ArmA 3 System Requirements

[Rapture686 1]

Re: @rapture686

I would agree with that comment. I can’t see the setup you have being a problem at all..

Thanks guys. I was just kinda worried about my setup when alot of people are talking about all the top-notch graphics cards and cpu's they are buying for this game.

Edited July 9, 2012 by Rapture686

[-Coulum- 35]

So I am planning to upgrade when A3 comes out (I know long time from now), but I figure i should get my self somewhat knowledgeable on hardware and what not concerning arma. One question I have:

For arma do you guys think it would be more beneficial to get a better cpu (i7 3770k@3.4ghz vs i5 3570K@3.4ghz) or a better graphics card (gtx680 vs. gtx 670)? My first instinct is to go with the better cpu as arma can never have too much of that, but I have also heard that to arma, the difference between an i5 and i7 is nonexistent... So what do you guys say? (and apologies if this has been asked)

[oldbear 390]

The problem with the "Arma family" games is that you need both a decent CPU and a decent GPU ... and I will add a decent RAM amount and a decent HD.

From what we have hear so far, a nice i5 will be enough, but you will need a "good" video card and a SSD will help.

ATM, on my own "N°1" rig, i7 3770, GTX 670 and Crucial 128 are doing a good job and Arma2 is quite enjoyable.

[-Coulum- 35]

The problem with the "Arma family" games is that you need both a decent CPU and a decent GPU ... and I will add a decent RAM amount and a decent HD.

From what we have hear so far, a nice i5 will be enough, but you will need a "good" video card and a SSD will help.

ATM, on my own "N°1" rig, i7 3770, GTX 670 and Crucial 128 are doing a good job and Arma2 is quite enjoyable.

Thanks for the input, have you ever gotten the chance to see arma on an i5? If so is it any different than an i7? also what do you mean by "good graphics card".

I am the type of player that would appreciate having more ai in his battles than having prettier picture, so I am leaning toward the i7, but my main concern is that money spent on that could be a waste, and that an i5 would perform just as well... If that were the case than I would rather get the better graphics card.

[oldbear 390]

A "good graphics card" is a quote from some guy from BIS saying that for Arma3 we will need such item, on my opinion, the minimum for an enjoyable experience at the moment in the Armaverse are GTX 560Ti/HD 6870, these are rather "good graphics cards".

My son is playing on i5 2500/HD 6870 TwinFrozr II and the result is quite good.

[batto 17]

My first instinct is to go with the better cpu as arma can never have too much of that, but I have also heard that to arma, the difference between an i5 and i7 is nonexistent... So what do you guys say?

Hi. If it's Sandy Bridge for LGA 1155 then the the only difference is that i7s have hyperthreading (useless for ArmA AFAIK) and slightly higher clock rate (0.1 - 0.3 GHz). i5 2500K FTW ! (I'm running ArmA2 on it btw). Given the price and heat problems (some sh1t material) Ivy Bridge doesn't seem to be good idea.

Edited July 10, 2012 by batto

[ruhtraeel 1]

TBH I think anything with similar power to my machine will be able to max it fine. The GPU equivalent being GTX 680/Radeon 7970, processor being anything between an i3-i5.

[mr. bravo 17]

Hi. If it's Sandy Bridge for LGA 1155 then the the only difference is that i7s have hyperthreading (useless for ArmA AFAIK) and slightly higher clock rate (0.1 - 0.3 GHz). i5 2500K FTW ! (I'm running ArmA2 on it btw). Given the price and heat problems (some sh1t material) Ivy Bridge doesn't seem to be good idea.

The "heating problems" with Ivybridge is so ridiculously exaggerated. It only becomes an issue when you pass a certain level of voltage when overclocking on higher levels. I'm currently running my 3770k in 4.5Ghz with working-temperatures around 50C and no problems what so ever (With a Corsair H80 cooler though). Most 3770k's reach around 4.4Ghz without touching the voltage at all, which practically means no big differences in temperatures compared to default frequencies. When passing 4.6Ghz you're getting close to that amount of voltage that will make your temperatures suddenly skyrocket (Around 1.3v). But Ivybridge is still more effective per Mhz than Sandybridge, so 4.6Ghz on Ivy equals about 4.7-4.8Ghz on Sandy in actual performance. Not bad at all!

Also, eventhough hyperthreading isnt used well in Arma itself, it can still be used for other applications you're running in the background and windows in order to balance your overall performance. So for example, people who like to record or stream their gameplay might want to consider i7 for this purpose.

[batto 17]

The "heating problems" with Ivybridge is so ridiculously exaggerated. It only becomes an issue when you pass a certain level of voltage when overclocking on higher levels. I'm currently running my 3770k in 4.5Ghz with working-temperatures around 50C and no problems what so ever (With a Corsair H80 cooler though). Most 3770k's reach around 4.4Ghz without touching the voltage at all, which practically means no big differences in temperatures compared to default frequencies. When passing 4.6Ghz you're getting close to that amount of voltage that will make your temperatures suddenly skyrocket (Around 1.3v). But Ivybridge is still more effective per Mhz than Sandybridge, so 4.6Ghz on Ivy equals about 4.7-4.8Ghz on Sandy in actual performance. Not bad at all!

