What should I do?

[Sniper1432]

at the moment my my current PC has:

MSI 650i SLI
Q6600 @ 2.7ghz
4 GIGS DDR2 800
Nvidia Geforce GTX 460 1 GIGDDR5 overclocked to 870/1740/2130 @ 1.25v
Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit

I run the game all high with 4xaa, 16xaf, HBAO, @1280x1024 (got a small monitor) and I get anywhere from 30-80fps.

But I kinda want to get more than that, like 50-70 FPS constant. I mean, it's playable and it looks really nice, but I get slow downs sometimes especially in the streets. Now, since money is tight for me atm, I can afford one upgrade. DO you think I should keep the Q6600 and get a card like a 560/570? OR get a new CPU say like an i5? I'm not really sure what's slowing me down, my CPU or GFX card. thanks!

[Vreki]

Re: What should I do?

With that small a screen, couldnt you cut a lot of the fancy effects in half without noticing it?

[Shawn Zipay]

Re: What should I do?

I have almost an identical system, even the motherboard is the same. Your CPU is clocked a bit higher than my Q6600 though but I have 6GB RAM.

With that said, I have a 560Ti GTX (factory OC'ed from MSI to 570 speeds) and I'm able to run the game at 1920x1080 on most everything High/Auto on Metro. HOWEVER, Caspian Border kind of gave my setup a hearty backhand on the same settings to the point I had to drop a few things to medium on that map.

The problem is, you won't get any substantial gains from any one upgrade. I know that in my case I'm severely CPU bound. You might be a bit better though as you have a slight OC on that and could probably benefit more just from a GPU upgrade. But if you do the opposite of me and go with a new CPU, then you'll probably be GPU bound.

It's honestly really difficult to say right now since it's still very much a beta and I'm guessing they have room for more optimizations.

[Scinto]

Re: What should I do?

Turn off the Ambient Occlusion (HBAO).

[Cantina_Fly]

Re: What should I do?

Zips has it right. A better GFX card with that CPU won't do much. And if money is at all an issue, 100%, just turn down the detail and live with it. It's not like Medium looks like rubbish or anything. Save the money for a system wide upgrade/replace down the road.

[Minmaster]

Re: What should I do?

i have my Q6600 at 3.0, why don't you at least put it there? i did the simple BSEL mod to turn it to 3.0.
i also have a gtx 460, but only 768mb version. however, it's factory overclocked so that makes up for it.

i have everything on high except textures and shadows which are both on medium. and i turned off HBAO.

that said, i don't know if i notice fps improvement from default auto to current settings.