Tossed a coin between CS and IMHO, and CS “won.” Anyway, here goes:
A couple of weeks ago, my daughter acquired a barebones computer from a local outlet. She and I put it together, then she and a friend loaded WinXP. And she saw that it was good.
Until she tried to play EverQuest. Then the video turned crappy, and she started getting “low on resources” messages.
One (obvious) problem is insufficient memory. She has 256MB—but the video adapter steals 64, bringing available memory under EverQuest’s minimum. So one (obvious) solution would be to provide another 256; but before doing that, I’d like to get some input on the video adapter itself. The motheboard is an AsRock K7S41GX, with an SiS 741GX chipset and a “Real 256E graphics controller.” My recollection is that SiS is not the brightest star in the chipset galaxy, so I’m concerned that even with extra memory the video won’t be up to snuff. And while I’m willing to shell out extra bux to make the computer EverQuest compatible, I’d prefer to do so effectively.
So my question for the EverQuest-savvy Dopers (there have to be some out there): would it be better to add memory, or install a capable graphics card and disable the onboard video (which would bring available memory up the EQ minimum)?
Or do I [shudder] have to do both?
I’d say graphics card. Even a fairly old graphics card should run Everquest fine (though there have been expansions since I played, I don’t imagine the engine is top-of-the-line) and onboard video usually sucks.
Major problem…they have made a change to the game engine requiring a dx9video card<let me scrum around and find a link for you>
http://eqlive.station.sony.com/
http://eqlive.station.sony.com/support/tech_support/ts_system_requirements.jsp
System Requirements
Required Specs:
* Windows® 98/2000/ME/XP
* Pentium® III 400 equivalent or greater
* 256 MB RAM
* ATI Radeon 7500/NVidia GeForce 1 equivalent or greater
* DirectX Compatible Sound Card
* 28.8k + Internet Connection
* 4X Speed CD-ROM
* 500 MB Hard Drive Space
* DirectX 9.0
* EverQuest Classic and a valid EverQuest account
- Note: All Direct 3D cards not supported.
Recommended Specs:
* Windows® 98/2000/ME/XP
* Pentium® 4 equivalent or greater
* 512 MB RAM
* NVidia GeForce 3/ATI Radeon 8500 equivalent or greater
* DirectX Compatible Sound Card
* 56.6k + Internet Connection
* 16X Speed CD-ROM
* 2.5+ GB Hard Drive Space
* DirectX 9.0
* EverQuest Classic and a valid EverQuest account
*Note: DirectX 9.0 or greater is required for all Win98/ME/2000/XP
I happen to run with 516mb ram, and have some light lag issues, so I turn off most of the luclin models to save resources. I do have to run my clip plane to 0 in bazaar, and have most spell effects off when I raid. Nothing like a bunch of spell sparklies obliterating the screen and lagging me out when I am in mid complete heal chain=\
Go with disabling the onboard, add a decent vid card and add memory. of course I am going with the assumption that she will want to have all the expansions EXCEPT for Gates of Discord. Trust me, unless you are a stone player, there is no real use for that expansion.
What server is she on? If she is on Sol Ro, my main is the same as my screen name here=)
She has an integrated chip, which are all really slow. Even a $40 video card will out perform it by leaps and bounds. A Radeon 9200 or a Geforce 5200FX would give you a huge speed boost.