Saving up for "Crysis 2" upgrades

[tomaso1z]

Crysis requirements were ridiculous but looking to achieve the highest settings (1920 x 1200) averaging 30fps+ on "Crysis 2" the day its released .

APPROXIMATE UPGRADE DATE:June 2010 on release of Crysis 2
BUDGET RANGE: £800-£1000
SYSTEM USAGE: Crysis 2 PC
PARTS REQUIRED: Graphics Card, CPU, Motherboard, SSD Hard drives
PREFERRED WEBSITE FOR PARTS: www.ebuyer.com
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: UK
PART PREFERENCES: Asus XFX Intel Nvidia
OVERCLOCKING: Yes
SLI OR CROSSFIRE: Yes
MONITOR RESOLUTION: 1920 x 1200
COMMENTS: My current thoughts, bearing in mind Cry Engine 3 is a crossplatform and it won't stress pc's that much...

Simple Upgrade when prices come down in June:
Four 64gb Solid Sate Drives in Raid0
Two Directx 11 high end Nvidia 300 Single Card's running in SLI

Im worried will i need to upgrade current 4Ghz Dual Core to a quad core 4Ghz? if so my thoughts when prices come down in June: 1) Q9650 & Asus Striker mobo or 2) i7 920 & Asus Rampage mobo.

Current System
Windows 7 Enterprise
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 @ 3.9Ghz
Corsair H50 CPU Watercooler
Nforce 6 Motherboard (xfx 680i)
4gb DDR2 @ 800mhz 4,4,4,12 (2.1v)
Nvidia Xfx GTX 295 1.7gb DDR3
Creative X-fi Titanium
Velociraptor (Windows 7 boot drive)
1.37tb Raid 0 (storage)

 

[wathman]

don't upgrade to a Q9650. In fact, if gaming is your only concern, your C2Duo can keep up with games for quite a while yet. This CPU benchmark comparison over at anandtech is a pretty useful one: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=56&p2=108 it's normalized across platforms as well as cumulative over time so you have a better idea on how older CPUs compare with the new ones. It isn't perfect, but good enough to be a rough guide.

Also, by June 2010 (if they actually meet that date and don't push back) there will most likely be a new generation of i7's along with the i9's so I wouldn't commit to any big selections until it's closer to release date.

 

[tomaso1z]

don't upgrade to a Q9650. In fact, if gaming is your only concern, your C2Duo can keep up with games for quite a while yet. This CPU benchmark comparison over at anandtech is a pretty useful one: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=56&p2=108 it's normalized across platforms as well as cumulative over time so you have a better idea on how older CPUs compare with the new ones. It isn't perfect, but good enough to be a rough guide.

Also, by June 2010 (if they actually meet that date and don't push back) there will most likely be a new generation of i7's along with the i9's so I wouldn't commit to any big selections until it's closer to release date.

Nice cpu benchmarks, your right by the looks of it new cpu's dont improve games these days. I do like the dual core at 3.92Ghz, so quad core @ 3.9Ghz wouldn't make a difference.

I still think the SSD's would be a huge improvemt, waiting for the price to come down and nvidia 300 cards are yet to be released, patience is a virtue.

 

[wathman]

yeah, the SSDs will be an improvement, but really hard to make a recommendation since there will be 3rd generation SSDs out by then, and if the market continues to grow and tech improves, you may be looking at buying a better set of SSDs for RAID config.

 

[tomaso1z]

yeah, the SSDs will be an improvement, but really hard to make a recommendation since there will be 3rd generation SSDs out by then, and if the market continues to grow and tech improves, you may be looking at buying a better set of SSDs for RAID config.

I haven't done my research didn't relaize there was any difference in SSD's, i seen an ssd with 100mbps read but also seen a high end corsair ssd with 220mb read. Apart from read speeds how can they be different? I'm guessing the 3rd genereation will max out the sataII/300mbps.

 

[wathman]

http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3631
This is the best single article covering SSDs out there right now. The problem with how companies are advertising their new SSDs, is they don't specify if they are reporting average speeds or max speeds. Also, there is a very important distinction on who built the controller for the various SSDs out there right now. Intel and Indilinx make the best ones, Samsung is average bordering on pretty good, and J-Micron plain sucks.

 

[wathman]

As for recommendations for "right now" Intel X25-M is the"best", OCZ Vertex second, then I'd say Patriot Torqx.

 

[tomaso1z]

As for recommendations for "right now" Intel X25-M is the"best", OCZ Vertex second, then I'd say Patriot Torqx.

thanks for the read, will definately wait for the x25 gen2 price drop or wait to see what gen3 brings and stick to Windows 7 for TRIM.

 

[obsidian86]

keep your current system crysis 2 will be less of a hardware sl*t then crysis 1

 

[tomaso1z]

keep your current system crysis 2 will be less of a hardware sl*t then crysis 1

i really should report your foul language about Crysis Mr Corsair obsidian86 but you are techincally correct!

as for keeping my system i very doubt the GTX 295 will handle Crysis 2 full trottle, high end nvidia 300's are the only option benefiting from hardware tessellation and Directx 11 making use of multi core CPU's.

X25's & GTX300's FTW

 

[obsidian86]

the only reason crysis 1 was so hard on hardware is that the original cryengine was never designed to be used for gaming,it was intended for 3d architectural renderings to be used with high level workstation cards,and as a fact a high end gaming card doesn hold a candle to a high end workstation card on pure output capacity

 

[tomaso1z]

the only reason crysis 1 was so hard on hardware is that the original cryengine was never designed to be used for gaming,it was intended for 3d architectural renderings to be used with high level workstation cards,and as a fact a high end gaming card doesn hold a candle to a high end workstation card on pure output capacity

crysis still struggles now so that would explain alot

 

[tomaso1z]

Has Nvidia ever thought of developing support for Nvidia workstation Quadro FX in conjuction with an Nvidia gamer card? woudn't that bring two great technologys together instead of making ati and nvidia work together like i saw in a new motherboard thats come recently, can't remember which model it was.