Gaming computer

They typically differ from mainstream personal computers by using high-performance graphics cards, a high core-count CPU with higher raw performance and higher-performance RAM.

The Nimrod, designed by John Makepeace Bennett, built by Raymond Stuart-Williams and exhibited in the 1951 Festival of Britain, is regarded as the first gaming computer.

[13] More recently in the 2020s, portable handheld gaming PCs have started to gain traction that run on full desktop x86 (the de facto standard) platforms.

These began with GPD's Win and Alienware's UFO concept, inspired by the Nintendo Switch (which is not a PC), and have been popularized by Valve Corporation's Steam Deck.

[18][19] Individual components are typically attached to a motherboard through different bus slots, including the CPU, RAM, and graphics card, or wired to it with SATA or IDE cabling (for hard disks or optical drives).

[22] Hardware specs continue to improve over time due to the graphical demands of games, especially with architectural and other changes within CPU and GPU designs.

Freedman states that laptops are ideal candidates for LAN parties, especially ones equipped with "Nvidia's Max-Q GPUs" which "can easily fit into a backpack and don't pack outrageously large chargers".

These uniquely shaped motherboards can limit the owner's capability to upgrade components in the future, but they can still generally change out "the RAM, GPU and… CPU".

Jason Clarke, a contributor to Chillblast, mentioned that there are a number of builders that deal specifically with laptops, with some adding configurable features that were not originally there, such as being able to change CPUs and GPUs.

[28] Many PC gamers and journalists, like Clarke and Freedman, advise people to start with gaming desktops as they are the way to go when seeking pure performance.

Marshall Honorof, a writer for Tom's Guide, explains that the steps on how to build a gaming PC from scratch "can be a daunting process, particularly for newcomers" but it could be one of the best technological decisions someone can make.