Hi. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_Bridge_(microarchitecture)#Heat_issue_when_overclocked

The problem is some cheap thermal paste or something. I haven't investigated it too much though.

[mr. bravo 17]

Hi. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_Bridge_(microarchitecture)#Heat_issue_when_overclocked

The problem is some cheap thermal paste or something. I haven't investigated it too much though.

Not really. There have been lots of experiments on soldering the heatspreader to the CPU as it should be, instead of using thermal paste, and other possible solutions. But according to what I've read from the people who have done it, the difference in temperature never was more than a few degrees anyway, definitely not worth the massive extra cost in manufacturing and higher prices. Main "problem" is simply the 22nm shrink which results in heat concentrated on a smaller surface, which naturally means it becomes harder to spread out for effective cooling. The only way for Intel to fix this is by making it less power-consuming, but which doesnt exactly go hand-in-hand with overclocking ;) That's basically also what Intel themselves are saying, and that it will not be much better on next generation.

But as I said, as long as you're not planning on messing with more extreme overclocking, Ivybridge will have no problems with temperatures at all. Reaching 4.4-4.5Ghz with good temperatures is simple as cake, unless you're using Asus Autotune or some other madness alike.

[batto 17]

@Mr. Bravo: Hey, I'm not negating what you said. But did you actually look at the link I posted? They use different and worse cheap thermal grease between processor and integrated heat spreader in Ivy Bridge processors. That's not hoax. It's fact. Somebody in Japan did research. There are references in the link I posted. Take a look.

Edited July 10, 2012 by batto

[mr. bravo 17]

I know what it says, but the media-"facts" on wikipedia are old. Yes it has thermal grease instead of soldering, and that's what everyone talked about the first week from launch. But since then it's been proven many times that the extreme temperatures that occurs when running Ivybridge past 1.3v would not have been much different if it was soldered to the heatspreader as on Sandybridge, only a few degrees. So the problem is not the "cheap thermal grease", but the laws of physics when shrinking a heat-source. That's what I'm trying to say.

Ivybridge is getting much undeserved critics on forums, so I'm just used to defending it :p Unless you get a much lower price on a Sandybridge processor today, I see no reason to why not buying an Ivybridge instead. 99% of the users wont be bothered by these heat-problems anyway. It has a whole bunch of improvements and advantages compared to Sandybridge and is more future-proof, especially considering it's Z77 motherboards.

[batto 17]

I know what it says, but the media-"facts" on wikipedia are old.

That's why you look at references.

Yes it has thermal grease instead of soldering, and that's what everyone talked about the first week from launch. But since then it's been proven many times that the extreme temperatures that occurs when running Ivybridge past 1.3v would not have been much different if it was soldered to the heatspreader as on Sandybridge, only a few degrees. So the problem is not the "cheap thermal grease", but the laws of physics when shrinking a heat-source. That's what I'm trying to say.

Where are those proofs? According to PC Watch test they reduced temperature by 18 (stock voltage) - 23% just by using better grease.

I'm not saying that it's "bad" processors. But trying to hide obvious problem just because you bought one is silly.

Edited July 10, 2012 by batto

[PuFu 4600]

That's why you look at references.

Where are those proofs? According to PC Watch test they reduced temperature by 18 (stock voltage) - 23% just by using better grease.

I'm not saying that it's "bad" processors. But trying to hide obvious problem just because you bought one is silly.

Are you actually talking about default thermal paste here? All of the fans and thermal in the box are garbage, bar maybe the i7 970, 980 and 980X which are using a completely different one (backplate mount and proper thermal). Hell, i prefer the 3820 i got that had no fan in the box, at least i am not forced to buy one i will never actually use.

All in all, i doubt you can call this an obvious problem. You got no one but yourself to blame if you seriously think using that fan instead of a proper after-market one.

[batto 17]

No PuFu, me and Mr. Bravo are talking about something else.

[oldbear 390]

It's all about this : Ivy Bridge heat issue indeed caused by thermal paste

I think the problem is more for over-clockers than for guy using their CPU at standard speed.

[mr. bravo 17]

The thing with PC Watch's results is that they're like the only ones who have presented anything like it, which makes it doubtful. Other people who have tried the exact same process and other variants got a 5-10C difference, max (Many of them used heavy watercooling though). Sorry I dont have time to dig around for these threads right now, but shouldnt be too hard to find on various popular OC-forums. But even if there would be a gain of meaning with new thermal paste, the temperature still completely freaks out when it reaches a certain level of voltage. This is not normal behavior for bad cooling, as it should raise in a smoother way. So the general conclusion I see on forums is that the problem lies within the CPU itself. Could be in the manufacturing or architecture, who knows. Intel practically states the same, which you can see in your wikipedia-link.

And no, I'm not defending Ivybridge simply because I bought one myself. I made this upgrade mainly for the Z77 motherboard to properly run my gfx-cards and SSD's. And naturally I needed an Ivybridge to get full speed pcie3-lanes, USB3 and all (Intels) SATA-controllers. Not much to choose from!

