If he’s interested only in gaming, a faster Phenom II quad core is better than a slower Phenom II hex core. The GTS 450 puts it in the same ballpark as an HD 7750.
I’m going to assume you simply forgot to mention the RAM.
If he’s interested only in gaming, a faster Phenom II quad core is better than a slower Phenom II hex core. The GTS 450 puts it in the same ballpark as an HD 7750.
I’m going to assume you simply forgot to mention the RAM.
The problem with Passmark Ricky is it tests all cores being used so hex cores trump quad cores of the same generation/manufacturer. Games rarely use all the cores.
It’s going to be tough to debate this point if the Mods delete nearly all mentions of other games.
First Seas you will need to limit your comparisons to games that are B2P or F2P because the Gem shop in GW2 is it’s source of continuous income, unlike subscription based games.
I opened around 75-85 normal dragon coffers, collected since Dragon Bash started, before logging off tonight, got a ticket. Seeing how the drop rate data on the wiki suggests a 1 in 2000 chance of that, I was indeed quite lucky.
Also got one mini, one Cold Potion and three types of food items (and of course fireworks but they are quite common relatively speaking).
With all due respect, I don’t see how this is relevant to the current thread, which is about rich coffers. I’m happy for you though that your slot machine cashed out. That’s at the heart of the RNG model, and the reason this community remains divided on the issue. Yet, false advertising and gambling are very real issues, that take a special place in legal systems around the world. Certain commercial companies have been taken to court – and lost – for far less as a result of false advertising. If these were items in a regular store, most national watchdogs would have intervened by now. But because they’re virtual items, people don’t know what to do yet. Anet is exploiting this uncertainty to the fullest; with each update, it’s checking where the boundaries are, and what people will still accept.
Because 1) they are available in the normal Dragon Coffers and 2) random is random.
When will people understand that sometimes the odds aren’t in your favor and sometimes you bat 0.000 or flip 100 tails in a row.
It’s a dollar (or euro) a pull and if the chance is 1.25% (25x higher than normal Dragon Coffers) there is still a 2.3% chance in 300 pulls of not getting one. There is also only a 2.2% chance of getting 8, 0.9% chance of getting 9 and 0.5% chance of getting more than 9. There is still a 10.4% chance of not getting at least 1 at 180 rich coffers.
In my case, getting 1 in 75-85 at 2000:1 is 3.6-4.0%. A similar chance can be have with only 3 rich coffers at 80:1.
This all goes back to the disconnect between ANet’s definition of rare chance and the players. So what’s rare to you? Less than 50%? 10%? 5%?
Probability is a kitten people, learn and embrace this.
I opened around 75-85 normal dragon coffers, collected since Dragon Bash started, before logging off tonight, got a ticket. Seeing how the drop rate data on the wiki suggests a 1 in 2000 chance of that, I was indeed quite lucky.
Also got one mini, one Cold Potion and three types of food items (and of course fireworks but they are quite common relatively speaking).
In terms of cost effective gaming, the i5 is better in terms of price/performance so your friends are right from a certain point of view. Generally the top end i5 is $100 less than the top end i7 and is only 3-5% slower.
My point about the FX is that even the oldish Intel i7-2600 is about 40% faster executing a single thread running at 100% than the FX-8350. But when each are running 8 threads at 100%, they are nearly tied. The FX is good for certain types of applications but not games that are not held up by a slow graphics card.
And leaving Best Texture Filtering and Depth Blur on while everything else is turned down isn’t easing the burden on the video card either.
But really the problem is single thread performance and AMD CPUs aren’t currently designed to run single threads quickly rather it’s designed to run, in your case, 8 threads nearly as well on a cost basis as an Intel i7 quad core running 8 threads with Intel’s Hyper Threading turned on. Good for servers, not so good for games or lightly threaded applications.
I don’t think one can be built for that price to do what you are asking it to do. Not sure if one for 3x that price can do what you are asking it to do. The game engine simply doesn’t scale well when lots of players are on screen, even worse when they are firing off their abilities.
While VR is really something you must experience at least once, the over the shoulder 3rd person that most MMOs use can be very disorienting since not only where you are looking moves, the camera moves as well. If people feel a little queesy in 1st person just imagine being at the end of a boom being swung around merely by turning your head. Not an enjoyable experience since your eyes aren’t sinking with what your inner ear is sensing.
Just wanted to be sure. Had someone who wanted to put an i7 into the P4 motherboard once. Never sure about how tech savvy a poster is when reading their request.
Still, once you factor out the £90 for the CPU your video card budget is from £110-160 and that’s the HD 7790 or HD 7850 in the AMD realm or the GTX 650 Ti or GTX 650 Ti Boost for nVidia. The HD 7850 and the GTX 650 Ti Boost are at the high end of that range.
And like I said before all these cards are noticeably faster (50-100%) than the HD 7750 but are still unlikely to give you 60 FPS play in those games at 1080p except maybe in quiet moments of standing and admiring the scenery.
