I have run a gaming clan for 2 years, with a lot of members, 40+
Only 2 of them have had less than 3ghz PC's so I beg to differ

Most of the serious gamers I know think nothing of spending £300-£500 on a GFX card, and most of them are running bits of kit that put my PC to shame.

Again 90% of these guys are constantly rebuilding thier PC's adding new hardware and overclocking bits and bobs, looking for the best configuration. Our clan competed in 2 leagues and our team often got outspec'd.

I wonder if those of us who enjoy games, more so builders, are just not in as financially secure a position. When it comes to competative online play, I think you will see a much higher spec than 1-2Ghz CPU's with 512MB.

I would also like to say, that our gamers often took part in an online specification tester, and our team's PCs often rated in the top 20% of PC's around the world. So I may be speaking from a bias perspective, most of us upgrade or replace our PC's every 3 years.

Just my 2 cents, once more