Personal computing discussed
Moderators: renee, Flying Fox, morphine
morphine wrote:There is variance in the single-core performance, and if I had to guess, the Xeons have the best (but they all require specific motherboards AFAIK). Other than that, you can grab the highest-end i7, but unless you're rolling on cash, spending $1000 on a CPU is not the best use for it.
The big issue right now is that the current generation of Intel CPUs, besides having great performance and absurdly low power consumption, have very poor overclocking headroom. Hence my recommendation for "wait a bit for the new ones, then go big on overclocking".
UndrState wrote:Okay, so I need to better understand overclocking and heat management. At the risk of trying your patience, any beginner's guides you would recommend?
morphine wrote:c) Bring the multiplier up in the BIOS. Make sure that all the memory, voltage, PCIe, etc settings are not automatically messed with by the motheboard (some do this). Keep cranking it until Prime95 crashes within ~1 hr (Mark I Eyeball estimate).
-- c.1) Keep watching the temperatures. You wanna stay below 80ºC at full load, 75ºC preferably.
NeelyCam wrote:morphine wrote:c) Bring the multiplier up in the BIOS. Make sure that all the memory, voltage, PCIe, etc settings are not automatically messed with by the motheboard (some do this). Keep cranking it until Prime95 crashes within ~1 hr (Mark I Eyeball estimate).
-- c.1) Keep watching the temperatures. You wanna stay below 80ºC at full load, 75ºC preferably.
If you don't have much overclocking experience, one option would be to use the mobo's automatic overclock functions - some have it in the bios, some offer a Windows software tool (or even a button on the mobo). The overclock won't be as good as possible, but you can get some boost with near-zero hassle.
puppetworx wrote:That particular game has really low requirements (Pentium 4 1.5GHz). So you won't need to overclock anything to just play that game. If you are playing mods then you might.
puppetworx wrote:That particular game has really low requirements (Pentium 4 1.5GHz). So you won't need to overclock anything to just play that game. If you are playing mods then you might. More recent games from the Total War series are a lot more demanding (Shogun 2) especially, so a high end CPU would do you well if you think you'll play those at some point, though overclocking probably still won't be required.
Firestarter wrote:BTW, if you're looking to get maximum performance in games by overclocking the ever loving **** out of an Intel CPU...A bottom of the barrel motherboard will most likely limit your overclocking headroom
morphine wrote:There is variance in the single-core performance, and if I had to guess, the Xeons have the best (but they all require specific motherboards AFAIK). Other than that, you can grab the highest-end i7, but unless you're rolling on cash, spending $1000 on a CPU is not the best use for it.
UndrState wrote:The game is too old and it was too unoptimzed when released. This part of the hardcode was never updated.
UndrState wrote:Hello, first time poster - I'm hoping to tap into minds wiser than mine as I begin planning and budgeting for a home built gaming desktop.
My favourite game is Medieval 2 Total War, and from what I've gathered from the Total War forums is that the game will only use 1 core on multi-core processors, which means that otherwise great gaming machines can experience a lot of low FPS during the game's battle sequences esp. on high detail.
So what I'm asking is this: Is buying the latest, most expensive processor from Intel the best choice to cope with this problem, or is there a counter-intuitive better choice?
I also know little about overclocking, and I wonder how it might factor into this.
I appreciate all replies!
mattshwink wrote:Motherboard: ASUS H87M-E: $86
UndrState wrote:Hi mattshwink - I suppose it would've been helpful on my part to have indicated how much I was willing to spend. Before peripherals, I'm looking at $2000-2500 range. I've been using Internet Explorer on my Xbox while my GF has been going to school ( and doing work on a PC I paid for, BTW), so now that she's finally getting out and employed god damn right I'm gonna get myself a decent rigg. it's been too long. Seriously though, the promise of maximizing quality and performance of this particular game has been a carrot on a stick for me for some years.