Will my PC Run this? What CPU/GPU to get? What settings? System Specifications.

[echo1 0]

The triple core Phenom IIs are actually pretty good, and they're a good deal cheaper (€40-50 difference) than the equivalent quad core. If you're on a tight budget, it's a good way to cut corners but not lose much performance (ArmA 2 can't make full use of Quad cores anyway)

[quicksand 0]

All these super duper rigs. You dont need some ninja system to run the game. It runs fine for me on my X2 4400, 2GB ram and a 1GB HD4650. Thats everything on normal apart from video memory, thats set to high.

A lot of posts within this thread was almost putting me off geting the game...$1200 rig to play a $40 game...you guys are crazy! It cost me £50 for the graphics card, and £38 for the game, im well happy. Good job BIS!

QFT,my friend.I was almost put off from buying this game too but after 1 week of playing the demo at 1650x1050 with completely playable FPS and high settings with 2 km viewdistance I think there were gross exagerations being made.Arma 2 needs optimization but as far as I can see for me it runs better then Armed Assault ever did with the specs i have in my sig.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

Ok, how about this.

Asus M3A78-CM AMD 780V/SB700 Chipset w/Integrated ATI video, 8-channels, Gb LAN, S-ATA Raid, USB 2.0, Single PCI-E MB (motherboard)

650 Watt -- Casegears ECO-Element 80 Plus Certificated High Efficiency Power Supply SLI Ready

AMD Athlonâ„¢ X2 5200+ Dual-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology

4 GB [2 GB X2] DDR2-800 PC6400 Memory Module Corsair-Value or Major Brand More Options

ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB PCI-Express x16

320 GB HARD DRIVE [serial-ATA-II, 3Gb, 7200 RPM, 16M Cache]

LG 22X Dual Format/Double Layer DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW Drive

17" TFT LCD Monitor

Some of the things that were the same I left out. It came out to $686.00

Also, Im not sure about that sound card, sorry. Its the default setting. Wish I could be of more help in that department, but, like I said, Im new to the whole PC gaming thing.

Edited June 30, 2009 by Cobra Pilot

[echo1 0]

That's a reasonably good setup, but the PSU is crap. Do they offer any ones made by Corsair?

[Cobra Pilot 10]

The Corsair model takes the system out of my price range. I can take it down to 600 watts and its not made by Casegears.

Edited June 30, 2009 by Cobra Pilot

[echo1 0]

What about the 550W Corsair unit? The Power Supply/PSUs are really something that you can't cut corners on.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

It doesn't tell me who makes the 550W unit. How much am I going to need to run the system that I have configured right now?

[echo1 0]

I'd say that at least 550W would be more than enough to cover it and any upgrades that you make. The thing is, non-brand PSUs are bad, and cause all sorts of problems and can potentially damage your components (they also are incapable of delivering their stated wattage under most conditions). The only way to guarantee that you get a good one is to buy one made by a brand that is known to make good ones. Corsair makes the best value for money ones, but there are other companies that made good quality ones. If you could tell me which alternatives are around, there might be a good one around.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

The ones that I can choose from are either casegear, corsair, or an unnamed brand. It just has the wattage and power supply. Like this: 550 Watt -- Power Supply. A nameless 600W is "SLI Ready", what is that?

[echo1 0]

How far over budget does the Corsair one bring you?

[Cobra Pilot 10]

Its only $30 but $700 was pushing it already. If I get this job I'm trying to get it wont be a big deal though.

[echo1 0]

Here's an idea to make it more affordable - downgrade from 4GB of RAM to 2GB. 2GB is more than enough for ArmA 2 and most other games out today when running on Windows 7. RAM is cheap and easy to upgrade, so you can just buy another 2GB and pop it in if you have the money dwon the line. Trust me, it's worth the extra money to have a good quality PSU that you know isn't going to fuck up after a few months (and I've seen it happen a lot, so it's not some obscure problem that may or may not happen at some distant point in the future.)

[Joseph Troska 0]

I'm not quite sure what to make of this:

In the ArmA2 demo in the scenarios section I ran the Arma2 Benchmark mission/cutscene.

At the end it said: Average 43 fps

I run it on a Corei7 920 @ 2.67 (stock) with 6gb DDR3 and 4870x2 (no crossfire) - Catalyst 9.6

and on Vista64 Home Premium with SP2

With Terrain: High, Objects: High, Shadows: High, Textures: High

Res: 1680x1050, Fillrate: 1680x1050 (100%), Draw Distance: 2000m

Anisotropic Filtering: Off, Antialiasing: Off, PostProcess: Disabled

Is that good? :confused:

[krazypoloc 10]

So I take it this thread is a "how many FPS should I be getting with X hardware at Y graphics settings"?