But not a lot of people have means of getting a Windows key for free (if you ignore the fact a TechNet subscription is $200-600 a year). My point was describing the box on Tom’s at only $650 is misleading. In my experience discussing DIY builds on various forums, those that gloss over the required offering to the Gods of Bellevue are acquiring a Windows key from less than reputable sources.
I’m truly sorry I lumped you in with them.
I do find it interesting you dismissed the i5-3470 quad core yet recommended a box containing an i3-3220 dual core that with an OEM copy of Windows Home would run $200 over the systems the OP were looking at. And Tom’s shows that for GW2, the dual core/hyper threaded nature of the i3-3220 would blunt performance over a true Intel quad core.
True, probably not enough to make sticking a $90 HD 7750 in that HP box the faster solution but you are sending mixed signals. My sin is being cheap and cautious over the PSU when it comes to recommending an replacement video card.
NCSOFT owns the holding company that owns ArenaNet and Carbine Studios. A holding company NCSOFT formed late November last year to hold their western subsidiaries that they already owned 100% of.
One way to look at it is all sales of all products go into a big pot and that money gets distributed to all the various entities in NCSOFT as NCSOFT sees fit.
Another way to look at it is each developer and distribution entity (NC Interactive and NC Europe) takes in their own sales, handle their own expenses and any profits are sent back to NCSOFT and any losses are covered by NCSOFT.
In the case of NC West Holdings which now own ArenaNet, Carbine and NC Interactive (unclear about NC Europe is part of this), which was created with it’s own $45 million or so piggy bank, it’s possible that it can cover it’s own losses and the profits can be claimed on paper by NCSOFT but not raided in full by them (think of the $45 million start up bank as a loan that is being repaid by the holding company entity).
Pick your poison. At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter in NCSOFT’s quarterly reports but if you are an aficionado of chapeaus made of Reynolds Wrap feel free to believe what you will.
Last three times I mass converted with Master kits I got a little under 1.8:1, that’s on over 200 ectos. I think some people’s luck in small batches are leading them to the wrong conclusion that Master kits ares a sure 2:1 thing.
Except Tom’s and other DIY sites tend to leave out that pesky $100 Microsoft Tax called an OS. I take it Limey that you are part of the “just pirate it” DIYers out there.
Thanks for the help. I sorta knew that the graphics card wasn’t all that great. if I were to upgrade that myself would it help any?
Yes, you can get a modest GPU like the Saphire HD 7750 for under $85 after $10 rebate at NewEgg or the Asus HD 7750 for $88 after a $20 rebate. Neither should remotely stress the PSU in that HP system and are roughly 4 times faster than either the GT 620 or the HD 7470.
Hi!
I am pretty new, and I am level 18. I have a friend that also plays GW2, and we like to party. But we only find good party…stuff in Black Lion Chests. These are not a problem, 4 gold/a Chest. The KEYS are the problem. I dont know how to find them, besides buying them. Can you guys help me?
P.S. I buy chests for tonics, they are awesome. Could you recommend other ways of getting cool tonics? Thanks.
That’s the point, the chests drop reasonably often, but you got to buy the keys.
Keys can be acquired from map completion, the human personal story arc and found in chests. They occasionally go on sale at 20% off at the gem store.
The thing is the BL chest is simply a Gem Store sample box with a very rare chance to get something truly fantastic. If you use boosters and one-shot items they you might think their fun. Otherwise their contents are mainly account bound junk.
This was posted at the end of last year but is still relivant.
Sadly, Tomshardware is paid reviews, so I won’t take anything that site has to say for truth.
I would like references on that. I’ve only found traditional Intel/AMD or nVidia/AMD fanboy accusations of Tom’s “obvious bios towards X so they must be getting paid”. I haven’t seen any of their reviews contradict reviews on components from multiple other sites.
And if you honestly don’t trust Tom’s, here are a few other sites.
Screw overclocking, the first one has the better CPU when it comes to gaming. Also supposedly comes with a 460w PSU according to HP’s specs which is a lot better than the usual crappy 300 watt ones you find in their home models.
Limey is right that the graphics are horrible. The GT 620 is faster than the Intel HD Graphics 2500 but that’s like saying a snail is faster than a dead snail. It really isn’t a gaming card, more of something you put into an HTPC to offload video decoding.
It is definitely a advancement as currently im on a old amd cpu which i got ages ago , not sure what it is?. Also my graphics card is a nVidia Quadro FX580 FX 580 which i got for 20 quid.
Okay now, this is important, you can’t drop a FX-6100 into any old AMD motherboard.
Download CPU-Z, install it, run it and please tell us what CPU (CPU tab, name and package), type and speed of RAM (memory tab) and motherboard (mainboard tab) you have.
If you are going to be forced to get a new motherboard, it opens up a whole new can of worms.
As for the video card, yes essentially a 9500GT so an HD 7750 IS a big step up but still not great for 1080p so lower your expectations or resolution and graphic settings.
If the amount of gold in the world increases and demand for an item does not, the price of that item will rise. That’s the Eco 101 definition of inflation.
Now drops of coin and items, and those items sold to a vendor, are the sole sources of gold entering the world. Any money received at the TP is simply from another player, minus 5% from you and 10% from him. Between that, armor repair, way points and buying from vendors with coin, ideally the amount of gold among all the players is increasing slowly.
