Vista - Waheyyyyy!

Pulled that off a site searchin for the system requirements for MotoGP07

[northwind]

Personally, I wouldn't even run vista with half a gig of ram, never mind try and run a modern game on top of it. It can be done, but... Well, lots of compromises.

From Yougamers:

The graphics can be tweaked via the game launcher and the settings are mostly based on detail and visibility; draw distance and number of bikes visible play a large role in performance and gameplay. The publisher's minimum requirements are another case of "it'll run but that's it;" even with every setting on its lowest value, the frame rate barely crept into the 30 region at 1024 x 768. The only way it was playable was at 800 x 600, and even then it was choppy. Realistically, one needs to take those requirements and move them up one level to have a minimum level of playability: a 2.8GHz CPU, 1GB of system RAM and a 128MB graphics card along the lines of an ATI Radeon X700 or NVIDIA GeForce 6600.

The problem is one of view distance: set to short and bikes just pop out of nowhere, leaving you to guess where they are further ahead, so it needs to be set as high as possible and we recommend one uses Medium settings, half draw distance and 15 bikes. Unfortunately this eats into the CPU's power and amount of RAM, hence the difference between the YouGamers and publisher's minimum requirements.

For the best balance of graphics, gameplay and performance, one needs a dual core processor (MotoGP 07 will use all cores available), plenty of memory and a reasonably modern graphics card: an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ or Intel Core 2 Duo E6300, 1.5GB of RAM and an ATI Radeon X1800 256MB or NVIDIA GeForce 7900 256MB will do the trick; with such a setup, once can play on "High" details settings at around 1280 x 1024 without the frame rate wobbling around too much. "

Originally Posted by HooliganDan

Well you can do it on a reasonable budget. The most expensive item will be the graphics card, nature of the beast I'm afraid.

Here is a breakdown of what I consider to be a decent enough gaming rig:

Motherboard:
Asus P5K Intel P35 (socket 775 FSB upto 1333Mhz) - £78.71

CPU:
Intel Core2Duo E8400 (socket775 - FSB 1333Mhz) - £146.86

RAM:
2GB Geil DDR2 PC2-6400 Dual Channel - £41.11

Graphics:
OcUK Nividia 8800 GTX 768MB GDDR3 PCI-Ex16 - £234.99
OR
ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT 512MB - £152.74 (this card will not be as good as the Nvidia card though).

HDD:
Fujitsu 250GB 5400RPM SATA 2 - £85.76

Optical:
Pioneer DVD-RW SATA - £19.96

Case:
Antec Nine Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case - £72.84

Power Supply:
OCZ 600W Silent PSU - £46.99

I assume you already have a monitor, keyboard, mouse and speakers?

So all in all this would set you back £707.26 (with the Nvidia card) and about £622 with teh ATI card.

You could save money for example if you had the E6700 CPU and also the 650W PSU from me (say £70 for them) which would give you a new total of £442.65 which would still include the kickass 8800GTX graphics card. If you can use your optical and hard drives from your existing system then yo ucan save even more money.

I can find cheaper prices than this easy:-


Motherboard:
Asus P5K Intel P35 (socket 775 FSB upto 1333Mhz) - £74.01

CPU:
Intel Core2Duo E8400 (socket775 - FSB 1333Mhz) - £129.83

RAM:
2GB Corsair PC5400 (if not Overclocking which ill bet your not this is fast enough.) Dual Channel - £28.89

Graphics:
OcUK Nividia 8800 GTX 768MB GDDR3 PCI-Ex16 - £234.99
OR
ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT 512MB - £133.94 (this card will not be as good as the Nvidia card though, But not enough to warrent the price imo.).

HDD:
250 Gb Western Digital SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 9 ms £40.31

Optical:
Pioneer DVD-RW SATA - £19.96

Case:
Gigabyte Poseidon - £52.88

Power Supply:
OCZ 600W Silent PSU - £46.99

Price with ATi graphics card = £526.81
Price with Nvidia Graphics card = £ 657.86

Prices from Scan.co.uk

Originally Posted by plowsie

Ok now i know this is lookin like im chasing a lost cause... But...

System Requirements
Operating System: Windows XP ? Windows Vista
Minimum Processor: Pentium IV
Min Processor Speed: 2400 GHz
RAM: 512MB
Minimum Graphics Card: ATI Radeon 9 or better
Sound: DirectX 9.0 Compatible Sound Card
HDD Space: 18Mb
Other Requirements: Mouse ? Keyboard ? Speakers


Theoretically, have i not got all of this except for the gfx card? Could i not just get a graphics card that meet these requirements? Or would i still have to update the PSU and RAM?

Stu,

The problems you've got are thus:

You're on-board graphics are simply not up to the job of running a modern game.
You have a slimline case, and therefore certain sacrifices have been made to shoe-horn everything in (hence the use of on-board gfx, but to be fair, most bog-standard PC's do that these days, and also you have a "slimmed down" PSU which is comfortably able to handle all the components currently in the system).

