrial fans. And yes, bigger and better monitors. At one point, I had so much gaming hardware stitched together that I didn't run my heater at all that winter.

Hey.... I may not be a gamer anymore but it's far better than being a loser. 

So yeah, enjoy your "2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing" monitor, I'll be busy banging my wife every night.

Tesla is making a truck?!?!!?!

Check the link bro. I was going to go with Gladiator instead of an El Camino but it appears they're bringing the Gladiator back. 

I ---smurfing--- love the old Gladiator and would lay my right nut on railroad tracks if I could get the one from Tremors.

[yotsuya]

If you don't think it's worth $800 to play games at 2560x1440@144hz with no v-sync input lag and no tearing, I wouldn't call you a gamer.

Right..... Fifteen years ago, yeah, I probably wouldn't bat an eye at spending that kind of money on that kind of hardware.

I came from an era when overclocked Celery/BP6/Voodoo2+SLI was KING, water cooling was still in its infancy and everyone had to carve their own aluminum blocks and bend their own copper tubing. Yeah, like you I dropped that kind of cash on pretty much anything that I thought would give me an edge. My set up was always in a state of flux. RAM upgrades, larger and faster HDD's. Industrial fans. And yes, bigger and better monitors. At one point, I had so much gaming hardware stitched together that I didn't run my heater at all that winter.

Hey.... I may not be a gamer anymore but it's far better than being a loser. 

No, ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---, SL, I was the same way 15 years ago. Bought a 3DFx VooDoo video card JUST so I could run Unreal in Hardware Mode and not its slow as hell software mode. One of the top 10 moments in my WHOLE LIFE was seeing the resonance cascade in Half-Life for the first time. Chased video card upgrade after processor upgrade after hard drive upgrade...

Now, I just want to play some damn Galaga. My $85 4:3 Syncmaster is awesome for it. Don't need something 10x the price in the wrong aspect ratio which wouldn't fit in my cab anyway.

[dkersten]

Why are you flinging personal insults at me over a monitor? Are u mad, bro? 

Um, you flung a lot worse at me in a nearly identical argument less than a week ago.  Hypocritical much?

I took the stance against Bulbous in the last argument, now I will take a stance in the middle here.

First off, most laptops screens in the last couple years have had the ability to change refresh rates, which is why when NVidia unveiled G-Sync at CES in January this year, AMD unveiled "Free-Sync" which was running on existing laptops and only required a driver.  Not exactly vaporware, and if manufacturers will enable this kind of technology in desktop monitors in the coming year, it will put up some serious competition to G-sync.  HOWEVER, it doesn't address the latency issues inherent in LCD's, where G-Sync does.  So it is not exactly an apples to apples comparison.

That being said, G-sync IS some pretty groundbreaking technology, and everyone who is respected in the industry who has reviewed it has given it very high scores.  Anyone who plays modern 3d rendered games would notice an improvement.  Anyone who went from the last generation of high res CRT's to LCD's saw a pretty high step backwards in quality, particularly when it came to motion.  Screen tearing and ghosting used to be horrible.  It has gotten better, but with any game that has intense 3d rendering, it is still an issue.  And yes, with v-sync off I have seen excessive screen tearing when playing mame arcade games, and if I were a purist, I would be irritated with this.

But I am not, and v-sync is "good enough" for me with mame.  I also no longer play games that require intensive 3d rendering and high frame rates.  If I did, then I would seriously consider a G-sync monitor, and in fact would have bought one back in February when the Asus ROG was first announced, but it took 5 more months to come out than expected, and since then my priorities have changed.  Right now I can't justify spending $800 for a $200 TN panel even if it has technology that makes it play any content smoother than any other monitor since the CRT went out of production. 

I too used to spend money to be on the bleeding edge of technology.  It didn't take me long to realize I was just wasting my money and spending 10x as much to gain 2% performance.  I will still buy good stuff, but I don't need the best. 

I can't find any fault in Bulbous buying this screen, and I have no doubt that it is the best LCD for playing ANY game on a computer.  But that also doesn't mean that I can't play just fine on my screen that isn't the absolute best.  At this price, if it were a 30" panel I might consider it for my main gaming computer, and for a 27" if it were closer to $500 I would also still consider it.  But at $800, it just isn't worth it to me.

