(full disclosure, I’m a console games, got a wii and I’m eagerly awaiting opening the xbox 360 I picked up this weekend)
Are there enough games to make buying a $500+ GPU worthwhile? Diminishing returns aside, the difference between a 1080i HD+console and a 1600x1200 4AA monster pc is what?
Not to mention the time not spent in driver hell, and the better sound system in the home theatre.
Plenty of high end games for the PC that will take advantage of the all the GPU you want to throw at them (Crysis, UT3, Orange Box, Bioshock, Oblivion at full 1680x1050 resolution HDR and 4x AA at 40+ fps finally!, Assasin’s Creed is coming out in february, etc, etc).
Graphics will always be superior on the PC, except just at the onset of a new generation console system where they will be more or less on par, and then the PC will quickly get better. And this also applies to console ports who usually sport more content, end user development tools, and nicer graphics + more stable frame rates when making their way to PC.
Sound system is about the same on my rig as on my tv (YMMV), and you can always hook up your tv and soundsystem to the PC as well.
May want a physics processor. I like my PhysX. It was nice and cheap, and it does something amazing when there’s more than 300 people on my screen.
Nothing happens. I get 40+ fps in the middle of mass raids in CoH.
I didn’t know that Company of Heroes took advantage of a physics processor. What is your experience with the game with and without? Oh, I love this game.
City of Heroes, not Company. Generally, in non-PhysX enabled games, I notice that, as the number of visual effects on the screen increase, the performance of the computer stays pretty stable. Takes a metric ton more to make me slideshow.
So would a physics card improve my current situation in WoW where my frame rates get really, really bad whenever I raid and there are 25 characters on the screen?
Don’t know! It might. Anyone know?
It won’t. World of Warcraft doesn’t support AGEIA’s PhysX card (or any others as far as I know.)
More RAM is probably what you want, but something else might be bottlenecking your system, so don’t take my word for it.
I seriously doubt it. There’s a lot of processing going on in WoW, but physics is not a big part of it.