Limited by GPU or CPU?

[ewilson248]

How can you tell when a game is going to be more CPU intensive or GPU intensive? inside/outside areas? textures? lighting? version of directX? number of enemies? etc... what puts a strain on what?

I have seen several posts here regarding frames rates VS quality in many FPS games but everyone has differing opinions on the weak link with regards to HW specs.

some guys have fast cpu's but last genaration graphics,
others have state of the art gpu, but last years cpu!

can someone shed some light?

o look i made a funny )
VBG

 

[amneziac85]

Ill try to keep it simple...

The latest games cant push the latest processor even close to its limit. The slowest Athlon64 (i believe is the 2700) can handle any of the games you throw at it with ease, and probably will for another year.

With graphics cards, the latest games can push them far if you turn on all the little features.

So if your playing games, the graphics card is head and shoulders much more important then your processor.

So from looking at your sig, you have a 2500 barton, which is enough to play todays games and probably till the end of the year, while that GeForce is gonna need to go, lol.

 

[ewilson248]

So, you would rather go with a shiny new gfx card (ATI) around xmas rather go from a 2500/333 to a 3200/400?

 

[Shuzer]

The XP 2500+ can handle just about any graphics card you throw at it (with the exception of the X800 XT, I believe).. I'd definitely upgrade my VGA card before processor with that system

 

[Ames]

Shiny new gfx card would be better imo.

 

[Sephiroth98743]

precisely....and by xmas there will be a ton of new chips out, possibly faster than current ones out now that u might be interested in.

 

[ewilson248]

ok, just did a somewhat interesting thing, just played UT2004, painkiller and farcry(not at same time) with the windows task mgr recording cpu usage.. all three ran at 100% cpu usage!
and 400-600 megs of ram, not to sure now about new gfx card idea..

your thoughts?

 

[Sephiroth98743]

for one, give me painkiller

but seriously...it will always monitor 100% cpu usage when playing game. play counter-strike or hl1 itll still say 100% cpu usage. maybe someone more knowledged on the topic can assist you but that much i do know.

 

[Hazar]

and much more expensive.

 

[Asus]

Yes, if your goal is games then make sure the money is in the GFX card.
Less so to the CPU/Memory/etc.