A question about possible gfx card upgrade, as related to cpu.

[Zukas]

Wow thanks for all the great replies guys.

My PSU says "max output 500w"

So if NVIDIA says minimum is 450w, does that mean it will run fine with my PSU?

Is it worth it with the 2.66ghz CPU and 2 gigs of ram? I feel like I should be more worried about CPU than ram, my ram rarely fills up, but I am running low settings.

And Tychus, I guess I'm a tech-moron but I don't even know what a "benchmark" is or how to interpret that information.

[Crazy_Jonny]

Wow thanks for all the great replies guys.

My PSU says "max output 500w"

So if NVIDIA says minimum is 450w, does that mean it will run fine with my PSU?

Is it worth it with the 2.66ghz CPU and 2 gigs of ram? I feel like I should be more worried about CPU than ram, my ram rarely fills up, but I am running low settings.

And Tychus, I guess I'm a tech-moron but I don't even know what a "benchmark" is or how to interpret that information.

Again, your CPU is fine. I've seen people run this game just fine on Athlon Dual Cores, let alone Core 2 Duo which are superior. It's when you get into Pentium 4 territory you'll have a problem.

But in addition to the video card I think you should get another gb or 2 of RAM. That's where you're going to bottleneck the video card.

And benchmarks are like tests. There are websites out there like tomshardware that'll compare performance between similar leagued computer parts.

Hope that helps.

[Twilice]

played on low/medium, now after I bought 460 GTX (cheap version) I play everything on ultra 1v1 and 2v2.

(in larger battle's there isn't really any difference between lower settings and ultra, they both lagg. But I think that is the processor or ram.)

[TheEconomist]

A CPU is going to lag eventually in SC2 since it only uses two cores. I have a Core i5 3.46Ghz and I still lag in some huge battles/UMS maps. There's just no avoiding that unless they optimize StarCraft 2 to use four or more cores.

[Crazy_Jonny]

A CPU is going to lag eventually in SC2 since it only uses two cores. I have a Core i5 3.46Ghz and I still lag in some huge battles/UMS maps. There's just no avoiding that unless they optimize StarCraft 2 to use four or more cores.

On ladder matches I don't experience any problems with my stock core i5. Only in UMS will I occasionally find some lag, but I think that's more due to my video card (HD5450) and the fact that some people need to optimize their maps better (play 1 million zerglings and you'll see what I mean).

[hyde]

Guys, I get about 100 FPS in most areas, the water kills my ATI 5770 1GB to like 30FPS.
Although the game is perfectly rendered at 60+FPS in 1v1's, it's pretty bad in custom games.

I was wondering, upgrading from ATI 5770 to nVidia GeForce 460 GTX or whatever...the one that SCLEGACY JUST reviewed....
I have a feeling it'll be a stupid idea since the marginal gains vs cost = horrible.
I know I'll get smoother FPS by at least 10-20% increases but for another 200$?
And I doubt anyone will buy an ATI 5770 -_-.

My specs

i7 920 @ 2.6 ghz stock
6GB of Triple channel 1600 MHZ gamer ram
64 bit Win 7 Pro
ATI 5770 1GB; it's a 128 bit card =\

Maybe I will just wait until the next gen of products by nvidia/ATI before I upgrade.

[dustinbrowder]

I'm looking to get a new graphics card for SC2. I'm currently running on,

Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.7GHz
2Gigs of ram
and my NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GS


My question is, if I were to purchase, say, a NVIDIA GeForce GTX-460, like this guy did, would my CPU be able to handle it and run SC2 like he does in the video? Or anywhere near it? I want to be able to 1v1 on Ultra settings no lag at all. My worst fear is needing a new CPU for that in addition to the graphics card.

Your CPU is good, don't worry about it. CPU's have very small gains in 3D performance over series, so the biggest difference you are going to notice is going from your current one to a Core I7 930 or better.

So don't worry about that.

I'd purchase the GTX 460 1GB, do you know that the 1GB and 768mb perform very differently due to smaller bus on the 768mb one?
So go for the 1GB one, its also more future proof with the 1GB GDDR.

Don't get fooled by "quality" and generic PSU's. There is a difference, but its just very small.
So a generic 600W and a "quality" 550W is pretty much the same.
You would want to go with a more expensive PSU only if you plan on extensive overclocking.

2GB is good, but I'd look into getting 2GB more if I were you, since today's games become more and more ram hungry.

[mikill]

This may help: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/vid...f-liberty.html

[dustinbrowder]

Guys, I get about 100 FPS in most areas, the water kills my ATI 5770 1GB to like 30FPS.
Although the game is perfectly rendered at 60+FPS in 1v1's, it's pretty bad in custom games.

I was wondering, upgrading from ATI 5770 to nVidia GeForce 460 GTX or whatever...the one that SCLEGACY JUST reviewed....
I have a feeling it'll be a stupid idea since the marginal gains vs cost = horrible.
I know I'll get smoother FPS by at least 10-20% increases but for another 200$?
And I doubt anyone will buy an ATI 5770 -_-.

My specs

i7 920 @ 2.6 ghz stock
6GB of Triple channel 1600 MHZ gamer ram
64 bit Win 7 Pro
ATI 5770 1GB; it's a 128 bit card =\

Maybe I will just wait until the next gen of products by nvidia/ATI before I upgrade.

It would be very stupid to upgrade from a 5770 to a GTX 460.
Even waiting for the next gen and upgrading than its stupid, because the margin gains are so small that its not worth at all another $200, $300 or whatever.

The best thing for you, if you really want better performance in water maps is to buy another 5770 and put them in crossfire.
The performance gains should be great and it should come close to the 5870.

[sandwich_bird]

Moved to off-topic.