Will the GTX460 make the difference?

asteldian

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Hi all, I am trying to decide whether I need to get my wife a new GPU or whether it is the processor that needs changing, here is the situation:
System specs:
E8400 (Slight OC to 3.4ghz)
2gb 800mhz RAM
8800GTX
Monitor resolution 1920 x 1020

I cannot remember the other specs but these are the most relevant for this question I believe.
My wife plays Everquest 2, she suffers a fair bit of lag, will replacing the GPU with a GTX460 (768mb or 1gb) be a significant boost? Usually I would have no problem knowing what to upgrade to improve performance, however, I know Everquest 2 is CPU heavy, so even though the game is on high resolution, I am not sure how much the CPU may still be limiting her performance. It's the only game she plays so it would be a waste to upgrade a part that wont really help in this game

The 8800GTX was once a nice card, but now it is about 4 or 5 years old and is being used on a resolution much higher than I consider it good enough for, as I said, any other game and I would immediately replace it, but with EQ2 being CPU intensive I wonder if the money is better spent towards replacing the CPU/mobo/RAM

Talking of RAM, I am not concerned aobut being only at 2gb, my own new computer with Win 7 had to cope with 2gb for a while and it played EQ2 fine.

Any opinions would be greatly appreciated.
 
Hmm. I would think the card and processor are sufficient for a game like EQ2. Has performance degraded over time? If so you may just have a build up of unnecessary background processes/services and/or malware. Whittling those down or doing a fresh Windows install may help
 

asteldian

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On low settings it is not so bad, but the game is ugly below medium settings.
Obviously in empty places its ok, but dungeons and busy areas can be a nightmare. It hasn't really degraded over time, not significantly - of course, it is hard to tell with MMOs because overtime they adjust the game (like adding shaders 3.0 etc)

My computer runs the game very well as you would expect (i5 750 (not Overclocked) and a 5850). But unfortunately it's hard to tell whether the CPU or GPU were most responsible for the good performance.

I guess the smart thing to do is put the 8800GTX card in my machine and see how it runs while she has the 5850, I was just hoping people here might have a Magic 8 Ball answer for me to save all the fiddling
 

asteldian

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That's what I was assuming, I just wasn't sure if with a game like EQ2 lowering the settings reduced the CPU requirements much. Darn MMOs break the usual game-performance rules!

Thanks