Guild Wars 2

Hello! I recently bought GW2 and just found out my graphics card is WAY below the minimum requirements. (Much to my surprise after using the ‘can you run it website’.)

This issue is stopping me from even installing the game. (Downloads 10k kbs, then opens again and closes itself.)

So I believe I have narrowed the issue down to the graphics card. So that’s where I am wondering if some of you could help me out.

My budget is pretty thin and I wouldn’t want to spend any more than 100$(Canadian) if I can help it.

So any ideas of a decent graphics card that is hopefully above the minimum requirements enough to run the game decently? I am lost when it comes to these kinds of things so any help is much appreciated.

return your copy of GW2, your comp is not made for this.

Well evidently it’s too late for that.

So care to tell me what else needs to be upgraded? I know it isn’t very good at all, and would barely meet the minimum requirements but I would like to try. If it didn’t work out a graphics card would do well for my other games as well so I don’t have much to lose.

What CPU do u have?

AMD Phenom™ 8400 Triple-Core Processor (3 CPUs), ~2.1GHz
- From the GA report.

It is a bit old i don’t think the GPU upgrade will give u a enjoyable experience without upgrading the whole motherboard+CPU. Nevertheless, u can get a good radeon hd7750 for 100$ it will serve u well for gaming. And just wait untill u have money to upgrade the rest of ur components, or just gather 400$ at least and get yourself a whole new budget system capable of playing this and other games just fine.

Look at the GW2 system requirements. Your (Phenom) 64×3 processor is better then an (Athlon) 64×2. But your performance might be bad since it’s only ~2.1GHz. Google around to see where your CPU stands compared to current ones.

If you’re on a budget, I suppose you could try to upgrade the power supply and graphics card, instead of buying a complete new PC.

Things to take into consideration.

1) Operating System. -ok
2) Processor. -ok
3) Available memory. -ok. But it looks like you can add more if you want. You don’t need to though.
4) Power Supply 250 W -not ok. You will need to replace this in order to install a new graphics card. Google the reasons why.
5) PCI Express® 2.0 x16 graphics card support -keep this in mind while buying a graphics card. Some will tell you that 3.0 cards are ok in 2.0 slots… but I disagree. Especially since your CPU and RAM is not up to date. So stick with PCI E 2.0 x16.

PS: If you did buy a new graphics card and a power supply… those could be considered short term investments.
A nice power supply could be swapped into a future PC. And most retail PCs usually always need a better power supply unit. The same with the graphics card.

Rampage.7145:

It is a bit old i don’t think the GPU upgrade will give u a enjoyable experience without upgrading the whole motherboard+CPU. Nevertheless, u can get a good radeon hd7750 for 100$ it will serve u well for gaming. And just wait untill u have money to upgrade the rest of ur components, or just gather 400$ at least and get yourself a whole new budget system capable of playing this and other games just fine.

Thanks for the info! I will possibly upgrade other components if it needs it but I didn’t want to spend loads of money on a single part (like the graphics card).

One other thing, if I upgrade the graphics card would it allow me to run the game? Even if it was terrible quality?

If that was possible I would work on upgrading the rest of the system.

Look at the GPU chart here in Part 2.2 of this thread

Go down the list until you find one that fits your budget/needs.

Yeah if u upgrade the videocard u can run the game, but frames won’t be nice cuz the CPU would be crppling the GPU performance. But u should be able to at least run the game and may be playing a bit, paired with a good CPU the card should run this game at high settings at 30+ FPS easy
HD 7750 100$
HD 7770 120$
GTX 650ti 150$
Those are the budget options i would recomend do not go any lower, just as i listed the cards the more expensive 650ti will perform better than the hd7750 ofc.
Check out this article it will give u a very good idea of what to get according on how much u want to spend:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107-3.html
also there is a videocard hierarchy chart there that will show u how the compare to each other.

Thank you for all the information and suggestions everyone, you have all been a great help! I will probably go with the HD 7750 as it fits my budget quite well and seems to be a good quality. I will continue to look into other computer upgrades for long term effect.

Once again, thank you all!

Your PC is not going to play this game well no mater what you put in it old AMD 2.1GHz processor ouch. Also just a 250Watt (old) powersupply.

first Ignore Voxel, he dosnt know WTF hes talking about…..

second, a cheap upgrade path for you, after a 15second google would be.

Athlon II X3 460/AM3 3.4 GHz 2MB-L2 95w $75.24 shipped
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004Z68O94/?tag=pcpapi-20

or an even better deal for overall perf

http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=ADX645WF&c=CJ
AMD Athlon II X4 Quad-Core Processor Model 645 3.1GHz Socket AM3, OEM – ADX645WFK42GM

these fit within the specs found at
http://support.acer.com/acerpanam/desktop/0000/Acer/AspireM1201/AspireM1201sp2.kittenml

so yeah, my advice, upgrade to one of those cpu’s, grab yourself a 7770 and a cheap quality psu.

this should cover it
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817101011

or,if you want one that will be worth moving to a new rig in a year or so when you have saved up.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182076

and before anybody complains about the last one check the reviews, neweggs getting most of their rosewill powersupplies made by superflower now, one of the worlds top OEM’s, and the reviews are showing the quality….

either way, the upgrade listed above is the cheapest way to keep that pc working with modern games for a nother year or 2, it wont win any contests and wont let you WvWvW but, you will be able to play the game smoother then you can now

also note: it will run other games GREAT compared to what you have now.

if you want a game that would run great on the above upgrade, try Tera, its quest systems anoyingly old skool but, its f2p now and the combat systems a complete blast!!!! and it will run well on the above listed upgrade……far better then gw2 does….