What System Specs would I need to play wow ultra/25+fps?

[pauen]

Right now lets just say my system is not soo good, I want one that is the cheapest yet best that can run wow on ultra with 25 fps or more... i found this spec on dell... 4gb ram 1333Mhz, Intel core i3 2.26Ghz Pross. Ati mobility radeon 550v. is it worthy enough to?
Edit: Signature

[MidgetMage55]

Cant say much about the vid card as I'm not terribly well versed in Ati cards. However I would highly recommend at least the core i5 if your going for gaming. The i3 was designed for very casual computer users. Web surfing, watching movies and occasional multitasking. It'll run wow but your not going to get reasonable performance if ultra is your goal.

Ideally since wow is a more CPU intensive game an i7 would be what you want but they can be a bit prohibitive cost wise. This is of course if you plan to go only Intel. You might also consider looking at some of the AMD chip sets if your looking to save a few dollars.

[Led ++]

I really don't know a lot about technical stuff, but I currently use http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=1392644 and all my settings are at the highest except for shadows. (I kinda like hte circular shadows more then the realistic ones).

I think it's a reasonable good set-up, perhaps the graphics card is a bit older. But I run WoW absolutely fine on "ultra" settings on a 24" screen at 1920x1080.

[blkdrgn]

Personally I use a Q6600 quad core cpu, running at 3.3 Ghz, X2 Evga 9800 GTX (running in SLI), 4 GB of corair dominator ram. and all of this is cooled by a custom system LCS, with a few things not tied in yet and still on air=(

You could probably play wow on a real old system. There is enough setting to turn down and ways to modify things that you could probably run it on who knows what. IT might not look like much, but hey, gaming and not are two different things=)

[Zagrei]

Pshh, I run WoW on a MacBook 13.3" :P One of the OLD ones, with the GMA 950 video card (*sigh*... why, Apple, WHY?!)

For the sake of having better frame rates, I run it at the lowest settings and THEN use LeatrixGFX to lower them further. I get good frame rates this way Being an avid player of World of UICraft, though, having such a small screen and low graphics makes me sad =/ So... not sure how this helps you... just don't get an older model of MacBook if you intend to be an intense gamer (LOL, duh xD)

[haylie]

Originally Posted by MidgetMage55 Cant say much about the vid card as I'm not terribly well versed in Ati cards. However I would highly recommend at least the core i5 if your going for gaming. The i3 was designed for very casual computer users. Web surfing, watching movies and occasional multitasking. It'll run wow but your not going to get reasonable performance if ultra is your goal. Ideally since wow is a more CPU intensive game an i7 would be what you want but they can be a bit prohibitive cost wise. This is of course if you plan to go only Intel. You might also consider looking at some of the AMD chip sets if your looking to save a few dollars.

Pff. My i3 can run WoW just fine on medium settings+bloom mod+firefox/msn/etc running in the middle of a 25 man. As long as you have a dual core and a decent video card (i.e. not integrated) you really don't have to worry about WoW.

[break19]

I am normally a huge ATI Radeon supporter.. but in the case of the "mobility" GPUs, I find that nvidia generally has better bang for the buck.

ATI's mobility offerings are... cheap. and I dont mean inexpensive.. I mean cheap.

Powdered macaroni n cheese cheap..

Ramen noodles cheap..

I think I've made my point..

I see from the specs you posted, you're thinking of getting a laptop. Im not sure if you've been told or not, but a desktop the same price as a laptop will, in most cases, net you a -huge- performance advantage. and even desktops with similar specs tend to perform better than their laptop counterpart..

Most (if not -all) Laptop GPUs and CPUs are designed to be power efficient..
Not fast.. You sacrifice speed for portability.

Granted, these days, the trade-off is less pronounced on some of the higher end laptop and desktops.. But the low end systems still vary by a bit.

Hope this helps.

*edited to fix a missing d heh*

[voodoodad]

Laptops are great for their portability, but desktops are so much easier to deal with as far as upgrades and the like are concerned. I can install new memory sticks, sound cards and graphic cards on a desktop in around five minutes. I wouldn't even dream of opening my old laptop to do anything lol.

[Ither]

I spent over $3000 on my rig, custom built by me. Took me about 6 months to get it running from start of design to testing finish. Went through 3 motherboards and 2 processors until it held.

