8 replies to this topic

[KerenskyClone]

Bascially whats in the title...

Would an upgrade in RAM make much difference?

CPU 8300 OC @3.0 Ghz
4 Gb DDR2 1066 Ram
ATI HD 6870 1 GB DDR5

Any ideas?

[NitroDev]

probably not. you'd be better off saving your money for a new rig.

[thiemo56]

The only thing you can safe is the gpu, the rest i would sell.

[Oderint dum Metuant]

Difference to what? what is your issue?

The issue i can see up top, is that is an early 4 year old quad core still on DDR2.

[DisasterTheory]

I would invest in a new graphics card since the 6800 series was a **** on a stick compaired to the 5800 series for ATi. The newer 7870's are great budget cards that pack some serious gaming potential. Doing this would give you one less semi-expensive part to buy when it was time for a core upgrade. The CPU and ram you have will get you buy for a while, but dont expect big performance.

[IQwrassler]

I currently run a rig with:

Athlon x4 955BE @ 3.6Ghz
8Gb DDR3 RAM @ 1600Mhz
2x 550ti 1Gb @ 1Ghz

I currently am building a 2nd rig for my pops for Xmas, and have 4Gb of my RAM put into it (just temporary to get the OS installed, etc.). I approximate a 3-5fps difference, maybe, but not really noticeable (running 35-40fps). RAM is so cheap, why not have 8-16Gb installed anyways.

I would advise:
Upgrade anyways because it's so darned cheap, and would likely help you run multiple apps alongside MW:O (Browser, chat client, etc.). Otherwise, you would likely not be bottlenecked to any signifacnt degree by your RAM.

Edited by IQwrassler, 05 December 2012 - 03:23 PM.

[Catamount]

Okay, OP, there's been a bit of misinformation here, so let's get straight what you're looking at for what you have for a system, and upgrades, if you want to do them.

First off, your GPU is fine. That GPU can net 40-60fps on a mix of medium and high settings in MWO, no problem. I know because I run an OCed 5850, which is around -maybe a hair less powerful than- a 6870, and slightly more powerful with the OC, and I run the game very well at 1920x1200, with textures, particles, effects and post processing on high (everything else on medium). The 6800 series is less powerful than the 5800 series, yes, because of the lineup change, but since anything is less powerful than something (unless you have dual 690s OCed on liquid cooling), that's not a terribly helpful statement. The 6870 is definitely powerful enough to run this game very well.


Your RAM is also fine. MWO is a 32-bit application, so it's capped at 2GB of memory. So 4GB is enough.


Your weakest spot is your CPU. If you don't want to spend money for upgrades, your system should still be fine, but your CPU is your foremost problem. The first thing you can try? You can OC that chip WAY more than that. The E8400 goes to 3.6ghz at stock voltage, almost guaranteed; yours should be able to do 3.3-3.4 no problem with no voltage increase. Up your FSB to 400mhz, set your RAM to 800mhz with the lowest latency you can (4-4-4-12 should be no problem for you), and call it a day. On the stock cooler, that's a good OC.


If you want to get into upgrades, give us your budget and we'll work out what we can, but for now, if I were in your situation but didn't have much money, doing the classic Wolfdale stock volt OC.

Edited by Catamount, 05 December 2012 - 05:29 PM.

[DegeneratePervert]

Not really, man. If you're starved for memory, kill some background applications while you play.

The CPU is your weakest link for sure, just save your cash for a new mobo+cpu+ddr3.

[SunderODeath]

If your running Windows 7 or 8 than I would imagine you would be pushing it with 4 gigs of ram.
Right now windows is using 2.7 gigs of ram with just internet explorer running. I don't have much of anything running in the background. Just CPUID and EVGA precision running in the background. No AV software or anything else and windows is eating almost 3 gigs of ram. That doesn't leave very much for games and other programs if you only have 4 gigs.

But like everyone else is saying, If I was in your shoes I think you would see more benefit from a new CPU/MOBO combo, which would consequently mean you would need to buy new ram ( which is luckily pretty cheap these days). But yea, I would definetly think of throwing in 8 gigs of ram whenever you upgrade.