6870s are hawtsauce fo sho

lol, how are your 6870's crossfire working out for you?

Which do you prefer:

6870 w/ 8 gigs of ram and X6 1100T
OR
6950 w/ 4 gigs of ram and X6 1100T

both at 1920x1080

The 6950 for sure. You won't see a big difference between the 4GB and 8GB of ram in gaming anyway, plus it's a very easy and cheap upgrade down the road.

They are awesome, playing dirt 3, oblivion at max settings, got morrowind going again with MGE and distant land with custom water shaders looking awesome, max texture sizes and everything.



the 6950 config would be best, nothing's going to use 8 gigs of ram, you could see full utilization on 4 depending on what's open. but honestly, save up another 50 bucks (if that) and get the 8 gigs, then you're free to multitask to your heart's content, and you won't have to even think about the possibility that you'll run low on physical memory.

Better yet. Don't get a X6 1100T and instead get a i5-2500k. It's way better and it's using the same socket as Ivy Bridge.

That depends on your purpose really. Intel is the fastest right now and their top end will probably always be the fastest by some margin. However, you buy that processor, and the only upgrade you'll be able to go to will be hideously expensive, and then they'll release a new socket so the next upgrade after that you need to buy a new mobo as well.

My 1100 is top of the line for AMD right now, I got it oc'd to 4.2GHz easy enough, it was cheap, and in a few months when Bulldozer finally gets released I'll have another affordable upgrade ready for me that will also be readily overclockable.

Intel is for people who have money to burn, or who aren't interested in upgrading components and just buy new PCs instead.

MS Windows SP3 AMD Phenom 9650 Quad-Core Processor
3 GB Ram, ATI Radeon HD 4550
Thinking of changing the 4550 card but what do you guys think and what cards do you know that are good priced and good for gaming.

If you're going to stick with that build I wouldn't bother buying anything higher than a Radeon 6850 unless you're planning upgrades soon thereafter.

However, with an upgraded video card you should have no real problem running skyrim, maybe have to turn down some of the settings depending on how ram-hungry or cpu intensive the game turns out to be at the high end.

This ^ I think AMD has much more bang for your buck currently, with a lot of things not just CPU's.

Will my laptop be able to run Skyrim, and if so, at what level?

CPU: Intel Core i7-2630QM @ 2.00GHz (8 CPUs)
VGA: NVIDIA Geforce GT 540M / 1GB DDR3
RAM: 8GB

I'd say you'll be set with solid medium settings, give or take a little depending on the resolution.

Thanks for the help! My resolution is 1920x1080, using a lower resolution should help with the FPS?

At that resolution you probably just be able to get medium settings, but I'd rather play at that then say a lower resolution with high settings. 1080p(1920 x1080) will still look very good at medium settings.

Best bang for your buck CPU currently is the 2500k.

Little more expensive but it does beat AMD's CPU's atm and the Bulldozer will nto be as good as the next gen I7's

Ok, this is where I am currently at, with a DELL 8300, I bought new in 2004.

PIV 3.0ghz Dual Core

4 gigs of system ram

VisionTek ATI Radeon HD3650 1gig DDR2

Dell 2702WFP monitor, currently running 1920x1200

Where does that put me as starting?

I am thinking I really need to get a totally new system, to really run this game the right way, what do you think, and recommend?

you can get by with the CPU/RAM but the video card is the thing you need to upgrade no choice I don't even know if it can play any game.

If your serious in getting a entirly new rig however I would start off with a i5 2500k and go from there but you can always upgrade the GPU now on your current rig and then save up for the rest of the parts later on and just switch it over when you get it.

This money to burn argument has gotten old for me. Yes, AMD has some nice bang for buck chips (Phenom II 955/965) but the 1100T is not one of them. The 1100T is a $190 chip...the 2500K is a $200-$220 chip at most online places. I got mine at Microcenter for $180 and another $40 off the motherboard. Fry's had the chip for $150 just recently. Sure, not everyone has a MC or Fry's store, but it just to show a point: the price difference isn't very big, but the 2500K pounds the 1100T when it comes to games.

There isn't a single AMD chip right now that can touch it (in games) and I'm not so sure Bulldozer even can at this point. I had high hopes for AMD this year, but the delays are just shocking to say the least. And if it does turn up to be something to at least match it, Ivy Bridge (die shrink) isn't far off to put it behind again. Right now, the 2500K is quite the bang for buck and you can thank it for dropping those Phenom II X4 chips to the price levels that they are now.

