Support NeoGAF

[godhandiscen]

Crysis
Crysis: Warhead
STALKER
STALKER Clear Sky
Fallout 3

In that order.

I'm gonna pull the trigger on this rig tomorrow first thing. Should be here by the end of the week. Newegg is so good... shipping is only like $19.78. How is that even possible?

NO. You have a similar rig to mine, and will not play the game for which I upgraded? TRACKMANIA NATIONS FOREVER! The game is free and its fucking worth whatever my PC cost me.

 

[Zzoram]

Crysis
Crysis: Warhead
STALKER
STALKER Clear Sky
Fallout 3

In that order.

I'm gonna pull the trigger on this rig tomorrow first thing. Should be here by the end of the week. Newegg is so good... shipping is only like $19.78. How is that even possible?

Just remember to get Vista Ultimate 64-bit, if you want to use your 8GB of RAM instead of just 3.2GB of it.

All of those games (minus Fallout 3) can be purchased through Steam. If you have any technical issues/bugs, feel free to ask us about them.

Man, that reminds me how annoyed I am that Bethesda isn't selling through Steam. Fallout 3 is the only PC game I'm buying this year other than Spore that isn't through Steam.

 

[JudgeN]

Oh please. I doubt anyone can notice a substantial difference between a higher processor and the E5200 clocked to 3GHz. Artificial benches, yes, but real life applications?

Like I said in my quote I'm talking about cache not clock speed.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e7200_4.html#sect0

This article compares the E7300 to the E8400 and you will see gamer suffer a 10% decrease on the E7300 due to the low cache. Now just imagine the E5200 processor with hits 2MB cache instead of the E7300 with its 3MB cache.

 

[DarthWoo]

Should I bother getting Windows Vista at this point, with 4GB of RAM? I know it's said that with sufficient components, gaming performance increases with Vista, but how about non-gaming apps like Photoshop, Painter, video encoding, etc?

 

[zoku88]

Should I bother getting Windows Vista at this point, with 4GB of RAM? I know it's said that with sufficient components, gaming performance increases with Vista, but how about non-gaming apps like Photoshop, Painter, video encoding, etc?

Well, I guess Vista has better overall RAM management. You might not notice a difference, though...

 

[TheHeretic]

Should I bother getting Windows Vista at this point, with 4GB of RAM? I know it's said that with sufficient components, gaming performance increases with Vista, but how about non-gaming apps like Photoshop, Painter, video encoding, etc?

Gaming performance does not increase with Vista (we are talking fractions of framerates, nothing tangible). This is from someone with XP SP3 and Vista 64, its well documented.

 

[Big Takeover]

I'm definitely leaning towards building my own system now since newegg's shipping is so cheap and the overall cost is so much lower than NCIXUS. I might regret the decision, I dunno.

Here's the latest build, based on all the discussion from earlier today. It's a nice high end solution that has a quad and 4870X2, but keeps the price somewhat decent. Also, I upped the RAM to 8GB. :lol

CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W Power Supply
$129.99

SAMSUNG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model SH-S223Q
$26.99

POWERCOLOR AX4870X2 2GBD5-H Radeon HD 4870 X2 2GB 512-bit (256-bit x 2) GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card
$539.99

ASUS P5Q Pro LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
$119.99

Logitech EX 110 Black USB + PS/2 Standard Cordless Desktop Keyboard & Mouse Kit
$25.99

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$74.99

G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ

G.SKILL 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Memory
Item #:N82E16820231122
$131.98

SCEPTRE X24WG-1080P Black 24" 2ms Widescreen LCD Monitor Built in Speakers
$259.99

Antec Twelve Hundred Black Steel ATX Full Tower Computer Case
$199.99

ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler
$19.99

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 Yorkfield 2.83GHz LGA 775 95W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80569Q9550
$324.99

Grand Total: $1,854.88

Much better. There's a difference between going high end, and going stupid end.

As far as building, I have full confidence you'll be able do pull it off. No problem. Let us know when you get your stuff. GAF will back you up.

