is CF right for me? - 4850, e8500, WAR

[hurbt]

From what I've seen of the benchmarks, SLI and CF don't really help very much. In more cases than not, it actually worsens performance. I'm not talking about running at super high resolutions, and I don't care too much about AA... the 2 things I've heard SLI and CF help with the most...

That said... Here's my setup: e8500, 4 gigs ram, ATi 4850, 1600x1050 monitor. Motherboard supports PCI-E 2.0, and full x16 on both slots. I have the 8500 at stock speed (3.16ghz), but can easily OC it to 3.8Ghz.

I'm a MMO junkie, and I've been playing Warhammer Online since it came out a few weeks ago. Love it... It runs beautifully on the 4850 on max graphics settings (no AA or anisotropic filtering). HOWEVER, during huge keep sieges (the whole reason I play the game), the frame-rate drops a lot... down to 15-20 FPS, and it's barely playable. Would another 4850 in CF help with this?

A friend of mine has a 4850, and I might be able to convince him to let me borrow it to test, but if not, I'd like to hear from you guys on this... so I don't blow $170 on something that won't help. Thanks in advance.

 

[bpogdowz]

You didn't show your system specs. sorry

 

[hurbt]

You didn't show your system specs. sorry

-Intel E8500 at 3.16Ghz
-Ati 4850
-4 gigs DDR2-800
-PCI-E 2.0, dual 16x capable MSI motherboard (can't remember the exact model off hand)

All in the 2nd paragraph, what more do you need? Operating system? Vista Home Premium - 64 bit.

 

[bpogdowz]

So the PSU isn't a concern?

 

[tgmchuck]

I don't personally play WAR, but I do play AoC. I do find that in raids or guild battles graphics can cause a fair portion of the lag. In AoC there is a way to turn off the animations for effects/spells that you do not cast or do not effect you and that helps a fair bit.
Unfortunatly a fair bit of that lag can be caused by the sheer amount of people on the screen. Position updates and spell effects and general network traffic and server latency. The two make a nasty combo.

But to give an actual answer, I'd say yes, in CF you likely will notice an improvement in large battles, especially if you are displaying all spell effects. but it won't solve all you lag problems. If you can borrow youre friends card, give it a try!

 

[Talon]

I'm not sure you will see a great gain honestly. I think it would possibly be noticable but that you likely won't see as great a change as you want for the extra $. Here is why I say this....

If you read the WAR boards, pick almost any good War site, which I do almost daily, you will see numerous long posts about this same issue. Developers have responded on the forums and even people with the highest end systems are often found dropping FPSs greatly in sieges and other really highly congested battles. From what I've read this is more likely server lag than someone's system at midrange or higher with what it out today (4850/9800GTX or greater).

The developers have said the next patch will attempt to address some of the lag in larger battles and it is a known issue with many players on a wide range of systems. I wouldn't spend my $ until giving it another week or two and see if they can make it better through their efforts. I've played MMOs since the first 3-D ones were out and especially in recent years MMOs need tweaking the first couple months they are out. WAR is one of the best, at release, I've seen in many many years for playability/stability. Give the devs a chance to iron things out since it is a known issue for a few more weeks. Then if that doesn't change, or doesn't change enough I might try spending the $ but from what I understand of the situation it may or may not change your experience much.

My 2p for what it's worth, see you in WAR, hope you're playing order, hehe......need more bodies to wail on...

 

[bpogdowz]

You probably just need a Killler NIC like Talon said.

 

[hurbt]

but it won't solve all you lag problems

not what i'm talking about...

I fail to see how server lag and client FPS are related. You don't see any network connection details in the TH, vid card benchmarks, which are almost all based on game FPS. For the purpose of this thread, I don't care about server lag. I have not had any issues with it so far. What I'm seeing is specifically a decrease in framerate. I can tell it is not server lag because when is spin my view around, it's nice and smooth when looking at the ground, or away from the keep... then choppy and stuttering as hell when looking at the battle... that is NOT server lag... nor does it have anything to do with it. Regardless of whether or not your're looking at the crowd, you're still getting all the information from the server... so a change in framerate, as stated above cannot be because of server lag. It's like walking into a big room with tons of polygons and everything becoming "choppy" or "flickery" or however you want to describe it.

@ bpogdowz... I posted the info about my system I thought pertinent to my question. My PSU has nothing to do with my question. For what it's worth, my PSU is a 750W thermaltake... way more than enough to power 2 x 4850's... and a 10 Mbit internet connection.

