New Rig for SOW:BofB What should i get

[IceFire]

Originally Posted by szala11

Dude! If you want to run BOB flawlessly you should get at least the 6 core i7980X. Anything weaker will struggle with BOB.It is just a few more bucks! It is said there will be lots of planes flying at the same time in SOW. and more important : drop in another gtx480 if you plan to fly near buildings. But i'd wait for the gtx580. 2 of them.

Are you sure about that? None of us have played the game yet.

I suspect any top spec Core i7 will probably do just fine but experiences will probably vary. I was saying somewhere else that Storm of War will probably look spectacular on a wide variety of computers but the absolute top level of detailing will probably be a whole other level that only the absolute top of the line computers will be able to take advantage of.

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by T}{OR

I would suggest waiting for the beginning of the 2011 when Intel's Sandy Bridge micro architecture CPU-s should become available to public. The new GPU flagships are behind the corner and should also be available by then.

What does this all mean? - You can save considerably on your current components if you buy them in two months time as the prices will drop. Or you could get the latest gear available for the more or less the same price.

Personally, and more importantly - I'd wait for the game specs to be come out. This way you won't miss with your purchase.

Good point if you want cost effectiveness.

As for the individual components and judging from the performance we've seen in the videos from the Igromir expo (running SoW on full detail at PCs below the minimum specs, with stutters no less but still running stable and smooth over water), i doubt your proposed rig will have any problems whatsoever.

If anything, i'd go for a more middle-range quad core i7 instead of the 6 core model as it seems a bit overkill to me personally. Not that i know anything about how much SoW will benefit from extra cores, just guessing here.

I'd also choose an Ati graphics card just because the current nVidia offerings use up a lot of power, generate a lot of heat and as a consequence need high speed, noisy fans to keep temperatures where they need to be, all for a very small performance increase in most applications that don't go overboard on tesselation. Meaning, Ati will give the same or better performance over a wider range of different applications for less money.

I've always had nVidia cards up till getting my i7 rig last year, at which point i switched to Ati, so it's not like i have a grudge against them. It just doesn't make sense to me at this point in time to buy and install a very expensive mini-heater in my PC case with all the trouble that comes with it, for a marginal 5% or so boost in frame rates and maybe 20-25% in specific full-tesselation titles like a few first person shooters that i don't play.

As for RAM, 3GB is the minimum requirement for SoW, that's pretty much the only part of the specs we do know officially. I'd say get 6GB, 3 sticks of 2GB actually to take advantage of the tripple channel feature in i7 boards. More than 6-8Gb seems again like overkill and wasted money (before you can ever take full advantage of it, you might be on your next upgrade that uses a different kind of stick altogether, like DDR5 for example)

Since RAM is relatively cheap compared to other stuff, you could get one of the dual GPU 5xxx series Ati cards with the left-over cash, a simulator specific peripheral you might need, an extra hard disk, or a solid state disk to put your operating system on, and so on. You might even be able to sell your old monitor and get a new IPS one for the added color quality. The options are endless and you can tailor your PC to be a very well rounded machine for reasonable amounts of money, as long as you shop one step below the top of the line components.

[szala11]

Originally Posted by DoolittleRaider

As I understand it, the Core i7 970 is essentially the same as the 980, but a hundred bucks or so cheaper (maybe $850 versus $1000???), except that the 970 is 'locked' and cannot be overclocked. Both the 970 and 980 are 6 Core. I don't need the 'open' or'unlocked' structure of the 980, as I never will overclock.

Hey, at this level 850$ or 1000$ is really not a difference!! If you have 850$ you also have 1000$! BUY the i7980X! I'm 100% sure i will get the 980X or maybe a very good sandy for XMAS. That's why i saved up my money. I Also plan to drop in a 3rd gtx480 into my babe. With 980X and 3 GTXs BOB will run WITHOUT any issue. I understand you dont plan to OC but nowdays overclocking is VERY easy. 10-15 seconds in BIOS and you can get the 980X to 4.2Ghz. Also if you dont plan to OC why do you buy the p6T Deluxe V2??? It is made for OC and Crossfire/SLI. Buy a cheaper board and drop the difference into CPU.

