Cheapest card that will run COD2 maxed out?

[lakedude]

My XFX 7800 GT will run COD2 perfectly smooth with all video options turned up including aa. $280 after rebate before shipping is your price to beat. I guess we should have 2 winners, one at stock settings and one using OC.

I'm guessing the 7800GT is cutting it pretty close.

You guys are on the honor system, we will be taking your word for it unless you claim a Ti 4200 or some such nonsense.

EDIT:

At: 1280 by 1024 Because it is the most common LCD screen resolution.

EDIT2: I've mucked this entire thing up. Some driver settings were overriding game settings so my card does not work as claimed.

Still, at the setting I'm running the game looks darn good and runs VERY smooth. I just don't know exactly what those settings are at the moment.

 

[pauldh]

What resolution? 640x480 I'd have a chance , but otherwise my 6800U has some low framerates at 10x7 even. I first tried the demo at 12x10 with FSAA, and was seeing framerates in the teens on the ride in and during heavy action.

I don't think any 256MB card can max out COD2. I remember a review showing the 512MB X800XL (not x1800) beating a 7800GTX 256MB, and the X1800XT absolutely dominating (pre 7800GTX512MB days). I know I've linked to it in the past., can't remember where it was.

This one shows how bad the game hammers the top cards. It also earlier on mentions the 512MB vs 256MB difference.
http://firingsquad.com/hardware/call_of_duty_2_performance_ati_nvidia/page7.asp

 

[pauldh]

OK here are the links: X800XL 512MB beating 7800GTX 256MB. Texture quality dumbed down automatically on the 7800GTX at 1600x1200, so it's rendering less:
http://www.amdzone.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=182&page=3

X1800XT 512MB kicks butt:
http://www.driverheaven.net/reviews/r520reviewxvxv/COD2.htm

talked about it here, Read the 9th post:
http://forumz.tomshardware.com/hardware/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=84549&highlight=

 

[lakedude]

Ok full list of in game options"

1280 by 1024
Anisotropic edit: not sure what x, will manually set in driver
Anti-aliasing 4x edit: this is not true, it was shut off in the driver
sync - yes
shadows - yes
dynamic lights - high
smoke - everything
corpses - insane
textures - extra

I got bi, tri and aniso as options but I only got one aniso option (no x's) in game.

BTW you can bog the game down buy going into the drivers and messing with the transparancy AA settings. Those were off by default.

 

[GeneticWeapon]

From what I understand, this is a brand new engine, coming from an inexperienced game house. They used the Quake 3 engine before, but wanted to strike out on their own.....

I'd almost consider it a success, but the beauty of the graphics dont coincide with performance penalty you recieve when you launch the game.

Everyone has their oppinions, but I think it should run a whole lot better for what eye candy it's offering(which isnt much)

(I'm drinking tonight so spelling is bad)

Rock on brothers....

 

[lakedude]

Whoops! looks like I lied. AA was off in the driver so that 4x in game was meaningless. I still can't figure out what AF setting the game was using. I guess you need to set em in the driver directly.

Sorry for being such a dumb-head. I'll play with the settings and get back to you all.

 

[GeneticWeapon]

I'll play with the settings and get back to you all.

I'm in Oklahoma, and it's pronounced y'all.....

 

[pauldh]

I only have the demo to go by. Not sure what the driver updates have done either.

 

[lakedude]

Ok instead of going with the in game settings for aa and af I set em manually and the early results are too close to call. The game is still very playable with true 4x aa and 8x af turned on. It does not seem as smooth all but if it is jerkey it is only slightly so. NOTE this has been a very short test, most of my playing has been aa off and af unknown.

Sorry again for the misleading info....

 

[GeneticWeapon]

Let's just say, that takes the best graphics card available today, to play this game with all details maxed out....


....and then some.



....also cocks.

 

[lakedude]

Update:

I've been playing with the settings as originally claimed and the gameplay is still pretty smooth if not perfect. I'm pretty picky and it is hard to tell the difference in smoothness most of the time. OTH there is not much visual difference in with aa on or off. The only thing I could find that looks much different is the black wires on poles against a bright sky. Having aa on definately makes the wires smoother but otherwise you almost can't tell the difference.

Since the game is slightly less smooth I will retract my claim that a 7800 GT will play maxed out and perfectly smooth.

Comes darn close. Keep in mind that the XFX and other cards are factory overclocked so they might be doing better than you might expect from a 7800 at normal speeds.

How are you 6800 w OC guys doing? x800? 850?

 

[pauldh]

What kind of framerates are you getting with Fraps? You may be surprised how low it gets. I am very picky too but I found COD2 easy to play even with lower than usual fps. Of course it's hard to enjoy it when I stare at the low red fps that fraps gets at times. I wouldn't want those framerates in multiplayer though.

Look at the first link I gave. Firingsquad AVERAGES 27.5 fps on the 7800GT at 1280x1024 4X/8X. The X1800XL and 7800GTX don't do much better. Their 20.8 for the 6800U is probably pretty much what I was getting when I played max detail settings in the demo; I had lows in the teens. Their test system is pretty close to mine also. Same ram, fx57 vs A64 4000+, my 6800U is the BFG OC version. I did run throught the whole demo benchmarking various settings and will post some results when I am at that machine.

You should try running fraps and also doing a F9 fraps benchmark to see your min max ave fps while playing.

Looks like the X850XT's don't do any better in this game than the 6800U. So, I'd say unless you are running a GF7800 or X1800, forget 12x10, especially with FSAA.

 

[pauldh]

Wow, was just looking to see what map Firingsquad tested on and I noticed this comment:

"In fact, CoD 2 is so demanding that we didn’t even crank up all the eye candy settings to their maximums for this article, and we’re testing with the fastest hardware on the planet right now!"


It would be fun if we all could get a hold of their custom timedemo (or Toms, Anands, [H]'s) and run the same test. That would be fun too see how various systems here on the forums perform.

 

[pauldh]

From what I understand, this is a brand new engine, coming from an inexperienced game house. They used the Quake 3 engine before, but wanted to strike out on their own.....

I'd almost consider it a success, but the beauty of the graphics dont coincide with performance penalty you recieve when you launch the game.

Everyone has their oppinions, but I think it should run a whole lot better for what eye candy it's offering(which isnt much)

(I'm drinking tonight so spelling is bad)

Rock on brothers....

Firing Squad seems to agree with you as they commented: " As a launch title for the Xbox 360, we have a sneaky suspicion Infinity Ward and Activision spent too much time playtesting CoD 2 on the Xbox 360, rather than the PC." The game does look very good though, but low framerates is one reason I didn't buy the game (others being time related; too into BF2 & NFSMW).

 

[lakedude]

Evidently framerate isn't everything. Per your request I downloaded fraps and observed the framerate during game play. Naturally it went up and down but it usually hovered around 20 fps with all 4x aa and 8x af. The highest framerate was around 30 and the lowest I saw was 14. The game seemed pretty darn smooth even though they say anything under 30 is no good.