-------------------------------------------

My current rig

 

i5 2500 @ 3.30GHz (cannot overclock)

AMD Radeon HD 6850 1GB

8 GB RAM

Windows 7

 

My FPS

 

Warzones - 20 to 40

Fleet - 50ish

Anywhere else - 50 to 70

-------------------------------------------

I'm one of those people who freak out about their FPS and it really bothers me when I get drops. I only find myself fully enjoying the game when it is smooth and 70+ as snobby as that sounds. For the record I've tried basically every combination of graphics settings but to no avail. I'm looking at upgrading either my CPU or my graphics card but so far I'm thinking its the GPU that's the problem.

 

It's always when there are a bunch of people around when it drops obviously. Firstly, is it even possible on ANY rig to stay at 70 FPS in warzones and fleet without major drops? I know the game itself is poorly optimized but still!

 

Could anyone give me suggestions on possibly what GPU to get? For example will I see a NOTICEABLE difference in FPS if I dish out 200 dollars for a new card compared to my current AMD 6850?

 

What I'm currently looking at (I welcome other suggestions please!):

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127685

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202025&ignorebbr=1

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121728&ignorebbr=1

 

Thanks

before you order a 200 or more card upgrade, check your power supply and motherboard,

 

all three of those cards you linked are 500 Watts min to run and Does your mother board run PCI 2.0 or 3.0 you can use the cards in 2.0 slots but you may not get up to their full bench marks.

 

That and also because I knew a guy once that did this if you have a pre built system, that there is room for the card , A lot of mini towers you just can't fit a 9 to 10 inch card into them,

you are being bottlenecked by your cpu in warzones a new gpu wont help there, it will only increase your maximum fps since your cpu will still be the same

 

Does your mother board run PCI 2.0 or 3.0 you can use the cards in 2.0 slots but you may not get up to their full bench marks.

,

 

pcie2.0 is yet to be fully saturated not to mention 3.0, there is not a single gpu on the market that wuld benefit from pcie3.0 vs pcie 2.0

-------------------------------------------

My current rig

 

i5 2500 @ 3.30GHz (cannot overclock)

AMD Radeon HD 6850 1GB

[/Quote] Your GPU is bad compared to the stuff you linked but if you upgrade it you'll just run into your CPU. So upgrading your GPU should help some but without a new CPU i doubt you would benefit from its full potential.

If you want to upgrade your CPU you are basically looking at buying a completely knew system since the i5-2500 uses a LGA1155 socket which is two generations out of date and has no future.

OP

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121728&ignorebbr=1

I have this card and it's great. Bought it the day newegg slapped on their early black friday deals

Hrm. an i5 should be fine. I use a phenom ii x4 3.4ghz, and an xfx 6950 (2 gb) amd card. These are just below 'top of the line' items, from *several years ago*, and I never have any issues in PvP, or open world settings. I have seen the usual stutter, slow load of email objects, etc. on Fleet, when we get past a 100 or so people. Assuming your drivers are up to date, and you're not running a ton of crap in the background, any of the card you listed ( and several cheaper ones as well ) should be more than enough.

 

tl/dr Any modern card costing ~200 bucks, paired with an modern intel quad core is going to do just fine in this game.

Edited November 24, 2013 by translucentwolf

My motherboard is an ASUS P8Z68-V LX if that means anything. I'm not too familiar with motherboards. Any suggestions? Buy a whole new computer? lol

 

Btw my power supply should be fine. It is 750W.

Edited November 24, 2013 by Ventonix

If you want to upgrade your CPU you are basically looking at buying a completely knew system since the i5-2500 uses a LGA1155 socket which is two generations out of date and has no future.

 

Nahh i disagree, although effectively the socket LFGA 1155 is two generations back, last year processors like the i7 3770k are compatible with that socket.

 

So.. unless he wants to buy the top notch machine i7 4770k he will need to change his whole machine but that would be an exaggeration you don't need a top year machine to run this game.

 

Personally i think a new cpu is not gonna improve your pvp experience for example, i mean, you know, this is swtor, a new cpu can perform miracle.s

 

what about improving your internet speed? how much is your lag to your server?

Edited November 25, 2013 by psikofunkster

This game is pretty poorly optimized any upgrades you get aren't going to do much for your FPS.

 

I have an i7 3770k and a GTX 680 4GB I run at 2560x1440 and sometimes even my framerate drops into the 30's in warzones.

How is an i5-2500 bottle-necking a GPU? Unless he runs two 670s in SLI believe me that CPU is barely gonna be a bottle-neck. Even if it does, its gonna be a very marginal loss.

 

Getting a 670 instead of a 650 will give him a much much bigger performance gain than upgrading from a i5-2500. Right now, his GPU is already bottle-necking his CPU. Increasing the CPU power in such a case would be just idiotic. It's a good enough Quad core CPU with Turbo speeds upto 3.9GHz which is more than enough for a single high-end GPU.

