🚀 go-pugleaf

"| || ||| ||||| || |" <|||||||||||||||||||||> wrote in message 
news:529089c8$0$46483$c3e8da3$a9097924@news.astraweb.com...
> after a few other loads, the first load is kinda slow.
>    5 seconds
> running 1920x1080 (HDMI connect ) windowed fullscreen
> at the docks looking back at the city in FPS  as ctrl-r shows
> using the stardard selects no tweaks
>  Ultra 24
>  High 38
>  Good 48
>  Fair 120
>  Low- who cares?
> Running from docks to bank with moderate population
>  Ultra  24-20
>  High  38-40
>  Good  50-55
>  Fair  90-110
>  Low- who cares?
> - there was a crowd of dragons waiting for a boat when I did the docks
> but the ranges are  fairly consistent, no real spikes

Load from character screen off SSD 3 seconds, graphics much the same
This is with no addons. 

"| || ||| ||||| || |" <|||||||||||||||||||||> wrote in message 
news:52908fb7$0$46455$c3e8da3$a9097924@news.astraweb.com...
>
> "| || ||| ||||| || |" <|||||||||||||||||||||> wrote in message 
> news:529089c8$0$46483$c3e8da3$a9097924@news.astraweb.com...
>> after a few other loads, the first load is kinda slow.
>>    5 seconds
>> running 1920x1080 (HDMI connect ) windowed fullscreen
>> at the docks looking back at the city in FPS  as ctrl-r shows
>> using the stardard selects no tweaks
>>  Ultra 24
>>  High 38
>>  Good 48
>>  Fair 120
>>  Low- who cares?
>> Running from docks to bank with moderate population
>>  Ultra  24-20
>>  High  38-40
>>  Good  50-55
>>  Fair  90-110
>>  Low- who cares?
>> - there was a crowd of dragons waiting for a boat when I did the docks
>> but the ranges are  fairly consistent, no real spikes
>
> Load from character screen off SSD 3 seconds, graphics much the same
> This is with no addons.

after a couple of hours with tweaks I don't know that you really need 
anything else
unless you are really picky and loaded

 Ultra lags in places and is jumpy  but in High everything is smooth 35-45 
FPS
 And when you logoff, there is the temp 45-43-40-38-36  in about the time it 
takes to read

So, stress tested quite well, no cooking, the fans barely ticking over
  if you are a bit doubtful or strapped for cash you don't need $300 cards 
in $1500 systems anymore
at least to get around in WOW quite nicely

So now I need another reason to buy the big stuff , so sad :-) 

Den 23-11-2013 12:56, | || ||| ||||| || | skrev:

> Load time from the character select screen, which should be same-ish for
> zone changes
> after a few other loads, the first load is kinda slow.
>      5 seconds

SSDs are just porn.  When I got my samsung 840 256GB earlier this year 
I'm usually one of the first toons who enters a raid in LFRs.  I see the 
raid grid getting cluttered slowly. :)

> running 1920x1080 (HDMI connect ) windowed fullscreen
> at the docks looking back at the city in FPS  as ctrl-r shows
>   using the stardard selects no tweaks
>    Ultra 24
>    High 38
>    Good 48
>    Fair 120
>    Low- who cares?
> Running from docks to bank with moderate population
>    Ultra  24-20
>    High  38-40
>    Good  50-55
>    Fair  90-110
>    Low- who cares?
> - there was a crowd of dragons waiting for a boat when I did the docks
>   but the ranges are  fairly consistent, no real spikes

The interesting question is: and 25 man raids?  Elegon in MSV uses 
graphic effects that brings down many older video cards to 2-10 fps even 
at low settings and in 10man.
Intel's HD video is quite strong.  My old cpu (i7-2670) with a HD3000 
gives pretty nice fps in pve environment.  But when it comes to dungeons 
or raids I prefer my geforce 540 mobile which handles even 25 man quite 
fine despite a single spike or 2 in a boss fight.  When that is said - I 
havent tested the HD3000 in dungeons or raids.

-- 
Peter T.

