Finding the best gaming machine isn't as simple as buying the most expensive package you can find. Sure, sure, it would be nice to buy a Falcon Northwest machine with all of the bells and whistles, but at the end of the day do you really need a Quad-SLI machine to play the games you love? Short answer: no. Long answer: no, and if you spend thousands of dollars on a top of the line machine you're probably wasting your money.
Before you purchase your gaming machine, stop and consider the following:
What games are you going to play? If you're going to play top of the line games all of the time, at their highest possible graphics settings, then, yeah, you're going to need one monster of a computer; but, even if you plan on playing the latest games, most of us can get by with a less expensive system by simply turning the graphics options down a notch.
What else will you do on this machine? If this computer is going to be more than simply a gaming machine, then you're going to want to consider the costs of other components, such as the optical media drive. Generally top of the line gaming computers come decked out with all kinds of crazy high end equipment that you don't need to play games. Sure, it would be nice to have a HD-DVD/Blu-Ray hybrid drive, but if you don't plan on watching movies with those drives, what use are they?
How often will you need to upgrade it? If you're going to get on the bleeding edge of technology, chances are you're going to upgrade the machine more often than a lower end counterpart. While a lower end machine may cost around $1500, upgrading a high end machine could cost upwards of several thousand dollars (depending on what you want to upgrade). Being on the bleeding edge is nice for bragging rights, but in the long run it'll drain your wallet pretty fast.
Do you really need it? A lot of people get sucked into buying a really expensive computer only to learn that they didn't need to spend that much money. My aunt fell into that trap a while ago, until I helped her pick out the right computer: an employee at a large electronics chain had convinced her that she needed a "gaming pc" in order to "play her games." It sounds nice in theory, but the only games she wanted to play were the simple Popcap games. The employee tried to sell her a $5000 computer when she could've easily bought a $500 one instead.
There isn't one best gaming machine out there that trumps them all. Instead, there is only the best gaming machine for you. If you determine what your budget is and what you're going to use the machine for, chances are that the best gaming machine is going to be something substantially cheaper - and last a lot longer - than the flashy top of the line computers.
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