Major factors:
1. GPU. The graphics card is what dictates the settings you can run the game on; The other parts have minimal effect on this.
2. CPU. The processor is the brains of the PC and as such, needs to be adequate to run the game. As mentioned before, the CPU has almost nothing to do with the settings; If paired with a powerful enough setup, a CPU will run the same game at almost the same framerate on the lowest and highest settings.
3. RAM. The memory of the setup is one of those things that you either have enough or don't have enough. If you have enough, the impact on performance will be minimal; 2133MHz RAM might give you a 5% increase in fps over 1333MHz RAM (note that faster RAM will make a bigger difference if you are using the integrated graphics of an AMD APU), but it depends on the game. If you however do not have enough RAM, you will have problems. Your system will start to move the content in your memory to the HDD/SSD, making almost any game unplayable. 4GB is the minimum for gaming nowadays, but 8GB is recommended for the most intensive games out there.
Minor factors:
1. Storage. Whether you have a 5400RPM HDD or a brand new SSD, the impact on fps will be minimal. A faster drive will shorten your load times and will make transitions from area to another in open world games much smoother.
2. Operating system. Your OS can be considered a minor factor in most cases, but it will increase the performance drastically in some games. As long as you have Windows 8.1/8/7, you're good to go. XP is good too, but it is no longer supported by some newer games and is therefore not recommended.
3. Motherboard. The differences between motherboards are usually very, very small; Most motherboards perform exactly the same. The same goes for the PCI-E revision of the board. As long as you have PCI-E 2.0 x16 or 3.0 x8, you are good to go. If you have something older, the chances are your GPU is not able to utilize it anyway since only the most powerful GPUs can utilize PCI-E 2.0 x16 to its full extent.
4. Power supply. Having a quality PSU is important, but it really doesn't affect your performance; A Corsair AX1200i will not boost your performance over an EVGA 500B if your system only uses 300W of power while gaming. In this sense the PSU is very much like RAM: It either works or it doesn't.
Now then, how can you really know what you need?
This site is one of the most useful ones out there: http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri
Please note that some games that don't even have set release dates yet (or those dates are far away in the future) may not have official minimum/recommended specs and therefore will not be found on the site above. To find the more or less official requirements for these games, Google 'PC requirements *the name of the game you are searching for*'.
You can either run a Java detector, download a desktop app, or just check out the minimum/recommended specifications. (The desktop app has been tested and is safe and very easy to use)
.
Of course using the automated apps will be much easier, but if you want to compare specs manually, this is how you do it:
1. CPU. You will need to compare the recommended/minimum CPU to your own. To do this, use CPU World.
On the right, you can "Identify CPU, FPU or MCU", type the model of your CPU there and hit "Go". A page should come up with some specs, but that's not what we're interested in. In the last tab titled "Related pages", there should be a link that leads to the page of your CPU. Scroll down and you should find a part called "Detailed side-by-side comparison" just under the specifications of the CPU. Write the model of the minimum required CPU there and hit "Compare". Click the name of the CPU on the list that comes up and you should now find yourself comparing these two CPUs.
If the CPU you have is better than or equal to the minimum requirement, your CPU will be enough for the game.
2. GPU. Use GPUboss for this: http://gpuboss.com/compare-gpus
Since AMD and Nvidia GPUs can't be compared by specs alone, you need to compare your GPU to the minimum requirement from the same manufacturer you have. So if you have an Nvidia GPU, compare it to the minimum required Nvidia GPU and so on.
Once again, if your GPU is equal to or better than the minimum requirement of the game, you can run it, provided that the rest of your parts are adequate as well.
3. RAM. There's really not much to say about RAM. As mentioned previously, you either have enough or you don't. If you have at least the same amount as the minimum requirement, you're good to go.
So now that we've determined whether a certain game will run or not, it's time to find out what kind of fps you will get.
Benchmarks are the best and often the only way to find out how the game will run.
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/t/cpus/articles/?articleT...
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/t/graphics-cards/articles...
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/t/gpus/articles/?articleT...
These pages contain many useful reviews, but the truth is that the best way to find benchmarks is to do a Google search. For example, if you want to know how BF4 will run on your system, Google: 'BF4 *your CPU* benchmarks' and 'BF4 *your GPU* benchmarks'. Then open up the first few of the links that come up and see what you can find.
This is where bottlenecking steps in. Watch this informational video on bottlenecks to understand how they work (also check out the other videos on that channel if you want to acquire some basic knowledge on PCs):
Now that you understand bottlenecks, you need to find out which part is your bottleneck, the CPU or the GPU. Look at your CPU benchmarks first. Let's say your CPU can achieve 45 fps on average in BF4. This means that no matter how good of a GPU you put in your PC and no matter what settings you use, you will always be limited to a maximum of about 45 fps. Now, let's say your GPU will achieve an average of 35 fps on ultra settings at the resolution you are using. This means that on ultra settings, you will get an average of 35 fps, but even if you set all the settings to low, you will still get no more than 45 fps.
This means that you should use settings that will let you play with 45 fps, but with the highest possible image quality. Playing around with the settings will take some time, but once you get used to it, it'll be pretty easy. It's recommended to first turn down/off Anti-aliasing if you want to get higher fps. If this is not enough, you'll have to turn down everything step by step. If you want to keep it simple, just use the quality presets like 'low', 'medium' or 'high'.
P.S. If you have any suggestions on how to make this guide better, more understandable or grammatically correct, feel free to send me a PM if you have the time.
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