<https://elite.frontier.co.uk/>

"Peter T." <pinoc10@hotmail.cum> wrote in message 
news:l6t67l$fed$1@speranza.aioe.org...
> Den 23-11-2013 12:56, | || ||| ||||| || | skrev:
>
>> Load time from the character select screen, which should be same-ish for
>> zone changes
>> after a few other loads, the first load is kinda slow.
>>      5 seconds
>
> SSDs are just porn.  When I got my samsung 840 256GB earlier this year I'm 
> usually one of the first toons who enters a raid in LFRs.  I see the raid 
> grid getting cluttered slowly. :)

Most things are twice as fast off the SSD, which means the memory and HDD 
are really fast anyway :-)
The other mail I used SSD, it can be 1 second for zone changes.

>> Running from docks to bank with moderate population
>>    Ultra  24-20
>>    High  38-40
>>    Good  50-55
>>    Fair  90-110
>>    Low- who cares?
>> - there was a crowd of dragons waiting for a boat when I did the docks
>>   but the ranges are  fairly consistent, no real spikes
>
> The interesting question is: and 25 man raids?  Elegon in MSV uses graphic 
> effects that brings down many older video cards to 2-10 fps even at low 
> settings and in 10man.
> Intel's HD video is quite strong.  My old cpu (i7-2670) with a HD3000 
> gives pretty nice fps in pve environment.  But when it comes to dungeons 
> or raids I prefer my geforce 540 mobile which handles even 25 man quite 
> fine despite a single spike or 2 in a boss fight.  When that is said - I 
> havent tested the HD3000 in dungeons or raids.

 At this point in time it seems you spend about $100 per man.
It is subjective, some people can't tolerate less than 50FPS, I got 
comfortable with 7FPS on a good day :-)
So, $500 you can do 5 man, 25man raid a $2500 system will do really well 
with full sparkle.
For all that,once you have got over the detail mostly you are just looking 
at buttons and icons anyway, not the delightful coruscating mists.
Tuning to decrease spikes becomes more important and that just needs the 
graphics to be 'good enough'.
  Again with the subjectives :-)

I would expect this one to be absolute rubbish in larger dungeons, raids, 
world boss fights.

Of course it has slots you could put a $50-$500 card in, although a proper 
550W+ supply and cooling would be needed for the upper end. And then we get 
into liquid coolers and multiple fans on the way to $2-3000.
Once you get above $1000 it is into serious diminishing returns.
A ~$250 2Gig card will trounce the HD4400 by about 10x, bucketloads more 
sparkle.

A 4440 cpu or 4570 cpu will also do better plus has better onboard graphics.
It also pushes the total system cost towards $800 -1000 range, $1200 with 
say a GTX 660 or whatever the magic number for the latest equivalent.
[ all prices are in constant flux, and this is Oz prices ]

I am reporting a new budget desktop can do really well, far better than I 
expected straight off the shelf.
So if anyone was longing for a fresh dose but their system is long in the 
tooth then it is easy.
Not $1500, not $1000, you can roam in the world in visual and responsive 
comfort on an unstressed stock machine for $500, at the moment.

It may also mean new players on their average desktop.
 I logged into my middle population old realm and even with crossrealm there 
were about 3-6 others leveling up that I saw ,  moving through the same 
starter quests at the same time, on a weekend. 4 had heirlooms.

"Lewis" <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote in message 
news:slrnl958hu.ifj.g.kreme@mbp55.local...
.
>>> Intel's HD video is quite strong.  My old cpu (i7-2670) with a HD3000
>>> gives pretty nice fps in pve environment.  But when it comes to dungeons
>>> or raids I prefer my geforce 540 mobile which handles even 25 man quite
>>> fine despite a single spike or 2 in a boss fight.  When that is said - I
>>> havent tested the HD3000 in dungeons or raids.
>
>>  At this point in time it seems you spend about $100 per man.
>> It is subjective, some people can't tolerate less than 50FPS, I got
>> comfortable with 7FPS on a good day :-)
>> So, $500 you can do 5 man, 25man raid a $2500 system will do really well
>> with full sparkle.
>
> My 2012 Mac mini does just fine in 25 man raids at "Good". The only
> change I made to it from stock was putting in 16GB of RAM. I should put
> in an SSD, but it's a pain in the ass so I haven't done it.

