That`s not entirely true I have a phenom 2 x4 965 and get anywhere from 30 to 80+fps in spvp and pve.The only areas that I have issues is large WvW and black citadel. But if you have the cash go for the Intel chip to eliminate any issues.
Anyways, to the OP… if you want playable WvW then you probably need an i5/i7. If you’re happy with pve/spvp then you have more options.
You could even buy a GTX690, but with a Q9550@2.83GHz forget about it. Try fitting a Porsche engine inside a Fiat Panda, it’s the same kind of ordeal!
You bring up a good point, I’m just thinking down the road the lifetime of the 7870 > 560 Ti, but when paired with an old school q9550 it’s in a different realm.
It does not appear to overclock well, but nevertheless its $100 and it’s reasonable if you really, really don’t want to go with a new mobo/i5/ddr3ram which is in the ballpark of $300.
560 ti isn’t too “powerfull”. If you have good Power supply. I have Corsair VX550W Power supply with nVidia GTX 560 ti CU II and i have stable 60fps. And i have 12Gb RAM but game uses about 2-4Gb only. So i would recommend better Graphic card.
Stick with your RAM, I use 4GB with same OS and with nothing else running in the background I have about 900MB to spare which leaves room for some stuff.
Look up an overclocking guide for the Q9550 and purchase a $30 Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus, it supports your CPU socket. You should be able to increase from 2.83 to roughly 3.6MHz.
The best part of going with a top-line video card is you will be set for at least a couple years. Even if you get a new computer you can just plug the video card in.
Just FYI, if you’re going to go laptop you gain some convenience but you also loose some. You’ll be paying almost double the price to get the same experience… for a shorter period of time. They are quite limited when looking into performance upgrades. To maintain a “current” gaming laptop you’ll need to buy a brand new one roughly every 2 to 3 years. For a desktop you can upgrade the hardware. A video card is an easy upgrade for anyone. A CPU, power supply, motherboard can be upgraded but does require some planning and knowledge or at least a friend with the same.
My wife has an HD 5770 runs fine on Medium settings, low shadows at 1920×1200. She has an i5 760/4gb ram. PvE is always above 20-30fps (frame limited to 30) depending on situations. WvW varies from 15-30fps. I’ve heard no complaints.
In Catalyst Control Center confirm AA and AF are application controlled (turned off), I know the 5770 cannot handle that. Also, make sure the fan on the card is clean, it will clock down if it is not cooling properly due to too much dust.
If I were you I’d try disabling audio at different levels. Adjust resolutions, try to zero in on what is the limiting factor. Obviously, drop shadows to none, that usually has a large impact on my experience and it appears (and from what I’ve read) it is mostly CPU bound.
Adjust your graphics software settings to see how it impacts the game, and anything else that comes into play from start to finish.
Yeah that’s screwed up. I’d be very curious if someone with your exact rig is playing fine, and then to find out what is different… It could be something you’d normally unsuspect like the power supply is insufficient or an audio driver is bottlenecking the game.
Agreed, but that gets into a number of other factors. The same situations folks are encountering in the low fps thread even for high-end intel CPU’s with high end GPU’s.
Normally, that indicates a bottleneck probably due to a hardware or driver unrelated to the CPU.
AMD CPUs… this is a bit broad. Although, in general AMD CPUs are an economical choice. As such we inherently give up quality of gameplay to save money.
ArenaNet has stated they are constantly working to improve their engine’s performance. That is the likely response to this question which includes any budget CPU.
That said, I have read a number of users with AMD rigs that are playing just fine, albeit most are overclocked.
Yeah, welcome to MMO land. Minimum requirements in an MMO generally equates to 15fps when questing in a quiet zone with absolute lowest settings/resolution. It has no guarantees beyond that.
Some people just want to harvest/craft and use the trading post… minimum requirements will work. It would be difficult to do the main storyline without recommended settings.
Check my sig for details. I play a ton of WvW. I set shadows on low, FXAA off but otherwise high settings at 1920×1200.
Insane sieges are generally 15-25fps but rarely under 20fps, playable imo. Everything else varies from 35-60fps. If I’m in a PvE mood I’ll do high shadows.
My wife has the same rig except an HD 5770. At Medium settings and low shadows in PvE it is smooth (20-40fps). Insane WvW sieges may dip to 10fps but generally 15-20fps.
