Build a computer to play GTA:IV at best ability

[pinky]

seems to run max settings nicely @ 1680x1050 without crashing and saying out of memory

on 1920x1200 it really does look awesome but it does not take long before it crashes, it is much more unstable so 1680x1050 it is for now

 

ron123, i'll give memturbo a try, but i don't know what processes are ok to shut down, i use vista 64bit premium, there is quite a lot compared to a fresh os install over 50 processes when i check task manager but scared of closing something important down, i've done that before and had to press reset, if you know an ok guide for what processes are not necesary would be a good help

 

edit, wow ron123 you get that good of performance with 9800GT on full settings this is an amazing tweak, i just checked your youtube vid i'm gonna have to apply this tweak to my bro's pc, he's got a q6600 at 2.4 will not overclock probably due to poor psu 4gb and 8800gtx

You need to use the -memrestrict commandline, i get similar with my GTX285s. There should be a topic aboput it in here somewhere with official settings from R* Toronto.

[thales100]

 

No doubt about it, 280 is the better card, but not two times better.

 

 

Yes, "to rape" is a bit over the real thing, just a joke, but with the GTX 280 i was finally able to run the benchie at 60+ FPS (60.21) at 1680 x 1050 all GFX maxed and shoot a mini video as proof - im still waiting for any 4870x2 user to post a better result, but in fact the difference over aidan87 was less than 1 FPS.

Edited February 16, 2009 by thales100

[anus]

Keep in mind though that your 280 is only better in a few games. The 4870X2 is usually twice as fast if not more in almost all games apart from a slight few.

 

@mkey, Blackviper's site is one of the, if not the best guide there is to disable your services. And he recommends doing everything in services.msc .

[thales100]

 

Keep in mind though that your 280 is only better in a few games.

Thats not true again warlord., the 4870x2 may be like 15-25% faster in some games, thats all. Also you should not forget this is a GTA 4 forum, and the GTX 280 seems to be the best card to run the game.

Edited February 16, 2009 by thales100

[mkey82]

 

Keep in mind though that your 280 is only better in a few games.

Thats not true again warlord., it maybe like 15-25% faster in some games, thats all. Also you should not forget this is a GTA 4 forum, and the GTX 280 seems to be the best card to run the game.

You seem to forget that loads of people are doing terribly with the 280 and GTA4.

 

Warlord, pawned again , I thought Blackviper was an autoruns type of app.

 

Anyway, my preferred option is to make changes by heart and then see what's going on with your system. Of course, when I change too much, IDK what service handles certain functionality

[thales100]

You seem to forget that loads of people are doing terribly with the 280 and GTA4.

 

And also with the 4870x2, so to compare you should get the best result from each card running the only benchmark available at the same res and GFX settings - and the GTX 280 has proven to be the best.

[pinky]

You seem to forget that loads of people are doing terribly with the 280 and GTA4.

 

And also with the 4870x2, so to compare you should get the best result from each card running the only benchmark available at the same res and GFX settings - and the GTX 280 has proven to be the best.

280s FTW so far, even my 285s fail miserably so far when it comes to performance in IV.

[maraca2020]

for a nodusm mobo, is this the best option for a cpu?

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16819103773

[maraca2020]

which is better, a gtx 280, or only 1 4870?

[thales100]

which is better, a gtx 280, or only 1 4870?

Man youre a troll.

[anus]

Yep I just realized too. And to think I actually tried to help him out.

[maraca2020]

yeah guys I apologize

[ron123]

I got his point long ago, he didn't want to buy anything, It can't be that a gamer wants to spend money for new rig and doesn't know anything about the hardware in the market.

[Waynio]

you know with the -availablevidmem cmd line, is it possible the 4870x2 using ddr5 not being able to play nicely with the slower ddr2 in my system so maybe that causes it to crash to desktop?

also i'm going to give the memturbo app a try with AlacrityPC over the next few hours, i'll update once tested.

would putting another 4gb of system ram of same brand and model be the best work round for this as i could get it still for a good price? making my system ram 8gb, and the ram will always be of good use as i like making pc cases so all my older parts get re-used in other systems

[anus]

Nah, your problems aren't caused by your DDR2 RAM.

 

Do this, run IV at your absolute maximum settings for a while (remember to be outdoors) and then ALT+TAB out and open up Task Manager (CTRL+ALT+DEL) and then go to the Performance tab and see how much PHYSICAL RAM is free.

 

This is a good way to see if you need more RAM or not. A game using the page file is a good sign of needing more RAM.

 

If your free RAM is very low, definitely get more RAM. 8GB would be more than enough .

[Waynio]

here it is showing everest stats and windows task manager before running gta IV

what everest says and what task manager say are very different

 

and here after running game for a couple of minutes max settings and 1920x1200 quite naturally with it saying 26mb free before running gta

 

looks to me like it would surely benefit from an extra 4gb, wouldnt you say

[anus]

Damn, in that second pic you have absolutely NO RAM left. f*ck, I've never seen a game as resource hungry as IV. I mean using an entire 4 gigs ?

 

Anyway, yeah, more RAM would definitely help. That second pic shows how badly your system needs more RAM .