Edited November 25, 2013 by DKNS

your GPU is fine

dont listen to players here that think a beter GPU card is beter

 

i have play this game ad mid/high setting with my old rig

 

now i have a new 1 after 5 years but stil in that time i play this game fine

 

it was a duel core E8400 3.0 GHZ

asus 6850 HD GDDR5 1 GIG

windows 7 ultimate 32 bit

4 GIG ram only

 

and my MS was only 28 in fleet warzones flash points and so on

but i do recommen dont instal windows 8 becouse its crap

 

most think new windows is beter but its not

alot think new things that come out wil be beter and wola instal it right away

 

and then they QQ ad forum why there game wont run

i see it so many times

 

when i was ROFL with my dam old rig and play with out trouble

bummer that windows XP wont be suported anymore

that was a good windows the pro version was very good

Edited November 25, 2013 by ShadessaWayland

your GPU is fine

dont listen to players here that think a beter GPU card is beter

 

i have play this game ad mid/high setting with my old rig

 

now i have a new 1 after 5 years but stil in that time i play this game fine

 

it was a duel core E8400 3.0 GHZ

asus 6850 HD GDDR5 1 GIG

windows 7 ultimate 32 bit

4 GIG ram only

 

and my MS was only 28 in fleet warzones flash points and so on

but i do recommen dont instal windows 8 becouse its crap

 

most think new windows is beter but its not

alot think new things that come out wil be beter and wola instal it right away

 

and then they QQ ad forum why there game wont run

i see it so many times

 

when i was ROFL with my dam old rig and play with out trouble

bummer that windows XP wont be suported anymore

that was a good windows the pro version was very good

 

Windows 8 runs that game much better than windows 7 does. Take your misinformation elsewhere.

 

Or maybe ya'know upgrade to windows 8 and look at your 2-3 fps increase.

Windows 8 runs that game much better than windows 7 does. Take your misinformation elsewhere.

 

Or maybe ya'know upgrade to windows 8 and look at your 2-3 fps increase.

 

windows 8 sucks trust me old windows is 10X beter becouse it was simple and not to much junk

programs into it

 

the new windows get more and more heavy for your comp becouse of to many useless crap they putt in

like vista it was back then so heavy that you need adleast 1 gig ram to run it -.-

 

so pleace dont tell me 8 is good the old ones are good simple and light and dont ask to much of your comp

with that you can run games beter becouse you stil have plenty of power left

i found this

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/9aaae724-6f54-4885-9350-66f137ff0f7c/windows8-pro-uses-too-much-ram-how-to-solve?forum=w8itproperf

 

i was right windows 8 ask more memorie then 7

and am sure alot of players have trouble with this

 

not every 1 have 8 gig ore 16 ore 32 gig ram in there comp

 

i have my self 8 gig ram 1600 GHZ

its stil nice but i no my card ask also alot as my windows 7 premium 64 bit also

 

so every thing wil eat a bit of my memorie and if you have to less you wil lagg in a game

My internet connection is above average I don't get any lag in that regards.

 

I'm gathering multiple opinions from this thread but I'm thinking that my i5 isn't the problem, its the GPU. Correct me if I'm wrong but upgrading from an i5 to an i7 will do pretty much nothing if I have the same GPU in there.

My internet connection is above average I don't get any lag in that regards.

 

I'm gathering multiple opinions from this thread but I'm thinking that my i5 isn't the problem, its the GPU. Correct me if I'm wrong but upgrading from an i5 to an i7 will do pretty much nothing if I have the same GPU in there.

 

You are absolutely correct. Your GPU is already bottle-necking your game. If you want proof, run your game and check which is at 100% and which is not. Keep in mind though that SWTOR is purely coded so you should check your results with multiple games. You can use any GPU and CPU monitoring to check it for yourself. You will find your GPU max loaded. Upgrading a CPU in such a situation is just foolishness.

 

Even without checking all this, anyone will tell you that getting a i5-3770K to run with a GTX650 is just ridiculous.

Edited November 25, 2013 by DKNS

your GPU is fine

dont listen to players here that think a beter GPU card is beter

 

i have play this game ad mid/high setting with my old rig

 

now i have a new 1 after 5 years but stil in that time i play this game fine

 

it was a duel core E8400 3.0 GHZ

asus 6850 HD GDDR5 1 GIG

windows 7 ultimate 32 bit

4 GIG ram only

 

and my MS was only 28 in fleet warzones flash points and so on

but i do recommen dont instal windows 8 becouse its crap

 

most think new windows is beter but its not

alot think new things that come out wil be beter and wola instal it right away

 

and then they QQ ad forum why there game wont run

i see it so many times

 

when i was ROFL with my dam old rig and play with out trouble

bummer that windows XP wont be suported anymore

that was a good windows the pro version was very good

 

Please don't spend Misinformation. If you are happy with your game so be it.

 

I have used the exact same config once (E8400 with 6850 which i later had RMA'ed for a GTX560) and i know how much E8400 bottle-necks the GPU. It is really really bad especially for new games who all utilise 4 cores efficiently.