 

[toxicgonzo]

So how would I go about making an 8-core desktop? I need it for 3d rendering. I don't think too many computer cases were made for such a thing.

 

[zoku88]

Gaming performance does not increase with Vista (we are talking fractions of framerates, nothing tangible). This is from someone with XP SP3 and Vista 64, its well documented.

Benchmarks from Sept say otherwise :-/

And other benchmarks show that not much has changed in gaming performance since then...

 

[bee]

Like I said in my quote I'm talking about cache not clock speed.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e7200_4.html#sect0

This article compares the E7300 to the E8400 and you will see gamer suffer a 10% decrease on the E7300 due to the low cache. Now just imagine the E5200 processor with hits 2MB cache instead of the E7300 with its 3MB cache.

we've been through this before, who plays games at 1024x768 with no aa? at real settings say 1680x1050 4xaa, its all graphics card and cache means shit, e5200 is king

 

[EviLore]

Nice high end system, che. Personally I use multiple hard drives...OS/app, gaming, and media...but you can always change up your one drive config later depending on your system usage.

 

[chespace]

Looks like the ASUS board lost the instant $20 rebate in just 1 day.

Based on Evilore's advice, I changed the HDD to two Seagate 320GB drives ($50 each).

Price is now $1921.65 SHIPPED. I should have it by Thursday.

Here we go...

 

[fatigues_gasolini]

Whats a good 19 or 21 inch lcd monitor?

Im using my 27 inch lcd tv now, but only can go to 1280x960 for games.

 

[SRG01]

Like I said in my quote I'm talking about cache not clock speed.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e7200_4.html#sect0

This article compares the E7300 to the E8400 and you will see gamer suffer a 10% decrease on the E7300 due to the low cache. Now just imagine the E5200 processor with hits 2MB cache instead of the E7300 with its 3MB cache.

You missed my point. All lower end processors can be clocked higher to hide the lack of L2 cache. Moreover, after a certain performance point, it is unlikely that he'll actually see the difference. It's all artificial benchmarks.

 

[chespace]

Whats a good 19 or 21 inch lcd monitor?

Im using my 27 inch lcd tv now, but only can go to 1280x960 for games.

Don't know if this is "Good" or not, but I'm picking this up based on the fact that I can do 1920 x 1200 resolution and it's 24".

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16824112011

 

[Big Takeover]

Did you already order, Che?

 

[chespace]

Did you already order, Che?

In the process... just put in my CC#... why?

Something up?

 

[Big Takeover]

If you use Microsoft's Cashback Live, you'll get 3% back. It takes 3 months to process, but why not right? Should be about $60 for you. It's dead simple, and it's Microsoft, so it's not scammy/spammy.

http://search.live.com/cashback/stores

 

[DarthWoo]

we've been through this before, who plays games at 1024x768 with no aa? at real settings say 1680x1050 4xaa, its all graphics card and cache means shit, e5200 is king

*raises hand*

I'm hoping that my new system improves a little bit over my old Athlon XP 2000+ 1.6GHz; 1GB DDR RAM and Radeon 9800SE though.

 

[chespace]

If you use Microsoft's Cashback Live, you'll get 3% back. It takes 3 months to process, but why not right? Should be about $60 for you. It's dead simple, and it's Microsoft, so it's not scammy/spammy.

http://search.live.com/cashback/stores

Awesome tip. Thanks. Order processed. I missed the 12pm PST deadline for orders today so it'll get sent tomorrow and I'll hopefully receive it by Friday.

If not, Monday it is. Sheeeit, large ticket item buyer's shock setting in...

 

[DarthWoo]

Oh, and I also got my E5200 in the mail right now, and was examining the stock HSF. All that it has as far as thermal paste is three little strips of some gray goo on the connector that is not even covered in some sort of protective plastic. Is that really supposed to be sufficient for stock needs? I bought a neat looking rear-facing HSF though, so I don't really need it anyway.

 

[Big Takeover]

Awesome tip. Thanks. Order processed. I missed the 12pm PST deadline for orders today so it'll get sent tomorrow and I'll hopefully receive it by Friday.

If not, Monday it is. Sheeeit, large ticket item buyer's shock setting in..

