Will a processor by itself make a difference in video game resolution?

[Doc]

I installed an Nvidia GTX 460 video card to boost the gaming
experience. Looked far better than the 8600 GT I'd been using. Then I
went from an E8400 Core2 Duo processor to a Q9550 Core2 Quad
processor.

I don't know if it's some placebo effect but it seems like the
graphics is even better after installing the Quad processor. Is there
any basis for this to be true? I.e. is there any reason for an already
fairly stout video card running under one CPU to look better just
because it's running under an even stronger CPU?

[Flasherly]

Yes. It's all about relative bottlenecks in determining The Final
Limit.

[Paul]

The visual look of a game, is determined by the render path.
Both the GPU and CPU performance play a part, in making a
particular render path practical. The CPU sets up the data,
that the GPU will be rendering.

There's no point having an infinite amount of detail, if the
frame rate is one per second (a slide show). The game can detect
your hardware, and get the machine in the relatively correct
ballpark (low, medium, high). If you don't like the speed
versus level/quality of detail, you can always adjust the
game preferences as you like.

There's an article here, if you're having trouble sleeping at night.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Direct3D

In the past, having a game auto-set some of these things,
actually ruins your enjoyment. I had a game that would
select DX9 render path, when DX7 looked crappy but
ran like grease lightning. Sometimes, it might take
a registry edit or the like, to fix that, as they
may not have provided a control to override it. In an
FPS, I'd rather have low latency and be able to
respond rapidly, than have a nicely rendered scene,
where I've just been fragged :-)

Paul

[Darklight]

install and rune 3dmark and see for your self

[John Doe]

The Central Processing Unit (CPU) greatly affects gaming.

[Anssi Saari]

Doc <docsa...@yahoo.com> writes:

> I don't know if it's some placebo effect but it seems like the
> graphics is even better after installing the Quad processor. Is there
> any basis for this to be true? I.e. is there any reason for an already
> fairly stout video card running under one CPU to look better just
> because it's running under an even stronger CPU?

Well, I don't see how graphics could get "better" with just more CPU
cores. Faster certainly.

I just found out this weekend that I seem to be CPU limited, at least in
Borderlands 2. Can't quite always do 60 fps at 1920x1200, same CPU as
yours, GTX 670 video. I usually run the CPU at 3 GHz just so it's easier
to remember what I have.

I thought the video card was the bottleneck but overclocking it showed
no improvement. So then I looked at the task manager and saw the game
seemed to have pegged out all four processors. So I tried a little
overclocking. Saw some improvement, CPU seemed to work fine at 3.4 GHz.
Still not quite enough though.

So, probably getting a 3570K CPU, Asrock EXTREME4 and 16 GB of RAM
pretty soon since those seem to be what I need without being overly
expensive.

My requirements for a motherboard aren't that complicated but a little
above the cheapest boards: 7 SATA ports, USB3 pin header (the 19-pin one
since I have a matching front panel), SPDIF optical out. Linux support
too (seems to work from some user comments).

Not happy about having to pay for *four* video output connectors on the
motherboard that I'll likely never use but I guess that's the order of
things now.

[Darklight]

this is to Anssi Saari
have you disabled any of your peripherals Ie storage hard drives. Second
what is your psu. Third what are your settings for you nvidia gpu.

[Paul]

It helps to understand what the processor is being wasted on. Try
"PhysX Medium - GPU".

http://physxinfo.com/news/9425/borderlands-2-is-cpu-capable-of-handling-the-physx-effects/

Someone tests with a second video card dedicated to PhysX, and
gets a modest improvement.

http://1pcent.com/?p=135

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhysX

"accelerated by either a PhysX PPU or a CUDA-enabled GeForce GPU
(if it has at least 32 CUDA cores), thus offloading physics
calculations from the CPU"

The game looks like a good way to promote the sale of new hardware.

Paul

[Flasherly]