4.5Ghz i7-920 on water
8GB of 2GHz Corsair Dominator GT
Intel G25-XM2 80gb SSD's in Raid 0
blah blah blah

I have since added a second 5870 to the list (pictures were from the initial build).

I play on a 30" Apple Cinema HD with everything maxed at 2560x1600. Wandering around playing with my willie gives mes about 140 fps, in raids (10 or 25) I average between 60-90.

I wouldn't worry unless your frames drop below 20. Tho I will admit the old school designs are quite attractive at full spec.

http://picasaweb.google.com/stormthegeek/LiquidKhaosV2#


I love it. She crunches Fold when I'm at work.

[haylie]

This isn't really the place to brag about your awesome new rig. The OP was asking for advice on a "cheap" spec that can run WoW on max settings. $3000 is not what I would call cheap

[Ither]

Originally Posted by haylie This isn't really the place to brag about your awesome new rig. The OP was asking for advice on a "cheap" spec that can run WoW on max settings. $3000 is not what I would call cheap

Pfft. I brag about everything, I'm just that f'n AWESOME!


Cheap, go pick up a $400 box from Dell and call it a day. WOW is not a heavily used GPU design, it's more CPU and Network due to the MMORPG nature. No this doesn't mean you put in a chit GPU and get amazing results, but what I'm proving is that a $3000 rig like mine is f'n USELESS for WOW. I will never be able to exceed the potential unless Blizzard re-designs the game engine.

Since your name is Haylie, does that mean you're one of them ubber sexy WOW chicks like Cariren?

*GiGGlE*

[MidgetMage55]

Originally Posted by haylie Pff. My i3 can run WoW just fine on medium settings+bloom mod+firefox/msn/etc running in the middle of a 25 man. As long as you have a dual core and a decent video card (i.e. not integrated) you really don't have to worry about WoW.

Didn't say it wouldn't work. Just said it wasn't designed with gaming in mind and would not perform as the OP wanted if they were trying for ultra settings.

[Sepioth]

Originally Posted by StormCalai Pfft. I brag about everything, I'm just that f'n AWESOME! Cheap, go pick up a $400 box from Dell and call it a day. WOW is not a heavily used GPU design, it's more CPU and Network due to the MMORPG nature. No this doesn't mean you put in a chit GPU and get amazing results, but what I'm proving is that a $3000 rig like mine is f'n USELESS for WOW. I will never be able to exceed the potential unless Blizzard re-designs the game engine. Since your name is Haylie, does that mean you're one of them ubber sexy WOW chicks like Cariren? *GiGGlE*

Wow .... someone needs some growing up to do ... hehehe

You might want to step away from your pc and go out and meet real people cause your way outta touch with reality

Seriously though WoW is a fairly old game (at least in the PC world anyway) Just about anything mid range will run wow without a problem.

They are updating the engine for the Cataclysm release .. how much I have no idea but one can assume these changes will take a toll on FPS if settings are to high and you PC is under spec'd.

These are the system specs according to Blizzard for Lich King. The recommended settings should be able to push medium to high with no problem but for Ultra that would require more power. If Cataclysm is upping the engine expect the requirements to also go up.

Processor:

Minimum: Intel Pentium 4 1.3 GHz or AMD Athlon XP 1500+
Recommended: Dual-core processor, such as the Intel Pentium D or AMD Athlon 64 X2 

Memory:
Minimum: 512 MB RAM (1GB for Vista users)
Recommended: 1 GB RAM (2 GB for Vista users) 
Video:
Minimum: 3D graphics processor with Hardware Transform and Lighting with 32 MB VRAM Such as an ATI Radeon 7200 or NVIDIA GeForce 2 class card or better
Recommended: 3D graphics processor with Vertex and Pixel Shader capability with 128 MB VRAM Such as an ATI Radeon X1600 or NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT class card or better

I'm running on a 3+ year old PC and run it on Ultra max resolutions with no problems at all.

Ohh and the ubber sexy wow chicks name is CAIRENN (not Cariren) .. You might wanna fix this horrible typo before she deletes your account

[Seerah]

I thought we were uber sexy wow chicks, not ubber ones...

