Computer/Game specs

[The Fugitive]

I was helping a friend of mine with building a computer. Like many he doesn't have a lot of "extra" cash laying around and so can't build the "bestest" computer. So we have to make compromises but then run into issues of "will this be enough to run the game well?". Knowing while making these compromises it will also hurt to longevity of the computer to keep up as well.

So we were hunting around looking for what works, and what people are having trouble with. How well does this computer set up play as compared to that and so on. Are laptop videos card FINALLY getting to the point you can run the game with some eye candy and still have a good frame rate and so on.

So I thought I would start this thread with the hope that people can post what they have, how it is setup in the game, and what kind of FR/eye candy game experience they get with it. I'm not looking for a "My rig is better than yours" type of thread, but a listing people can use to compare and make a decision on which compromises they can live with and have an idea of the FR/eye candy game experience they might be able to expect from a "not so super computer".

My computer,

ASUS P8Z77-V LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3770K CPU @ 3.50GHz (8 CPUs), ~3.5GHz
8 gig ram
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670

Game settings,

Texture size is 1024
Everything "on" except "shadows on others" and "ground clutter"
Detail slider set to "detail"
Shadows set to 512
Environmental slider to about half way

Game experience,

Solid 60 FPS in both furballs and on ground.

[Max]

Abit IP35 Pro LGAIntel P35 ATX mobo, Core 2 Duo E6850 Conroe 3.0 GHz LGA 773, 2x 1GB DDR2800, Seagate Barracuda 7200 SATA
EVGA Geforce 9800 GTX+ 512 M
Texture size 2048
Ground clutter off everything else checked
Bumped - plane, clouds, terrain
Sliders full detail

solid 59/60 except heavy smoke

[RedBull1]

Windows 7 64bit

AMD Phenom II x4 965 BE (Quad core @ 3.40)

ATI HD 7770 (1GB)

8GB Ram

1TB HD


I have mostly everything checked, slider bar for bump map (or whatever) at about half way, other slider on detailed, bump map my plane, their plane, shadows on my plane, their plane, bump map buildings, etc... and I easily hold 50-60 fps with it locked at 60.

Entire rig cost about $500-$600.

[1701E]

Actually did some testing a while back so the results are as follows. 

Old system;

Motherboard: ASUS M4A88T-M LE AM3
CPU: AMD Phenom II X2 555 BE 3.2GHz (dual) / Phenom II X4 B55 3.2GHz (quad)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H80 Liquid Cooling
RAM: G.Skill 4GB (2x 2GB) DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Dual Channel
GPU: Sapphire Radeon 7970 OC with Boost
HDD: Western Digital Black 1TB SATA 6.0GB/s
PSU: SeaSonic Gold X750 750W

Settings;
1680x1050 - 2048 Tex - Max AA - 4K Shadows - Second-to-Last notch Env Map - Bump Map Cloud/Terrain - No shadows on other
offline mode only

Results; Min FPS / Max FPS / Average FPS
Dual Stock - 0 / 68 / 41.77
Dual OverClock - 3 / 76 / 51.25
Quad Stock - 0 / 68 / 43.32
Quad OverClock - 4 / 81 / 49.40

New system;

Motherboard: ASUS Sabertooth 990FX R2.0
CPU: AMD FX-8320 4.8GHz
CPU Cooler: Corsair H80i Liquid Cooling
RAM: 8gb (2x4gb) Kingston HyperX DDR3-1600 Dual-channel
GPU: Sapphire Radeon 7970 OC with Boost
HDD: Western Digital Black 1TB SATA 6.0GB/s
PSU: SeaSonic Gold X750 750W

Settings;
Same as before - Only changes: 1920x1080 res - 2K shadows
offline mode only

Results; Min FPS / Max FPS / Average FPS
Results - 42 / 136 / 65.587


<S>
X

[titanic3]

Q9550 @ 2.83Ghz (Stock speed)
Radeon 6870 1GB (stock speed)
Corsair 750W PSU
4GB RAM
Windows 7 32 bit

Screen resolution at 1360x768. Runs every game I've played maxed out or nearly maxed out with 40+ FPS. Honestly, after my 1920x1080 monitor died and I switched to this one, there's really zero difference in the game play. And I get 10-20FPS boost in every game.