A partial benefit is to program in a language capable of addressing
disparate core processors in such a way that "the one hand washing the
other" is within means other than what is accorded the pseudo-
actuality of notoriety to programming as it's spoken. Forgive me.
Allow me to rephrase that into words that make sense. Time Magazine,
I happened to notice this week, says that Microsoft's Halo debut is
"beautiful." Beautiful obviously is within a means the program is
coded, written for matrixes timed to address both GPU/MPU cores over a
syncopated return we perceive in similar fashion for a cat rolling in
catnip. In actuality, programming over multiple cores is no different
in that modal forms predicating a logic behind that language is very
much abstract and without the determinism of established precepts
involving singe-core linearity. Perhaps, but an aspect to incongruity,
a stipend, portioned to residuals, as it were, much as would be a
practical implication of expectation from serious chess players if
asked to sit before a three-tiered board of 3D chess. Computer
science does have that tendency -- to flow slowly behind the
advancement of conditional relationships as presented and fashioned
for social determinacy. Whether you would use four more cores more
efficiently than your present four (on W7 - XP is limited to
two). . .I should doubt that without special considerations first on
the user's part to stage a semi-convoluted sequence of programs to
such end. Beyond what most would be likely conceive if capable of
implementing, and certainly beyond a return on benchmarks for present
means as averages to benefit overall processor power available and
utilized. It's rather a brutish approach, then, as affordable and
more cores impose themselves over all other considerations to approach
what practical limits no doubt would exist.

[Yousuf Khan]

You didn't mention if you were using XP, Win7, or Vista. Those might
have a bearing on the answer. If you're using XP then that only supports
upto DirectX 9, whereas the others support upto DirectX 11 or higher.
The higher DirectX's have more offloading onto the GPU from the CPU. So
if you were using XP with DX9, then you would indeed have a more
CPU-dependent graphics subsystem.

Yousuf Khan

[Anssi Saari]

Darklight <nglen...@netscape.net> writes:

> this is to Anssi Saari
> have you disabled any of your peripherals Ie storage hard drives.

No.

> Second what is your psu.

Corsair 520HX. I know, it's a little borderline for my system but should
be fine at least as long as I don't overclock both CPU and GPU at the
same time.

> Third what are your settings for you nvidia gpu.

The video card is a Gigabyte GV-N670OC-2GD, so Base clock: 980 MHz and
Boost clock: 1058 MHz. Memory clock is normal 6008 MHz. Somewhat factory
overclocked since nominal clocks for a GTX670 are 915/980 MHz.

[Anssi Saari]

Paul <nos...@needed.com> writes:

> It helps to understand what the processor is being wasted on. Try
> "PhysX Medium - GPU".

Well, unfortunately I get frame rate drops seemingly at random even in
areas where there are no obvious PhysX effects in play. I've found one
place especially where frame rate drops typically to 50 fps but there's
nothing obviously heavy on screen there.

I tried lowering PhysX but as expected, no change. Also no change from
lowering various video options except for resolution. Even then, I can't
do 60 fps even at 1280x800.

I suppose it's upgrade time. I wonder how well Windows 7 copes when
motherboard is changed? My old motherboard is Asus P5Q Deluxe,
P45/ICH10R chipset going to Z77 on the Asrock Z77 Extreme4... At least
SATA should be all AHCI now so hopefully booting works. I'll have look
into this a little.

> The game looks like a good way to promote the sale of new hardware.

I agree, the fluid effects like flowing water in streams are very cool.
I can't remember ever seeing such realistically flowing water in a game.
Which is kind of weird since Borderlands has a hand drawn cartoony look
about it in general.

[Flasherly]

On Nov 1, 8:55 am, Doc <docsavag...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Not sure stronger even applies now.

I was looking over MSI MBs, Intel variants - and NOT one was equipped
for other than running an Intel *Graphics Enabled* processor (in a
socket 115x form factor).

Coupled with the newest breed of dual Celerons, of that persuasion,
they're running faster benches than powerhouse AMD X2s a few years
ago.

MSI's big deal, however, is solid-state capacitors on MB built for
(ostensibly, not to) "military" specifications.

Over on Gigabyte's offerings, however, similarly socketed for graphic-
qualified only CPU mates, they've support for a likes of automatic
switching between PCI-E (including CrossFire configs) and the MPU-GPU
aspect of the processor.

Take an instance of video encoding and that pair of PCI-E graphic
boards priced at respectively $400 each, and it should be readily
apparent they won't do one damn thing faster in the time the processor
takes to finish.

Play a game such as Halo, though, and the MB enters in the picture to
switch to the CrossFire slots for whatever flavor suits the builder.

To say in absolute terms (apart from program theory and predictive
analysis code written for branch decisions on multi-cores) - you'll
have to hit the gaming or hardware sites for CPU to GPU to both
combined over similarly grouped matrices.

Pretty pictures on graphs and such you know and love.

Doesn't look like there's other than Gigabyte and MSI left these days
-- although good to see MSI still in there, among newer brands and
others (BIOSTAR comes to mind) -- still priced for reasonably to
affordable means and entry builds;- ASUS I simply didn't mention
because it perhaps was priced beyond limits on a construction emphasis
(solid-state capacitors and advertised longer-life MBs) I was looking
at. Nothing much more in there hardly above $75US.