Put it this way, with SSD this booted in 9 seconds clean, loaded with 
software it slows way down to 12 seconds
The SSD doesn't make that much difference, IF the rest is pretty fast anyway
Only when loading a lot of small packets it matters
about half the speed for load screen but little FPS difference or stalls 
ingame.

They are only ~$1 A gig, 8 Gig ram or 120G SSD, about the same.
I would go for a 120G SSD over 8G more ram, if you already have enough ram, 
but it doesn't matter than much.
It depends how much is 'enough' for you, and they will be cheaper next month 
anyway :-)

Here base mac mini  $AU689, just for comparison
thats off Kogan webpage, maybe it is an old page
  a.. 2.5GHz dual-core Intel Core i5
  b.. 4GB memory
  c.. 500GB hard drive1
  d.. Intel HD Graphics 4000
  e..
  f.. So yeah, you can get quite useable for quite cheap if you don't need 
the sparkles.
 Decent PCs aren't $3k anymore. Hardly suprising since they double every 
couple of years
twice as much for 2/3 the price.
  a.. It is common for games that  instead of content graphics quadruples 
yet again
  b..  Here lies an unknown 4770/GTX770, killed by an eyecandy xpac 
b2013-d2014

"Lewis" <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote in message 
news:slrnl958hu.ifj.g.kreme@mbp55.local...
> In message <5292986b$0$46446$c3e8da3$a909...@news.astraweb.com>
>>  At this point in time it seems you spend about $100 per man.
>> It is subjective, some people can't tolerate less than 50FPS, I got
>> comfortable with 7FPS on a good day :-)
>> So, $500 you can do 5 man, 25man raid a $2500 system will do really well
>> with full sparkle.
>
> My 2012 Mac mini does just fine in 25 man raids at "Good". The only
> change I made to it from stock was putting in 16GB of RAM. I should put
> in an SSD, but it's a pain in the ass so I haven't done it.

Ah I see,
if a HD4000 is "good" for 25 man a 4400 or 4600 should handle good or high.
Then there is always res tweaking, HD res isn't necessary, nice but not 
necessary.

As power approaches 50c/Kwh it is getting so you could take the card price, 
and figure it will cost that to run it for a year.
Not that it matters much, 15 cents an hour is cheap entertainment. 

On Sun, 24 Nov 2013 04:59:57 +0930, | || ||| ||||| || | wrote:
>  So now I need another reason to buy the big stuff , so sad :-) 

we needs it,  for work , yes we does :-)

Cheers
Urbin

-- 
Dun Morogh-EU (PvE)  | Tunyatgong (12), Monk        | Juran  (65), Druid
Urbin  (90), Hunter  | Surana     (75), Mage        | Greeta (65), Rogue
Mymule (85), Warlock | Kordosch   (75), Deathknight | Gera   (26), Paladin
Sunh   (81), Priest  | Taalas     (85), Shaman      | Vargal (42), Warrior

Den 25-11-2013 09:40, Lewis skrev:

> To be fair, there are things that I turn down from "good" (or Ultra)
> that probably impact the graphics, but I turn them down because I want
> them turned down. Ground Clutter, for example, I set as low as possible.

I run all graphics on absolutely low (except View Distance which is set 
to ultra) on my geforce 540M card.  But first time I did Malkorok on 
flex in SoO I had to adjust article Density from low to good so I could 
see his cone on the floor.  I got killed by it the first two times and 
everybody said "why dont you move your french popo away from the 
shite?".  "What shite?" I asked. :)  I dont feel any decrease in fps 
despite the adjustment.
Liquid Detail also has to be set to Fair or a very few quests cant be 
done because the texture makes it impossible to see specific quest objects.
so there are drawbacks in the game when everything is set to low.

-- 
Peter T.

