What role does Processor speed play in Gaming??

[Boostin14PSI]

My friend got a new pc with a duron 1300+ in it. He wants it to be a nice gaming rig. Nothing major but enough to run games smoothly at atleast the stock grfx settings for the game. So what role does the processors play. It has about 512mb sdram & i told him to get an 8500le. Mine runs great so i suggested it to him. He is on a tight budget.

[funnyperson1]

The processor is important but I cannot think of a game that will not run smoothly on a duron 1.3. He should be fine especially if he overclocks it.

[Boostin14PSI]

ya but the thing is the mobo he has doesn't oc. It shows hardware and case temps in the bios but no ocability????

[Labotomy Jack]

Unless your playing a game like SimCity 4 where there are lots things to keep track of your CPU won't be taxed very much. In your average FPS there's really not that much to keep track of. The bulk of processing is done in the video card and that is going to determine your frame rate in most games.

[Super Nintendo]

cs would play find on a 1300 duron. But if your friends has money and wants to spend a lot go for p4 if not then amd and overclock it.

[funnyperson1]

well if he really wants there are some very cheap yet very good amd alternatives out there. I personally picked up a shuttle nforce2 board and 1700+ for 110$ shipped from newegg.

[Super Nintendo]

thats a good combo, he would probably like it. And it also have the ablilty to overclock when he can get a new mobo and ram. Which is nice.

[funnyperson1]

the shuttle has all the ocing options, the only problem is that vdimm only goes up to 2.7.

[Illah]

Why a Duron? He can get a XP2100 for about $60 - the cheapest duron 1.3's online are $35. That's $25 well spent in my opinion.

If he's THAT poor then at least get a XP1700 in the high $40's. Once he gets some cash he can replace the mobo and OC the thing to 2.2GHz+, and even at stock it'll be way better than a Duron.

--Illah

[Boostin14PSI]

sorry upgrading is not an option. He bought the system how it is for very cheap and wants to use it to play games.

[TUK101]

I detect another thread running astray. The question asked was "how is this system for gaming" and it gets turned into another suggestion poll for upgrading lol. The sytem will be fine for most games if your buddy gets at least the suggested Radeon 8500. A ti200 would do ok, but the 8500 looks a bit nicer and runs a slight bit faster. If your buddy could swing it then a TI4200 would work even better and last awhile longer for the games yet to come. As far as the cpu goes it isnt a barn burner but is sufficient for most of todays games, and with the 512mb ram that will help a bunch to keep some of the load off of the cpu trying to run a swap file at the same time. It just too bad that he cannot OC the rig and drop the multi and bump the fsb up to 133 to speed things up a bunch. The fsb will be hurting him more than the cpu speed will. Just make sure that your buddies comp has good cooling because when he puts a good graphics card in it, things will heat up inside of that case a bit.

[Boostin14PSI]

thanx tuk.

[thalzaar24]

most of today's video cards are basically mini-computers you attach to your main computer. All the graphics calculations are basically all done on the card itself, leaving the processor to do other things. With the recent increase in ram on the cards, this also relieves the stress on your computer. Just about the biggest factor now days, is your FSB which helps speed along the transfer of data from card to ram/processor, so the biggest upgrade is your motherboard.

Right now i'm experiencing this limitation. I'm using old 100mhz fsb and pc 133 ram so i'm extremely limiting my bandwidth. However, that being said, i have a nice card i recently softmodded (9500np > 9700np) and overclocked it and games run really smooth. I don't get really high 3dmarks (graphical benchmarking utility which we use to "brag" on the boards, hehe) because of the low FSB.

So, the point of my post is, if you have a lower end system (as compared to the speed demons around here :D ) go with a good graphics card. It will definately help you out with running more recent games.

[theflyingrat]

Just beware of flight simulators, or any other game that's very, very physics-dependent. Keep in mind, no amount of video card power will make up for a CPU that can't do physics calculations as quickly as your game can! The newest generation of flight simulators all tax CPUs to a much greater extent than first person shooters do, for the most part - the video card helps only when you want to crank resolution and FSAA up a whole bunch. A Duron 1.3 will run these okay, but don't expect the world... My old Celeron at 1470 would happily run IL-2 Sturmovik: Forgotten Battles with a finite number of aircraft, but the more planes you had doing all sorts of crazy stuff at one time, the more it dragged the game down...