Oh, you'll definitely have it by Friday. In fact, as many will attest to, it's not unusual at all to get stuff early from Newegg. It's happened to me many times, and shit, you're 2000 miles closer than I am. I wouldn't bank on it, but don't be surprised to see at least some of your stuff show up on Thursday.

 

[chespace]

Oh, you'll definitely have it by Friday. In fact, as many will attest to, it's not unusual at all to get stuff early from Newegg. It's happened to me many times, and shit, you're 2000 miles closer than I am. I wouldn't bank on it, but don't be surprised to see at least some of your stuff show up on Thursday.

So they don't send it all in one lump package but piecemeal?

Hmm, should be interesting...

 

[DarthWoo]

I guess they ship everything from New Jersey so I'm pretty close. I had something arrive the very next day with the free shipping option. UPS hadn't even updated the tracking info beyond the origin scan until a couple hours after it was delivered.

I'm annoyed that the driver tends to just leave packages on the porch without knocking or anything. This is a safe area generally, but you never know when someone will be malicious.

 

[Zzoram]

So they don't send it all in one lump package but piecemeal?

Hmm, should be interesting...

Every place, even Dell does that (they might send your laptop case before your laptop :lol)

The reason is they are maximizing efficiency of their shipments, to save as much money and time as possible. If they sent everything together, they would have to wait on the stuff not in stock or more difficult to access, and wait for a truck with enough room for all your stuff that is headed in your direction.

 

[Hazaro]

Newegg has warehouses in CA, NJ, and I think 2 other states, but their main ones are in those 2 areas.

I get all my stuff next day if I order before 12

Spoiler

But I have to pay tax

 

[Cheeto]

NO. You have a similar rig to mine, and will not play the game for which I upgraded? TRACKMANIA NATIONS FOREVER! The game is free and its fucking worth whatever my PC cost me.

LISTEN TO THIS MAN

 

[chespace]

LISTEN TO THIS MAN

The game is free? Really?

I NEED CRYSIS.

Holy shit at this (old) trailer. Can you really do the things I see here with the nanosuit?

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/24070.html

Like grab your enemies by the neck and punch away flying jeeps?

 

[Hazaro]

Yeah it's free, download it from Steam, it's a fantastic game.

 

[bee]

I NEED CRYSIS.

make sure you play on delta, its WAY better on that difficulty

 

[Zzoram]

The game is free? Really?

I NEED CRYSIS.

Holy shit at this (old) trailer. Can you really do the things I see here with the nanosuit?

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/24070.html

Like grab your enemies by the neck and punch away flying jeeps?

You can indeed grab your enemies by the neck, and toss them. As for punching away flying jeeps, you could, if you somehow managed to blast a jeep into the air. It's not easy to do, since physics is pretty hard to predict sometimes.

 

[chespace]

Based on this review by Gametrailers, Crysis doesn't even look as mindblowing as I thought it should. What settings and PC were they running here?

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/28457.html

Also, the gameplay in this vid looks pretty bland.

 

[Big Takeover]

Crysis
Crysis: Warhead
STALKER
STALKER Clear Sky
Fallout 3

In that order.

I'm gonna pull the trigger on this rig tomorrow first thing. Should be here by the end of the week. Newegg is so good... shipping is only like $19.78. How is that even possible?

Tell me your fingers just happen to slip, and you missed the T, e, a, m, F, o, r, t, r, e, s, s, and 2 keys!

 

[Zzoram]

Based on this review by Gametrailers, Crysis doesn't even look as mindblowing as I thought it should. What settings and PC were they running here?

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/28457.html

Also, the gameplay in this vid looks pretty bland.

Crysis is very open ended for the first half. That means the gameplay is what you make of it. The "level" is so huge you can sneak around entire fights. You can be slow and sneaky with sniping, or rambo it. Warhead is all about the rambo thing, with pretty constant fast paced action. Your health regenerates faster in Warhead, to encourage the fast paced action. Speed mode is also faster in Warhead. If you prefer the more linear game type, you may prefer Warhead. If you like to play at your own pace, in large open environments, Crysis original may be a better match. Either way, it doesn't hurt to play both and judge them for yourself.