<https://elite.frontier.co.uk/>

"Lewis" <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote in message 
news:slrnl9631u.lhb.g.kreme@mbp55.local...
> In message <5292bde5$0$46479$c3e8da3$a909...@news.astraweb.com>
>  | || ||| ||||| || | <|||||||||||||||||||||> wrote:
>
>> Put it this way, with SSD this booted in 9 seconds clean, loaded with
>> software it slows way down to 12 seconds
>> The SSD doesn't make that much difference, IF the rest is pretty fast 
>> anyway
>> Only when loading a lot of small packets it matters
>> about half the speed for load screen but little FPS difference or stalls
>> ingame.
>
> Well, I think your machine has SATA-II, which is limited to 3.0Gbps,
> well under the peak speed of a decent SSD, so that is quite a limiting
> factor.
It was sata 3.0 which is 6Gbps, it clocked 350 MB/sec in subjective 
stopwatch transfers ,
write is 200MB/s but read isn't too bad, more than sata II
I checked to be sure it wasn't a lemon.

6Gbps = about 500MB/s once you hit real hardware using what you send out

the boot was from power on, 6 or so seconds until the bios screen went away,
starting windows..done
granted it wasn't the top end SSD but nice for a budget
http://www.storagereview.com/plextor_pxm5s_ssd_review
http://vr-zone.com/articles/plextor-m5s-128gb-review/44863.html/4
not too bad

but that is besides the point, given this was extra to the basic machine
it doesn't make a 'totally must have' difference anymore
just a really nice to have difference

>
> It's hard to spend more than $2000 on a gmaing machine, really. Not
> unless you want to get stupid, and there are plenty of options well
> under $1000 that will work fine. Heck, the mini even handles Parallels
> well enough to play most PC games (the kids play Skyrim, KSP, Minecraft,
> Civilization V, and several others in Parallels).

 once you get way up there about 1/3 goes just on keeping the little gems 
cool enough
and that heat is costing you 50c/Kwh, which would be fine in winter or cold 
climates
Why have a heater running when you can game instead?

..and then they add even more cooling to overclock the things,
a $1500 dollar rig and they add $500 cooling to get 30% more out of a $200 
processor
  rapid rampup diminishing returns
hmm, maybe thats why so few pro gamers come from hot countries? they melted 
:-)

> The Intel HD 4000 is nothing to write home about, but it does a fine job
> for most things.

  The thing to write home about is the price for what it does :-)

  When you are talking $500 for a budget pc, that does a fine job
$300 for extra cpu/motherboard, $250 for card $150 for more 
power/case/cooling
more than doubles the price, no longer budget

"Lewis" <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote in message 
news:slrnl9631u.lhb.g.kreme@mbp55.local...
>
> It's hard to spend more than $2000 on a gmaing machine, really. Not
> unless you want to get stupid, and there are plenty of options well
> under $1000 that will work fine. Heck, the mini even handles Parallels
> well enough to play most PC games (the kids play Skyrim, KSP, Minecraft,
> Civilization V, and several others in Parallels).
>
> The Intel HD 4000 is nothing to write home about, but it does a fine job
> for most things.

on a 4570 with HD4600, rates were about 20% up on the 4400
With tweaking down clutter and the items listed 'significantly degrade' to 
~fair it was 45-60FPS
on High running around and at the table outside stormwind with a blizzard of 
chars hopping around.
Turn away and it got to 80.
Went into stockade, thinking it may slightly emulate a higher man instance, 
not likely, 150 FPS.
  Anyone wanna run me through stockade? just a bit, for science, honestly 
:-)
Graphics was peaked , 1 core was at 80% and the others at ~10%.
Running a HD video recode , just to see, barely glitched wow.

