Cheers, so, today Ive bought myself a 20" Widescreen display today, after I couldn't bare with my old fat one anymore... Together with my new display, I plan to buy either a new CPU or a new GPU (no money for both at the moment), so I thought which might be the better upgrade - which might bring a real FPS increase... Concerning FPS, I only really care about World of Warcraft performance, as that's the game I mainly play! My System: Operating System: Windows 7 Professional 32-bit Motherboard: GeForce6100PM-M2 Processor: AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4400+ (2 CPUs), ~2.3GHz Memory: 2048MB RAM GPU: Elitegroup GeForce 8600 GT 512MB | PCIe So, I got the choice between either a: - Nvidia Geforce GTS 250 with 512 MB or a - AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 6000+ (2x 3.1GHz) My questions would be: - Taking my new display and its higher resolution (1680 x 1050) into account, which of the two brings me the better FPS increase in World of Warcraft (or generally?) (If it is the CPU, is the 8600GT capable of handling a 1680 x 1050 resolution?) - Is a Geforce GTS 250 with 1024 MB necessary for a 1680 x 1050 resolution, or are 512 MB enough? Thanks for the help!!
WoW basically runs off your CPU... so even if you have a supar awesome l33t GPU, you'll be very limited by your CPU. Solution: Get AION when that comes out
QFT, I never noticed a diffrence jumping from 8800 Ultra to GTX 280 in WoW, so if you upgrade just for that game go for CPU.
I noticed a relatively decent increase when going from my x1600xt to a HD4870 under the same CPU, but I'm inclined to believe that it's because of the massive difference between the two cards. But yeah, anything beyond a x1900xt/7900GT won't show any improvement. The graphic engine on WoW is outdated and broken, so don't worry about it.
What fps are you getting ? Turning off shadows will increase your fps nicely ( if you even had that turned on). I would vote for new cpu or try to overclock that current cpu and see if you still need better cpu and higher fps.
The first picture displays the CPU when Shadows are at max, at resolution at 1600x1024! (the orange line is only the wow.exe process) The second picture displays the CPU when everything is at max, at resolution at 1600x1024! (again, orange line = wow.exe process) Strangely CPU usage doesn't reaally increase, it's never more than 65-70%, would this mean I should rather upgrade the GPU? Or is it normal that the CPU never wants to go to more than 65-70% for WoW? Thanks for the help!
If your CPU is dual core and the graph doesn't exceed 65-70% then that desn't mean that the CPU isn't the bottleneck. The graph is probably an average of both. So, if one is at 100% and the other at 40% it will end up as 70%.
This is a pic of the ressource monitor, while standing with full details, 4x AA and 1680x1050 resolution in Dalaran! Now this is a pic while standing with shadows at half, 4x AA and 1280x1024 resolution in Dalaran! Ok, what I've found out: - Whenever I set the shadows and sight distance to half, the CPU usage is nearly at max! - Whenever I set the shadows and sight distance to max, the CPU usage is at 70%, generally a bit lower than before! - Resolution doesn't have a big impact, only a few FPS! Now what does this mean
An 8600 GT would absolutely be able to run WoW on a 1680 x 1050 and i have the same GPU and a 22inch and WoW runs very smooth on that res no problems here. When i first bought my 22incher i thought the same but i decided to try my 8600GT first and apparently it still works good. So i havent bought any newer GPU's cause im on a very low budget.
If the GPU has a lot of work to do then the CPU has to wait for the GPU to finish its job and thus the CPU eats less cycles. That explains your 70% (case two). If the CPU can keep up with the GPU it doesn't have to wait and goes as fast as it can. That explains your 100%.
why not overclock the CPU? PD: Get AMD 7850 x2, they are cheaper and better. http://www.pccomponentes.com/AMD_ATHLON_X2_DUAL_CORE_7850_2_8GHZ_AM2__BOX_BLACK_EDITION.html With your current CPU you wont get higher performance with a 250GTS than with a 9600gt (trust me, i have almost that cpu and had a 9600gt). Maybe OC the CPU more if possible and get a 250gts/ati 4770 (i suggest the ati one, cheaper and you wont notice any difference with that cpu, even with a better cpu there wont be any big difference)?. My suggest its get the 7850 and ati 4770/4850. PD: Are ALL AM2 mobos, AM2+ Compatible? If you desesperatly want the items you said, first get the GPU. Its where you can get more performance.
My MoBo is AM2+ compatible! Why is the AMD 7850 better than the 6000+ ? It's 2,8GHz compared to 3,1GHz? (Concerning overclocking, im a newbie, do you know good guides to overclocking my kind of processor?)