As for graphics, turn on vsync to get rid of screen tearing. The game looks like it was probably set to High DX9 judging by the lack of Object Motion Blur. You'll be able to set it to Very High DX10.

I love the way the guns feel in this game personally.


On the highest difficulty (Delta) the game gets a lot better, but it's pretty hard so you have to be good at FPS games to beat that. Still, it's the best difficulty because it doesn't point out grenades to you, and the KPA speaks Korean so you don't hear them yelling out their strategy. Also, ammo requires you to pick it up, instead of just walking over it, making it more dangerous to leave cover to pick up that ammo in the open road. You also can no longer use the jeep turret while driving, you have to press a button to swap seats to the gunner seat.

 

[Hazaro]

On the highest difficulty (Delta) the game gets a lot better, but it's pretty hard so you have to be good at FPS games to beat that. Still, it's the best difficulty because it doesn't point out grenades to you, and the KPA speaks Korean so you don't hear them yelling out their strategy. Also, ammo requires you to pick it up, instead of just walking over it, making it more dangerous to leave cover to pick up that ammo in the open road.

Yeah the difficulty system is kind of bullshit, I personally love controlling the turrets in vehicles because it makes for a few awesome things I can do, but the rest of the stuff Normal gives I hate.

I should check how to make them speak Korean and pick up goodies, I leave outlines on because I AM in a frikken nanosuit. :lol

 

[Gully State]

Crysis is very open ended for the first half. That means the gameplay is what you make of it. The "level" is so huge you can sneak around entire fights. You can be slow and sneaky with sniping, or rambo it. Warhead is all about the rambo thing, with pretty constant fast paced action. If you prefer the more linear game type, you may prefer Warhead. If you like to play at your own pace, in large open environments, Crysis original may be a better match. Either way, it doesn't hurt to play both and judge them for yourself.

As for graphics, turn on vsync to get rid of screen tearing. The game looks like it was probably set to High DX9 judging by the lack of Object Motion Blur. You'll be able to set it to Very High DX10.

I love the way the guns feel in this game personally.


On the highest difficulty (Delta) the game gets a lot better, but it's pretty hard so you have to be good at FPS games to beat that. Still, it's the best difficulty because it doesn't point out grenades to you, and the KPA speaks Korean so you don't hear them yelling out their strategy. Also, ammo requires you to pick it up, instead of just walking over it, making it more dangerous to leave cover to pick up that ammo in the open road.

wtf? From what you described, apparently I've been playing on delta mode instead of easy (I suck at fps). And here I was wondering why the hell all the enemies take 100000000 hits before they went down.

 

[Hazaro]

wtf? From what you described, apparently I've been playing on delta mode instead of easy (I suck at fps). And here I was wondering why the hell all the enemies take 100000000 hits before they went down.

On the original Crysis, bullet distance and silencers greatly effected the damage you did.

Even then sometimes it was a bit ridiculous...

 

[Zzoram]

wtf? From what you described, apparently I've been playing on delta mode instead of easy (I suck at fps). And here I was wondering why the hell all the enemies take 100000000 hits before they went down.

Headshots my friend. The KPA are wearing very thick armor.

 

[Kosma]

Good choice of games, I haven't played Crysis beyond the demo (to test my rig) so my judgement ain't perfect but I think Stalker is a fucking mazing as far as atmosphere goes. Can't blame you for trying the prettiest game atm first though.

 

[Hazaro]

Headshots my friend. The KPA are wearing very thick armor.

Thick armor?

It's made from frikken titanium + ceramic + carbon fibre mesh.

Originally 90 inches thick it was sent into the heart of the sun where it was compressed into a 0.1 inch thick plate. They are then stacked 20 plates thick on each side, rendering them near invincible.

 

[Gully State]

Headshots my friend. The KPA are wearing very thick armor.

I have this nasty habit of aiming for the crouch whenever I play FPS. Even when I consciously aim for the head, the reticule always ends up near the groin area. You would think that groin shots would be just as effective as headshots. Anyways, I think I'm going to turn down the difficulty until I get the controls down pat.