The 4000 is VERY competitive actually in this range, particularly since the 
difference is easily soaked up by ground clutter and
view range.
If you can 'see' clearly out to your engagement range that is all you -need- 
or pay attention to most of the time.
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/mid_range_gpus.html
lists 4000 at  460
4400  499
4600  612   - which is inline with 20% or so on straight FPS, it does 
slightly better eyecandy as well
The last card I really played wow on rates 128, it was dying on sub 10FPS 
just standing
The first card I played wow on , and it ran quite well at the time , 
rates...brrrrrr...7...tish
I think there have been a few eyecandy xpacs since then :-)

Most of the demanding graphics are in discardable detail that you mostly 
don't see when you are looking at cooldowns, situation alert text, solid 
colour bars.

Den 28-11-2013 14:21, | || ||| ||||| || | skrev:

> on a 4570 with HD4600, rates were about 20% up on the 4400

Thats what I read too when I check benchmarks of the intel gpu.

> Most of the demanding graphics are in discardable detail that you mostly
> don't see when you are looking at cooldowns, situation alert text, solid
> colour bars.

True.  But there arent much info about 
HD3000/4000/4200/4400/4600/wutever when it comes to raids and dungeons. 
  The only real WoW benchmark I have found was a test by flight over 
Burning Steppes.  Seriously... :)

-- 
Peter T.

<https://elite.frontier.co.uk/>

"Peter T." <pinoc10@hotmail.cum> wrote in message 
news:l79l2r$ihb$1@speranza.aioe.org...
> Den 28-11-2013 14:21, | || ||| ||||| || | skrev:
>
>> on a 4570 with HD4600, rates were about 20% up on the 4400
>
> Thats what I read too when I check benchmarks of the intel gpu.
>
>> Most of the demanding graphics are in discardable detail that you mostly
>> don't see when you are looking at cooldowns, situation alert text, solid
>> colour bars.
>
> True.  But there arent much info about HD3000/4000/4200/4400/4600/wutever 
> when it comes to raids and dungeons. The only real WoW benchmark I have 
> found was a test by flight over Burning Steppes.  Seriously... :)

you probably don't need these numbers, but if anyone cares here they are
(I am not fixated, I am merely...okay maybe I am)

for 4600
Via the flight npc stormwind-ironforge-storm
  Burning steppe was better than Elwyn area in all of them, maybe there are 
other areas that kill it when random flying
   but random fligh isn't repeatable
 I suppose I should do each going the same way...or I could get a life :-)
 1920x1080 windowed fullscreen, for some reason it loses the mouse in true 
fullscreen
  Typically it also clobbers the refresh rate
  I did try it on some more modern games that don't support the diversity of 
players.
  On their Utlra setting it just ran under the bed and refused to come out.

Ultra Defaults - I expected lousy, and bits were getting way down
   Leave SW  34
       16 goldshire..yeah
       25 northshire
       35  the high valley
       40  BS entry
       45  altar, up to 50
       33 bloodchar
       44 pyrox
       50 firewatch
       38 Dun Morogh
       25 frostmourne
       38 at Ironforge gates
       78 inside ironforge
       78 after landing at npc
       Then switch to true fullscreen.....43..
       It was pretty smooth, just watching the fps yoyo, no lags
       the numbers are the lowest I saw at the areas, there may have been 
lower while I was jotting them down.

High defaults, people were talking at me so less data.
   Burning steppe was better than Elwyn area
   BS was 35-65, mostly 50-55
   Elwyn mostly 45-ish, down to 30 in parts, just before Stormwind down to 
32, then up to 75 at the landing

Good default, these passed in the reverse order listed, direction of sight 
does change things
       97  SW  at fp staring at wall
       45 northshire
       57  the high valley
       62  BS entry
       62  altar
       72 bloodchar
       78 pyrox
       69 firewatch
       70 Dun Morogh
       92 frostmourne
       70 at Ironforge gates
       105 inside ironforge
       85 after landing at npc
       Then switch to true fullscreen.....48

I think the fullscreen may be refresh rate limited, but it is a pain to 
experiment without a mouse and I just don't care that much :-)

It isn't the best graphics by a long shot but it isn't useless, at least for 
getting around wow and since it comes with the processor I suppose it is 
'almost free'.


(disjoined or repeated text is the result of cutnpaste and undo disasters 
after a catstrike on the keyboard)