Support NeoGAF

[RedSwirl]

Guys, System Requirements Lab is giving me this for Crysis 2:

Can they be trusted? I know the game has leaked and everything but Crytek never fully finalized their system requirements for the game.

And by "run," what I'm settling for here is 30 frames per second at 1440 x 900 resolution at high-to-max settings with 2x AA.

 

[confused]

No chance you'll be getting maxed (DX11) + 2x AA on a 8800. High DX9 is the best you can hope for.

 

[The Elite]

Still waiting on NCIX to ship my order.

Please be soon.

 

[Naked Snake]

What is the lowest/cheapest GPU you would recommend for an HTPC?

 

[Ricker]

Antec 300 ATX no PS - Case.

Corsair Enthusiast Series VX550 Power Supply.

Intel DP55WG : Intel P55 Chipset. Motherboard.

Intel Core i5 650/3.2GHz/DMI/LGA1156/4mb Cache. Processor.

Kingston ValueRam DDR3-1333 -2x 2GB - CL9.

EVGA GeForce GTX460 SC - 1GB DDR5 - Mini HDMI/Dual DVI. -videocard.

Seagate Barracuda 500GB/ Sata 3gb/s / 7200.12 /16mb Cache. Hard Disk

Pioneer DVR-218L-DVDRW-22X Dual Layer -SATA.

980 Canadian dollars(1,118.74 tax Included,2 years guarantee parts and labour).
================================================================

Good system for the price....?

 

[RedSwirl]

No chance you'll be getting maxed (DX11) + 2x AA on a 8800. High DX9 is the best you can hope for.

DX9 (or 10) is what I meant.

Add a GTX 460 to that system and what do you think?

 

[mclaren777]

Is there a point in higher fps when your LCD monitor [assuming] refreshes at 60Hz?

Nope. I love tracking my frame rate while playing games at 1080p@60 and seeing that I'm only using 50% of my GPU.

 

[mrklaw]

What is the lowest/cheapest GPU you would recommend for an HTPC?

gaming or HTPC only? Probably an ATI card to support proper 24p (intel integrated can have problems), and to support bitstreaming of audio if you want bluray playback. Maybe a 5450? its passively cooled so it'll be silent too

 

[Omiee]

Again going from 4gb ram to 8gb ram, are there any articles or something that show how much more performance you get with gaming and multitasking gaming and hd movie's

 

[MisterNoisy]

Again going from 4gb ram to 8gb ram, are there any articles or something that show how much more performance you get with gaming and multitasking gaming and hd movie's

Tom's did one a while ago.

 

[Corky]

Nope. I love tracking my frame rate while playing games at 1080p@60 and seeing that I'm only using 50% of my GPU.

ditto, feels great maxing games capped @ 60fps while , as you said , not even pushing your gpus to the limit

 

[Kenka]

Jesus, Aldi sells a laptop which has USB 3.0 and a GT 540M for 599 €.

The problem is that the CPU is an Intel Core i3 390M. I fear that it might be the bottleneck. Would it allow me to pass the Crysis 2 test (and subsequently, The Witcher 2 and Skyrim tests too) ?

edit : I'm too stupid to write correctly.

 

[Wazzim]

No chance you'll be getting maxed (DX11) + 2x AA on a 8800. High DX9 is the best you can hope for.

DX11 isn't much more power hungry than DX9 as long as you don't use tesselation.

 

[Tony Redgrave]

Hello people, I have a question and I hope you guys answer.
I'm getting a new PC and I'm purchasing something very similar to the "Get a lot more build" posted in the first page of the thread, the thing is, I don't know anything about motherboards and I noticed that the Asus P8P67 listed has crossfire support but I'm more of an Nvidia guy so I wanted to ask you if you knew some good MB around 150 €/$ with SLi support.
I've been looking around and found the Asus M4N98TD EVO to feature SLi at a good price but, again I don't know if it's any good.
Thanks in advance.

