this goal is exactly the same regardless of whether it is a gaming or audio PC, I don't understand what incompatibilities you think exist

 

1: You will push the buffer of the audio as low as possible for low audio latency = good for audio, bad for heavy use of CPU programs such as videogames.
2. You will install many audio related programs and utilities, many of which will start at the OS startup = good for audio production, bad for competitive gaming
3. You will have to install many drivers related to audio = good for audio production, bad for competitive gaming

Music and audio production looks for the lowest audio latency and for a good audio/music workflow environment; competitive video games look for the lowest graphics & input latency, with the least amount of stuff open or working in the background.

I don't know any real-world professional videogame FPS/TPS player that uses his PC as both PC & audio/music/photo/video design. You can build the best Formula 1 car, or you can build the best Rally car, but you can't build a car that is the best at both. You can drive them at their own pace at any road if you want tho.

But again, this is only relevant if you are looking to be a professional competitive player, if you just wanna play casual games in your work PC then none of this matters and you can play games just fine.

 

Last edited: Apr 28, 2026 at 3:57 AM

No. Audiosoftware is not as intrusive as games with all their anticheat systems and what not.
As long as you don't have your DAW with hundreds of plugins open in the background while gaming, there won't be any impact.

 

I just built my new mothership this past winter specifically for DAW, CG VFX and flight sim games.

ASUS Z890 ROG Extreme, Intel i9 285k, 128GB Corsair Vengeance DDR5 6400, Asus Tuff RTX5080 OC

99% of the software I run is from the sister site, CGPeers and RUTracker.org…. R2R is the star of the show.

Shout out to Chris Titus for his amazing Windows tool, to the guy who made Defender Remover, and a huge thank you to Pictus over at VIControl and Askdrtk on YouTube for their Windows optimization tips.

 

Normally, DAW and related software doesn't interfere with gaming if it ain't running.
Also, vice versa. Unless you have terrabytes of Kontakt libraries hogging your HD/SSD.
Lastly, if your system is fast, you can EASILY run your DAW and 2, yes two games, and even on 32GB RAM you won't have spent it all.
I do this all the time. And i like to see how much ram is spent. And it's so easy to test yourself. Just run it and see.
Lastly, stop talking about latency and audio buffers as if that applies to everyone - it really doesn't. I don't record anything. I put one note, then the next. Then i press play. Old or new PC, old sound card, new sound card - it always sounds exactly the same, latency isn't even a small factor unless you're recording.

 

Any fans of Need For Speed franchise here?

Having said that, when you use Linux with RT Kernel as your main OS, you can make videos, audio, graphics... and game all you want without any problems. But - true, a very powerful GPU will take over more PCIe lanes and more kernel time with its drivers than an average GPU. It also depends on drivers quality, of course.

I recently purchased Intel B580 GPU and it takes only 8x PCIe lanes, leaving 8x PCIe lanes free for NVMes... and it's a beast for a casual gamer like me. Assemble your PC according to your needs, eh? But it's always better to have a beastly PC than a budget PC.

 

Last edited: Apr 28, 2026 at 1:54 PM

excuse me if I've missed the point here.

Have all your music stuff on one hard disk and gaming stuff on another.

Boot to whatever dedicated drive you need at startup?