Help upgrade my specs
#1
Hi all,
I'm currently using my relatively old desktop which has these specs :
Core 2 Quad Q9300 @2.5Ghz (never OC'd)
HD 3850 256mb
4 GB RAM
I wanted to know how can I upgrade this so I can play all games at 1080p resolution or scaling x4 to be more accurate.
I don't have a large budget so I want to know what do I have to change,especially the graphic card,I'm thinking about changing it for a used HD 4870,is it enough for 1080p ? I especially want to play Dragon Quest VIII at scale x4 (that's my goal overall)
And about the CPU,do I have to change it or do I just OC it ?
Please help me out ^^"
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#2
If you want x4/1080p then that GPU should be fine as there are some good used deals on ebay. Of course, that old of a GPU will only get you DX10 but that shouldn't be an issue for PCSX2. Regarding the CPU, I was able to play DQ8 using an E5400 and an Athlon X2 both o/c'd to 3.1ghz to play it just fine. DQ8 also does tolerate speedhacks well. You could try doing the same with your CPU, and also use MTVU.
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#3
Thanks for the answer DaTanKAC =)
Actually,I found a HD 4890 also,a used one,but pretty cheap (40€)
So it should be fine too for scaling x4 right ?
I'm going to try to OC my CPU and hope for the best
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#4
Well, maybe x4 with 4870 is cutting it close. When I go here to look at benchmark scores...

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

...the 4870 gets a score of 1403. How exactly they base that score? I'm not totally sure. Anyways I currently am using the AMD Trinity A8-5600k with it's built-in GPU which is a Radeon 7560D, which gets a score of 680. I am running at a stock 3.6 ghz for CPU. I have 64 bit Win7 (I also use Linux) being used, at 8GB DDR3 RAM at 1866 mhz.

I decided to do a test. At native res, framelimiting disabled with the hero inside the Farebury church, my fps avg is about 62 fps. At x2, fps avg is about 58. At x3, avg is 33. At x4, only about 20 fps.


The 5870 gets an overall score of 2533. I think that's a better choice for x4 on a known GPU demanding game.

Edit: Also to add, all other graphics options were default, with DX11 HW mode, 8bit textures not checked at all.
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#5
I don't trust that benchmark score,I find it a little bit incoherent, for example they put gtx 650 TI better than HD 6870 while it's the other way around,the HD 6870 is way better (based on series of tests on many websites).
Another thing that made me a little bit confused,the PCSX2 team made a video on youtube with DQ VIII running at scale x4 with an old 9800GTX+ which as far as I know is the equivalent of the HD 4850. So I doubt how can a HD 4870 be insufficient .
And for the HD 5870,I only found some at a really high price so =/
That's why I'm thinking about the HD 4890..
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#6
I agree that overall the 4870 is still a good choice overall given the price. I think the videocard benchmarking site is more geared towards overall computer gaming and multimedia which does not always correlate with PCSX2. Here is a benchmark thread involving GPUs and Dragon Quest 8.

http://forums.pcsx2.net/Thread-GPU-Bench...-for-PCSX2

The 4850 does quite well.
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#7
Thank you for the link !
I see the HD 4870 doing well also with 49 fps on NTSC at 2048x2048 but that resolution is overkill right ?
I mean if the card is doing 49 fps on that resolution then it must do better in the resolution I want i.e 1920x1080 or am I wrong ?
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