 

[Wazzim]

Hello people, I have a question and I hope you guys answer.
I'm getting a new PC and I'm purchasing something very similar to the "Get a lot more build" posted in the first page of the thread, the thing is, I don't know anything about motherboards and I noticed that the Asus P8P67 listed has crossfire support but I'm more of an Nvidia guy so I wanted to ask you if you knew some good MB around 150 €/$ with SLi support.
I've been looking around and found the Asus M4N98TD EVO to feature SLi at a good price but, again I don't know if it's any good.
Thanks in advance.

Maybe the P8P67-M PRO? I heard good things about it.

 

[RedSwirl]

DX11 isn't much more power hungry than DX9 as long as you don't use tesselation.

What's the best image you can show me that displays the difference between a game using tessellation and a game not using tessellation?

 

[Tony Redgrave]

Thanks Wazzim, it certainly looks nice.
I think I'm gonna get the component list and post it so you guys tell me what you think, I'm not very knowledgeable about half of the stuff.

 

[Erebus]

What's the best image you can show me that displays the difference between a game using tessellation and a game not using tessellation?

http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...chmarks-Top-article-of-October-2009/Practice/

Technically it's not a game but still you'll see what tessellation is all about.

 

[Omiee]

Tom's did one a while ago.

thanks that was usefull, but they said you have the option to use it as ram disk or something.
How does that work if i go from 4gb ram to 8gb ram..?

http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/257381/dell-ultrasharp-u2311h.html#tab:info
is this a good screen for gaming, my screen now had a respons time of 5ms this is 8ms is that a lot worse..?

 

[Zzoram]

Jesus, Aldi sells a laptop which has USB 3.0 and a GT 540M for 599 €.

The problem is that the CPU is an Intel Core i3 390M. I fear that it might be the bottleneck. Would it allow me to pass the Crysis 2 test (and subsequently, The Witcher 2 and Skyrim tests too) ?

edit : I'm too stupid to write correctly.

The CPU is fine. The GT540M is your bottleneck.

 

[Lime]

Jesus, Aldi sells a laptop which has USB 3.0 and a GT 540M for 599 €.

The problem is that the CPU is an Intel Core i3 390M. I fear that it might be the bottleneck. Would it allow me to pass the Crysis 2 test (and subsequently, The Witcher 2 and Skyrim tests too) ?

edit : I'm too stupid to write correctly.

1) Both the CPU and the GPU are bottlenecks.
2) Don't buy a laptop for playing hardware-demanding games (if you want to play on medium-high settings). Seriously.
3) Don't buy computers from Aldi. Built one yourself or get a respectable brand of laptop.

 

[Zzoram]

No chance you'll be getting maxed (DX11) + 2x AA on a 8800. High DX9 is the best you can hope for.

An 8800GT cant even handle AA in Crysis 1 if you have high or very high settings on.

 

[wandering goat]

Awesome, that's very similar to my setup. Does removing the upper HD cage make much of a difference? I've left mine in for the time being.

Well, I only compared having the fan in the mid position on the cage vs. the fan in the front without the cage, but the latter gave me better CPU temps. I don't know if it's a matter of just fan position, so that perhaps it gets air through easier than farther away from the front, or if the cage not being there allows the CPU to get more fresh airflow with the cage focusing it more on the GPU instead. If you don't have anything in or on the cage, I'd just try removing it, as it only takes a minute.

Also, if you don't have the top vent blocked off (and even more so if you have a fan there), I think the CPU would be cooler already, so it may or may not make as big a difference. I remember with my HAF922, I had great airflow with the top and back fans on low settings, when if I turned off the top fan and covered the opening with a large book, I had to turn up the back fan a good bit to keep the same CPU temps.

 

[Kenka]

The CPU is fine. The GT540M is your bottleneck.

Fine, thank you. I was worried about the fact that no OC was possible on this CPU. I will also ask if it is possible to switch the GPU while not effing the guarantee.

1) Both the CPU and the GPU are bottlenecks.
2) Don't buy a laptop for playing hardware-demanding games (if you want to play on medium-high settings). Seriously.
3) Don't buy computers from Aldi. Built one yourself or get a respectable brand of laptop.

Thank you, but the value packed in that thing (599 €) is awesome and it comes with 3 years guarantee. I'd love to build a laptop myself though but am not sure how to do, or if it's really less expensive.

