40 PSG'S in Pirate alley........O B~llocks!!

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SnakeMaster
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40 PSG'S in Pirate alley........O B~llocks!!

Post by SnakeMaster » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 17:10

So this time round decided to build my fleet around all Paranid ships ( done the split thing to death ) mainly cuz there simply the coolest looking ships but also cuz well what would a oddy look like maxed out with PSG'S...probably one huge ball of white energy i thought...so sod it i'll do it i thought....anyway after a while i built or aquired enough....sent it out last nite to pirate alley for a little cruise.....and...and....a total...total flaming screen lock..... :evil: set all the graphics to min and still the same! has anybody done this??????...if so what specs are needed...just for the record i have Ge-Force 6800 with a 1 Gig of ram..so midddle of the road?? but what would u need??

Apollo911
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Post by Apollo911 » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 17:45

What processor do you have? If your getting no increase in fps when dropping all the graphics settings to min, it might be your processor thats causing the slideshow.

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CraftyPilot
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Post by CraftyPilot » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 17:56

I feel for you. Really. I experienced that once until I upgraded my rig. The prosser is the most likely cause of drops in fps.

SnakeMaster
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Post by SnakeMaster » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:11

It's a P4 3.2 HT 800.0MHZ thingy...but i thought it was nearly always the graphics card and ram that affected the graphics the most??

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CraftyPilot
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Post by CraftyPilot » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:17

SnakeMaster wrote:It's a P4 3.2 HT 800.0MHZ thingy...but i thought it was nearly always the graphics card and ram that affected the graphics the most??
No, fps is mainly due to the prosser. I have a dual core prosser and it helps a lot with frames as other applications uses the other core, and each core is hyperthreaded so speeds up threading through the cores thus improved game perfomrance. Your graphics card produces the pixels, shading and directX required to play the game, the prosser still has to process that information before it goes to the screen. A good graphics card helps by reducing load on prosser. Also RAM helps, all PC components uses RAM as back up memory, high speed ram is better, not amount. I have 2gb DDR2 667MHz RAM, that helps a lot. Your 800MHz P4 only does 800Mhz if graphics card, RAM and other components in PC runs at that hertz rate. 3.2GHz single core is good, but I have 3.4x2GHz dual core with 2mb L2 cache each core, larger cache memory helps a lot in games.

PPCs and PSGs really eat frames. I am lucky so far. I have done that in an oddy, frames were very good.

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Flybye
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Post by Flybye » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:21

Good luck with Pirates alley. As a little test, last night I sent one fully maxed out Ody (the other 3 are waiting for weapons) with me in my M7. Of course, shields failed in my M7 while my Ody kept thundering its way through to the Pirate base :mrgreen:

I have an AMD Opteron running at 2.9ghz with an 8800GTX. It still got laggy. This game is insane and I'm wondering if I should get a Conroe or if I should just wait for the next family of CPUs to hit the market.

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Post by Gregster6 » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:33

Flybye, CraftyPilot and SnakeMaster,

I'm also very interested in this at the moment...I'm wondering whether a decent upgrade now is worth it (say something like a C2D E6600 and 8800 GTX) or whether even with such an upgrade, things would still be laggy.

What resolutions and settings are you playing at?

Cheers

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CraftyPilot
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Post by CraftyPilot » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:36

Gregster6 wrote:Flybye, CraftyPilot and SnakeMaster,

I'm also very interested in this at the moment...I'm wondering whether a decent upgrade now is worth it (say something like a C2D E6600 and 8800 GTX) or whether even with such an upgrade, things would still be laggy.

What resolutions and settings are you playing at?

Cheers
1150 x 856, hi anti aliasing, hi post proc, everything on max. 50-60fps even in busy settings. Some people have lucky machine mixes, others dont.

i would recommend a cpu upgrade, get a dual core prosser. game wont utilize both but it leaves one prosser with less threads for the game to use. You have a good card already. Mine is XFX 6800GS. My CPU is brill, Pentium D945. 3.4x2GHz, 2mb L2 x2, HT, 800MzHz. 2Gb DDr2 667MHz RAM helps a lot.

