Build a PC for Rome 2 / Hardware Recommendations and Advice Thread

[airborne guy]

LOL, no that graphics card blows mate. you can pay 200 more and get a monster

[ahowl11]

Can someone point me to a good graphics card that is reasonable in price? $200 is the max for my budget.
Someone said they would hand me their nvidia 9600gt so I looked it up.
http://www.amazon.com/nVidia-Geforce...nvidia+9600+gt

Would that work?

And with that I need a better PSU than 180w correct?

I apologize but I do not have a lot of knowledge with computer parts. I simply want to run the game the way it's supposed to be played.

[Aruberikku]

Can someone point me to a good graphics card that is reasonable in price? $200 is the max for my budget.
Someone said they would hand me their nvidia 9600gt so I looked it up.
http://www.amazon.com/nVidia-Geforce...nvidia+9600+gt

Would that work?

And with that I need a better PSU than 180w correct?

I apologize but I do not have a lot of knowledge with computer parts. I simply want to run the game the way it's supposed to be played.

With your current CPU, I wouldn't spend $200 on a graphic card. It will probably get bottlenecked.
Personally I'd wait for Rome II to come out and then use the benchmark tool, assuming it includes one like Shogun 2 did, to see how your CPU performs. Then you can take a better decision.

P.S.: That card would need a minimum of 350W. But it would probably perform sub-par in Rome II, since it's rather old. Maybe ask a friend if they have an old GPU lying around that you could borrow? Maybe you can get something similar.

[ahowl11]

Where would I find the benchmark tool?

Here is something to consider..

I use my laptop for everything: itunes, school, rtw, m2tw, modding and mods, and other programs. I bought the new desktop solely for R2. I have downloaded Spotify so I can listen to music on it, Steam for activation and dlcs/updates and that is it.
I recently installed Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault (a game that was super choppy on an older CPU) and it worked amazing, super smooth. I uninstalled it, and I do not plan on ever putting anything on this CPU except for R2.

Will that make a difference in performance at all?

[Epic28]

Where would I find the benchmark tool?

Here is something to consider..

I use my laptop for everything: itunes, school, rtw, m2tw, modding and mods, and other programs. I bought the new desktop solely for R2. I have downloaded Spotify so I can listen to music on it, Steam for activation and dlcs/updates and that is it.
I recently installed Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault (a game that was super choppy on an older CPU) and it worked amazing, super smooth. I uninstalled it, and I do not plan on ever putting anything on this CPU except for R2.

Will that make a difference in performance at all?

Download the Shogun 2 demo from steam on your desktop and see if it runs on your PC, this will give you a decent estimate of what you can expect from Rome 2. A couple of things to note is you spent money on a rig that can barely run Rome 2, if at all. To compare a game like Medal of Honor PA running versus Rome 2 is like trying to play a PS3 title on PS2.

You should of done a little more research before you made your purchase. Bottom line.

[Chronus]

Yes, you should do fine.

badass

Thanks! Do you think I will be able to get >60 fps on ultra with this set up?

Btw I also have a 120 hz monitor FYI

[Geniuswas]

Where would I find the benchmark tool?

Use a free program called Fraps.

Here is something to consider..

I use my laptop for everything: itunes, school, rtw, m2tw, modding and mods, and other programs. I bought the new desktop solely for R2. I have downloaded Spotify so I can listen to music on it, Steam for activation and dlcs/updates and that is it.
I recently installed Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault (a game that was super choppy on an older CPU) and it worked amazing, super smooth. I uninstalled it, and I do not plan on ever putting anything on this CPU except for R2.

Will that make a difference in performance at all?

Hardly. If you overload your computer with unneccesary programs running at once then that will have a performance drop. Otherwise installing many programs will not nearly cause the same amount of performance hindrance. Make sure to close unneccesary programs and applications!

[Aruberikku]

In Shogun 2 you would find the benchmark tool by launching Shogun 2 through Steam, then you would get several options. Can't guarantee it will be included with Rome II though.

MoH: Pacific Assault is a game from 2004, Rome II is from 2013. So don't expect it to run the same way.