It just bugs me to see people rather buying pre-gen hardware because of this overblown flaw. As soon as Ivybridge is mentioned, this is what seems to instantly come to mind for most people;

Oh well, each one to their own decisions. I'll be quiet now :)

Edited July 10, 2012 by Mr. Bravo

[batto 17]

It just bugs me to see people rather buying pre-gen hardware because of this overblown flaw

Sandy Bridge isn't really pre-gen. Ivy Bridge is just smaller Sandy Bridge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Tick-Tock

[ruhtraeel 1]

It may have been overexaggerated, but it still doesn't help the fact that Ivy bridge isn't really worth it.

The performance different between sb and ib is minimal, but ib costs around 70 more. With that 70 you can get an aftermarket cooler and make your sb processor run just as fast as an ib while being cooler at stock and possibly at oc'ed speeds.

---------- Post added at 02:17 ---------- Previous post was at 02:13 ----------

Or you can use that 70 to get a 60gb ssd and have a performance boost much larger than a sandy bridge vs an ivy bridge.

[Leon86 13]

It's all about this : Ivy Bridge heat issue indeed caused by thermal paste

I think the problem is more for over-clockers than for guy using their CPU at standard speed.

Yeah, only a prob for overclockers. Anyway, overclock will be heat limited often but an ivy bridge is about 5% more faster at the same clockspeed, so a 4.6 ivy compares to a 4.8 sandy.

[smokabee123 1]

hey all. new to the forums even though i have been playing ARMA2/OA for over a year now.

thanks for having me in your community.

i am looking forward to ARMA3 and been following your videos on FB and through other gaming sites.

OT: i am hoping for some specs before christmas as my wife and kids are looking to buy me a nice (expensive :D) present this year. hoping to upgrade my computer to run heavy resource games like you guys at bohemia make. hoping i get into the community BETA to see how this system i have now runs.

this is something i would like not an ask by the way.

[oldbear 390]

I am not disturbed by the "cooling paste affair", here, my own 3770 runs cool with the help of some Corsair water-cooling and I do not intend to OC.

[mr. bravo 17]

Sandy Bridge isn't really pre-gen. Ivy Bridge is just smaller Sandy Bridge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Tick-Tock

Depends on how you look at it. Sandy Bridge belongs to second generation iX-series, which was an improvement (Architecture-wise) of the first generation. Ivy Bridge is third generation (The Tick), which will be refined in the upcoming fourth generation (Haswell/The Tock). They're all still considered new generations on paper but in different ways. In my eyes however, I'd like to see it as two series per generation. Since it begins with a shrink and ends with a reworked architecture, instead of doing both at once as in the past. That would make Ivy Bridge the first series in the new current generation, making Sandy Bridge the last series in the past generation.

But saying that Ivy Bridge is "just a shrink of Sandy Bridge" is retarded and not true.

It may have been overexaggerated, but it still doesn't help the fact that Ivy bridge isn't really worth it.

You're forgetting that the "CPU" deals with almost everything on your motherboard nowadays. Ivybridge offers more news than just frequencies, like proper PCI-E 3, integrated USB3- and SATA-controllers. Seeing how many people here doesnt exactly upgrade every year, they should put priority on hardware that will last as long as possible, not things that are being phased out as we speak. Ivybridge is also less power-consuming, which might matter for some people, especially if you're running it 24/7.

Also, if you dont want to overclock your system, the 3570 still is running 100Mhz faster + ~15% better performance than the Sandybridge 2500, which makes up for that slightly higher price (Along with what I mentioned above). Most motherboards also has a quick'n'safe-switch on them to overclock to 4.2Ghz, for anyone who're just afraid of using BIOS.

An Ivybridge system is also more ideal for anyone planning on SLI/crossfire, since PCI-E 3 will give you full speed PCI-E lanes (x16). This was one of the reasons to why I upgraded, so I could separate my gfx-cards more for better cooling, while also leaving the possibility to use 3 cards in the future.

[batto 17]

Sandy Bridge belongs to second generation iX-series, which was an improvement (Architecture-wise) of the first generation. Ivy Bridge is third generation (The Tick), which will be refined in the upcoming fourth generation (Haswell/The Tock). They're all still considered new generations on paper but in different ways. In my eyes however, I'd like to see it as two series per generation. Since it begins with a shrink and ends with a reworked architecture, instead of doing both at once as in the past. That would make Ivy Bridge the first series in the new current generation, making Sandy Bridge the last series in the past generation.

Hmm. It seems that you are talking only about marketing. Whatever name it is given and on what name they start counting generations doesn't really matter. SB was new architecture and IB is indeed "just a shrink" (new manufacturing process which results in die shrink). Haswell will be new architecture and next generation will be die shrink. Etc...

But saying that Ivy Bridge is "just a shrink of Sandy Bridge" is retarded and not true.

Care to elaborate?

[sky770 1]

..a game set to be released 1 year from now..It is gonna take at least another 8 months before..

patience.

:O ?

I thought it is really 2012 "Q4" :(