CPU limits, requirements for best 5850 performance

G

GrayJay

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Oct 3, 2009
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Present specs E8400 stock 4g ram Vista 64 and will upgrade to Windows 7 64
Interested iin getting a ATi 5850 and presently have an LG L222wt monitor.
I was going to upgrade to a larger monitor size but the eyefinity review has me thinking of going that direction.
Looking at the dell P2310H Widescreen Flat Panel Monitor
Primary use gaming with my grandson and single player for myself.
mmo AOC Battleforge COD games
Single player COH Heroes Might and magic series Civ 4 etc
Is the cpu a bottleneck for this setup?
Thanks for help
 
Where can you find out that kind of info? I have an E2180 and I'm thinking of an 5850 as well. I game at 1680 x 1050. My 3850 is starting to show it's age. hehe
 
pretty much any modern core 2 duo at, or over 3ghz and you will not be bottlenecking.
i mean i have an e6850 (which is ancient these days) at 3.6ghz and I can run pretty much anything i want to, knowing my gpu is the limiting factor.
 
|Tch0rT| said:
Where can you find out that kind of info? I have an E2180 and I'm thinking of an 5850 as well. I game at 1680 x 1050. My 3850 is starting to show it's age. hehe
Click to expand...

2.8-3.0 GHz dual core is currently the sweet-spot. You could probably get away with 2.6 GHz, but that's the lowest I'd upgrade with.

Your CPU is 2.0 GHz, and has a cut-down 1MB L2 cache. I'd say an upgrade (or overclock) is in-order.
 
defaultluser said:
2.8-3.0 GHz dual core is currently the sweet-spot. You could probably get away with 2.6 GHz, but that's the lowest I'd upgrade with.

Your CPU is 2.0 GHz, and has a cut-down 1MB L2 cache. I'd say an upgrade (or overclock) is in-order.
Click to expand...

I've had it overclocked at 3ghz stable and strong for the last year and half. I've been kinda thinking of buying a E8400 but I'm not sure if my motherboard will allow me to overclock it well or not.
 
|Tch0rT| said:
I've had it overclocked at 3ghz stable and strong for the last year and half. I've been kinda thinking of buying a E8400 but I'm not sure if my motherboard will allow me to overclock it well or not.
Click to expand...

3Ghz? Unless you spend all day converting videos, spend your money on a new video card instead.
 
|Tch0rT| said:
I've had it overclocked at 3ghz stable and strong for the last year and half. I've been kinda thinking of buying a E8400 but I'm not sure if my motherboard will allow me to overclock it well or not.
Click to expand...

Got two for sale :D


But yeah for the OP I think you will be fine with a 3GHz Core 2 Duo. The guy with the E2150 though I wouldn't go any higher than a 4770 or 4850 without doing a mobo/cpu upgrade. I don't think you'll get your money's worth out of a 5850 with that processor.
 
GrayJay said:
Present specs E8400 stock 4g ram Vista 64 and will upgrade to Windows 7 64
Interested iin getting a ATi 5850 and presently have an LG L222wt monitor.
I was going to upgrade to a larger monitor size but the eyefinity review has me thinking of going that direction.
Looking at the dell P2310H Widescreen Flat Panel Monitor
Primary use gaming with my grandson and single player for myself.
mmo AOC Battleforge COD games
Single player COH Heroes Might and magic series Civ 4 etc
Is the cpu a bottleneck for this setup?
Click to expand...

For gaming in general more cpu cache (L1 L2 L3) is better. There a few games which need a really fast cpu.

Age of Conan is not one of them. Nor are the others listed by you. At least not that your E8400 will grind fps to a halt.
 
|Tch0rT| said:
Where can you find out that kind of info? I have an E2180 and I'm thinking of an 5850 as well. I game at 1680 x 1050. My 3850 is starting to show it's age. hehe
Click to expand...
5850 is going to be overkill for that resolution. 4850 512MB could be had pretty dang cheap and would be a big boost. Another consideration is keeping the 3850 and buying a faster CPU.
 
defaultluser said:
2.8-3.0 GHz dual core is currently the sweet-spot. You could probably get away with 2.6 GHz, but that's the lowest I'd upgrade with.

Your CPU is 2.0 GHz, and has a cut-down 1MB L2 cache. I'd say an upgrade (or overclock) is in-order.
Click to expand...
yeah but clock for clock his 2180 isnt even close to a E8xxx series. those E2xxx series are about equivalent to the old Athlon 64 X2 cpus so even at 3.0 he would noticeably hold back a 5850.
 
good luck with 5850,, dont worry about overkill. youll want a new monitor after a while and that card can power most ofthem.
 
GrayJay said:
Present specs E8400 stock 4g ram Vista 64 and will upgrade to Windows 7 64
Interested iin getting a ATi 5850 and presently have an LG L222wt monitor.
I was going to upgrade to a larger monitor size but the eyefinity review has me thinking of going that direction.
Looking at the dell P2310H Widescreen Flat Panel Monitor
Primary use gaming with my grandson and single player for myself.
mmo AOC Battleforge COD games
Single player COH Heroes Might and magic series Civ 4 etc
Is the cpu a bottleneck for this setup?
Thanks for help
Click to expand...

You are clearly getting bottlenecked over there by that year + old core 2 duo wolfdale.

You need at least(!) a core i7 @ 4.5(!) or core i9 at 4.0Ghz(!) to see the max potential of that card.




PS/ You're fine, even in crysis you might see 2-3fps more with a [email protected]
 
DeadSkull said:
You are clearly getting bottlenecked over there by that year + old core 2 duo wolfdale.