[emericanchaos]

the processor won't be the bottleneck here. i'd say that duron with an 8500LE would be well matched. a ti 4200 would be a tad faster and than force the bottleneck onto the cpu.

it really depends on what games he goes with.

[rdy2rave]

Go Ti4200

[Supertrucker]

if you are willing to alter the chip i would suggest hard coding a 10 multi and a 133 fsb to get every bit of bandwidth out of that sdram, it being sdram would probably hurt you more than it being a duron. and unless you get a stellar deal on a ti4200 i would say that an 8500 and a 4200 would play close to identical on that system

[Boostin14PSI]

well the card is an onboard duron. Meaning there is no socket to change it or take it out. with that said how would i go about hardcoding it to clock higher?

[funnyperson1]

I suggest simply running it at 1.3, he'll be fine with that much power.

[MetalStorm]

The processor is a huge bottleneck, at 1300 duron, well the fact its a duron is a problem, it has less cache for a start, which will reduce performance, and saying that the processor doesnt do much for fps is complete and utter crap, if you have a slow CPU, you get slow fps, I think you can work out what happens if you have a fast CPU...

For graphically intensive games, like UT2k3, graphics card will have quite a large impact on fps - but thats only if your graphics card really sucks, just about anything above a GF2 GTS will be able to easily keep up with the duron, the duron simply cant feed the card the data it needs as fast as the card can process.

What im really trying to say is that CPU speed matters, a lot.

[funnyperson1]

Originally posted by MetalStorm
The processor is a huge bottleneck, at 1300 duron, well the fact its a duron is a problem, it has less cache for a start, which will reduce performance, and saying that the processor doesnt do much for fps is complete and utter crap, if you have a slow CPU, you get slow fps, I think you can work out what happens if you have a fast CPU...

For graphically intensive games, like UT2k3, graphics card will have quite a large impact on fps - but thats only if your graphics card really sucks, just about anything above a GF2 GTS will be able to easily keep up with the duron, the duron simply cant feed the card the data it needs as fast as the card can process.

What im really trying to say is that CPU speed matters, a lot.


Yes it does. But his cpu is soldered on to the mobo. There arent any ocing options in bios. Yes the fps may be lower than if he had a tricked out rig, but the games will be playable.

[star882]

"The processor is a huge bottleneck, at 1300 duron, well the fact its a duron is a problem, it has less cache for a start, which will reduce performance, and saying that the processor doesnt do much for fps is complete and utter crap, if you have a slow CPU, you get slow fps, I think you can work out what happens if you have a fast CPU..."
My friend Tom Stage has stuck a GF4MX420 in an old 500MHz P3(for testing), and it works just as good as my 2.4GHz P4(which also has a GF4MX420) for Fear Factor.
In fact, you can probably put a Radeon 9800 Pro in a 350MHz P2, and it would perform just as good in Fear Factor as if you put the card in a 3.0GHz P4.
"most of today's video cards are basically mini-computers you attach to your main computer. All the graphics calculations are basically all done on the card itself, leaving the processor to do other things. With the recent increase in ram on the cards, this also relieves the stress on your computer."
Yeah, since Fear Factor is virtually 100% GPU load.

[MetalStorm]

Dont expect to have playable fps on doom 3 though, you are going to need a powerful rig to get good fps... no matter the resolution.

Also, Star, I have never heard of "fear factor" appart from the TV program - care to provide a link?
And anyway, the GF4 mx 420 is not a good card, its so unpowerful you wouldnt expect a large fps increase on a fast rig.

[Boostin14PSI]

i was telling him to get a 8500le 128mb and he wanted to test mine in his rig to see how it is. The stupid thing has an onboard vga. There is nothing in the bios to disableit so there must be a jumper. I just cant find which one it is. he has a pchips m810l v7.1c. if anyone is familiar with the board and can help me that would be great. Thanx

[MetalStorm]

Oh dear god! NO! a PC chips mother board... run, run for your lives! They are that bad... they are cheap, but that doesnt make them good.