The amount of data stored on your hard drive won't affect performance. As long the data on the HDD is not accessed, your PC will just happily ignore it. It would be quite a flaw if your PCs performance dropped just by storing more data on your HDD.
What you want to control however is what that data is. Bloatware, malware, programs that run when windows start, even anti-malware slows down your PC considerably.

Some stuff to prevent your PC slowing down are:
- Uninstall unneeded programs, especially all that junk you get when you buy a pre-made PC.
- Turn off a program's ability to run at startup if it's not needed.
- Don't run all the latest software on your PC if your hardware is older. The latest software is made to run on newer PCs, so running it on older machines might take away a lot of resources.
- Remove malware/viruses/etc...
- Big anti-malware suites with lots of fancy monitoring stuff can really slow down a PC, just get something more basic. Make sure it's good though.
- Defragment your hard drive on a regular basis.

[Chronus]

Hi, can you tell me if i will be able to run Rome 2 on ultra with my PC?

1. Intel Core i7-3960X (Six Core Extreme, 15MB Cache) Overclocked up to 4.0Ghz
   
2. 16GB Quad Channel DDR3 at 1600MHz
   
3. Dual 3GB AMD Radeon HD 7950 AMD CrossfireX Enabled
   
4. Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit, English, w/Media

[Ramesses II The Great]

Hi, can you tell me if i will be able to run Rome 2 on ultra with my PC?

1. Intel Core i7-3960X (Six Core Extreme, 15MB Cache) Overclocked up to 4.0Ghz
2. 16GB Quad Channel DDR3 at 1600MHz
3. Dual 3GB AMD Radeon HD 7950 AMD CrossfireX Enabled
4. Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit, English, w/Media

badass

[alQamar]

badass

Regarding my benchmark thread this system will not perform better than a way cheaper 3770k with dual channel ram. Waste of money for Total War sadly :/.

Feel free to run the benchmarks in my signature.

Thanks for adding positive facts about SLI barbarian. Still I think SLI is some kind a waste of resources for a single monitor solution and as Rome 2 does not support Multimonitor scenarios I really don't see much sense and less return on investment.

[alQamar]

In Shogun 2 you would find the benchmark tool by launching Shogun 2 through Steam, then you would get several options. Can't guarantee it will be included with Rome II though.

The Bechmark for Rome 2 is definitely included in the options menu where you can choose the graphics settings so you can more easily testdrive your settings made.
However based on the information I have it does not have a cpu benchmark (melee close up) there. If this would be same in the final we could not compare if the promised optimisations apply.

This would then be a really sneaky way to cover facts under a veil of mystery. Let's hope we also get a cpu benchmark for Rome 2.

[A Barbarian]

If this would be same in the final we could not compare if the promised optimisations apply.

I don't think we are going to see any significant improvement in that area. Even their own video in the 'How to play' Wiki is choppy in the same places as Shogun 2. Just watch from second 11:


And that's even without any fighting action going on.

[Aruberikku]

Yes, you should do fine.

[Another fan]

What about me?

Thi is my computer:

http://www.acer.com.ph/ac/en/PH/cont...t/DT.SJPSP.003

[Another fan]

My system!:


-Windows 7 Home Premium 64bits.
-Intel 4 core i7-3770 3.40 GHz.
-8GB DDR3 SDRAM.
-Nvidia GeForce GT 645.

[ahowl11]

Yeah, you are right. I guess I was little over my head with my expectations that day. I took it back and got a refund. And I have researched and found a few sites that offer customized desktops. Looks like I'll go that route to get the hardware needed to play R2. It's a real shame that we have to spend x amount of money to just play one game, but for this game it's worth it.

[alQamar]

At least this video shows us DX 11 graphics this time.

[CanOmer]

Loading times in TW games are long. SSD is the solution but they are expensive.

While Windows installed on my old HDD, can I install and play Rome II on a small SSD (I think 60GB is enough for Rome II and mods) without problem?

[DrEvil]

When the SSD is installed properly, there shouldn't be any problems with that.