How well will these games run with this system?

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:30

I'd like to know before I buy them.

The games I'm considering are F.E.A.R and Company of Heroes. They're my two favourite genre of games, so I should enjoy them. I'm open to recommendations for other games btw.

System is:

E6320 @ 2.9GHz. Will overclock more once I get a better cooler.
1GB Cricial Ballistix 4-4-4-12 @ 420MHz
XFX 7600GT @ 630/1600

Thanks.

edit: I'd download the demos but all the sites I try are really slow and are taking hours, so I thought I'd ask here in the meantime.

Will_3rd · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:31

Should be fine at quite high detail settings, but you might not get as much eye candy with your card.

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:32

Will_3rd said:
Should be fine at quite high detail settings, but you might not get as much eye candy with your card.

Would a 1950pro be a worthy upgrade?

snowdog · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:43

Oh stop it the card is fine, fear runs fine maxed with 20 min average 25 ish FPS, CoH same but have to turn shadows and trees to low/medium, but rest is maxed/ultra. 1024x768 res for FEAR and 1280 for CoH.

This is with a 6800GS.

Unless you really want 35+ fps or a higher reso: you can have all the eye candy maxed with that gfx card.

RAM though is another matter, both CoH and Fear will stutter stutter @ start with just 1 gig when on high textures...

Get yourself another 1 gig kit or get yourself a 2x1 GB kit and sell your old, if you want full eye candy in those 2 games with no stutter...
Gfx are just enough to cope though, expect 25 FPS too, if you want more you need new gfx and ram...

1950 pro would be a worthy upgrade yes, its approx 90% faster as a 7600GT

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:50

snowdog said:
Oh stop it the card is fine, fear runs fine maxed with 20 min average 25 ish FPS, CoH same but have to turn shadows and trees to low/medium, but rest is maxed/ultra. 1024x768 res for FEAR and 1280 for CoH.

This is with a 6800GS.

Unless you really want 35+ fps or a higher reso: you can have all the eye candy maxed with that gfx card.

RAM though is another matter, both CoH and Fear will stutter stutter @ start with just 1 gig when on high textures...

Get yourself another 1 gig kit or get yourself a 2x1 GB kit and sell your old, if you want full eye candy in those 2 games with no stutter...
Gfx are just enough to cope though, expect 25 FPS too, if you want more you need new gfx and ram...

1950 pro would be a worthy upgrade yes, its approx 90% faster as a 7600GT

Thanks mate.

Yeah the only PC games I've ever played are Halo PC, Age of Empires and Black and White. So I really don't know if this card is good or not. I thought the RAM might be an issue, I'lllook into getting more of the same RAM.(this Crucial stuff is really good)

tomanders91 · 1 Jun 2007 at 17:54

what res are you hoping to play these at? Both them games will work on on 1280x1024 at medium-to high settings with no AA/AF. If you go to 2gb it will run a lot better with less hitching etc

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 18:02

tomanders91 said:
what res are you hoping to play these at? Both them games will work on on 1280x1024 at medium-to high settings with no AA/AF. If you go to 2gb it will run a lot better with less hitching etc

Either 1280x1024 or 1024x768. Depending on how much of a difference the games look between the two.

tomanders91 · 1 Jun 2007 at 18:25

yeah they should be fine then, will run and play nicely, you may need to put texture detail on medium plus no AA/AF but mostly should be great.

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 18:50

tomanders91 said:
yeah they should be fine then, will run and play nicely, you may need to put texture detail on medium plus no AA/AF but mostly should be great.

Great.

Thanks mate.

HangTime · 1 Jun 2007 at 19:11

With only 1gig RAM you will need to be careful with your settings in these two games. For example I definitely wouldn't recommend using High textures in FEAR, this boosted my RAM usage from ~1gig to ~1.25gig compared to medium.

krisboats · 1 Jun 2007 at 20:29

I can play fear at 1280x960 with high settings and high textures on my system and it gets an average of 36fps.

athlon64 3000+
1gb ram
leadtek 7600gt

Also plays hl2/counterstrike etc at 75fps with fulll everything (hdr maps are at 50-60fps) at 1280x1024.

Plays oblivion alright at same res.

Plays the need for speed games flawlessly.

Plays supreme commander high settings up to about 500 units a side with 2 AI before any slowdown.

I think people generally state crap with these answers. I mean, you've got answers ranging from high settings to medium textures with no AA/AF

Textures play at high on mine in both games, with 2xAA and medium shadows. And mines a poorer spec pc!!!

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 20:45

Well the FEAR demo finally finshed, and I just finished playing the first level.

I had everything on max with 2xAA, 8xAF and 1024x768. It played fine, looked amazing too. Not sure about the FPS though because I don't know how to view it.

snowdog · 1 Jun 2007 at 20:59

Yep total rubbish what people were saying with no aa/AF, fine here with 4x aa & 16X AF too while i have a slightly worse card as u.

just Scott · 1 Jun 2007 at 21:12

snowdog said:
Yep total rubbish what people were saying with no aa/AF, fine here with 4x aa & 16X AF too while i have a slightly worse card as u.

How much of a difference does higher AA and AF make?

lol sorry, I'm not really a PC gamer so this is all quite new to me, this eye candy stuff. I was surprised at how amazing FEAR looked though.

snowdog · 1 Jun 2007 at 22:27

H2F Scott said:
How much of a difference does higher AA and AF make?

lol sorry, I'm not really a PC gamer so this is all quite new to me, this eye candy stuff. I was surprised at how amazing FEAR looked though.

Af hardly a hit, AA a slight performance hit, imo anyhow, I usually play @ low framerates thus dont notice changes on smaller settings, ie. in TDU i can absolutly find no diff in performance with 8x AF than with no AF, AA tho kills performance a bit...

bobert50 · 1 Jun 2007 at 22:46

people claiming 25fps is fine!! :rolleyes:

madness!!!

125fps is 'fine'

Inazuma · 1 Jun 2007 at 22:49

Get an x1950 XT... or a pro atleast. I can play COH with all max details and 2xAA. I have FEAR set to max aswell. All at very playable FPS

In fact except for when in intense combat, the FPS stays above 40.

And I'm guessing the above poster is joking cus screens only refresh 75hz max :|

krisboats · 1 Jun 2007 at 23:57

Human eye can't perceive anything higher than 24 fps anyway either. So long as your card can handle the explosions and effects at a minimum of 24fps your eye wont tell the difference.

Energize · 2 Jun 2007 at 00:04

krisboats said:
Human eye can't perceive anything higher than 24 fps anyway either. So long as your card can handle the explosions and effects at a minimum of 24fps your eye wont tell the difference.

I assure you it can lol, hence why the ps3 and 360 output at 60fps. And why crt monitors at 60hz flicker.

bobert50 said:
people claiming 25fps is fine!!

madness!!!

125fps is 'fine'

If you have an lcd your going to be stuck at 60fps though, and my crt can only do 85hz at 1280x960. With my crappy cpu it's a miracle to get 30fps in modern rts games.

furnace · 2 Jun 2007 at 00:10

24fps is all you need to make something look like it's moving smoothly

But your eye isn't limited to percieving x frames per second - the eye doesn't see things in 'frames' [100fps.com explains it if you fancy a read!]

Anyway back on topic, I have a 7600GS clocked just under a GT and it runs things fine (CoH, CoD, BF2) but don't expect "high" graphics settings. The card was only supposed to last me a couple of weeks as a trouble-shooting "stop gap", but it's been 2 and a half months so far and I don't feel the need to upgrade