The price of upgrading to a new processor (a dual/tri/quad machine) is amplified by the fact that a CPU upgrade entails a motherboard and RAM upgrade in most cases (unless you are lucky enough to be stuck with the LGA775).
On the other hand, upgrading to a better graphics card is terribly cheap these days. Take a look at these prices (May 2009, Bangalore):
| Card | Price in Rupees |
|---|---|
| ATI HD4670 | 5000 |
| Geforce 9800 GT | 6500 |
| ATI HD4770 | 8000 |
| Geforce GTS 250 | 8500 |
Another option is to upgrade the CPU, the motherboard and RAM. Lets look at a reasonable configuration
| Component | Price in Rupees |
|---|---|
| Intel E7400 (2.8 Ghz Dual Core) | 6500 |
| Intel Q8200 (2.33 Ghz Quad Core) | 8500 |
| Cheap Motherboard | 4000 |
| 4 GB of DDR2 800 RAM | 2600 |
So, no matter how you swing, your pockets will get lighter by around 12-15k for the entire deal.
I am one of those weirdos who has a Single Core 1.8 Ghz CPU with 1 GB DDR RAM, and a grossly overpowered (for this setup) Geforce 9800GT 512MB. Why? I went with option 1... buy a GPU, leave the rest as it was 3 years ago.
Earlier, I had a Geforce 6800 GS, which was by no means a bad card 3 years ago...
Now that the stage is set, this article will tell you the true story behind the CPU bottleneck in games. How bad is it really, to have a crappy CPU coupled with a reasonably fast GPU? How much difference does the RAM make? These are things you will never see in regular GPU benchmarks, because they use a Core i7 (3 ghz) with 8 GB of 1600 MHz DDR3 RAM... crazy.
These numbers that I will be reporting are not in the true sense a benchmark, they are just a bunch of readings. I dont really have comparision data in most cases. Maybe I will put in some numbers from my friend, who has a Pentium 4 Dual Core rig with a 8800GS.
Watch this space for actual results over the next few days...
No comments:
Post a Comment