[Malenko]

My boner got a boner the first time I ran GL Quake on a voodoo.

[yotsuya]

Even without ULMB or black frame insertion, there's minimal ghosting on it.

The only downside on it is that the blacks aren't that hot on it.

Yeah.... I'll save my $800 bucks until they perfect this... and it does my dishes for me as well...

[yotsuya]

My boner got a boner the first time I ran GL Quake on a voodoo.

I know, right? I went back and replayed a lot of games just to see them done in hardware 3D.

[SavannahLion]

No, ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---, SL, I was the same way 15 years ago. Bought a 3DFx VooDoo video card JUST so I could run Unreal in Hardware Mode and not its slow as hell software mode. One of the top 10 moments in my WHOLE LIFE was seeing the resonance cascade in Half-Life for the first time. Chased video card upgrade after processor upgrade after hard drive upgrade...

Now, I just want to play some damn Galaga. My $85 4:3 Syncmaster is awesome for it. Don't need something 10x the price in the wrong aspect ratio which wouldn't fit in my cab anyway.

Exactly. I bought my first Voodoo2 when I was still using a crappy AMD K6-II (with built in DVD decoder which, for some bizarre reason the computer was never sold with a DVD player  ), just seeing the Unreal Fly-by in hardware mode for the first time was what did it for me. I got Half-Life and seeing the resonance cascade sent me on a downward spiral that took years to recover from.

I was devastated when 3DFx bit the dust (who else was looking forward to their pending motherboard release?) and again when I finally had to retire my Voodoos when I bought an nVidia that just creamed the SLI pair. Despite the speed boost, it was a big step backwards on games like HL and Unreal because, IIRC, those games took advantage of the randomized texture mapping in GLIDE. The walls never really looked the same

In any case, ALL of the same arguments existed back then. Whether it was hardware or software. The only thing that changed are the players.

Now, I just want to spend time with my kids. I don't need a $700 monitor for that.

My boner got a boner the first time I ran GL Quake on a voodoo.

I know, right? I went back and replayed a lot of games just to see them done in hardware 3D.

Same here. If the games didn't support GLIDE, they weren't worth looking at.

[yotsuya]

Exactly. I bought my first Voodoo2 when I was still using a crappy AMD K6-II (with built in DVD decoder which, for some bizarre reason the computer was never sold with a DVD player  ), just seeing the Unreal Fly-by in hardware mode for the first time was what did it for me. I got Half-Life and seeing the resonance cascade sent me on a downward spiral that took years to recover from.

I was devastated when 3DFx bit the dust (who else was looking forward to their pending motherboard release?) and again when I finally had to retire my Voodoos when I bought an nVidia that just creamed the SLI pair. Despite the speed boost, it was a big step backwards on games like HL and Unreal because, IIRC, those games took advantage of the randomized texture mapping in GLIDE. The walls never really looked the same

In any case, ALL of the same arguments existed back then. Whether it was hardware or software. The only thing that changed are the players.

Now, I just want to spend time with my kids. I don't need a $700 monitor for that.

And ... you... call... yourself... a... GAMER. 

[yotsuya]

I remember an awesome stretch there where I was picking up 3D enhanced FPSs like every month... Shogo:Mobile Armor Division... SiN... Kingpin... Soldier of Fortune... No One Lives Forever... Quake II... then Half-Life... Sweet, sweet Half-Life. My 12 year old daughter actually beat Half-Life earlier this year. She was hooked.

True Story: I was one of the 5 first people in the world to own a copy of Daikatana. I have an autographed Daikatana headband signed by John Romero. 

[dkersten]

The first 2 NVidia cards (the Riva 128 and the TNT) performed better than the Voodoo, but they didn't look nearly as good.  There were all kinds of texture tearing issues, and most OpenGL games looked like crap in comparison.  The TNT2 nearly perfected it, and then the GeForce line was rock solid.  I was one of those "anti-Voodoo" guys, and I owned every generation of NVidia (except the horrible GeForce 3) from the Riva 128 up until the GTX-9800, and still prefer NVidia over AMD.  NVidia bought out Voodoo IIRC, but by that point there wasn't much technology they hadn't already blown past (I think they got the SLI tech is really all).