@talon - yeah, i've read they're working on optimizing the game. Honestly, I think the server lag is pretty tame. I've never really had a problem targeting people or attacking them... maybe a couple times I've been running behind them and not been able to hit them because they were really a few more steps in front of me... and morales not triggering despite spamming them... but that's about it... but, again, that has nothing to do with my question... Also, I'm a WE... so watch your back

 

[yathink13]

I'm running a Q9450 at 3.2 with a 4870, 4gb of ram on a rampage formula mobo and I have the same problem you do in large keep sieges. I partially blame the fact i'm running it on max details on a 24" monitor.

 

[johnyeah]

not what i'm talking about...

I fail to see how server lag and client FPS are related. You don't see any network connection details in the TH, vid card benchmarks, which are almost all based on game FPS. For the purpose of this thread, I don't care about server lag. I have not had any issues with it so far. What I'm seeing is specifically a decrease in framerate. I can tell it is not server lag because when is spin my view around, it's nice and smooth when looking at the ground, or away from the keep... then choppy and stuttering as hell when looking at the battle... that is NOT server lag... nor does it have anything to do with it. Regardless of whether or not your're looking at the crowd, you're still getting all the information from the server... so a change in framerate, as stated above cannot be because of server lag. It's like walking into a big room with tons of polygons and everything becoming "choppy" or "flickery" or however you want to describe it.

@ bpogdowz... I posted the info about my system I thought pertinent to my question. My PSU has nothing to do with my question. For what it's worth, my PSU is a 750W thermaltake... way more than enough to power 2 x 4850's... and a 10 Mbit internet connection.

@talon - yeah, i've read they're working on optimizing the game. Honestly, I think the server lag is pretty tame. I've never really had a problem targeting people or attacking them... maybe a couple times I've been running behind them and not been able to hit them because they were really a few more steps in front of me... and morales not triggering despite spamming them... but that's about it... but, again, that has nothing to do with my question... Also, I'm a WE... so watch your back

Believe it or not, server lag actually lowers FPS (may or may not be the source of the significant drop though).

However, at this point, I think it's more of a problem in software optimization (optimizing their graphics engine) than your hardware not meeting the demands. I would save the $$.

 

[Talon]

johnyeah above took the words out of my mouth almost verbatum. Server lag can cause lower FPS if it is bad. Also I have to agree that it is more likely optimization issues with the game and how their servers handle info in these cases that is more an issue than your graphics.

I just don't want to see you waste any $ before they do more work on the game possibly eliminating some of your troubles.

I forget where it was said as it was a couple days ago I read about this issue but whats his name....Kevin Jacobs? even referred to it being a known issue that was server related causing people to have performance issues in the bigger scenarios. Just saying it the way I remember it. I'm not perfect and don't profess to know all by any stretch but it wouldn't be the first time I've seen it in my 10+ yrs of playing MMOs.

Give it a couple weeks and if just not happy go ahead and load up every PCIx16 slot you may have and enjoy. I just sincerely hope it does raise your level of performance significantly and that many reports on the matter are wrong in your case. I honestly would like to just see you happy. A happy WAR player is a long-term WAR player and the more the merrier ! peace.

on a side note, later tonight at home I might try to find some of those posts but right now doing the tech thing at my job

 

[megamanx00]

The Killer Nic was made to reduce lag and increase FPS in MMOs. Depending on the way the game engine was written your slow down may simply be related to your computer waiting for information from the network before drawing a new frame. In that case the faster your computer can send out and process incoming packets, the better. Try lowering your graphic quality settings, and if you still get the same result then it's just a case of lag. I'm sure the developers will find creative ways to patch things, but in the meantime I don't think getting another 4850 will help you much.

 

[-Fran-]

MMO's work in a different way than regular games.

They have to load textures in real time to the Video card, have to generate effects in real time, etc...

So the video card isn't here to blame, it's just the way MMOs work, and the more eye-candyness you want to show, the more bandwith/cpu/ram/gpu/vram you will use in REAL TIME.

Remember all benchmarks pre-load things on the cards so that later on they just render them, using CPU for minor calculations (physics in a lot of cases, software thingys, etc...). On MMO's there's a continous use of HDD (to load textures that ain't on memory), CPU (there's a lot of addressing here that has to be done), RAM (HDD -> RAM -> VRAM) and off course, PCIe bandwith. Once it's on the card, we go back to the "render" scenario, but remember there's no "loading screen" on MMOs while interacting with various things on a map.

So, adding a second card for MMO purposes, won't solve any issue regarding big sieges or big populated areas. That's a CPU-RAM-PCIe thingy.

OC'ing will solve partially that, but never make it anywhere near smooth.

Esop!

EDIT: Spelling xP