[Bizman]

Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3
Intel E8500
Radeon HD6970 1 Gb
4 GB RAM DDR2 1066
Chieftec 750W
Windows XP 32bit

Current resolution 2560x1600, plays 60'ish most of the time with more than default eye candy, one notch AntiAliasing, HiRes. All stock.
Used to work well with a Radeon HD3870 512Mb, too.

[Debrody]

PhenomII 955 3.2GHz (about 60% as fast as the i7)
8GB ddr-1600
el cheapo Sapphire HD-5830 (about 50-60% as fast as the 670)

1920x1080
anti-aliasing is one notch from the top - unnoticable difference
2048 texture size
everything on except shadow on others
4096 shadow size with smooth shadows
the reflection slider is at 2 notches from the minimum (the first one what updates the reflections) - this causes a huge frame rate drop when pulled further.

steady 50+ fps with this old machine. Your puter is great, Fugi, feel free to turn on a lot more eye candy, especially the texture and shadow texture size. I doubt that you will notice any frame rate drop.

[Latrobe]

Intel Core i5-2500K @ 3.30GHz (quad core)
24GBs DDR3-1600
EVGA GTX 550 ti
Win 7 Pro
1TB HD

Play AHII with everything but ground clutter turned on (which I only have off because I never see it anyways), 1024 shadows, and the reflective metal bar turned up 1 notch. Get 90 Frames most the time. it drops slightly when there's a massive furball, but has never gone below 60.

Also play games like Heroes of Stalingrad with max settings and get 60 FR or more.

I have my 24GB of ram to thank for my high frame rates, the video card is starting to age. It's not fantastic, but it's also not bad. It gets the job done.

[Gman]

Corsiar C70 Case
|ASUS Sabertooth X79
 i7 3930k@4.4
Noctua DH14 |
Corsiar Dominator Platinum 16gb 1866
2xSLI 680 GTX 4gb FTW+LE
Corsair TX850 PSU
Samsung 830 SSD + Caviar Black 1GB
CH F16 Pro Throt Peds + TM Warthog/Saitek Combat Peds |
Trackir 5 w/TC Pro
Razer BlackWidow Ultimate Mechanical Keyboard
Steel Series Sensei Mouse
Steel Series v2 Headset
ASUS VG248QE 24in 144hz LCD/LED x 3

I've got a eVGA Superclocked 780 that's in my other system I may put in this one, as when O/C'd it's faster than the TITAN that is 300$ more.  I haven't decided yet, I had by 680's sold but the guy backed out, if they sell I'll probably just go with another 780, but I'm happy just keeping them as well, as in SLI they do perform about as well as the o/c'd single 780 or Titan.

I've play at 2048, 1920x1080P, all settings maxed except for environmental which is one or two notches from the max, and shadows at max.  I have the Anti Alias being managed by the video cards, and set at 8x, same with the ant-filtering.  I see 143 or 144 fps most of the time with the vsync enabled, as the monitors are 144 hz.  I'm pretty happy overall with how AH2 performs, although if I do crank the environmental up to max, I'll see drops into the 60's if there are a lot of cons around, but that's still impressive if you ask me.  AH2 takes a lot of power to run maxed out, but is configurable enough to run on really old tech still, and run decently as well.

[olds442]

CPU: Intel I5 2500K overclocked to 4.8 ghz
Graphics card: Galaxy 560ti
Motherboard: Gigabyte UD3 Z77 dual BIOS
CPU cooler: Thermaltake Contac 30 aircooler. Max temps in intel burntest @ 4.8 ghz: 86*C
RAM: 8gb (2x4 sticks) DDR3 1600mhz kingston hyperX RAM
HDD: 1TB WD black 7200RPM
Monitor: ASUS 2ms 60hz 1080p monitor
keyboard: Unicomp model M ultra classic (made in US ;D) best keyboard simply ever i love buckling spring mech.
case: Cooler master HAF 932
PSU: (over kill until I SLI) Corsair HX850 850 watt PSU single rail
 

[gyrene81]

Processor: AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 965 Processor (4 CPUs), ~3.4GHz
Memory: 8GB DDR3 1333Mhz
Motherboard: Asus M4A89TD Pro/USB3
Video Card: XFX AMD Radeon 6950 DoubleD 2GB

the only game that gives me any grief at all is ah but i can run at 59-60fps 90% of the time. this is my graphics settings using 1024 textures and the hires pack.

