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3 year old computer < SW: TOR

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Hey all - built my pc about 3 years ago now, looking to upgrade it since my FPS drops when I go indoors in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Currently have:

1 x GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3R LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
1 x HIS H465PS512P Radeon HD 4650 512MB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card
1 x Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor BX80570E8400
1 x G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue WD3200AAKS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

with a 500w psu.

I was hoping I could get away with just upgrading my vid card, but I'm thinking maybe I should get some more cores. Can anyone tell me what might be holding me back and why? If I can help it, I'd rather not buy a new vid card and then just have to get a new mobo in a year or two.

Gracias

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mrenton7 said:
Hey all - built my pc about 3 years ago now, looking to upgrade it since my FPS drops when I go indoors in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Currently have:

1 x GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3R LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
1 x HIS H465PS512P Radeon HD 4650 512MB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card
1 x Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor BX80570E8400
1 x G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue WD3200AAKS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

with a 500w psu.

I was hoping I could get away with just upgrading my vid card, but I'm thinking maybe I should get some more cores. Can anyone tell me what might be holding me back and why? If I can help it, I'd rather not buy a new vid card and then just have to get a new mobo in a year or two.

Gracias


Well your components seem to be pretty old. In order to get a new CPU you would have to get a new mobo that supports a better processor. That mobo is at the end of its life with a newer CPU.

I would update your ram to some newer ones which is pretty cheap these days.

Also I would get a cheap 1GB video card.

Look around on the net and see what prices you can get, and always make sure everything is compatible with each other. You probably didn't want to hear all of this but if you want a fairly smooth run of SW:TOR then this is what I suggest.

Have a good day!

Yeah that pretty much sums it up. They were good, cheap parts at the time, so I figure I might need an overhaul, but I'm trying to stay away from that option. I figured having more MBs on my vidcard would be needed, or a cpu, but if I can, I think I'm gonna try and keep this mobo for one more iteration. You think RAM would help that much?
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going from 1066 to 1600 or above he will barely notice any difference if any at all.

I'd say upgrade your GPU first as it's a cheaper and faster upgrade rather than doing the whole mobo+new cpu overhaul (imo, if you go that route then you might as well consider getting a new build with reusing some of your current parts)

according to Tom's bench TOR has pretty low CPU requirements, but moderate to high GPU requirements. So, getting a new gpu is your best bet.

take a look at this, depending on what level of graphics settings you prefer this might help you out with picking out the GPU:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/star-wars-gaming-te...

I use over 4gb of ram while playing SWTOR

I would say a new video card would help as well as upgrading to 8gb of ram, ram is dirt cheap right now so not much reason not to.

My system specs are:
e8400 @ 4ghz
8gb ddr2
gtx460 1gb

I get 30+ fps in fleet with everything on high and 4xAA forced in .ini

Game loves ram. Also if you are running a 32bit OS it could be a bottleneck.

I'm running windows 7 64. I think I will definitely go with GPU and some ram (since it is absurdly cheap). I would prefer just making this mobo/cpu last another year or two. Any suggestions on RAM and GPU? I'm gonna research it in a little bit, but I've been out of the game since building this rig and was wondering if anything is outperforming the market.

Also, I have never really gotten into OC'ing, but would anyone suggest that or have any tips for doing it? Maybe I can squeeze some more out of this before I try to start purchasing.

Edit: For anyone who is decent with RAM, how heavily does timing weigh? For instance, would you rather choose a 1066 low timing or a 1600 mid-high timing - all other things being equal

timing is a very small difference, just go 1333mhz 9latency, if you have 4g on two sticks and have two open slots you can just get another 2g of ram equal in mhz and latency to what you got.

You are using DDR2 RAM ...NOT... DD3. You can't just throw some DD3 RAM at your board. It won't fit/work.

Therefore an upgrade would require either a new Motherboard/RAM/CPU combo and/or a new graphics card.

I'm sporting a 2 year old PC with a similar issue (DDR2 RAM, old board, old CPU). I went with a new graphics card for now (HD 6770 - OC to 915/1315). I'll upgrade to an i3/i5 + mainboard + RAM and a second HD 6770 (for crossfire) later, waiting for Ivy Bridge.

I suppose that would work for you, too.

As for OC, just take a look into your BIOS. The best way to overclock is by increasing the multiplier. If you have that BIOS option, you are lucky. If not you can still OC, if you increase the FSB a little bit.

Thanks Noise - I know about RAM fittings - didn't realize the higher you went required newer sticks (2v3). I'll check for a multiplier, thanks for the tip. I'll also just look some stuff up and try it out.

So, instead of getting 2 new sticks to replace my old ones, I think I'll just get 2 new RAM sticks and put them in the extra slots. jwolf - if I get extra sticks, why do you say have them = in mhz + latency? Is 4 sticks working together that much different than 2 of one type and 2 of another?

Also, thanks for the help so far everybody.

Okay - one last follow up question. I've decided just to get 2 more sticks of what I already have, since there's not a whole lot made for the type I need anyways. The same goes for graphics cards. Currently I have:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Would it be worth it to go from that to:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

That's the only card I really found that might be much better. My current card isn't on tomshardware benchmarks at all any more. Is it worth the ~$70?

PCI-e 2.0 is backwards compatible with PCI-E 1.0 and there is little real performance difference as most cards still dont saturate 16lanes of pci-e

The memory on the video card is independent of the memory on the motherboard.

I currently use a gtx460 on a gigabyte P35 motherboard, no problems.

yes it will work fine, no problem.

PCI-E 2.1 will work in a PCI-E 1.0 motherboard.

The different PCI-E versions add more bandwidth to each lane, but most video cards today can not even saturate a single PCI-E x16 1.0 connection.

PCI-E 2.0, 2.1, and 3.0 are more useful when you are running crossfire and sli setups and can't supply the card with 16 lanes of PCI. For one card it makes little difference.

If your power supply does not have 2 6pin PCI connectors you may have to use a molex adapter for one or more. Though most 500w power supplies should be able to handle it.

I have 1 extra 6 pin ready.. why do you say 2?

Also, thanks very much for the help - I actually think I will go with the PowerColor you mentioned, jwolf. I'm gonna wait til my RAM gets here, and if that doesn't make the situation bearable, I'll put in the order.
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