 

[RedSwirl]

http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...chmarks-Top-article-of-October-2009/Practice/

Technically it's not a game but still you'll see what tessellation is all about.

Holy shit. So basically I guess it's some kind of method where the engine figures out on its own how to take a flat texture and turn it into polygons? That sounds like the next step up from normal mapping except this time it's not just a visual trick.

Is Crysis 2 really gonna use it like that?

 

[Kenka]

1) Both the CPU and the GPU are bottlenecks.
2) Don't buy a laptop for playing hardware-demanding games (if you want to play on medium-high settings). Seriously.
3) Don't buy computers from Aldi. Built one yourself or get a respectable brand of laptop.

After having gone through this page, I can now safely avoid the Medion brand. Thank you for your advice. Hilarious enough, the strong critics are überlengthy.

 

[mclaren777]

I just wanted to say that it's great having 8GB of RAM.

 

[1-D_FTW]

Those are two of the three gadgets I use. You need to add one for you GPU too

 

[Shambles]

Antec 300 ATX no PS - Case.

Corsair Enthusiast Series VX550 Power Supply.

Intel DP55WG : Intel P55 Chipset. Motherboard.

Intel Core i5 650/3.2GHz/DMI/LGA1156/4mb Cache. Processor.

Kingston ValueRam DDR3-1333 -2x 2GB - CL9.

EVGA GeForce GTX460 SC - 1GB DDR5 - Mini HDMI/Dual DVI. -videocard.

Seagate Barracuda 500GB/ Sata 3gb/s / 7200.12 /16mb Cache. Hard Disk

Pioneer DVR-218L-DVDRW-22X Dual Layer -SATA.

980 Canadian dollars(1,118.74 tax Included,2 years guarantee parts and labour).
================================================================

Good system for the price....?

Seems a bit high. Where are you pricing parts from?

Is a 230W PSU enough for this build:

i5-2500 @ stock
Intel H67 board
8GB RAM
2x 7200rpm HDDs
Plus the occasional passive USB HDD

No dedicated GPU or optical drives.

Here's the PSU in question:

That wattage is fine, whether the brand is reliable is another question. I've had no problem running an Athlon II X4 system on an old 185W PSU. The only reason I ended up replacing it was because the PSU was not a standard ATX size and was just held to the case by a single screw that probably would have eventually ripped out. Also because I caught a CX430 for 10$ during boxing week. Otherwise i'd still be using the old one.

 

[mclaren777]

Those are two of the three gadgets I use. You need to add one for you GPU too

Link?

I just tried this one and it's pretty good.

 

[Lime]

Thank you, but the value packed in that thing (599 €) is awesome and it comes with 3 years guarantee. I'd love to build a laptop myself though but am not sure how to do, or if it's really less expensive.

Ehm, for 599 euro I can get a laptop with an i5 CPU, a mid-range mobile GPU, 500GB HDD and 4GB 1066mhz RAM (I'm from Denmark which usually is expensive, don't know about you). 599 isn't very cheap for a laptop with an i3 processor, especially when the brand is "Medion" or whatever Aldi is selling.

And for 599 euro, I can get a desktop PC (case only) with a Phenom II X4 CPU, a 6870 GPU, 1TB HDD and 4 GB 1333 mhz. I seriously have no idea why you want to buy a fucking Aldi laptop with an i3 mobile CPU and a 540m, all of which is intended for gaming.

You seriously need to reconsider.

 

[Snuggles]

Today is the day, my friends. Checked in with the dude assembling my rig, and he said it would be ready to pick up within a few hours. This is amazing, but having to wait for the 6-12 gig Steam games to d/l will be a buzzkill.


excitement level: critical

 

[Cosmic Schwung]

Well, I only compared having the fan in the mid position on the cage vs. the fan in the front without the cage, but the latter gave me better CPU temps. I don't know if it's a matter of just fan position, so that perhaps it gets air through easier than farther away from the front, or if the cage not being there allows the CPU to get more fresh airflow with the cage focusing it more on the GPU instead. If you don't have anything in or on the cage, I'd just try removing it, as it only takes a minute.