E2C, is that 2 core duo? If that is the case, get a good one. They are good gaming prossers.

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Flybye
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Post by Flybye » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:46

I'm playing at 1600x1024 with EVERYTHING set at max.

I can 3dMark06 10,500pts. With is just hairs away from the 3DMark06 scores of E6700s with an 8800GTX. To see a significant increase in performance in heavily populated sectors, IMHO you will need to get an E6800 and overclock it to something near 4ghz.

Because with the lag we are getting, it feels something in the 10-20fps range. In order for the game to feel its best, you want to have 60+fps, but some are comfy with anything between 30-60fps. IMO, getting an E6800 and leaving it at stock speeds will probably, at best, only increase FPS by 10-20, and you want to pull away as possible from the minimum of 30fps which is where a game is on the limit of being unbearable.

Let me put it to you this way.........I think I'm just going to simply wait for the next family of CPUs to hit the market before I upgrade.

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Post by elwayno » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 18:47

ppcs r basicly anti fighter anti corvette anti station and anti crate
Always one eye on the scanner and a missile ready for when its my turn to fight. khaak keep coming and i keep blasting. Thats how to survive.

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CraftyPilot
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Post by CraftyPilot » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:03

elwayno wrote:ppcs r basicly anti fighter anti corvette anti station and anti crate
No, ppc are anti cap, not anti fighter, tehy are too slow. FFKs and PSGs are good antifighter

Gregster6
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Post by Gregster6 » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:35

I'm starting to think that you're right Flybye.

My own system is a X2 4800 (@ stock) with a 1950 XTX and 2G of decent ram. Everything runs great for me under normal conditions but mass PPC-fests slow down something chronic and things become less than enjoyable. I play at 1280 x 1024 with medium AA / AF. Now my system isn't top-end any more but it does OK in all other games. X3 capital ship ppc battles are its absolute nemesis.

As such I've wondered what it would take to play out one of these battles at an acceptable frame-rate. Or even, can this be done on today's equipment? On other games as old as X3 you'd expect to be playing at 1600 x 1200 by now (i.e. after a GPU upgrade or two). That's just not on! (for me at least!) I don't know if this is down to the sheer complexity of the game or, as some would suggest, poor software design.

What doesn't help is the twaddle that some people talk around here about the great frame rates they get with everything "fully maxed" when their fleet of 150 M2s is PPC-ing the $hite out of a Xenon sector.

CraftyPilot, I'd say that the low resolution you're playing at probably accounts for the high performance you're reporting (check out the CPU and GPU comparison charts below...unfortunately X3 isn't one of Tom's benchmarks!). The alternative would be that your components are performing disproportionately well with X3 Reunion...possible I suppose... :wink:

http://tomshardware.co.uk/cpu/charts.ht ... &chart=169

http://tomshardware.co.uk/graphics/char ... &chart=198

If anyone out there is really murdering this game at high resolutions and settings (including high frame-rates during mass PPC action!), I'd love to hear about it (and your secret!)

Cheers
Last edited by Gregster6 on Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:59, edited 2 times in total.

SnakeMaster
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Post by SnakeMaster » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:38

This gentlemen is NOT the answer i was hopeing for...i was considering just getting another Gig of ram...maybe moving up to a 7800 card....as a mid life boost.......but a new Dual core processor!!!..:o ...mmmm starts looking like more like a new computer in the future....but that blast the paranid capitol fleet for now.....bugger! :cry:

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Flybye
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Post by Flybye » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:47

Gregster6 wrote:.....
As such I've wondered what it would take to play out one of these battles at an acceptable frame-rate. Or even, can this be done on today's equipment? On other games as old as X3 you'd expect to be playing at 1600 x 1200 by now (i.e. after a GPU upgrade or two). That's just not on! (for me at least!) I don't know if this is down to the sheer complexity of the game or, as some would suggest, poor software design.
I'm not sure about poor software design as I'm not a programmer to say yay or nay on it, but one thing for sure....there are calculations happening for every ship inside every single sector and for every station and their changing inventory. The ships and stations are extremely detailed, and when you start having such a large number on your screen will tax your system even more.