Uf-da, the money I spent back then to stay on the bleeding edge..

[yotsuya]

The first 2 NVidia cards (the Riva 128 and the TNT) performed better than the Voodoo, but they didn't look nearly as good.  There were all kinds of texture tearing issues, and most OpenGL games looked like crap in comparison.  The TNT2 nearly perfected it, and then the GeForce line was rock solid.  I was one of those "anti-Voodoo" guys, and I owned every generation of NVidia (except the horrible GeForce 3) from the Riva 128 up until the GTX-9800, and still prefer NVidia over AMD.  NVidia bought out Voodoo IIRC, but by that point there wasn't much technology they hadn't already blown past (I think they got the SLI tech is really all).

Uf-da, the money I spent back then to stay on the bleeding edge..

Yeah, I had a VooDoo2, a TNT2, and then countless G-Forces and ATi cards since then.

I outgrew the need for $800 monitors and $500 video cards about 12 years ago.

[dkersten]

I remember an awesome stretch there where I was picking up 3D enhanced FPSs like every month... Shogo:Mobile Armor Division... SiN... Quake II... then Half-Life... Sweet, sweet Half-Life. My 12 year old daughter actually beat Half-Life earlier this year. She was hooked.

True Story: I was one of the 5 first people in the world to own a copy of Daikatana. I have an autographed Daikatana headband signed by John Romero. 

Wow, I remember all those, lol. I also remember firing up Shogo on my first Riva TNT and being disappointed in how bad the textures were joined.. sometimes the gaps were over an eighth inch.. All I recall about Daikatana was that it was a disappointing game.. I was never a half life fan though, not sure why.  Probably because of my hatred of the Voodoo cards, lol. 

[yotsuya]

I remember an awesome stretch there where I was picking up 3D enhanced FPSs like every month... Shogo:Mobile Armor Division... SiN... Quake II... then Half-Life... Sweet, sweet Half-Life. My 12 year old daughter actually beat Half-Life earlier this year. She was hooked.

True Story: I was one of the 5 first people in the world to own a copy of Daikatana. I have an autographed Daikatana headband signed by John Romero. 

Wow, I remember all those, lol. I also remember firing up Shogo on my first Riva TNT and being disappointed in how bad the textures were joined.. sometimes the gaps were over an eighth inch.. All I recall about Daikatana was that it was a disappointing game.. I was never a half life fan though, not sure why.  Probably because of my hatred of the Voodoo cards, lol.

I had fun with Daikatana, but I don't know if I could recommend it to everyone. I'm not one of those a-holes who get all hyped about stuff, so I went in with low expectations. I enjoyed the RPG elements of Daikatana, but it really did have it's share of bugs. It was a A+ concept in a D+ executed game.

Same with Shogo. If Daikatana and Shogo were MAME cabs, Half-Life would be Mission Control.

[yotsuya]

Oh, and I fixed my profile.









<<<<--------------------

[dkersten]

lol, I still use my first gen Dell 24" LCD that I paid $850 for brand new (On sale, it was like $1100 regular price).. And I did upgrade my gaming computer about a year and a half ago, ditched the GTX-285 for a Geforce 650 and got rid of the old Core2Duo setup for a shiny new Core i5.  That C2D setup had 4 gigs of corsair's finest ultra low latency DDR2 ram at a mere $250 per stick (4 sticks).  I just gave away the mobo, cpu, and ram to a friend like 3 weeks ago, dropped a 750ti in it and it probably performs pretty much on par with my own gaming rig.

That 650 I put in mine cost less than $200, and the entire upgrade was only like $700.  And that was the first upgrade in over 3 years (aside from an SSD I added when they first came out reasonably priced).  Back in "the day" I would spend that much on just the CPU.  And guess what, it is fast enough to play anything and I am perfectly satisfied with it, including the 10 year old 24" LCD.

Then again I have more into my mame cab than the last 3 gaming rigs combined.. lol.