Try here http://www.stud.fernuni-hagen.de/q3998142/pcchips/

There are lots of people there who made the same mistake, but they might be able to help your friend out as they have a lot of experience, I hope it helps

[funnyperson1]

Originally posted by MetalStorm
Dont expect to have playable fps on doom 3 though, you are going to need a powerful rig to get good fps... no matter the resolution.

Also, Star, I have never heard of "fear factor" appart from the TV program - care to provide a link?
And anyway, the GF4 mx 420 is not a good card, its so unpowerful you wouldnt expect a large fps increase on a fast rig.

DoomIII isnt even out yet. How do you know how much cpu it will require? Also as gamers we have a different definition of playable. Carmack is smart enough to make DoomIII playable on a 1.3ghz cpu, he wants to sell copies.

Anyways he should WAIT until DoomIII comes out to upgrade. Why the rush now when we havent even got a clue of how the game will perform.

[Boostin14PSI]

ya it is a pc chips mobo. I will look on that site for him.
Thanx for the link

[grunjee]

I have to disagree with the majority here and say, don't count on a Duron for great performance.

I have 2 brothers who each have a computer. They both use retail Radeon 8500 64 meg cards. Both use the same Catalyst drivers. The major difference is in their mobo and cpu's.

Brother 1 has a kt333 board, 512 megs of ram and a Athlon XP @ 2 GHz. Almost all games including BF 1942 run very well, nearly perfect at high settings.

Brother 2 has a kt133a board, a gig of ram, and a Duron 1 GHz @ 1.2+ GHz. All his games (especially BF 1942) run like @ss despite having more ram. I'm talking slideshow-level framerates. Now some of the performance may be sdr vs. ddr, but I strongly suspect the Duron is most of the problem.

So my advice is, stay the hell away from Durons if possible. I guess it's too late for your friend though.

[MetalStorm]

Originally posted by funnyperson1


DoomIII isnt even out yet. How do you know how much cpu it will require? Also as gamers we have a different definition of playable. Carmack is smart enough to make DoomIII playable on a 1.3ghz cpu, he wants to sell copies.

Anyways he should WAIT until DoomIII comes out to upgrade. Why the rush now when we havent even got a clue of how the game will perform.

Morrowind states 500MHz as the min spec at whcih to play, I would hate to see how jerky it would be at that speed though considering its only just playable when you have a 3000+ or P4 3GHz - I mean 30 fps here, I think doom 3 is going to be along the same sort of lines here...

[tio]

The Morrowind comment is very true. It seems that these days, if you have a "minimum spec" computer, you will be able to install and load the program... and that's about it. :(

Boostin14PSI, I know you are trying to help your friend out, but let’s face it: your friend messed up. A computer that has: a relatively outdated processor with very little cache, SDRAM, a 100 MHz FSB, and onboard video just isn't going to cut it with today's games. Forget trying to run them at stock settings, I think he'll have a tough enough time running newer games at barebones settings.

Simply wanting your computer "to be a nice gaming rig" doesn't do much. I hate to say it, but it doesn't sound like your friend did a lot of research before he bought this machine.

As for the role of the CPU when gaming: it has to constantly perform calculations to simulate the game's physics, process the artificial intelligence, execute the game's "engine" (ie: run the game's code, as a game is, after all, just a program like any other), and continually pump out data to the computer's GPU and memory. Definitely not a light task.

