Hardware and settings for ArmA

[Mr Sarkey 0]

I'm thinking about upgrading my graphics card..

How would a INNO3D Nvidia 8600GT 512MB fare?

[Mr_Tea 0]

I have an 7600GS with 512MB (AGP Card), and since i use patch 1.09 ArmA runs very fluid on high settings.

[-Snafu- 77]

I have an 7600GS with 512MB (AGP Card), and since i use patch 1.09 ArmA runs very fluid on high settings.

May I ask what the rest of your system specs. are? As I have the same graphics card but have most settings on low and very low with 1200m VD; shadows disabled and 1024x768x32 resolution.

[Mr_Tea 0]

May I ask what the rest of your system specs. are? As I have the same graphics card but have most settings on low and very low with 1200m VD; shadows disabled and 1024x768x32 resolution.

Sure, no problem.

AMD AthlonXP 3200+ (Barton)

2GB DDR RAM (PC3200) in dual-channel mode

MSI GeForce 7600GS 512MB (AGP) Aperture size set to 512MB

Ceative Audigy 2

Win2K Prof. SP4

Resolution: 1360x768 (16:9)-wide

Viewdistance ~2000 meters

Terrain detail: Normal

Objects detail: High

Texture detail: High

Shading detail: Very high

Postprocess effects: Low

Anisotropic filtering: High

Shadow detail. High

Antialiasing: Very high

Blood: High

Edit: I still use the 94.24 Forceware drivers, as the never ones requires WinXP.

[Mr Sarkey 0]

Anybody tried the ATI Radeon HD 3870, very good performance (reatively close to that of the 8800gt). What do you think?

[-Snafu- 77]

May I ask what the rest of your system specs. are? As I have the same graphics card but have most settings on low and very low with 1200m VD; shadows disabled and 1024x768x32 resolution.

Sure, no problem.

AMD AthlonXP 3200+ (Barton)

2GB DDR RAM (PC3200) in dual-channel mode

MSI GeForce 7600GS 512MB (AGP) Aperture size set to 512MB

Ceative Audigy 2

Win2K Prof. SP4

Resolution: 1360x768 (16:9)-wide

Viewdistance ~2000 meters

Terrain detail: Normal

Objects detail: High

Texture detail: High

Shading detail: Very high

Postprocess effects: Low

Anisotropic filtering: High

Shadow detail. High

Antialiasing: Very high

Blood: High

Edit: I still use the 94.24 Forceware drivers, as the never ones requires WinXP.

Woah! That's impressive running ArmA on that detail with an AGP machine.

The major differences seem to be that I have:

1GB RAM

Intel. Pentium 4 2.66GHz

Windows XP

At first I thought it was because of the Athlon but that seems to have a speed of 2.2Ghz compared to my 2.66GHz.

It can't just be the RAM though? Unless it's the Win2K that makes the difference?

What is aperture size?

Now I'm actually tempted to try and update my old computer if your getting results like those.

[BraTTy 0]

I have almost same machine too

PIV 3.0G prescott socket 478

1 Gig DDR400

7600 GS 512m (agp aperature set at 256m)

WinXP Home

Must be his Win2k allowing the high settings and his soundcard Audigy must take more load off cpu

I play with:

Resolution: 1024x768

Viewdistance ~2000 meters

Terrain detail: Normal

Objects detail: Normal

Texture detail: Normal

Shading detail: Low

Postprocess effects: Low

Anisotropic filtering: Low

Shadow detail. disabled

Antialiasing: disabled

Blood: High

If I turn on shadow detail, or increase shading detail I notice a substantial performance drop, most other settings I can change to whatever I want

[rabbity 0]

can anyone help me figure this out then?

these are my settings

but for some jacked up reason i get HORRIBLE FPS even though by sysreq standards and game standards i should be destroying the game

[Balschoiw 0]

to BraTTy:

Try to increase your resolution.

I know it sounds absurd, but I actually got better performance when I increased it.

Also setting texture detail to high gives me better performance than low or normal settings.

Shading details are at high aswell here.

Antialiasing is set to normal here. Also gave me better performance than using low.

I know it sounds absurd to increase the values to get it running better, but it did work with my machine:

- Athlon XP 3000+ @~2500 Mhz

- Leadtek A7600 GT AGP oc

- 2 Gig GEIL DDR 400 PC 3200 RAM

I have pagefile completely disabled on my comp because the RAM is really sufficient.

[Mr_Tea 0]

can anyone help me figure this out then?

these are my settings

...

but for some jacked up reason i get HORRIBLE FPS even though by sysreq standards and game standards i should be destroying the game

You are using Patch 1.09 Beta i assume?

[rabbity 0]

i've used 1.08 and 1.09 it doesn't make a difference for me really

[Shashman 0]

Anybody tried the ATI Radeon HD 3870, very good performance (reatively close to that of the 8800gt). What do you think?

The HD3750 beats every single 8600 and the performance of the HD3870 is better but not by that much, so yes, I'd definitely recommend either of the two HD3**0s.

The only bad point I've read about, is that they (like most ATi cards) don't handle AA too well. If you're not that fussy about AA then these two cards are definitely better value for money than any of the 8600 or 8800 series of nVidia cards.

Over the past few days I've been doing loads of research on the current gfx card situation, as I'm in the process of upgrading my system, and had I not found a good deal on eBay for an 8800GTS 320 (112GBP), I would've gone for the 3870 for sure.

[Mr Sarkey 0]

Anybody tried the ATI Radeon HD 3870, very good performance (reatively close to that of the 8800gt). What do you think?