[Ither]

Originally Posted by Sepioth Wow .... someone needs some growing up to do ... hehehe You might want to step away from your pc and go out and meet real people cause your way outta touch with reality Ohh and the ubber sexy wow chicks name is CAIRENN (not Cariren) .. You might wanna fix this horrible typo before she deletes your account

Life? What's that? We all needs lives, we're sucked into the WoW vortex!

I can't help it, I'm just that awesome! It's a curse, I piss success twenty-four seven.

Not really, I'm just a lonely old fat balding bastard!

Cair loves me, she would never do such a thing!

Originally Posted by Sepioth They are updating the engine for the Cataclysm release .. how much I have no idea but one can assume these changes will take a toll on FPS if settings are to high and you PC is under spec'd.

I don't know about that. I've seen no "significant" changes in the engine through beta except some increases in spell beautification. However, nothing that would really make me go "HOLY ****!"

Tho.. speaking of it.. there are some added features to click on, but again don't really make a big difference. Least none that I can tell. I based this on the fact I run ultra right now. I guess if I didn't, I would notice it?

I do have some vibrancy turned on through my GPU controller that kind of heightens the level at which WoW draws colors (kinda like the hack people were passing around on DX drivers).

None the less tho, WoW is incredibly awesome for such a heavy MMORPG. It could be tons worse! I get a kick out of the kids in our Game Dev program when they are cranking away on the Unreal engine. It's what they teach for most of the design classes. In fact there is a kid creating an MMORPG for one of his projects. I got to play a bit of it, was unreal LOL.

Originally Posted by Seerah I thought we were uber sexy wow chicks, not ubber ones...

Seerah you are hawt no matter what word I use! :P

[Rpruden]

Originally Posted by MidgetMage55 Cant say much about the vid card as I'm not terribly well versed in Ati cards. However I would highly recommend at least the core i5 if your going for gaming. The i3 was designed for very casual computer users. Web surfing, watching movies and occasional multitasking. It'll run wow but your not going to get reasonable performance if ultra is your goal. Ideally since wow is a more CPU intensive game an i7 would be what you want but they can be a bit prohibitive cost wise. This is of course if you plan to go only Intel. You might also consider looking at some of the AMD chip sets if your looking to save a few dollars.

You are really completely off base with this. It seems as though you are spouting off information that is not backed by any real research. The Core i3 and i5 (dual core) processors are actually the same exact processors. They are clocked at different speeds and have minor differences. The main differences is that the i3 does not support Turbo Boost, which is a technology that allows the processor to automatically overclock one of the cores to squeeze out extra performance if you need it. (With the right motherboard, you can just manually apply the overclock yourself and keep it running at a higher speed all the time anyways) Other than that the i5 includes new SSE instructions aimed at accelerating encryption and decryption with the AES algorithm. This is only used for business which need encrypted data. There is one type of i5 processor that is different. It is essentially an i7 but without hyper threading. It is the only processor of the i series that does not have hyper threading but it has 4 cores. One may think this would be better for wow, but there is really no need for a processor beyond the i3 unless you are planning to do other sorts of gaming. WOW, it's self will only utilize 2 cores/threads right now anyways so 4 cores will give you no benefit. As far as AMD goes, sure they are cheaper, but Intel beats them in almost EVERY benchmark. Spend a couple extra dollars and get an Intel processor. Currently the low end i3 processor runs at 2.93Ghz and is priced around $115. Pretty good deal if you ask me.

OP, if you'd like some help building your own custom rig, I can help you pick out some low cost components. My friend just did an upgrade to his current system for about $450. You need a modern dual core processor, good RAM, and a good video card. That's about it.

[Nadini]

Hello

Well If it was up to me, I'dn't be wasting my time getting Intel Base Systems, they suck, What you need is good ol' AMD Phenom II 4x core, with about 4gb of ram, gigabyte MB or Asus M2n Sli, with 2 Nvidia Gt Video Card each at about 1gb of video ram, or Ati Video, a hard drive thats dedicated to gaming only, and I'dn't be loading WoW into my main drive, but a totally separate partition, since is going to hold about 30gb's with the Cata Pre Patch expansion, n about 30gb with cataclysm it self, so id dedicate at least 100gb for the partition, oh and if you are lucky try getting video card that have HDMI outputs, less headache with cables, sound, an all. Sound Blaster Pro Fitality, Water Cooled, about 32" Monitor, and that should cost you no more then about 2700.00 Dollars for the whole thing.