[JoT]

Originally posted by MetalStorm


Morrowind states 500MHz as the min spec at whcih to play, I would hate to see how jerky it would be at that speed though considering its only just playable when you have a 3000+ or P4 3GHz - I mean 30 fps here, I think doom 3 is going to be along the same sort of lines here...

my Athlon 1800+ @Stock1533MHz and the Rage Pro 128 I killed tried to run Morrowing; I got slideshow results

I changed out the 1800+ with a 1600+, oc'ed it to 1806 (now 1610) and tried Morrowind on my Radeon 9000; it works just fine, maybe turn the viewdistance down a bit, but hey, the thing plays beautifully


back to the topic: the Duron should run fine; with an 8500le, it should push many games at high settings, and should run all current games at low settings

I'm just repeating everything said before :rolleyes:

[funnyperson1]

Originally posted by JoT


my Athlon 1800+ @Stock1533MHz and the Rage Pro 128 I killed tried to run Morrowing; I got slideshow results

I changed out the 1800+ with a 1600+, oc'ed it to 1806 (now 1610) and tried Morrowind on my Radeon 9000; it works just fine, maybe turn the viewdistance down a bit, but hey, the thing plays beautifully


back to the topic: the Duron should run fine; with an 8500le, it should push many games at high settings, and should run all current games at low settings

I'm just repeating everything said before :rolleyes: \


yeah, but you could have quad opterons and still not be able to play morrowind on a Rage Fury Pro. I had one of those, the most advanced game it could play was Max Payne and that was at absolute lowest settings with a little stutter once in a while.


Morrowind states 500MHz as the min spec at whcih to play, I would hate to see how jerky it would be at that speed though considering its only just playable when you have a 3000+ or P4 3GHz - I mean 30 fps here, I think doom 3 is going to be along the same sort of lines here...

Sure, but DoomIII isnt even out yet, and his friend is asking for help now. And he already has the system. Wouldn't it be prudent for him to wait until the minimum specs for DoomIII are made official before upgrading? Not too mention there are many people out there with PIII and Athlon 700mhz computers playing Morrowind and enjoying it.

[JoT]

Originally posted by funnyperson1
yeah, but you could have quad opterons and still not be able to play morrowind on a Rage Fury Pro. I had one of those, the most advanced game it could play was Max Payne and that was at absolute lowest settings with a little stutter once in a while.

You are correct, sir; I have a horrible headache at the moment and appear to be typing without thinking. I'm going to go lie down now :D

[dippy_skoodlez]

Originally posted by MetalStorm


Morrowind states 500MHz as the min spec at whcih to play, I would hate to see how jerky it would be at that speed though considering its only just playable when you have a 3000+ or P4 3GHz - I mean 30 fps here, I think doom 3 is going to be along the same sort of lines here...
Hmm... Odd.. My friend had a 1ghz Piii, and a radeon 7500 and ran the game pretty well... Min specs are correct, I could play UT2k3 with a TnT2.. IQ looked like %^*& but it was playable.. Just dont turn all the bells and whistles, and a low res, and its fine!

[dippy_skoodlez]

Originally posted by funnyperson1
\


yeah, but you could have quad opterons and still not be able to play morrowind on a Rage Fury Pro. I had one of those, the most advanced game it could play was Max Payne and that was at absolute lowest settings with a little stutter once in a while.




Sure, but DoomIII isnt even out yet, and his friend is asking for help now. And he already has the system. Wouldn't it be prudent for him to wait until the minimum specs for DoomIII are made official before upgrading? Not too mention there are many people out there with PIII and Athlon 700mhz computers playing Morrowind and enjoying it.

The doom III specs are out.. 1ghz, radeon 7X00/geforce, and 128-256mbram(forget which) are mins....

[Strida]

Anymore, games are very dependant on the graphics card.

This being said, the actual physics of the game do stress the processor, as well as the way in which the game was built.

[Yuriman]

If I remember correctly, pc chips advertises that proc as a duron 1300+. It runs at 1.1ghz. Am I wrong? I can provide linky, if the site I saw it on is still there.

Edit: OHH NO they're at it again. Integrated RAM?!?!
http://www.pcchips.com.tw/product/M810Lv90m.html

[tio]

^ :eek: "The horror! The horror!" :eek:

How on earth does that company stay afloat?

[dippy_skoodlez]

Hmm.. wow 256mb onboard... thats kinda sad for a mobo.. Would be a good mobo for someone only doing e-mail/surfing...

[MetalStorm]

Originally posted by tio
^ :eek: "The horror! The horror!" :eek:

How on earth does that company stay afloat?