The HD3750 beats every single 8600 and the performance of the HD3870 is better but not by that much, so yes, I'd definitely recommend either of the two HD3**0s.

The only bad point I've read about, is that they (like most ATi cards) don't handle AA too well. If you're not that fussy about AA then these two cards are definitely better value for money than any of the 8600 or 8800 series of nVidia cards.

Over the past few days I've been doing loads of research on the current gfx card situation, as I'm in the process of upgrading my system, and had I not found a good deal on eBay for an 8800GTS 320 (112GBP), I would've gone for the 3870 for sure.

Thanks. Thats just about the same conclusion I've come to. AA is no biggy for me so I think I'll take the plunge.

[charliereddog 9]

I decided to go the other way. Can't tell you what my 8800GT is like as it's not here yet, but every test I saw and review I read rated the Nvidia higher than the ATI.

[Dwarden 1124]

actually i'm going to concur on the AA issue ...

that was problem with HD2xxx serie

HD38xx series seems to handle AA way better than even HD2900XT

plus HD38xx introduced new AntiAliasing modes (now there is so many i'm slowly getting lost)

on contrary NVIDIA 8800 serie (not sure about 8600) got ideal AnisoTropic filtering quality

while HD38xx seems to include same or very similar (maybe bit faster) AF solution like HD2xxx serie ...

AA = AMD.ATI wins

power usage = AMD.ATI wins

heat = AMD.ATI wins

AF = NVIDIA wins

pure performance = NVIDIA wins by brute force

OC performance = some AMD.ATI cards shows fantastic OC range (beyond 1GHz core and beyond 1300*(2600)MHz GDDR4)

price and availability = tie

drivers = tie (both companies got own fuckups)

games supports = now this is catch NVIDIA wins there

which to suggest ... that's headache i know problems with both

ideal system should contain 8800GT and HD3870 lol

[charliereddog 9]

How about a cross-SLI system?

[MartinCrank 0]

I curently use 8600GT and have to have everything on low except textures on normal for game have playable FPS in builded areas, though i were thinking it could be my CPU fault because i use AMD Sempron 3400+. What CPU is "recommeneded " for ARMA (by recommended i mean not one readme suggest but from real gamers experience)?

Will upgrading to Athlong 64 X2 5200+, L2 Cache 2024 Cache give me more FPS?

I decided to start new thread, please answer there.

[Shashman 0]

actually i'm going to concur on the AA issue ...

that was problem with HD2xxx serie

HD38xx series seems to handle AA way better than even HD2900XT

plus HD38xx introduced new AntiAliasing modes (now there is so many i'm slowly getting lost)

on contrary NVIDIA 8800 serie (not sure about 8600) got ideal AnisoTropic filtering quality

while HD38xx seems to include same or very similar (maybe bit faster) AF solution like HD2xxx serie ...

AA = AMD.ATI wins

power usage = AMD.ATI wins

heat = AMD.ATI wins

AF = NVIDIA wins

pure performance = NVIDIA wins by brute force

OC performance = some AMD.ATI cards shows fantastic OC range (beyond 1GHz core and beyond 1300*(2600)MHz GDDR4)

price and availability = tie

drivers = tie (both companies got own fuckups)

games supports = now this is catch NVIDIA wins there

which to suggest ... that's headache i know problems with both

ideal system should contain 8800GT and HD3870 lol

Well, it all depends on your budget really.

If you're looking to get a good value for money card, but can't afford any of the better 8800 series, then I'd go for the ATi 3870.

If you're on a low budget, definitely go for the 3850. It beats all of the equivalent nVidias (except when it comes to AA performance) and costs much less.

[Mr Sarkey 0]

I'm definetley on a budget!

[Shashman 0]

Well what's your gfx card budget?

90-100GBP you can get an HD3850

120-140 HD3870

[Mr Sarkey 0]

90-100GBP, I think the 3050 512 looks damn resonable at its price.

[walker 0]

Hi all

With regard to the best processors for running ArmA

Fast processor is most of what it is about, multi core means some other processes like say windows OS can be shunted to the other cores and can improve things; however...

You can improve realy big SP missions on multi core by running them as MP on Dual processors. You start by making an MP version of your SP mission; then running the windows MP server of ArmA on one processor and then logging on to it with your ArmA client as the only player, running on the other processor and loading up the MP version of the mission. Gives about a 20% to 25% performance boost.

You loose the ability to save game though.

Kind Regards walker

[charliereddog 9]

That's a really interesting tip Walker. I hadn't seen that before and with a Quadcore on the way to me as I type it's going to definitely see some use.

[Rex Cobalt 1]

Hi,

you might want to consider the Powercolor HD 3850 Xtreme (512mb). Costs about 189 EUR where i live - guess atm it's the best bang for the buck.

Basically all ArmA settings are cranked to high or very high, except AA, using 1280x1024x32.

Crysis also delivers acceptable FPS on my system, same resolution, settings medium-high.

GA-P35-DS3

E6750

2x1GB DDR2-800

X-FI

[Mr Sarkey 0]

Hi,

you might want to consider the Powercolor HD 3850 Xtreme (512mb). Costs about 189 EUR where i live - guess atm it's the best bang for the buck.

Basically all ArmA settings are cranked to high or very high, except AA, using 1280x1024x32.

Crysis also delivers acceptable FPS on my system, same resolution, settings medium-high.

GA-P35-DS3

E6750

2x1GB DDR2-800

X-FI

Thats exactly the card I'm looking at for about 110GBP.

Sounds promising.