So ... if you want, you can go and buy an ATI Radeon 9 (or equivalent gfx card) and it WILL meet the specs the game requires.

However ... firstly the existing PSU won't be able to handle the additional power requirements of a dedicated gfx card (most likely), and secondly you'll probably need a "low profile" gfx card just so that it will fit in the slimline case.

So if you wish to carry on down that route, then IMHO, you ought to be looking for a dedicated, low-profile, PCI-express gfx card with a minimum of 256MB of dedicated video RAM on it. And on first looksies, they are either quite scarce or probably beyond what you might be hoping to spend.

To power this "beast" you'll also need to upgrade the PSU. Reading the link I posted earlier in this thread, that seems like a complete ar$e of a job to do (or at least to find one that will fit your system).

Of course you could always phone HP support and ask them what they recommend. Dut don't be surprised to hear them say "If you want to play the latest games then you've bought the wrong system".

As I say ... you may be better off flogging the HP system on fleabay (or taking it back to where you got it from), and put any money recouped towards building a system that is more appropriate for playing that game (it will also be capable of playing other games too without it having to be an out-and-out "gaming" machine).

HTH,
Pete

Yeah bin searching for gaming systems on net that are custom mate, cheap one that looks ok is just over the £300 mark!

Originally Posted by plowsie

Yeah bin searching for gaming systems on net that are custom mate, cheap one that looks ok is just over the £300 mark!

£300?? for a "gaming" system?? XBox360 perhaps? LMAO
TBH, I have built a fair few systems for people - none of them wanted anything "too fancy", just for basic surfin' n stuff ... certainly no gaming ... and I struggled to get systems built for under £300.
Now part of the reason for that is because I refuse to use "budget/crap" components, because in the long run it only falls back on me. I'll get a CPU to suit their needs and enough RAM to run whichever O/S (and applications) they have a preference for. I make full use of on-board sound and graphics (since they only want to do basic stuff), but I don't scrimp on peripherals either (not top-notch, but half-decent mouse, keyboard and speakers - maybe spend a little/lot more on the speakers if they are "into their music").

So do yourself a favour before you make any rash purchases m8 ... post up the spec on here and see what the learned folk think

None of us want to see ya wasting money m8

http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/gami...000/step1.html

Got that down to £297 playin with bits that i wouldnt need...

Now tell me what bits are shiiiiiiiite lol!

Stu, how confident are you of putting the system together yourself? I reckon you could probably save yourself a few bob by doing this. Or get someone local (who knows what they are doin) to lend a hand with the fiddly bits ... like locking the heatsink down onto the CPU ... I haven't built a system for a while, but the heat sinks that come with some of the retail AMD processors you are "supposed to" use a SCREWDRIVER to push a metal strap under a slot ... that slot is precariously close to the mainboard ... and believe it or not I once rammed a screwdriver into a mainboard ... no damage done thankfully! But you do have to be a bit careful with some of the components (memory is very sensitive to ESD* as well)

If you ain't confident, can't get someone to help or just not bothered about it, then go for it ... most of those components look ok at first glance ... although I haven't heard of that manufacturer of graphics card before (so maybe one of the others can chip in here?)

*Electro-Static Discharge

Pete

Originally Posted by HooliganDan

Well you can do it on a reasonable budget. The most expensive item will be the graphics card, nature of the beast I'm afraid.

Here is a breakdown of what I consider to be a decent enough gaming rig:

Motherboard:
Asus P5K Intel P35 (socket 775 FSB upto 1333Mhz) - £78.71

CPU:
Intel Core2Duo E8400 (socket775 - FSB 1333Mhz) - £146.86

RAM:
2GB Geil DDR2 PC2-6400 Dual Channel - £41.11

Graphics:
OcUK Nividia 8800 GTX 768MB GDDR3 PCI-Ex16 - £234.99
OR
ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT 512MB - £152.74 (this card will not be as good as the Nvidia card though).

HDD:
Fujitsu 250GB 5400RPM SATA 2 - £85.76

Optical:
Pioneer DVD-RW SATA - £19.96

Case:
Antec Nine Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case - £72.84

Power Supply:
OCZ 600W Silent PSU - £46.99

I assume you already have a monitor, keyboard, mouse and speakers?

So all in all this would set you back £707.26 (with the Nvidia card) and about £622 with teh ATI card.

You could save money for example if you had the E6700 CPU and also the 650W PSU from me (say £70 for them) which would give you a new total of £442.65 which would still include the kickass 8800GTX graphics card. If you can use your optical and hard drives from your existing system then yo ucan save even more money.

Dude, you definitely have to have the new 8800 GT on there instead, my mate just picked one up for £135 new off ebay, and it tests about 10% slower only but 1/2 the price! It's a real fast budget card now. Even outperforms the GTX on the odd test! Check out the side-by-sides on firingsquad.

TBH the setup I put down is about as cheap as you can get a gaming computer. You could go cheaper on GFX card and thats about it but then it wouldnt be the best for goming...