 

I run my i5-2500k with GTX560 (the equivalent of 6850) and i run the game at Ultra getting 40-60FPS. That is the difference bottle-necking makes.

Edited November 25, 2013 by DKNS

Nahh i disagree, although effectively the socket LFGA 1155 is two generations back, last year processors like the i7 3770k are compatible with that socket.

 

So.. unless he wants to buy the top notch machine i7 4770k he will need to change his whole machine but that would be an exaggeration you don't need a top year machine to run this game.

He doesnt need to do anything since he only has some fps issues. But you should always look to the future when upgrading. The i7 3770k is an awesome CPU atm but the newest stuff from Intel for the Gamer market is already almost twice as capable. Two years down the road this wont even be impreisse anymore. So unless he plans to invest another 1000$ at that point, i would invest in a LGA2011 socket today.

Whether or not this is something you should do if you just play swtor is another question entirely. Personally i wouldnt dump 250$ on a minor fps problem but thats me.

 

How is an i5-2500 a bottle-necking GPU. Unless he runs two 670s in SLI believe me that CPU is barely gonna be a bottle-neck. Even if it does, its gonna be a very marginal loss.

 

Getting a 670 instead of a 650 will give him a much much bigger performance gain than upgrading from a i5-2500. Right now, his GPU is already bottle-necking his CPU. Increasing the CPU power in such a case would be just idiotic. It's a good enough Quad core CPU with Turbo speeds upto 3.9GHz which is more than enough for a single high-end GPU.

I never said he should just upgrade his CPU. I said, if he invested in high end GPU he is likely to hit a CPU performance wall before he can benefit from the full potential of the shiny new toy. I run the game on a better platform and it routinely maxes out the main core its running on and then some - for whatever reason.

But just upgrading the CPU would indeed be idiotic, no argument there.

Edited November 25, 2013 by AMightyKnight

I never said he should just upgrade his CPU. I said, if he invested in high end GPU he is likely to hit a CPU performance wall before he can benefit from the full potential of the shiny new toy. I run the game on a better platform and it routinely maxes out the main core its running on and then some - for whatever reason.

But just upgrading the CPU would indeed be idiotic, no argument there.

 

You should check it with some other GPU intensive game. SWTOR, like i said before, is poorly coded. Unless you are running SLI or something, any decently coded game (unless it uses a **** ton of calculations) shouldn't max out your CPU. Also, always run a game in VSYNC enabled mode to prevent unnecessary maxing out of either the CPU or the GPU. It not only saves power but increases the life of the components as well.

Ok I understand now. But the question is, if I decide to dish out some money for a new GPU, what GPU should I get? What is a good card recommendation that will stop the bottlenecking? At the same time I don't want a bad *** card that is getting held back by my processor. Thoughts?

OP

 

I would recommend against getting a GTX650Ti, the difference would be marginal and barely noticeable.

 

Instead of the AMD 7870 you linked, you should get an AMD R9 270 or 270X (both are faster than the 7870 and cost only 30-40USD more on newegg)

 

Instead of the GTX670, i would highly suggest an AMD R9 280X. It is a monster of a card and will blow 670 out of the competition (costs around 300USD on newegg again). It is just 7970 GHz edition disguised which was already one of AMD's fastest production cards.

 

Keep in mind, i am not American and i don't use newegg nor do i have a concrete idea of the local prices. So, look around to get the R9 280X cheaper. That card is worth it. The performance for that price is just ridiculous.

Ok I understand now. But the question is, if I decide to dish out some money for a new GPU, what GPU should I get? What is a good card recommendation that will stop the bottlenecking? At the same time I don't want a bad *** card that is getting held back by my processor. Thoughts?

 

Your card is not getting held back by your processor, it is the reverse. Your GPU (graphics card) is holding back the CPU. If you put too much of a powerful card in your PC, the situation will reverse and your CPU will be holding back the GPU although as i have said many times, it wont happen unless you go SLI or install a Titan or a GTX780.

 

I have recommended several cards above which you should take a look at. Also, my preference for AMD above lies in the fact that they are giving great performance/price ratio at the moment and their driver issues have gone as well based on what i am hearing from tons of people. Hence, i have listed many of the newer AMD cards above.

you are being bottlenecked by your cpu in warzones a new gpu wont help there, it will only increase your maximum fps since your cpu will still be the same

 

His CPU isn't bottlenecking him at all. I run a i5 2550k which is a tad bit better and trust me, my CPU barely reaches the point of even coming close to bottlenecking me in this game. It actually comes out to my GPU holding me back and it's a GTX 660 which is boggling. It's bad coding.

 

His CPU could last him for at least 1-2 more years before an upgrade even becomes an afterthought.

Could anyone advise me on the best program to download in order to monitor my GPU and CPU % load while in game? I'd like to confirm that my GPU is under stress during warzones, pvp, ect. before purchasing anything haha.