I think its because people who have less experience with hardware think OMG you can get virtually an entire computer for £50 that 0wns... Okay, it depends what you want to do with it agreed, but people should really research things a bit more, then people would be able to see if they really want a PC Chips mobo, which I doubt they do if they want to do any demanding application.

I found out about PC Chips from a friend that bought a 810lmr motherboard from them, it really was crap, it cost £25 I think, and there were so many problems with it, if you have a look at the site I provided the link for in a recent post you will see that the 810 will only support a handful of graphics cards - it does have an AGP slot, just most cards dont work in it... the list of cards that simply do not work is about a mile long. It also cant handle certain CPUs, he has a 1700+ but it wasnt able to run at that speed, he had to run at 1100MHz as apposed to 1463 it couldnt even handle a 133 mhz fsb - and had to be run at 100.
Luckily he has managed to sell it to some unwitting fool :D

PC chips motherboards really are dire. Research people, research!

As for people making comments about my post on morrowind, obviously its going to suck if you have a rage 128, but in morrowind its the CPU that makes most of the difference. Of course if you are happy playing it on a 1Ghz p3 or whatever some people suggested, thats fine, you obviously don't have a keen eye for frame rates, and if thats not a problem to you then there is nothing to worry about, but I like my games smooth.

Im pretty sure doom 3 is going to eat processors for lunch, again, like my morrowind comment, this is irrespective of resolution, resolution only matters for graphics cards, if the computer cant give the card the frames to render, then they arnt going to be rendered and its going to run slowly, thats all I was saying.

[JoT]

Originally posted by MetalStorm
As for people making comments about my post on morrowind, obviously its going to suck if you have a rage 128, but in morrowind its the CPU that makes most of the difference. Of course if you are happy playing it on a 1Ghz p3 or whatever some people suggested, thats fine, you obviously don't have a keen eye for frame rates, and if thats not a problem to you then there is nothing to worry about, but I like my games smooth.

Sorry about my post there, I was feeling so horrible I didn't realize that my post makes NO sense. :rolleyes:

[dippy_skoodlez]

As for people making comments about my post on morrowind, obviously its going to suck if you have a rage 128, but in morrowind its the CPU that makes most of the difference. Of course if you are happy playing it on a 1Ghz p3 or whatever some people suggested, thats fine, you obviously don't have a keen eye for frame rates, and if thats not a problem to you then there is nothing to worry about, but I like my games smooth.

Hmm.. I have such an eye for framerates, I ALWAYS have them displayed while im PLAYING it. unreal championship for xbox for example.. I cant stand to play it because it bogs down so much.. In wolfenstein ET, I get 90FPS.. Im happy :D Now that I know my monitor does higher than 1024x786 that is.. lol..

[L_P]

Originally posted by Boostin14PSI
My friend got a new pc with a duron 1300+ in it. He wants it to be a nice gaming rig. Nothing major but enough to run games smoothly at atleast the stock grfx settings for the game. So what role does the processors play. It has about 512mb sdram & i told him to get an 8500le. Mine runs great so i suggested it to him. He is on a tight budget.


It depends on the game and such.
Take SOF2 "Solder Of Fortune 2"
in multiplayer mode utilizes the video card more, you can use a PII450 with a 16MB TNT card and still be able to play.

now put it in Single PLayer mode and you'll get 10FPS on the lowest video setting.

It really depends on what your playing. however a 1.3Ghz CPU and a good video card should at leat pull 30-50FPS on even UT2k3, may need to tweak it a little but it will still be nice game play.
-L_P

[dippy_skoodlez]

Yea.. UT2k3 should play FINE as long as the video card is up to it. It plays fine on a celeron :eek:

[star882]

"And anyway, the GF4 mx 420 is not a good card, its so unpowerful you wouldnt expect a large fps increase on a fast rig."
I hit Ctrl-Alt-Del to bring up the task manager, and Fear Factor uses ~1% CPU(on my P4).
Fear Factor is not a game BTW, it's an OpenGL video card benchmark.

[MetalStorm]

Star882, give us a link, I want to try it out...