You need at least(!) a core i7 @ 4.5(!) or core i9 at 4.0Ghz(!) to see the max potential of that card.




PS/ You're fine, even in crysis you might see 2-3fps more with a [email protected]
Click to expand...
with a card that fast he would certainly see more than 2-3 fps if going from a stock E8400 to an overclocked i7 especially at just 1680. his cpu is not really an issue except in games like gta4 that really need a fast quad to perform better. in the future I would certainly go with a fast quad core before upgrading that 5850 though.
 
cannondale06 said:
with a card that fast he would certainly see more than 2-3 fps if going from a stock E8400 to an overclocked i7 especially at just 1680. his cpu is not really an issue except in games like gta4 that really need a fast quad to perform better.
Click to expand...

Card used is GTX 295.

CWH.png


http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=807&p=5
 
DeadSkull said:
Card used is GTX 295.

http://www.legionhardware.com/Bench/CPU_Scaling_With_The_GeForce_GTX_295/CWH.png

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=807&p=5
Click to expand...
card used gtx280. in Crysis on high settings and 2x AA at 1680x1050 an overclocked i7 gets 10 more fps minimum and 6 more fps average than a stock E8600 which of course if faster then his E8400 . but as you see overclocking the E8600 about even things out again. thats besides the point though because an overcloked i7 will certainly give more than 2-3 fps more than an E8400 at the OPs 1680 res. at leaset according to bit-tech. http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2009/09/08/intel-core-i5-and-i7-lynnfield-cpu-review/7

also there are a few games that really utilize the i7 quite well and would hand the E8400 its ass. those games are very few though and even most of those cases the E8400 is way more than playable. in other words I agree the E8400 with a 5850 would not be an issue for the most part.
 
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My specs are in my sig... Running Crysis at Enthusiest 2xAA 1920x1200 with the card at stock clocks my performans looks like this:

MIN: 21.62
AVG: 29.50
MAX: 34.99

When I overclocked the card to 950/1250 (cpu still at 3.2GHz) my performance goes to:

MIN: 22.54
AVG: 31.20
MAX: 37.32

So atleast in Crysis, I don't appear to be bottlenecked by my CPU hardly at all as I get minor improvements in FPS accross the board with a minor OC of the card. If I was CPU limited, I would not see any gains or maybe only see a gain in max fps but not minimum.

There will be games that are not as GPU intensive which will be CPU limited, but generally those will have skyhigh fps anyway, so it shouldn't matter.
 
RamonGTP said:
My specs are in my sig... Running Crysis at Enthusiest 2xAA 1920x1200 with the card at stock clocks my performans looks like this:

MIN: 21.62
AVG: 29.50
MAX: 34.99

When I overclocked the card to 950/1250 (cpu still at 3.2GHz) my performance goes to:

MIN: 22.54
AVG: 31.20
MAX: 37.32

So atleast in Crysis, I don't appear to be bottlenecked by my CPU hardly at all as I get minor improvements in FPS accross the board with a minor OC of the card. If I was CPU limited, I would not see any gains or maybe only see a gain in max fps but not minimum.

There will be games that are not as GPU intensive which will be CPU limited, but generally those will have skyhigh fps anyway, so it shouldn't matter.
Click to expand...
only if you were completely cpu limited would you not see any improvements. every game is different so of course its hard to always speak in absolutes when you are talking about a cpu being a limitation or bottleneck. some cpus will be a huge limitation at just running a game smoothly while others will handle a game fine but will bottleneck a higher end card. of course I am sure you know all this.
 
cannondale06 said:
only if you were completely cpu limited would you not see any improvements. every game is different so of course its hard to always speak in absolutes when you are talking about a cpu being a limitation or bottleneck. some cpus will be a huge limitation at just running a game smoothly while others will handle a game fine but will bottleneck a higher end card. of course I am sure you know all this.
Click to expand...

Obviously every game is different, I clearly stated "There will be games that are not as GPU intensive which will be CPU limited, but generally those will have skyhigh fps anyway, so it shouldn't matter."
 
RamonGTP said:
Obviously every game is different, I clearly stated "There will be games that are not as GPU intensive which will be CPU limited, but generally those will have skyhigh fps anyway, so it shouldn't matter."
Click to expand...
I know you did but you also said that those fps will generally be skyhigh too. when I think of cpu limited games I think of gta4 where you better have an i7 if you want the best playable experience as the lower end cpus just tank. anyway we cant really go over gaming scenario so no worries.
 
Of course there are always exceptions, which is also why I said "generally"

I know better than to speak in absolutes ;)
 
RamonGTP said:
My specs are in my sig... Running Crysis at Enthusiest 2xAA 1920x1200 with the card at stock clocks my performans looks like this:

MIN: 21.62
AVG: 29.50
MAX: 34.99

When I overclocked the card to 950/1250 (cpu still at 3.2GHz) my performance goes to:

MIN: 22.54
AVG: 31.20
MAX: 37.32

So atleast in Crysis, I don't appear to be bottlenecked by my CPU hardly at all as I get minor improvements in FPS accross the board with a minor OC of the card. If I was CPU limited, I would not see any gains or maybe only see a gain in max fps but not minimum.

There will be games that are not as GPU intensive which will be CPU limited, but generally those will have skyhigh fps anyway, so it shouldn't matter.
Click to expand...

drop your cpu back to stock and see what the difference is. from the [H] cpu scaling evaluation we can see that quad core and cpu clocks can effect what level of settings you can use as well as frame rates. beyond that, the op would obviously see an improvement over any previous generation card save for a 4870x2 or gtx295.
 
I have no doubt dropping the CPU down to stock will have a significant negative impact.
 
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