The thing about the 2500K though is how well and easy it is to overclock it. I've built hundreds of PCs in the past (mostly for customers) and this is the first time I've actually felt one wouldn't need to change the CPU for 3-5 years especially if one is willing to overclock the chip. 4.6GHz+ and it simply just flies and i can't see it being a bottleneck for maybe a few generation of video cards. Software is well behind CPU hardware advancement...most games still at most utilize only two cores.

And I have the same feeling for Bulldozer as well. Get one and won't really have to upgrade for years. At the price point of the 1100T...I have to say that chip is NOT worth it. Unless Dabenguin (person who posted about it) is some die hard AMD fan that just must have something now, he/she should either wait for Bulldozer or get a 2500K if something must be had now. Or rather get something cheap like a Phenom X4 955 and an AM3+ good to go board in prep for Bulldozer....still, somewhat of a waste in the end IMO. Could've been sittin pretty with a 2500K.




That's one of the weaker quads in existence that will bottleneck a lot of cards these days. I personally wouldn't even go further than a Radeon 5770/6770. The GTX 460 or Radeon 6850 at the very most.

Please be sure power supply is adequate for the video card upgrade....don't just assume it will be.





I doubt you could even get by with the rather dated CPU, which will be the biggest problem. The Pentium 4 is a Dual-Core pretender....very very bad implementation of HyperThreading through ALL the Netburst based chips. It really is only a single core chip and I can almost guarantee it will struggle. Not many single core users have had a pleasant experience with FO3 or FNV for that matter. I would expect the same here.

The video card is more in the low-medium range.

Should invest in new PC....and look into building one yourself.

Question for the tech heads on here


I have a fairly decent Desktop that i know will run Skyrim on at least Average/High settings, but what i really would love, is to be able to play Skyrim on my little portable notebook.. i wonder if it would be possible on lowest settings and low resolution?
I know the CPU lets it down, but i can play Oblivion, Mass Effect 2 etc. maxed out on it, GTA IV and even The Witcher 2 on lowest settings.

Okay, specs are -


Alienware M11X (R1)

Intel Core 2 Duo SU7300,
Processor Speed: 1.3 GHz O/C @ 1.6 Ghz
Memory
RAM Size: 4 GB
Computer Memory Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Hard Drive
Hard Drive 320 GB
Graphics
Graphics Card Description: Nvidia GT 335M
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB
Additional Specifications
Operating System: Windows 7 Edition Home Premium



i know the CPU is really the bottleneck, but anyone reckon it could play Skyrim on lowest settings?

Thx

Well I ran Fallout 3 pretty well, I guess, I set it on Ultra and played it alright, now was it as smooth as it could have been? No Way. But playable No Doubt.

With Fallout NV I have to run that in compatibility mode, but even doing that it runs alright, I can run in High, and the game plays pretty well.

That being said I am a sniper and stealth based player and that game play worked just fine.

I am in agreement for sure, and new one is the way to go, I have been watching this thread for a good way to do that, I am not so inclined to build one myself, buying is the way I will probably go.

But I was going to wait till the game is out and people are actually running it to see what is the best way to go.

Also, I do understand that you have Very Good Knowledge on that now as well.

Hopefully you will still be working this kind of thread with knowledge of actual game play on systems to point me in the right direction.

Low settings, maybe even some medium. But yea, I'd expect that CPU to be a bit laggy. If you can run Witcher 2 to your liking, this game shouldn't be a problem.




I have to admit, you're the first with a single core CPU that I've read about that was comfortable with the level of play in those games. Most found it intolerable. Guess people are different.

I'll be around to help if you need a build. If you want a PC build, stop by the http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1224422-the-community-tech-thread-no-104/ ...you'll likely lose your question in this side of the forums when things get crazy around here.

Great, yeah thats what i was guessing. Thx.

I love my little 11.6 inch portable beast

"Most found it intolerable"

I am 100% sure your are correct, and that in my case I am 100% sure that it is I didn't know any better not to tolerate it.. lol

I will be looking at that thread and am doing so now as well, as far as building one, I think I know enough to screw that up royally, which is why I have always bought one and never built one.

But maybe I can go that way, I would have to get a lone to buy one, I am retired Navy and just have my pension to live on, so I don't really have my own large reserves of cash to piece it together.

So I have just bought one from Dell in the past and paid it off as quickly as possible.

But I do know building one is the way to go, for a more cost effective and more powerful system that I can buy as a whole.

EDIT: I will post what I have in the other thread as to have a starting point there, Thank You For Your Help.

Processor: Intel® Core™2 Duo CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Memory: 2048MB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285
Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3

I have an intel core i72600 at 3.4ghz, 8gb of ram and a 5770 graphics card. Do you think that would run skyrim better than an xbox 360?