[Waynio]

pretty crazy i know all 4gb

gonna get some memory asap

combination of vista mostly thou i think, i really hope windows 7 turns out better, the other main thing i hate about vista and don't seem to be able to get rid of is the green progress bar in explorer every time i scroll down a bit it kicks in, i've disabled indexing and some other bits but it is always bothering me when looking in a folder with many video's

 

would be brilliant if ms made a windows gamer module like media centre but purely for gaming which when run disables unnesasary bits but still has nesasary protection but is highly optimised for gamers, like an aditional couple of options on the start menu along with the regular shut down,reset options

[babarian225]

 

First Build one of these............the rest is history 

 

there was a guy on here who got an operating system from the Future (Windows 7)and it could not run GTA IV

[Waynio]

 

First Build one of these............the rest is history 

 

 

there was a guy on here who got an operating system from the Future (Windows 7)and it could not run GTA IV

downloaded the windows 7 beta recently, installed it but had it on for no longer than 8 hours before deciding i don't really want to run my rig on a beta, it still had the annoying green progress bar in media folders i can only see that feature what ever it is doing add more unnecessary wear and tear on hdd's and really hope that feature is gone come retail.

 

anyway aside from ms going the wrong way in making the customer happy, i will have an extra 4gb tommorow

[thales100]

pretty crazy i know all 4gb

gonna get some memory asap

 

It seems to me to be Vista Superfetch working, "empty RAM is wasted RAM".

[heat84]

Damn, in that second pic you have absolutely NO RAM left. f*ck, I've never seen a game as resource hungry as IV. I mean using an entire 4 gigs ?

 

Anyway, yeah, more RAM would definitely help. That second pic shows how badly your system needs more RAM .

You're forgetting that the OS itself is a resource hog(that is Vista right? Could be Windows 7, I can't tell). If you subtract a gig for the OS than GTAIV isn't using an unusual amount. It's using 1.8GB if you do the math. Subtract Free RAM in Picture 2 from Free RAM in picture 1.

 

 

 

[Gen0cide_]

@thales100

 

Very true, I have 4gb DDR2 800 in dual mode and have had major jams whilst RUNNING WORD because superfetch thinks im not using the RAM so goes and allocates 3.3gb. Then I go and open up a few tabs in chrome and the thing totally locks up for the next 10 mins because its run out of RAM

 

I hate superfetch. What does it even do?

 

@heat84 It's vista, widows 7 doesn't hog as much. I think that is the main reason they made windows 7 so soon. Cos vista was such a resource hog.

 

What speed is that RAM running at though, because Vista automatically puts most of itself into virtual RAM when you launch 3D apps. I had problems when I installed an extra gig of ream because without paired RAM the whole thing runs a lot slower.

 

I pulled 4.4 RAM score in windows experience index with 5 gig non pared and am running 5.9 with 4 gig pared and the same with my old 2gig pared (where the extra stick came from)

Edited February 17, 2009 by Gen0cide_

[thales100]

I hate superfetch. What does it even do?

Check here : http://techxpress.wordpress.com/2007/02/08...for-the-memory/

 

How to disable it : http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vis...-windows-vista/

[Gen0cide_]

 

I hate superfetch.    What does it even do?

Check here : http://techxpress.wordpress.com/2007/02/08...for-the-memory/

 

How to disable it : http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vis...-windows-vista/

Thanks but I already disabled it a long time ago. I was more concerned about the description in windows services being "Speeds up your system over time".

 

I'd assumed it was M$'s cure to the infamous "reinstall XP every year because the system gradually gets slower the longer you use it"

 

Oh and seeing as I'm quite the sporadic user (Im never using the same app at the same time everyday) there hasnt been any particular performance loss for me so I recommend disabling it

[thales100]

Thanks but I already disabled it a long time ago.

Im still using it, gonna try sometime to run GTA 4 with Superfetch disable to check how it goes.

[mkey82]

I hate superfetch.    What does it even do?

Check here : http://techxpress.wordpress.com/2007/02/08...for-the-memory/

 

How to disable it : http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vis...-windows-vista/

Don't disable it, it's one of the Vista's core features.

[Gen0cide_]

Maybe, but Internet explorer is also one of Vistas "core features" and thats a load of rubbish.

 

Aside from the ranting though, I seriously think its designed for office use. The type where you walk in at 8am, check you emails, run word, type a report, then run excel, make a spreadsheet of current efficiency. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

 

Read the link I was given, it just the programs you were using yesterday at the same time into memory to make Vista seem faster. Boll*cks for a gamer, especially if it east that much memory.

 

I've had it off for almost 5 months I think, no programs depend on it and I save a lot of memory.

[mkey82]

Explorer is not a feature, it's more like a pestilence.

 

I haven't tested it, but to me it seems prefetch makes your system respond a bit faster with a bit longer boot times. Just like all the Virtual memory bollocks. I got $GB of RAM, WTF do we need it for? But if you disable it, you hinder performance as OS was designed around it.

 

Anyway, I have around 500 MB of used RAM. And about 2.7GB left to spare. IMO more then enough.

[Gen0cide_]

Fair enough. I think the amount of memory it uses vastly depends on the programs you use, but hyperactive users (like me) who are used to a fast OS and open 10 or 15 small programs every half hour have serious problems with this. And Windows Indexer for that matter.