Guild Wars 2

In my opinion the game is both GPU and CPU bound. How can it be both? I am not an expert on 3D gaming performance, but in some cases I hit very high fps with high GPU util., and in some cases my GPU is 50% util and the fps is low…that suggests it can be both.

Which suggests that you want a GPU proven to be ok at the game ( see the Tom’s hardware article on GW 2 performance) and an i5 processor or better, preferably one allowing multiple overclocking.

That’s by best guess given what I have seen.

Welcome to the club. I have two GTX 670s in SLI.

Some claim this proves the game is CPU bound. That could explain why I can get as high as 150 fps in the game, but when the frame rate goes low, GPU util. seems to go low (maybe CPU utilization then goes high.)

You are hitting a pretty high CPU utilization possibly vindicating the CPU bound issue on our hardware ( I have a similar an Ivy Bridge CPU, i7 3770, but mine is mult. locked, so I can crank it up 400 Mhz to see if that helps.)

I have an i7 3770 (locked multiplier version.) I have two EVGA GTX 670 cards in SLI. I am running the latest beta driver I could find.

My fps are as high as 150, and normally, I suspect I get 80fps average (rough guess.)

In some locations, I drop to low 40s. It’s not necessarily related to dynamic variations such as nearbye battles. It seems to be due to that area and and what direction you are looking which determines the drop. It could be CPU limited in these cases, in which case it’s not clear how to fix that except to OC the CPU, which I can’t do with a non K version of the CPU.

What’s useless? Building a new PC? Since when?

Seems more helpful to answer the question…I don’t understand people…sigh

I suggest building the PC yourself especially as your budget is rather limited. There’s entire videos online showing the process in detail as well as written explanations. If you take a few hours to go over this stuff, you can do what MANY people have done – built their own machine.

$750 is definitely tight. Can you re-use parts off an existing computer such as the case, optical drive, etc.?

I suggest double that, but I understand money is tight.

Can you swing an i5 model with the K, indicating unlocked core? That would be helpful to see if a bit of overclocking helps; some people are claiming the game is CPU bound (the bottleneck is sometimes the CPU, not the video card.)

With that budget, you are a big limited on the video card. Maybe you can still find deals on older tech.

Sometimes there’s nice bundle deals. I saw a GPU/motherboard bundle at New Egg with a Radeon 7870 for under $400. An i5 3570k would add $230 to that price. That would give you $630. RAM should be under $50, that makes $680. A case and PSU might be less than $100 making $780. Optical drive $20. A hard drive would run you under $100, making it 900. Not going to bother will all the math. But if you have a case and other existing gear, you can save some cash and maybe hit that $750 with a decent CPU and GPU.

And you may need $100 for the OS as well.

Not sure why virtual cores would be detrimental, but it’s hardly a simple topic. You can always turn them off In which case the i7 has very little over the i5.

My opinion is that this would consistitute a fix. Why can’t a fix require different hardware? If you were running on a Commodore 64, your fix would obviously be to buy new hardware

Semantics I guess, but let’s not be silly

Those frame rates do seem high. What settings?

I have a comparable CPU, the i7 3770. And I have some minor fps issues with that CPU and dual GTX 670 cards. I run at max settings on a 1080p display. My fps drops as low as 40 fps in some areas. I think I would average over 80 fps, but I have not done a long duration test. I can hit over 120fps in some areas, but that’s not the norm.

The worst I have seen is the main sylvania area ( intentionally mispelling.) Seems like some vantages with open space and a long distance to distance objects hammer the system. Unfortunately, I have a locked i7, so I can’t test to see if more clock would help. It definitely seems to be boosting to the limits of the CPU (mildly overclocked via bclk)

I have attempted to figure out what the load is on all 8 cores, but I have not quite figured that out yet. I suspect in some areas, the game IS CPU bound.