Doubling the amount of gold you have will seem like a good thing. Unless everyone doubles the amount of gold they have in which case your buying power will remain the same at the TP.
I wait 10-15 seconds once I get that message and I’m usually good for a couple of sales then I hit the message again.
Yes it’s annoying. Yes the error could be worded better so it actually tells you to slow down. This is the drawback with a TP that covers all the worlds.
If these boxes aren’t bringing in significant real money into Anet’s coffers, they would have stopped offering them. They have been evolving.
F&F – BL Chest contained the skin
SoSS – Consortium Chests had the skin and they could drop, rarely, from critters
DB – Two Chests, one that drop frequently containing a much lower chance at everything that’s in the gem chest. But the skin is still rare even in the gem chest.
@Stormcrow – not a big believer in working within the limits set by the OP do you.
@Guardian of hell
I will assume you already have an AMD socket AM3+ motherboard since you are looking to upgrade to a FX-6100 from, I assuming, an Athlon II dual core or Phenom II quad core. Nice if you mention what you have since you may be unintentionally down grading your CPU when it comes to gaming.
HD 7750 is a fairly weak graphics card. Looking at Aria PC, I see pricing for an HD 7750 is from £62-100. But for £113-127 there’s the HD 7790 or £125 for a GTX 650 Ti. Both of those are 50% faster than the HD 7750. And even with either of these more expensive graphic cards, you aren’t going to like the frame rate at 1080p in Farcry 3 or BF3 unless you turn some of the video settings down or run at a lower resolution.
As for GW2, again, would really like to know what your CPU and video card is now to determine if the FX-6100 is actually an upgrade and whether or not £200 is enough to make a significant impact in gaming performance or whether you should save more.
Also it’s important when talking about upgrading components like the CPU and graphics card that your CPU is robust enough to handle the extra power load.
while I truly appreciate being surrounded by all computer science majors with master’s degrees that advise the best way to fix gw2 is to get a $10,000.00 computer – I admit to looking at benchmarks and facts.
And what does that have to do with the price of tea in China or importantly gaming. The OP asked for opinions on either the FX-4350 or FX-8320, neither are expensive CPUs ($130 and $160). We aren’t talking about the over the top socket 2011 CPUs that range from $570 to over $1000.
If you want to compare inexpensive CPUs as related to gaming, check out this article and chart
I run with a conservative guesstimate of 1.7:1 for master kits. I don’t believe I ever got close to 2:1 with master kits with the hundred+ ectos I’ve done.
When you are talking about AMD FX processors you have to remember that the cores are paired up in “modules” and running 4 threads in two modules is slower than 4 threads in four modules, by 20% even in the latest version of those processors. With three primary threads in GW2 chewing up 70% of total CPU usage within the game, I would go with the 4 module/8 core CPU over the faster 2 module/4 core model.
Well Mb marketing goes back to the day when dial-up was popular and the general populous understood modem baud rate as an indication of speed. "Dial-up is only 56K max while our broadband is 15Mb or 15000Kb.
Just like the term “unlimited” in reference to ISP plans comes from the time when dial-up was restricted to only X hours a month and not the amount of data consumed.
Did it or would it unbalance the economy? Did it or would it unbalance PvP or WvW? Did it or would it allow a player taking advantage of this to level their character faster?
Random is random. But as humans we recognize streaks. We attribute it to good luck or bad luck. We also cling onto the fallacy that previous results will affect future ones. “I’m due, just one more time.” We adopt superstitious rituals in an attempt to control chance.
I for instance will salvage my rares at a very slow pace because I think it avoids streaks where I don’t get an ecto. Any basis in reality? If I bother to document my results and analyze them probably not really. But if I salvage quickly and not get an ecto, it simply reinforces this belief. Especially if it’s a streak of no ectos. I’ve selectively ignore the times when salvaging quickly yielded an ecto or even a streak of ectos and let the negative outcome influence my future behavior.
But Smooth what he’s suggesting is each box/crate drops say 3-7 wachits and if the devs originally wanted a 1 in 50 chance set the cost to say 250 wachits. If you are lucky it’ll take fewer crates, if unlucky more.
This allows the player going for to get an idea of how many they need, worse case, the drop rate based on total crates open is the same but what gets eliminated are the 3 sigma cases of getting one with 3 crates or not getting one with 200. Heck you could if you are clever set up a distribution of wachits where there’s a rare chance you will get a bucket load of them, as long as the overall average is still 5, minimum of 2.
No, hasn’t been for quite a long time assuming you are looking at converting gold to gems to buy them.
With rares we’ve seen BLSK yield an extra 0.35 ectos on average per rare over a master kit. Considering the price of ectos are like 19s now and a BLSK at current exchange rates is 40s per use … 19s x 0.35 < 40s . Ectos would have to sell for 1.16g at the current exchange rate just break even.
What BLSKs are good for is a 100% chance in getting an upgrade out. Most players I imagine reserve them for extracting Superior Runes and Sigils out of exotics.