[szala11]

...but the absolute top level of detailing will probably be a whole other level that only the absolute top of the line computers will be able to take advantage of.[/QUOTE]

That's what Im talking about. Most of us want to play this game with everything
MAXED OUT to get the best visual experience. Therefore i dont hesitate to drop in a 3rd or even 4th gtx480 into my rig. You will need a VERY powerful system to get the most joy out of this game... Get the latest and BEST hardware so you wont be disappointed.

[Ataros]

IIRC Oleg several times compared BoB release with Il-2 release regarding system requirements. In 2001 no hardware could run Il-2 maxed at hi-res at 50+ fps.

I have an impression that we would not be able to run BoB at 100% maxed out settings (100% AI complexity, 100% ground units, etc.) at 50+ fps for 3-5 years after release on mid-range hardware ($800-1200 setups). My 2005 $1200 setup could not run 4 year old Il-2 maxed out at 50+ fps at 1680 res low above cities for example.

So wait if you can or be prepared to upgrade next summer or winter again I upgraded for BoB last spring and ready for next upgrade when I feel I am not satisfied with BoB performance.

PS. 3.2 GHz clock speed may not be enough for BoB regardless of number of cores. Some games just require high clock speed (e.g. Arma2). Say ArmA 2 starts to kick only at 3.8 Ghz at my quad core i7 860 and not playable at 3.3 Ghz. And in some complex Warfare missions with many AI fps drops to 8-10 due to lack of processing power (not video). Video is not an issue in sims unless you run triple monitors I think.

[kendo65]

Originally Posted by szala11

Dude! If you want to run BOB flawlessly you should get at least the 6 core i7980X. Anything weaker will struggle with BOB.It is just a few more bucks! It is said there will be lots of planes flying at the same time in SOW. and more important : drop in another gtx480 if you plan to fly near buildings. But i'd wait for the gtx580. 2 of them.

We really have no way of knowing this at this time. Although SOW will be multi-threaded it is fully possible that 4 cores will be sufficient to do the job. Anything more may be of no benefit - it may even be that clock speed for the individual cores may be more of a factor. We don't know!

Also, I'd be surprised if any current games even use more than 3 cores.

Ditto on the graphics....this is the area where I'd be most cautious. I think there are subtle indications (speculation yes..) that nVidia may be the way to go with SOW.

But Szala, your strategy of going for the absolute best (most expensive) on every level could well not be the best one - in that the extra expenditure over a more modest i7 say could be wasted. We really do need to learn a little more about how the game will respond to more cores versus clock speed, and just how CPU V GPU dependent it will be.

[Skoshi Tiger]

Apparently Intel has high hopes for Sandy Bridge!

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/san...-i7,11464.html

Unless you need to upgrade now, I'ld put off the upgrade.

Cheers!

[Triggaaar]

Another vote for:
Wait

Unless you have to build now, wait until we know more. We don't yet know if BoB needs 6 cores to run at max (it might) - you may for example be better with a 4 core i7 or and AMD cpu, then spending more on the GC - with the amount you're spending, I'd think of going better than the 480, either 580 or 6xxx series, but again you need to wait to see what BoB wants.

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by szala11

That's what Im talking about. Most of us want to play this game with everything
MAXED OUT to get the best visual experience. Therefore i dont hesitate to drop in a 3rd or even 4th gtx480 into my rig. You will need a VERY powerful system to get the most joy out of this game... Get the latest and BEST hardware so you wont be disappointed.

3-4 graphics cards? Come on

I mean, it's your money but isn't that a bit extreme? Going to all that trouble just to run one title at full detail a few months earlier? All you gain is seeing some features a few months earlier, that's all.

I never do SLI/crossfire for this very simple reason...today's double GPU solutions cost more and perform less than the single GPU of 6 months in the future.

