Explain something to me (GFX and CPU)

[Archer]

You dont meet the min system requirements for CPU or GPU, so both must be upgraded.

Then generally speaking most games are more GPU dependant than CPU dependant.

[NAG - Wesley]

How much impact does a processor have on gaming?

So... say I have a Core2Duo 6300 1.86GHz; and then a GeForce 9600GT

Then on that setup I play a game like The Witcher 2 but it is laggy even on lowest graphics.

If I now upgrade the graphics card, will the game run faster, or is it the processors fault?

Thanks!

Since everyone's giving conflicting information here, there's no real concrete answer as to what would help improve your performance in every game out there. Most developers out there code for the biggest userbase with the most mid-range hardware to help make sure that the game runs fine on all computers (Valve and Blizzard are two examples). Others, like CD Projekt Red, took the Crysis route and chose not to optimise things so that the game could run on lower-end hardware because they developed the game to take advantage of specific technologies. They wanted better visuals and the chance to let gamers who spent a lot of money on their rigs feel satisfied that those purchase choices were well-made. That's why Crytek had to create a DX11 patch for Crysis 2 because they knew the inevitable backlash by high-end gamers would be huge if they left the game in DX9 mode.

Consider, though, the problem that your platform has. You're using a Core 2 Duo chip that wasn't the most popular one and is strapped for L3 cache. You're sitting with an aged GPU that today is closer to a GT440 than anything else in terms of performance. You're on a barely supported platform these days (LGA775) with chipsets and on-board hardware that probably hasn't received an update in years. You're probably even using DDR2 RAM, something that most devs don't account for these days because DDR3 is the mainstream product and has higher transfer rates (and its what their dev computers and even console kits are shipped with). Your hard drive probably bottlenecks things in its own way with lowered transfer rates because you've been using it daily for years.

As a whole, your platform brings performance down in a big way. You'd only see notable improvements by swinging things in one direction - upgrading to a Core i3 with 4GB of DDR3 RAM and keeping your GPU and running things at medium-to-low settings at 720p resolution. The bottom line is that at your current settings there's not enough muscle or bandwidth to feed either the GPU or the CPU with the information it needs. By playing it at low settings and resolution you're pushing more work onto your CPU to provide the muscle to perform the code executions to make things go smoothly.

If you want a refresh and better performance, you have to do an entire upgrade. There's various low-cost options for you if you want to go this route and it doesn't have to break the bank. Hell, you could partly finance it by considering selling your existing rig, although you may find a better use for it in another capacity besides gaming. But mostly, you're between four to six hardware generations behind the curve and its time to get back up to speed.

A quad is needed to game. Even a slow quad core is better than a fast dual core.

That's not exactly true. There's a tipping point where it makes little difference moving onto a quad-core when you're on a fast dual-core. Intel's proved that point with the Core i3 and even the Sandy Bridge Pentiums lacking Hyper-threading, by kitting them out with decent speeds, improved instruction sets, better efficiency and enough L3 cache to not hurt performance. AMD did that too to a point with Bulldozer, since the FX-4100 performs similarly to the Core i3-2120 despite it being a quad-core.

You don't need a quad-core for acceptable gaming performance these days, but it is optional. Balanced rigs still get things right (even cheaper ones) and its all about planning for the future and the resolution you're playing on, and at what settings.

[COMPUTEK]

@ NAG - Wesley

Nice Informative Post!

[NomNom]

At least that's mildly okay,if you really can't afford to get an upgrade bundle check if you can get at least a 75xx series Core 2 Duo and a 57xx series ATI card on the cheapo ( lots flying around on sites like carbonite ),will give you some breathing room,though ideally you should upgrade everything

I suspect you are talking about this?

http://www.carbonite.co.za/f10/core2...s-x-3-a-34494/

[PsyWulf]

I suspect you are talking about this?

http://www.carbonite.co.za/f10/core2...s-x-3-a-34494/

Among others,surprisingly yesterday lots of the exact ones I mentioned popped up all over carb

[NomNom]

Hmm I see that Pooky has actually seen that already, when you look at the bench marks there doesn't seem to be really a difference that would justify R450.

I must add though that if you compare his E6300 to even just a i3 2100 the difference in performance in phenomenal.


Just under R2000 to upgrade to 1155, with 4GB of ram, i3 2100 and the cheapest H61 motherboard I saw on Rebel Tech. Even a Pentium G850 would be a big upgrade.

[PsyWulf]

I must add though that if you compare his E6300 to even just a i3 2100 the difference in performance in phenomenal.


Just under R2000 to upgrade to 1155, with 4GB of ram, i3 2100 and the cheapest H61 motherboard I saw on Rebel Tech.

Which is why I recommended saving for a bundle upgrade

[NomNom]

Which is why I recommended saving for a bundle upgrade

Agreed.

[Pooky]

Thanks guys for the information. I think my best bet is rather just to wait and upgrade everything.

[killadoob]

I would steer well clear of a dual core, go for quadcore that way you are covered and you never land in a position where a game requires more power and you need to upgrade yet again

If you are going to upgrade shoot for a quadcore and nothing less.

[ponder]

Odd i would have thought games ported from console would run poorer on pc and have more issues over games made for pc. At least that is how i understand it.

Assasins Creed franchise is a good example of a poor console port that loves to chow cpu & gpu cycles even at 800x600 with everything off or on minimal setting.

But even if it's a native pc game it could require high specs of both while some games are happy with a average cpu but require a good gpu.

It really does depend on the game at the end of the day and the only guarantee is to have both a good cpu & gpu.

[Nameite]

I can play witcher 2 on 1920x1080, though frame rate drops sometimes but generally playable

Q8200 + 8gig 1600 ram + HD6850, didnt cost much

If you dying to play the game now, OC your cpu to 3ghz and get a HD6850 (or if your monitor supports lower framerate get a 5750)

[cerebus]

Tbh your 9600gt is going to be the biggest issue. I know people are saying wait and do everything and I agree to an extent but you could go 6850 for around ~1000 outlay and it would be night and day. 9600 is totally unusable these days.

[Pada]

Tbh your 9600gt is going to be the biggest issue. I know people are saying wait and do everything and I agree to an extent but you could go 6850 for around ~1000 outlay and it would be night and day. 9600 is totally unusable these days.

Yes, that GPU is definitely an issue.

But like one of my friends who had an C2D E6500 borrowed my MSI GTX460 1GB Cyclone OC card, and in BF2 he couldn't even utilize 40% of my graphics card due to his CPU being too weak! Oh, and this was even with the CPU overclocked 10-15%

So he'll need to either overclock that very far, or he'll need a new CPU & GPU ! Of course BattleField is very CPU & RAM intensive too - so it could be a different scenario with other games.

[Nameite]

Yes, that GPU is definitely an issue.

But like one of my friends who had an C2D E6500 borrowed my MSI GTX460 1GB Cyclone OC card, and in BF2 he couldn't even utilize 40% of my graphics card due to his CPU being too weak! Oh, and this was even with the CPU overclocked 10-15%

So he'll need to either overclock that very far, or he'll need a new CPU & GPU ! Of course BattleField is very CPU & RAM intensive too - so it could be a different scenario with other games.

Maybe he can use the 9600GT as a phyx card? Then his CPU requirements wont be so high (for BF2)

But his E6300 is seriously...in need of a replacement

How much does a Q6600 and a HD6850 cost these days second hand? Think that should sort him out