Also, if you don't have the top vent blocked off (and even more so if you have a fan there), I think the CPU would be cooler already, so it may or may not make as big a difference. I remember with my HAF922, I had great airflow with the top and back fans on low settings, when if I turned off the top fan and covered the opening with a large book, I had to turn up the back fan a good bit to keep the same CPU temps.

Thanks for the info! The only reason I left it in was to hide the wires, which is of course completely stupid given I don't normally leave the side off my case. I have removed the top fan, but my temps aren't too bad. However, I'll take any help I can get, so I'll get that HD cage out tonight. I really should take some pics at some point, but your cable management is making me feel like I should put some more effort in to mine first.

 

[RedSwirl]

So are you guys seriously saying I'm okay with 425w on the GTX 460 (on a Core 2 Quad at 1440 x 900)? It looks like the best solution is to get 550 just to be on the safe side.

...And will I get the tessellation with acceptable performance?

 

[JoeBoy101]

Today is the day, my friends. Checked in with the dude assembling my rig, and he said it would be ready to pick up within a few hours. This is amazing, but having to wait for the 6-12 gig Steam games to d/l will be a buzzkill.


excitement level: critical

Do what I did. Get the most of, or the real big downloads, queued up and let it run overnight. By morning, most of them, if not all, will be ready.

 

[Snuggles]

Do what I did. Get the most of, or the real big downloads queued up and let it run overnight. By morning, most of them, if not all, will be ready.

That's the plan, cept I'll do Crysis first so I can play it this evening. Maybe Amnesia, too, since it's only like 4 gigs.

If I had 8 gigs of RAM (if that's even relevant), will I be able to install games on Steam as I'm playing them?

 

[Kenka]

Ehm, for 599 euro I can get a laptop with an i5 CPU, a mid-range mobile GPU, 500GB HDD and 4GB 1066mhz RAM (I'm from Denmark which usually is expensive, don't know about you). 599 isn't very cheap for a laptop with an i3 processor, especially when the brand is "Medion" or whatever Aldi is selling.

And for 599 euro, I can get a desktop PC (case only) with a Phenom II X4 CPU, a 6870 GPU, 1TB HDD and 4 GB 1333 mhz. I seriously have no idea why you want to buy a fucking Aldi laptop with an i3 mobile CPU and a 540m, all of which is intended for gaming.

You seriously need to reconsider.

Now that's convincing.

My problem is that I am in Switzerland sadly. I get those deals once a bluemoon To be honest, the deal didn't seem bad at all considering what we get in here. I swear I browsed a decent amount of websites before asking this question on GAF. My money cap is 1000 CHF (1000 $) which roughly translates into 600 € in Euroland after I take away the swiss rip-off. Almost all dedicated websites propose only a Mobility Radeon 5650 in their "high-end" laptops in this price range.

Norwegians have the same problem I heared. Prices are absurdly high in there too.

Your comments make me think that I should simply stop looking in those price ranges, I just don't have the shoulders to afford one.

 

[JoeBoy101]

That's the plan, cept I'll do Crysis first so I can play it this evening. Maybe Amnesia, too, since it's only like 4 gigs.

If I had 8 gigs of RAM (if that's even relevant), will I be able to install games on Steam as I'm playing them?

IIRC, Crysis is about 6 gigs.

And no, I think Steam suspends any downloads if you start running a Steamworks game. At least, mine does. Not sure if there is some setting somewhere you can turn that off, but even if I go play Plants vs. Zombies, my downloading game will suspend until I'm done playing.

 

[confused]

Holy shit. So basically I guess it's some kind of method where the engine figures out on its own how to take a flat texture and turn it into polygons? That sounds like the next step up from normal mapping except this time it's not just a visual trick.

Is Crysis 2 really gonna use it like that?

Lost planet 2 already does it :

 

[Zzoram]

So are you guys seriously saying I'm okay with 425w on the GTX 460 (on a Core 2 Quad at 1440 x 900)? It looks like the best solution is to get 550 just to be on the safe side.

...And will I get the tessellation with acceptable performance?

425w is fine if it's a good brand. No name brands over rate their PSUs so you should never trust them.

425w will work since your PC will likely be drawing like 300-350 watts.