I agree with what the other people are saying...the way PCs evolve today, you could buy a $2500 rig and it could be surpassed before you even have the chance to stress it to the maximum. If it doesn't get the chance to get used and stressed to its limits, it's wasted money plain and simple. What would i do in your position? Get the best foundation for a good PC by buying a good case, PSU and CPU, ie the things that don't get rendered obsolete every 6 months. Then, use mid-range components for the things that might need more frequent upgrades.

That's actually exactly how i'm set up right now...i have two 1.5 TB disks, an Asus P6T Deluxe, 3GB of RAM and a 700W power supply. I run a stock i7 920 with an Ati 4890 1Gb. All in all, i've spent about 1500 Euros on this rig over a few months (high quality IPS monitor included in the price). I could have gone for dual 4890x2 or 12GB of RAM but i didn't.
I wait for the 6xxx series cards to hit the market and nVidia to regain some lost ground that will force Ati to further drop the prices. Then i'm going to buy a 5970 or something like that for a mere $200 and have the same performance as someone who built a rig the same time as i did, but decided to spend $500 on dual 4890x2 right off the bat. In a similar fashion, when i7 prices drop due to the release of sandy bridge CPUs, i can exchange my 920 for a high end six-core at half the price it costs now.

[Splitter]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

3-4 graphics cards? Come on

I mean, it's your money but isn't that a bit extreme? Going to all that trouble just to run one title at full detail a few months earlier? All you gain is seeing some features a few months earlier, that's all.

I never do SLI/crossfire for this very simple reason...today's double GPU solutions cost more and perform less than the single GPU of 6 months in the future.

I agree with what the other people are saying...the way PCs evolve today, you could buy a $2500 rig and it could be surpassed before you even have the chance to stress it to the maximum. If it doesn't get the chance to get used and stressed to its limits, it's wasted money plain and simple. What would i do in your position? Get the best foundation for a good PC by buying a good case, PSU and CPU, ie the things that don't get rendered obsolete every 6 months. Then, use mid-range components for the things that might need more frequent upgrades.

That's actually exactly how i'm set up right now...i have two 1.5 TB disks, an Asus P6T Deluxe, 3GB of RAM and a 700W power supply. I run a stock i7 920 with an Ati 4890 1Gb. All in all, i've spent about 1500 Euros on this rig over a few months (high quality IPS monitor included in the price). I could have gone for dual 4890x2 or 12GB of RAM but i didn't.
I wait for the 6xxx series cards to hit the market and nVidia to regain some lost ground that will force Ati to further drop the prices. Then i'm going to buy a 5970 or something like that for a mere $200 and have the same performance as someone who built a rig the same time as i did, but decided to spend $500 on dual 4890x2 right off the bat. In a similar fashion, when i7 prices drop due to the release of sandy bridge CPUs, i can exchange my 920 for a high end six-core at half the price it costs now.

Yes. Why would I pay a premium price "now" for hardware to play a game that is not yet released? I could wait until it is released and pay less for the same hardware. Or I could spend the same amount of money in the future that I would spend now and get BETTER hardware.

I won't be upgrading the day the game comes out. I'll wait until other people report back on how their rigs, their new hardware, runs the game.

Most of the time when I upgrade, I end up saving a lot of money by just buying the things that will get me the most increase in performance right now. I have been burned in the past by buying video cards and CPU's that the game I was intending to play could not take advantage of. Oh, eventually something else comes out that justifies the excess hardware, but by that time the hardware in my system could have been bought for 60% of what I paid.

Think about it, the hardware companies WANT you to buy the bleeding edge components to play the latest software, that's why they often work with the development companies. Development companies walk the line between providing a product that can be used by the bulk of gamers right now (medium and low settings) and the gamers that must have the latest and greatest hardware (bleeding edge expensive hardware). There is a push/pull there between hardware companies and developers that I just don't want to be involved in with my wallet.

It's gonna suck if you spend $400 extra for a CPU with maximum cores right now when the games won't use those extra cores for a year or two. Been in a similar situation myself and it didn't feel good.

I mean, unless you have money to burn and in that case, who am I to tell you what to do with your money?

Splitter