[james]

1 x  Intel Core i7-3820 Sandy Bridge-E 3.6GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 2011 130W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80619i73820
1 x  GIGABYTE GA-X79-UD3 LGA 2011 Intel X79 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
1 x   GeForce GTX 560 TI 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2GB Ram Video Card
1 x  Seagate Barracuda ST1000DM003 1TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive - OEM
1 x  KINGWIN ABT-1050MM 1050W ATX 12V v2.2 / EPS 12V v2.91 / SSI EPS 12V v2.92 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Active PFC Power Supply
1 x  CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9B
1 x  Rosewill Blackbone Black Steel / Plastic ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
1 x  ASUS 24X DVD Burner - Bulk 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 12X DVD+R DL 24X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM Black SATA Model DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS - OEM
1 x  Arctic Silver 5 High-Density Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound AS5-3.5G - OEM - OEM
Water Cooled and running max settings at 59-60 fps on a 24" acer monitor

[numb1]

Motherboard..Z77 Sabertooth
CPU..3570k running at 4.7 at 1.255 volts..
PSU..AX850
GPUs...TWO 7950s ICEQ X2 Boost edition running in crossfire at 1200/1500mhz..
SSD..Intel 180gb
HD..Western Dig 1tb caviar blue..
RAM..Corsair vengence 8gbs at 2133mhz
Cooler..H100i
CASE..Cooler master storm stryker with 6 SP120 hi performance fans and 1 140mm AF140mm quiet edition..
Monitor...QNIX 1440p Korean monitor running at 120hz..

I play with everything maxed except the enviro slider is only up 1 notch..And i get 120fps at 1440p...

[Pudgie]

Win 7 HP 64x SP1 OS
Intel I7 3820 CPU at stock clocks (for the moment)
Asus Rampage IV Gene X79 ROG mobo
Corsair Vengence LP 16Gb 1600 DDR3 4x4 mem kit (Quad Channel)
Artic Freezer I30 Extreme CPU HSF
EVGA GTX Titan vid card at stock clocks using 320.49 WHQL drivers
2 OCZ Vertex 4 256Gb SSD's (no RAID)
Using the on-board LAN & sound off the Rampage IV Gene Mobo
Corsair TX 850 V2 PSU
Viewed on a DoubleSight DS-279W 27" IPS monitor at 2560 x 1440 x 32 res @ 59 Hz RR
(most recent addition)

With 320.49's set to use Application settings & ingame AA set to Most & all game graphics set to max except reflections set to 2/3 updates:
Runs 59-60 FPS w/ Titan GPU clocking around 614-835 Ghz off GPU Boost 2.0

With 320.49's set to override any Application settings, in-game AA set to None, all Nvidia driver settings set to max & all game graphics set as same above:
Runs 59-60 FPS w/ Titan GPU clocking full boost clocks at stock settings (980 Ghz) off GPU Boost 2.0

After seeing & playing this game at this res (I can really SEE stuff!!) I can't go back now!

More than you need but I wanted to go cutting edge for once......................... .

 

[olds442]

Just upgraded so ill post again
CPU: i5 2500k @ 4.8ghz overclock
CPU cooler: Thermaltake contac 30 air tower cooler max temps around 85-86*C ish in intelburntest and around 78*C in prime95
Graphics card: EVGA 660ti SC 2gb  overclocked to 1200mhz core clock max temps around 73*C on furmark with modded fan curve
RAM: 8gb DRR3 1600mhz kingston hyperX memory(2x4 sticks)
Main board: Gigabyte UD3H Z77 chipset LGA1155 socket
Case: Cooler master HAF932
disc drives: 1 samsung read/write drive
hard drives: 1 WD black 7200RPM 1tb drive
PSU: Corsair HX850 850 watt 80+ gold Power supply

This system maxes out anygame i throw at it in 1920x1080 with 50-60fps easy