And the glowing/lighting effects of weapons is even more demanding.

I think I'm going to try to reduce my resolution a bit.

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Post by WillWilk » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 19:58

Also a decent soundcard can significantly improve FPS - I got around 20% improvement (low 50s to high 60s averages) when I added a SB Audigy 4 and diched the onboard audiomax audio on my system.

I'm running:

AMD X2 64 4200+ (OC'd 10%)
2 GB Geil DDR2 800 RAM
515MB ATI 1900 XT Video
Abit Fatal1ty AN9 32X MoBo
SoundBlaster Audigy 4

I've only had noticeable slowdown in cap ship battles in asteroid infested systems - SPG with a XI and 3Ks plus a J and many Ls and Ms still makes the system groan a little.

Will

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shifty_powers
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Post by shifty_powers » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 22:16

WillWilk wrote:A
515MB ATI 1900 XT Video
Would be intrigued to see some proof of that as i have NEVER seen or even heard of a graphics card with 515mb of ram ;)
"I believe that inherent within the God-given right to the pursuit of happiness, is the equally God-given right to the pursuit of unhappiness. That is why I support gay marriage", Chuck Lorre, 2008

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Flybye
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Post by Flybye » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 22:28

Maybe he added the bios ram ;)

Gregster6
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Post by Gregster6 » Sun, 18. Mar 07, 23:21

shifty_powers wrote:
WillWilk wrote:A
515MB ATI 1900 XT Video
Would be intrigued to see some proof of that as i have NEVER seen or even heard of a graphics card with 515mb of ram ;)
Get intrigued shifty! :wink:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productli ... =priceDesc

Edit: I've just re-read your posts...I'll get my 515MB coat!!

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Post by Paranoid66 » Mon, 19. Mar 07, 00:35

I have a 7950GT it comes with 512mb. Memory isn't everything though. Although it seems to handle by Odys PSG's OK in most situations lots of rocks during an Xi in 18 Billion and things start to slow down a little LOL. ES never should have altered the old X2 way of mining it worked fine and didn't make all that mess.

I have an E6600 Core 2 Duo with 2 gig very standard ram. Nothing is overclocked. It plays X3 OK at my widescreen monitors res 1400 x 800 if I recall correctly. However it is far from free of the odd annoying judder as the program updates itself etc.

I think all the X incarnations are just processor eating monsters! I think a lot of this is due to just how busy the X universe gets!
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Post by VioletRapture » Mon, 19. Mar 07, 04:07

Flybye wrote:I'm playing at 1600x1024 with EVERYTHING set at max.

I can 3dMark06 10,500pts. With is just hairs away from the 3DMark06 scores of E6700s with an 8800GTX. To see a significant increase in performance in heavily populated sectors, IMHO you will need to get an E6800 and overclock it to something near 4ghz.

Because with the lag we are getting, it feels something in the 10-20fps range. In order for the game to feel its best, you want to have 60+fps, but some are comfy with anything between 30-60fps. IMO, getting an E6800 and leaving it at stock speeds will probably, at best, only increase FPS by 10-20, and you want to pull away as possible from the minimum of 30fps which is where a game is on the limit of being unbearable.

Let me put it to you this way.........I think I'm just going to simply wait for the next family of CPUs to hit the market before I upgrade.
Under 30 FPS is unbearable? Are you bloody joking? I can play a game on 20 FPS and still be fine. You're just used to being spoiled.
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