 

[Naked Snake]

That wattage is fine, whether the brand is reliable is another question. I've had no problem running an Athlon II X4 system on an old 185W PSU.

Oh, conflicting reports! Here come more headaches

Huntkey supposedly supplies PSUs for Dell and Lenovo. I thought they would be reliable.

I'd really like to get that case and not worry about having to find (and pay for) a replacement PSU that fits. But at the same time I definitely don't want to stress or risk frying my system. I guess I better be safe than sorry.

On another note, I found another local retailer that stocks i5-2300, 2400, and 2500s. None unlocked unfortunately and no P67 boards either.

 

[Dabookerman]

Holy shit. So basically I guess it's some kind of method where the engine figures out on its own how to take a flat texture and turn it into polygons? That sounds like the next step up from normal mapping except this time it's not just a visual trick.

Is Crysis 2 really gonna use it like that?

It's still a trick. It doesn't ACTUALLY turn them into polygons. That would be displacement mapping.

 

[Majeh]

That's the plan, cept I'll do Crysis first so I can play it this evening. Maybe Amnesia, too, since it's only like 4 gigs.

If I had 8 gigs of RAM (if that's even relevant), will I be able to install games on Steam as I'm playing them?

You can run downloads in the background but you need to tab out and resume them once you start the game up (steam auto-pauses them)

 

[mrklaw]

Came home to the PC not working. Kids had switched it on to play track mania.

Turned it off and on again, and the BIOS reported 'overclocking failed!' I had to press F1 to change the settings. Anyone seen this before? I'd previously run prime95 for an hour at 4.5GHz no problems, and my kids never even got into windows, just no picture. For now i've dropped it to 4.0 and will keep an eye on it.

MB is ASUS p6p87

 

[mrklaw]

Oh, conflicting reports! Here come more headaches

Huntkey supposedly supplies PSUs for Dell and Lenovo. I thought they would be reliable.

I'd really like to get that case and not worry about having to find (and pay for) a replacement PSU that fits. But at the same time I definitely don't want to stress or risk frying my system. I guess I better be safe than sorry.

On another note, I found another local retailer that stocks i5-2300, 2400, and 2500s. None unlocked unfortunately and no P67 boards either.

If you don't care about over clocking (and i'm assuming a stock 2500 will not be a bottleneck), then see if you can grab a H67 motherboard and a 2500.

 

[n0n44m]

Dame home to the PC not working. Kids had switched it on to play track mania.

Turned it off and on again, and the BIOS reported 'overclocking failed!' I had to press F1 to change the settings. Anyone seen this before? I'd previously run prime95 for an hour at 4.5GHz no problems, and my kids never even got into windows, just no picture. For now i've dropped it to 4.0 and will keep an eye on it.

MB is ASUS p6p87

It's a bit of a general message when it fails during POST, doesn't have to be overclocking related

are you running the latest bios? previous ones had some strange behavior during a cold boot

 

[flsh]

I have an HD 4878 gpu. Is it worth it to upgrade it to an HD 6970? I have a 550W PSU and an E8400 CPU. I'm pretty sure the PSU is powerful enough (it's by Thermaltake).
I know the CPU will hold the GPU back, but buying a new one + new MB + DDR3 ram is out of the question at the moment. Is it worth it? I miss playing games at 60FPS with AA and AF on

 

[RedSwirl]

425w is fine if it's a good brand. No name brands over rate their PSUs so you should never trust them.

425w will work since your PC will likely be drawing like 300-350 watts.

My PSU is just the one that came with the computer. It's a default Dell PSU I guess. Is there any way to test my current power draw?

 

[RedSwirl]

Lost planet 2 already does it :

I looked at some other tests and apparently that game can't even manage 60fps on an i7 in DX11 mode. Please tell me that's just a really badly optimized game.

 

[mrklaw]

It's a bit of a general message when it fails during POST, doesn't have to be overclocking related

are you running the latest bios? previous ones had some strange behavior during a cold boot

No, still running an old bios. Tried updating it but it didn't recognise the .ROM file. Does it need to be named in a specific way? Also I was updating using the file browser from the BIOS- I couldn't install the AI suite at all for some reason.