I’ve gone and done something rather rash

Well to get back to the original post regarding the upgrade itself, I’m sure you’ll all be thrilled to hear how it has all turned out 🙂

I got the gfx card delivered next day, and immediately installed it so I could measure for myself the level of improvement I was getting for the rash investment. Running some games and benchmarks it became very obvious that the bottleneck in my setup was the CPU, as I was only getting a marginal improvement with the 460 GTX over the ATI 4850HD. Benchmarks showed an improvement of under 1000 3d mark06 points, bringing me up to around 7000 total. TF2 showed some improvement as I was able to whack everything up full and run the game at around 50 fps average, it would spike as high as 100fps on occassion but likewise drop to 35-40 when the going got tough, however it looked good. Interestingly BC2 also improved to a reasonably playable level, but it still looked shit. These less than impressive results clearly explain why page 3 models are not falling all over me.

So anyway, last night I had the joy of installing a new motherboard for the first time, and despite it being slightly more complex that I first thought it went pretty smoothly. There were some connections on it I had not previously noticed, such as fans and the power and reset switches, and the LEDs etc, but once I noticed they were all quite clearly labelled it was pretty straight forward. The motherboard I got in the cheap CPU bundle offer was also a lot smaller than my old board (as I thought both were ATX, or at least that ATX meant one standard size), and with the GFX card being larger than I expected I had some difficulty squeezing SATA cables and my soundcard in together, but I got it sorted. I’m limited to using 2 SATA connections, when I wanted to use 3, but you’ve got to expect some drawbacks when you’re buying something so cheap, and the main thing is that it won’t impact performance.

Now a tip for anyone who also feels like going down this route, make sure you have as many possible network drivers downloaded for your new motherboard’s onboard lan controller as you can, before dismantling your old setup, or at least make sure network drivers are on the driver CD provided with it. I downloaded one set of drivers but I was a bit careless with this as I assumed it was on CD, and this lead to problems later, since once you’re offline it’s difficult to fix driver problems. To be honest the problems were of my own making, because I was also careless when running the installation CD, and misread the setup program as having installed everything it could. When I retraced my steps later in the night I discovered this was where I’d gone wrong, and rerunning the setup sorted all the problems.

All the above problems can be put down to a complete lack of experience doing something like this, and whilst I admit I held my breath and half expected sparks to fly while I pushed the on button for the first time, overall I’d recommend this approach as a cheap PC option. That someone who’s experience in building PCs is limited to installing single components, can do this without an instruction manual, shows how easy it is. I wouldn’t recommend this for someone who simply knows how to send an email with a computer, like my mother, but for anyone here wondering whether they could do it as well, I believe you could. There are plenty of voices here who could help with any questions you have too, and I can certainly offer my advice now as well.

Regarding how the PC is performing, it’s amazing. TF2 is regularly hitting 200+fps, and I haven’t seen it drop below 100 yet. I’m going to have to cap the frame rate manually now so I don’t get frame lag 😯 BC2 is also amazing, and runs perfectly at high settings. I don’t know the command to check framerate in BC2, but suffice to say it’s good. I only have an issue to sort now with my ISP because of the shitty pings I’m getting, and I’ll be back online properly 🙂 Hopefully it’ll start raining page 3 models at that stage too.

The future of console gaming, and soon to be present day PC standard.

I meant to post earlier in the week about those videos you posted as well Mike, as I was really confused. My old rig could have run that first game, and as exciting as the gameplay was made to look in the trailer, the graphics honestly looked dated. The second two videos were just stills, and I’ve no idea what argument clinching point they were trying to convey.

ffs you just won’t back down will you 😛 It’s almost as if you think you have a point.

The game below appears to be a rip off of L4D on first impressions, but holy fuck this looks atmospheric, and much better than that video you posted (which looks like it’s 2 or 3 years old) and miles better than the stills you posted. Posted link so you can watch the HD version as well.

GTX 460 will run this no bother – cost 100 quid

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eg_RcB91x2o

[youtube:1d26mgxs]Eg_RcB91x2o[/youtube:1d26mgxs]

Something you could probably use as a direct comparison between your xbox and a PC, below is a framerate test for bad company 2, showing the game in dx9, dx10, and dx11. You’ll notice a significant difference between the image quality in dx9 (console level) and dx11.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLqgcetMRK8 (for selecting HD version)

[youtube:1d26mgxs]KLqgcetMRK8[/youtube:1d26mgxs]

Of course dx11 is relatively new, but will soon become the standard. Consoles will catch up with this eventually, while PC’s continue to act as pathfinders for them.

Hang on, why are you making the Metro example about gameplay? You asked for a dx11 video of gameplay and dark or not, you can clearly see superior image quality. And just look at the BC2 comparison, it doesn’t matter what platform it was developed for, you can see dx11 is better.

And I do have a point, for those that dont want very pwetty GFX but can get enough without spending a small fortune, and I know you keep mentioning £100 for a card, but last time I looked you couldnt stick a GFX card in a shoe box on its own to be able to play games

and

The specs alone for that would cost over a grand easy which proves nothing on a versus basis

Atm I’ve only had a chance to play BC2 in dx10 because I’m limited to win XP, but I can now play this at full detail, with all bells and whistles turned up as far as they’ll go. Tomorrow I’ll have win 7, and I don’t expect to have to adjust my settings down for dx11. I refer you back to the op for how much this cost. You can add a tenner to that for win 7.

Gaming is for fun which is why consoles attract people, PC’s as popular as they are to some will never be as popular to all like they once were

Gaming is fun on both platforms, and while arguments regarding their relative popularity can’t be properly discussed without some figures, I have only noticed the trend you mention amongst a handful of people in XDC. One thing which struck me during my competitive TF2 adventure earlier in the year, for example, was how young everyone was, and to me this suggests PC gaming is still in a very healthy state.

Anyway, I digress. Consoles are the cheaper option for the masses, there’s no point really discussing that, but for the guys here for whom cost is a concern, this post proves there’s a cheaper way to upgrade your PC. The hardest part of this is pulling your motherboard out of your case, which requires the ability to use a screwdriver and note the shape of some connectors. Not exactly taxing, but it can be scarey notion if you don’t realise how easy it actually is. The cost of building this is within the budget range of your average console gamer, and easily less than the cost of next generation consoles on release (judging from the price of the XBOX 360 and PS3). When you take the price of games into consideration, we’ve already discussed how quickly any saving evaporates in taking a budget/lightweight console.

So in summary, the cost argument shouldn’t be an issue for anyone here, I’ve just proven how cheaply it can be done, and if I can do it, I dare say even Turks could do it.