I've been building rigs for people for AGES...I've had my fair share of bad parts, It does happen...It's common to receive faulty ram modules, or a malfunctioning Mobo. Not VERY common, but it does happen...and mine are obviously not user error =P.
But customer support and drivers are a big deal..no one wants their computer down for a week, few weeks, or a month or so due to crappy RMA support by the company they purchased their component from. But in relation to computer hardware...it isn't uncommon as stated to receive faulty hardware....Drivers though DO matter, such as getting flickering shadows in half life 2 based games (nvidia based cards have been suffering from this), or just poor gaming performance in general. Drivers play an important role in system performance and resolving graphical glitches in newer titles...It's always a smart thing to upgrade your drivers in order to improve performance or fix arising issues with new titles...At times performance does degrade though with older titles, or new issues may arise, but it's not a bad thing to stay up to date =P....
I do agree about the crysis comment though, some games are just ahead of the curve graphically...Same situation with Elder Scrolls before, it was a graphics hog when you were outdoors, and people were getting low frame rates. But it's to be expected by a game pushing graphical boundaries, it pushes the development and release of faster and more powerful graphical units....I'm actually on dual 8800 GT's..and I was getting around 18-30 or so FPS in crysis with nearly all setting on high ( a few on medium...but a very few)..This was DX9 though...But I'm not expecting even the next upcoming architecture from Nvidia or ATI to handle crysis fluidly in a single gpu setup...If you want fluid graphics in crysis though, it will be capable with the next GT200 architecture coming out by nvidia, but you need to pick up 2 in order to do so via SLI...The game is just ahead of the curb when it comes to graphics...it happens =P. I guess people just don't like paying 600 dollars for the baddest on the market and getting mediocre frame rates when you can pick up a console and have a wonderfully fluid gaming experience....But that isn't what PC's are only about, and if you do buy it for those reasons...You may as well just pick up a console =P....Pc's won't always be hassle free....I guess with the more recent increase in complaints has to lie on the fact that there are a lot more people playing consoles now-a-days....And they are just use to it.
VR-Zone : Technology Beats - GeForce 9900 GTX & GTS Slated For July Launch
July has been confirmed...So we get r770 next month, or early the month after...Along with GT200 in july ^_^. Things are looking up =D.