Upgrade of PC to run CoD Properly - Page 2

Bikerjack · #1 07-02-2012, 01:45 PM

Thanks Warhound.

Yeah, I do feel kinda committed as they have got the board and processor in for me. However, I am prepared to negotiate given the wealth of input you have given me.

I think the SSD is a good idea and I will enquire about a more robust PSU.

Question - I wanted to avoid reinstalling everything - I have Win 7 on one drive and XP on the other running 1946 very well. Can they simply copy all the data from the HDD onto the new SSD and can I get away with just one SSD and be able to switch from a Win 7 partition to an XP partition? In which case I would need a higher capacity?

TonyD · #2 07-02-2012, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bikerjack

...
Question - I wanted to avoid reinstalling everything - I have Win 7 on one drive and XP on the other running 1946 very well. Can they simply copy all the data from the HDD onto the new SSD and can I get away with just one SSD and be able to switch from a Win 7 partition to an XP partition? In which case I would need a higher capacity?

I wouldn’t recommend this – the new board and cpu will require different drivers to your current installation, and Windows will ask for re-activation because of this. It can be done (I have done something similar with Win7 before), but a fresh install will be a great deal better.

XP will most likely only work if you go through the installation repair routine, which entails starting the repair install on the old system, switching it off when it re-boots and change to the new machine with the same HDD, start it up again and let it continue. You would then need to use a disk cloning utility to copy the XP partition onto the new drive, preferably into the first partition of the drive. Win7 can be cloned onto the second partition, but you may need to edit the boot image if it isn’t currently on the same partition on the old drive.

The above should work, but you’ll only know on completion. In the end, there are no shortcuts to a good installation.

And I agree with Warhound about the power supply - depending how much you overclock, BD can be very power hungry, and a 750W will be insufficient (are you sure that you really want a second HD6970?)

Bikerjack · #3 07-02-2012, 02:45 PM

No, at this moment in time I am not sure about the Crossfire with two cards. I may see what I get from just the one card first?

Bloody 'ell, I didn't realise it would be so complicated to sort all of this out. Perhaps I will hold off the upgrade to an SSD until later. One step at a time eh!

Will keep you posted.

Bikerjack · #4 07-11-2012, 08:45 AM

I now have the new PC and have tentatively run some programs including 1946 and COD. There is a definite improvement across the board. 1946 in XP really "flies" (excuse the pun!) on max settings without a glitch, stutter or flashing with Crossfire enabled but I am not sure if the program is pushing the GPUs to high performance at all.

COD (win 7 64) runs much better than before (obviously with the capability of the new rig). But, I am experiencing the same old familiar problems that many posters have remarked upon in the past. COD runs well enough on one card (Crossfire disabled) at 35 to 70 fps on higher settings than before. I have only tried a couple of Mission Builder scenarios that I set up and have played regularly in the past so that gives me a direct comparison. There are not many AI planes or ground items in these missions and I have used one of the "island" maps which is also much "smaller" in data terms than the full southern England map.

With Crossfire enabled I am getting some stuttering and the rivers, in particular, are flashing quite badly. As discussed here I have renamed the Ubisoft logo file and have set up Crossfire to run with the Lost Planet settings. I will continue to experiment to get the best out of it.

Some forum members are helpful in terms of BIOS set up etc. I believe the Beta patch(es) for COD can improve performance but, thus far, I have not tried to download anything because I am not sure which is best and where exactly to obtain them from.

I will hopefully get used to the system over the next few days and any input would be helpful.

Gigabyte 990FXA-UD7 - AMD FX-8150 - VTX Radeon HD 6970 (2gb) x2 - 16Gb DDR3 RAM - Win 7 Home Premium 64-bit - Track IR5 - Logitech joystick

Bikerjack · #5 07-11-2012, 09:22 AM

Attached are pics of the new rig.

It has already been pointed out to me that the RAM should be installed in slots 2 and 4 (as seen to the right of the processor) and this has been changed.

Also, as suggested, I should add an additional fan at the rear of the case to extract warm air.

TonyD · #6 07-11-2012, 12:09 PM

Looking good! Those two cards look awesome together

Bikerjack · #7 07-24-2012, 10:16 AM

One thing I haven't done is reinstall COD from scratch - I have the CD that the missus bought me (and has regretted it ever since 'cos I spend so much time either playing or tweaking!!)

This paragraph from one of the posts intrigues me:- "*Reinstalling The Game after the latest patch has proven to be a performance booster."

I have recently installed the latest 1.07 patch. If I reinstall the game as suggested, do I uninstall first - in which case what happens to the patch tweaks? - or just reinstall over what I have and everything will fall into place? I gather a new Beta patch is due imminently.

Will I lose missions that I have created? I am still getting green smoke and dust in Mission Builder files whether old ones or newly created. Is there a fix for this. Nothing I do with CCC settings makes any difference. The standard Single player games are fine?

I also have Buchon's SMAA installed. I assume I just reinstall the files after the program is installed?

Would appreciate some guidance (again!).

Thanks