My main concern is actually building the pc. I have 0 knowledge in that area. Will either of these two sites build it for me…? pretty please?
Yes, they build it for you. Or you could ask a friend or a friend of a friend to build it and get a considerably better machine for the same cost. Offer them dinner or something… :b
If you want Medium/High settings unfortunately you’re going to need a new rig. The CPU, the 300w power supply, the GPU and the 32bit OS are all not capable. You need to upgrade all four of those to get there… most likely including your motherboard.
In theory, depending on your motherboard (PCI-Express x16 slot?) you could drop $60 on a new GPU such as the Radeon HD 6670 which only has a TDP of 66watts. This would be more consistently playable with Low settings but not consistently playable with Medium/High settings – certainly not in very busy situations.
Agreed, a laptop is roughly twice the price for the same experience and very limited in terms of upgrade ability. It’s the convenience factor that a lot of people prefer.
If you can find someone to help you build it from scratch then you’ll save roughly 25-30% the overall cost. $700 vs $900.
You’ll need to purchase a video card separately. Integrated video will not cut it in GW2. Consider the Radeon 7750 or better depending on the type of power supply in the unit. I didn’t see it mentioned there…
Yeah, what Rolo said. My wife has a 5770 at 1920×1200 with an i5 760 and she does surprisingly well for the card. Smooth at Medium settings for all PvE. Low settings in heavy WvW situations yields 15-30fps , still playable. This game is both GPU and CPU hungry. But I suspect heavy WvW requires an i5 or better for smooth play.
If your CPU is currently pegged at 100% in heavy WvW situations then you know what is needed. You could nab a new i5+mobo+ram and pair it with the 5770 before deciding the next GPU.
I know it sucks but everyone communicating their issues with low fps on high end systems are in the minority. The majority of players are playing the game fine even with cards like GTX260 (my wife is fine in WvW with a radeon 5770 for example).
I’m not saying there isn’t an issue with the game, but for the most part folks are doing fine. There is clearly some setting that is conflicting with some relative unknown… and it appears to be related to the GW2 patches. But like I said this isn’t across the board to everyone (I’d guess at 2% out of 1 million players leaving 20000 ppl posting unhappiness).
I’m sure it’ll get cleared up… hopefully sooner than later!!
Back to the OP’s question, you have an ancient motherboard. You do have a solid GPU however. If you want to fully enjoy GW2 you really want a quad core (preferably i5/i7 cpu) and Win7 64bit OS for at least 4GB ram since XP only sees up to roughly 3.2GB.
1. Dual cores are not very good for this game. Too CPU-dependant, hopefully this is fixed sooner than later though.
2. 4GB of RAM leaves roughly 2GB or less for the game. Not enough. Game uses 1.5gb+ pretty consistently, if you have pretty much anything else running you will run out of memory. You might still even with nothing else running.
3. 4870, noticeably slower than my 4890, and that could barely handle the game. Time to upgrade man, those cards are over 4 years old. We are 3 generations beyond the 4xxx series now. And if your 4870 isn’t even the 1GB model then you’re just going to be SOL performance-wise (goes back to the “time to upgrade your card” bit). Modern day games use well over 512mb VRAM.
1. Correct – 4 cores is basically mandatory if you want 30+fps at all times. If you only have 2 cores then drop shadows to None.
2. Incorrect – I have 4GB ram (Win7 64b) and I generally have about 800MB to 1GB to spare after hours of WvW. Windows 7 occupies about a GB outside of game, but I do make sure no other “crap” is running in the background (msconfig is your friend).
3. Not sure – But my 5870 is a beast for everything except the most intense WvW at 1080p. I reckon the 4870 is about 20% less performance, not great, but not pitiful. If you only have 512MB vram then run at 900p or less.
2Core Intel processor… what kind? I definately recommend lowering Shadows and report back. This game is more CPU dependent than relative games but if you drop shadows you should see a noticeable improvement. That said, 4 cores is the way to go.
You’re right it is buggy. From my experience and what I have read you may have better luck queuing from a non-overflow zone. If you get prompted to switch from overflow you probably want to requeue. Also, helps to relog before queueing. And if you’re waiting more than 20 minutes then relog and requeue.
There are more questions than answers on WvWvW queuing, especially since they don’t give a time or player count estimate.