BTW in my Opinion AMD's are much better Gaming Horses then Intel ever will be. And i've used Intel Processors in the past, wasnt too much impressed with them, and Amd is a little bit cheaper, but give you better performance then intel does, But thats only my opinion, so take it for what it is.

Right now im Running

Phenom II x6 1055T 2.8gh
Gigaby GA-870A UD3 2 Way Crossfire, AM3 DDR3, USB3, SATA3
Corsair Domminator 2gb PC1333 DDR3 PC3 10666 Tripple (8gb)
64gb Kingston 2.5in SATA SSD MLC ( For Operating System Only & Windows Applications)
1TB SATA3 6gb/s 7200 RPM 64MB Cache
Asetek 510 LC 120MM Watercooler
LiteOn 4X Blue Ray Player
LG DVD/CDRW 24X
ExtremeGear 800W PS
Skyline Mid Case
Windows 7 Ultimate

With out the Screen cost about 2300.00 Dollars

[Rpruden]

Originally Posted by Nadini BTW in my Opinion AMD's are much better Gaming Horses then Intel ever will be. And i've used Intel Processors in the past, wasnt too much impressed with them, and Amd is a little bit cheaper, but give you better performance then intel does, But thats only my opinion, so take it for what it is.

I used to use AMD over Intel because they used to out perform Intel dollar for dollar, currently Intel just gets you a little more bang for your buck. You can save a few bones by getting the AMD but the processors overall efficiency will be worse.

There is a video on youtube of a guy running full quality on everything with the following specs. AMD Athlon II X4 630, 6gb ddr3 ram, an 800 watt PSU, an Nvidia GeForce 9800GT XLR8 1gb DDR3, and a 1TB hard drive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKiZ6Wwyvo0

That AMD Processor is about $100 vs the i3 that is $113. The following benchmark below shows that the i3 out performs ALL of the AMD chips by quite a bit on WOW performance and all other games too. (bottom line Intel beats highly tiered AMD) This is pretty amazing considering that the i3 runs only 2 cores instead of 4 (wow only supports 2 anyways) and the i3 uses MUCH less power than the AMD. In the course of a year, the i3 will cost you much less to run in electricity. It is one of the most energy efficient processors that can be used for gaming. Check out the benchmarks below;

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2901/13

You can build a solution to run WOW at full quality for SIGNIFICANTLY less than $2700. Like I said my friend just ordered a new setup for about $450, The only thing he didn't purchase was a case and video card, since he re-used his old ones. Add a video card and a PC case to that and you can have a pretty great gaming rig for WOW.

His specs are;
Asus P7H55 Motherboard - $89.99
Intel Core i3 530 @ 2.93 Ghz - $113.99
Nvidia GTS250 1Gb - $134.99
8Gb of GSkill Ripjaws DDR3 PC-1600 - $169.98
750 Watt PSU - $49.99
320 GB 7200 RPM WD HDD - $44.99

Total System cost: $603.93

Just add $30 - $100 for a decent case and you are good to go with a much cheaper machine that will run WOW at full quality.

[Rpruden]

Also for reference here is a Video card comparison chart.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...80,2621-6.html

[Petrah]

I love it when people spout off opinions, and someone comes up behind em with reviews and benchmarks lol. Well of course Intel is better than AMD... anyone spending any amount of time at all doing research before buying a new processor will quickly figure that one out. It's like comparing a Pinto (AMD) to a Rolls Royce (Intel).

You absolutely do not need to spend an arm and a leg to get good performance in WoW. You just don't. I spent under 800 bucks on mine, and my boyfriend spent over a thousand on his (higher end machine too) and my system out-performs his. I even run on Vista, too lol (not a single crash or blue screen in two years).

This is what I paid for mine two years ago, and I still get awesome FPS in game.

$119.99 Antec Nine Hundred Gaming Case.
$84.99 Antec Truepower Trio 650w
$93.99 Gigabyte EP45-UD3L Motherboard
$167.99 Core2 Duo E8400 @ 3GHz
$39.99 Core Contact Freezer CPU Cooler
$54.99 4GB(2x2GB) G-Skill DDR2 1066 MHz @ 5-5-5-15
$199.99 Saphire Radeon 1GB GDDR5 4870
--------
$761.93