As I really don't want to dig through 200+ pages of posts and I want to make sure I am getting the best possible FPS as I have tried many settings and manual cfg file tweaking and get some confusing results.

I am an IT specialist by trade and a modder/OCer by night. :) So no need to sugar coat the acronyms here. lol.

System....

Server 2008 x64

Q6600@3.0GHz

8GB DDR800@920MHz

4870 1GB @stock

1920x1200 28" LCD

[echo1 0]

43 fps

It certainly is. Although I can never understand people asking whether their FPS is good or not... Go and play some missions... if it doesnt lag, be happy. Else, go look for optimization tricks. Don't expect anyone around here to vicariously enjoy the gaming experience for you :p

[krazypoloc 10]

I'm not quite sure what to make of this:

In the ArmA2 demo in the scenarios section I ran the Arma2 Benchmark mission/cutscene.

At the end it said: Average 43 fps

I run it on a Corei7 920 @ 2.67 (stock) with 6gb DDR3 and 4870x2 (no crossfire) - Catalyst 9.6

and on Vista64 Home Premium with SP2

With Terrain: High, Objects: High, Shadows: High, Textures: High

Res: 1680x1050, Fillrate: 1680x1050 (100%), Draw Distance: 2000m

Anisotropic Filtering: Off, Antialiasing: Off, PostProcess: Disabled

Is that good? :confused:

Sounds like CF is not enabled. You should get almost double your FPS with an x2 at that rez. Try renaming arma2.exe to crysis.exe as this game is probably not in the 9-6 CF profiles(I take it thats what driver version you are running) driver yet.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

Now that im only on 2GB I have the option for this, Corsair XMS2 Xtreme w/Heat Spreader. What exactly does all of that mean? What is a heat spreader?

[echo1 0]

They're a high performance RAM for overclocking, and a heatspreader is like a little heatsink for RAM, to be honest, it's a bit of a marketing gimmick. Just get some Value RAM from the likes of OCZ, Corsair or Crucial.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

Wouldnt it be just my luck that when i start to do this they start charging for win7! :banghead:

I can preorder it now for half retail price but I cant get it till October 22!

Will it run just as fine with XP if I can find it?

Edited June 30, 2009 by Cobra Pilot

[christud 0]

Not sure if this is the right place to post this but since a lot of people are asking how to improve performance, here's something I picked up from 'Shataan' on Blue's News:

'A seemingly good tweak is going into the control panel for the vid card and setting render frames ahead to 8, rather than the default 3. Seems to help alot.'

Obviously I wouldn't post if I hadn't tried it and I have to say that for me the increase was instantly noticeable... even on my system which was running it pretty well in the first place. And since it's the done thing, here are my specs - i7@4ghz, 6gb ddr3, gtx285, Gigabyte EX58-UD5, 64gb SSD.

... and yes, i did upgrade for Arma2 - which I'm loving!

Chris

---------- Post added at 08:25 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:22 PM ----------

Oops - forgot to say that I'm using Win7 64bit too. Dunno if that's relevant to the tweak but it's in the interests of the transparency for sure.

[Cobra Pilot 10]

How did you get win7?

[Gonzo89 10]

How did you get win7?

You can get the RC1, which is the final pre release before retail. It's free for a year, and will shut down next July.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/download.aspx

[christud 0]

Just dl'd it from Microsoft a few weeks back and it's the release candidate obviously. Are they not still giving it away? Mine lasts til March before it all goes a bit funny.

[Olasee 10]

Well, considering that you're getting a 5Kg+ laptop that more than likely doesnt have a long battery life, I think you're going to be stuck at a chair anyway.

The problem is that all of the above are the mobile versions, not the desktop ones. The CPUs trade in a good deal of power for battery life, and those nVidia graphics cards are really rebranded versions of their old 9800M series. So while it may look like you're getting a premium-grade "asskicker" you're getting something with decidedly mid-range performance. Of course, you pay €2,000+ for it, and can't upgrade it. Seriously, where do people like you get all this money? :P

There are chairs and CHAIRS with plug sockets all around the world, thank God.

You know, like on trains, in airport lounges, cafes, even in cars etc., that`s `high performance`mobile gaming.

If I want battery life, would buy an anus eebee and play mario 3 :D

5kg+? you`re a lightweight guy?

Finally - mid/range with no upgrade? for 2 years more than sufficient.

[€2,000+ ... nope ... £2000+]

P.S.: I am Hugh Hefners Landlord and Lewis Hamilton drives me to work everyday... you know, flawless :D

[sorry for off-topic, couldn`t refuse :o]

[echo1 0]

Don't worry, when I was 13 years old, I also thought Alienware was cool. Then you grow up, your priorities change, and then before you know it, you're married with kids, and a Thinkpad...