 

[chespace]

I played a bunch of Stalker a year ago on my laptop but it was, as you can imagine, quite a test of patience and general acceptance of shitty graphics and framerates. In fact, it was cooking my laptop so I literally had to put my laptop on top of an iron pot of ice water whereby the fan underneath the laptop would blow into the water and cool the machine.

Ridiculous, but I played prob 15 hours of Stalker like that until I could no longer take it. I even screwed around with the 3rd person mode, as well as that one hack where you could put all these weapons and gear into a corpse and drag it around like a bag. :lol

I loved it back then even on those low settings so I can't wait to revisit the game. I have no idea what patches and user hacks have been released since, and I'm a little scared to find out.

As for Crysis... the bullet sponge syndrome of Delta difficulty kinda worries me. I want better AI and more challenging tactics, not dudes who take 10 shots from an AR to go down.

 

[Kosma]

Now that's what I call loving a game. It looks stunning with everything maxed out and with the lightning patches. Maybe you should try it before Crysis even, so you can be amazed twice

 

[Zzoram]

I played a bunch of Stalker a year ago on my laptop but it was, as you can imagine, quite a test of patience and general acceptance of shitty graphics and framerates. In fact, it was cooking my laptop so I literally had to put my laptop on top of an iron pot of ice water whereby the fan underneath the laptop would blow into the water and cool the machine.

Ridiculous, but I played prob 15 hours of Stalker like that until I could no longer take it. I even screwed around with the 3rd person mode, as well as that one hack where you could put all these weapons and gear into a corpse and drag it around like a bag. :lol

I loved it back then even on those low settings so I can't wait to revisit the game. I have no idea what patches and user hacks have been released since, and I'm a little scared to find out.

As for Crysis... the bullet sponge syndrome of Delta difficulty kinda worries me. I want better AI and more challenging tactics, not dudes who take 10 shots from an AR to go down.

Delta does have better AI and more challenging tactics. They do take a few more shots, but if you aim for the head it doesn't really take much more. It's their body armor that really ramps up, you can unload a clip on a guy's chest and not take him down, but 2-3 headshots will do it.

 

[DarthWoo]

Argh, just noticed my specific RAM (Patriot Extreme 4GB Kit) isn't on the P5Q Pro qualified vendor list. Hopefully it will still work.

 

[chespace]

Argh, just noticed my specific RAM (Patriot Extreme 4GB Kit) isn't on the P5Q Pro qualified vendor list. Hopefully it will still work.

Where do you see this vendor list?

I should check to see if the 8 gigs of G.SKILL 2x2GB RAM I got works.

 

[DarthWoo]

Where do you see this vendor list?

I should check to see if the 8 gigs of G.SKILL 2x2GB RAM I got works.

http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=709&l4=0&model=2269&modelmenu=2

There's a "QVL DOWNLOAD" link on the sidebar.

 

[Zzoram]

I am pretty sure any brand name RAM should work on any brand name Motherboard. What you DO have to check is what voltage your RAM uses. A lot of enthusiast RAM requires more than the standard 1.8V (to to 2.1V on some RAM) and you have to set your BIOS to provide the appropriate RAM voltage to achieve stability at full speed. Just do not exceed rated voltage or you may risk damage.

 

[chespace]

http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=709&l4=0&model=2269&modelmenu=2

There's a "QVL DOWNLOAD" link on the sidebar.

Thanks. Yay, it's covered.

 

[DarthWoo]

I am pretty sure any brand name RAM should work on any brand name Motherboard. What you DO have to check is what voltage your RAM uses. A lot of enthusiast RAM requires more than the standard 1.8V (to to 2.1V on some RAM) and you have to set your BIOS to provide the appropriate RAM voltage to achieve stability at full speed. Just do not exceed rated voltage or you may risk damage.

Ah, I see. The Patriot stuff uses 2.0V. How badly will the system run if I forget to change the setting? Also, lower latency settings are better, correct? Mine is 5, with timing of 5-5-5-12.