Survey finds weak interest in expensive upgrades among gamers

The high cost of new graphics cards, driven up by shortages caused by crypto hucksters and kept there by AI hype, means many gamers have gone years without upgrading—and opting for lower-end models when they do. This has the odd effect of disrupting the usual Moore-esque treadmill of increasing system requirements—and the latest survey by the operator of the Steam game platform finds that most are quite content with relatively inexpensive gear.

For 1080p (Full-HD) gaming, the 8GB RTX 3060 makes sense as a frugal option backed up by NVIDIA's DLSS 3 upscaling tech to help improve framerates while natively rendering games at a lower resolution, among other helpful boosts. Processors aren't explicitly named, but a 6-core Intel CPU in the 2.3GHz to 2.69GHz range hints at the 12th Gen Core i5-12400F.

16GB of RAM remains the most popular pick, presumably DDR4, to match the age of the remaining components. However, 32GB is picking up the pace with an 8.28% increase since September

America, a nation of well-cared-for GTX 1080s.