graphics card/processor help!

[neorei]

yeah i've been hearing alot of praises for the 6850, online sources saying it's more bang to your buck.

[Davern]

Ya, that or a 6870 is all I imagine I'd ever need for current games.

[Lucifer]

This game relies heavily on the processor.
If you have the cash to switch to intel, the i5 will do you some justice.

You can make the switch for as little as 300 dollars. I would spend possibly 400-500; for an SSD and 8 gigs of ram.
8 gigs is overkill but it's so cheap today; why the hell not?

[nasomi]

I had hte 6870 before the dual 580's. The difference is like night and day. The 6870 can play on medium-high, the 580 is everything maxed, 16x aa, no ao or dof. However I freaking LOVE eye candy. so it's a bit of a factor for me. I do all the stuff, but i love it to look freaking amazing while i'm doing it. A lot of people get eye candy at first, then it fades with content. Not me, I love both equally.

[Zorlin]

I dont consider replacing that phenom a good choice atm since its still a pretty decent processor although if you can sell it for a decent price you could get an i5 2500k + z68 motherboard + 6950 for about 500$. The 2500k easily oc's to 4.5ghz with a cheap cooler for example a Cooler Master H212+ for about 30$. That rig would likely max any of those games. And dont forget most 6950 can be mod into 6970 unlocking extra shaders.

[Coldfire]

This game relies heavily on the processor.
If you have the cash to switch to intel, the i5 will do you some justice.

You can make the switch for as little as 300 dollars. I would spend possibly 400-500; for an SSD and 8 gigs of ram.
8 gigs is overkill but it's so cheap today; why the hell not?

This game is NOT heavily relying on the processor and AMD is fine. Especially a highend quadcore.

And I don't recommend a HD6850 as it is far inferior to the HD6950 :P

[Davern]

I had hte 6870 before the dual 580's. The difference is like night and day. The 6870 can play on medium-high, the 580 is everything maxed, 16x aa, no ao or dof. However I freaking LOVE eye candy. so it's a bit of a factor for me. I do all the stuff, but i love it to look freaking amazing while i'm doing it. A lot of people get eye candy at first, then it fades with content. Not me, I love both equally.

I agree with the changes you see between dual 580's and a 6870 but I don't know how you were not able to max everything in ffxiv with the 6870 as I do so with my 6770. Granted it's not 60fps but it's still above 38.

[Davern]

This game is NOT heavily relying on the processor and AMD is fine. Especially a highend quadcore.

And I don't recommend a HD6850 as it is far inferior to the HD6950 :P

I disagree, my score doubled in the bench by merely swapping to a faster cpu and beat out the score of a 5850 compared my 6770. I'm in town right now and lagging, my cpu is at 80%+ and gpu only at 40%. Outside of town I don't drop below 38fps.

[Zorlin]

any quad core can play this game maxed with a decent gfx but for solid 60fps anywhere yea you do need an high end cpu.

[Davern]

That I can agree with. Hoping that won't be the case come 2.0 as it's just ridiculous that an 2600k can't get 60fps maxed out anywhere without OC'n.