Pentium D 915 in Modern Gaming

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Aaron11

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How well does the Pentium D 915 fare in modern games with say a Radeon 4670? I might be getting a hand-me-down PC with a Pentium D 915 and I was just curious as to how it runs with video games. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! :cool:
 
I wouldn't expect that much. Athlon 64 X2s were significantly faster than Pentium Ds, about as much as C2D Conroe over any Athlon X2.
 
Aaron11 said:
How well does the Pentium D 915 fare in modern games with say a Radeon 4670? I might be getting a hand-me-down PC with a Pentium D 915 and I was just curious as to how it runs with video games. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! :cool:
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What game do you have in mind? What screen size are you using?
Chris
 
It will play world of warcraft fine. Eve online maybe also. But it wont plan something like Age of Conan.
 
If you can find out what the mobo is, it may support modern Core 2 processors.
 
I have an older Dual Xeon rig, using Prestonia xeons which were basically the same as Northwood P4's. I'm still suprised how well some newer games like Farcry2 run on there, I was getting like ~30fps with reasonable settings and that was on an older X800XT-PE. I would think the performance of the Pentium-D would be similar to my old xeons.
 
sequoia said:
What game do you have in mind? What screen size are you using?
Chris
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Well, I'm going to get a Hans-G 24.6 inch monitor off of Newegg for $200 which runs at 1920x1080, but I'll go down to as low as 1280x720 if I have to to get good performance. I'm currently running a Pentium D 820 with the 4670 and it runs CoD 4 buttery smooth never dropping below 30 fps. Here's a video I made of CoD 4 on my current pc with a Pentium D 820 @ 1280x1024 w/ 4xAA. I tried NFS: Shift on here and that didn't fare so well (above 30fps when few cars were in sight, but once there were many cars on screen, it dropped to about 20fps). I figured it was just the processor. I might get MW2 despite the lack of dedicated servers (How dare Infinity Ward do that!:)). And maybe L4D2 when it comes out. If games runs decent with a Pentium D 820, I would think it would work way better with a 915, but what do you guys think?
 
Pentium D are effectively 2xPentium 4's glued together (well not quiet but close enough).

Def find out if your board can support core 2, cause you can get a very cheap core2 that will cut the mustard a lot better than that PentiumD.

Pentium D is not good enough for high end gaming especially when running stock speeds im affraid.
 
Battleneter2 said:
Pentium D are effectively 2xPentium 4's glued together (well not quiet but close enough).

Def find out if your board can support core 2, cause you can get a very cheap core2 that will cut the mustard a lot better than that PentiumD.

Pentium D is not good enough for high end gaming especially when running stock speeds im affraid.
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It can support Core 2s. In fact the original processor that the dell came with was a core 2 e6300. (I think. I know it was Core 2 just not sure of the model. The mobo chipset is P965 express, so it would have to be 65nm.) Any ideas for a cheap Core 2 processor?
 
My wife has a D 945 with a 4850 and runs every single game without issues or low framerate .
 
Yeah but the 945 is a lot better than the 915. My brother had an 805 and his friend had an E4300 at the time and despite the 805 having a 2.66ghz core speed and the E4300 only having 1.86 the E4300 was far faster. Their setups were identical except for the CPU's.
 
houseofbugs said:
Yeah but the 945 is a lot better than the 915. My brother had an 805 and his friend had an E4300 at the time and despite the 805 having a 2.66ghz core speed and the E4300 only having 1.86 the E4300 was far faster. Their setups were identical except for the CPU's.
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Like I said though, I'm currently running a Pentium D 820 w/ a ATI 4670 and I can run CoD 4 @ 1280x1024 w/ 4xAA and it never drops below 30fps. It depends on the game, but I think the Pentium D 915 would fare better on games than the 820, besides this is only temporary as to I'd rather invest a little more money on a newer and better processor that I could use in the future than get a cheap used one. So my conclusion, as far as I think, the Pentium D 915 should give a performance boost over my 820, correct? Like I said earlier, I'd be willing to go down as low as 1280x720 if it meant getting better performance in video games. Could anyone else clarify this for me?
 
itll give you as much more performance as it costs. if you spend twice as much money on components, you can get twice the performance. just decide how much you can spend, and get the best you can for that amount of money. personally, unless youre overclocking it (which would make it essentially a 945 or better) then i dont see why youd want to invest ANYTHING in pentium D architecture. if it can handle an E6300, then why not get one? theyre cheap, and much better than any D. why not just go for the highest your mobo can handle, and then you wont have to even think about upgrading it again until youre ready for a whole new build.
 
ekuest said:
itll give you as much more performance as it costs. if you spend twice as much money on components, you can get twice the performance. just decide how much you can spend, and get the best you can for that amount of money. personally, unless youre overclocking it (which would make it essentially a 945 or better) then i dont see why youd want to invest ANYTHING in pentium D architecture. if it can handle an E6300, then why not get one? theyre cheap, and much better than any D. why not just go for the highest your mobo can handle, and then you wont have to even think about upgrading it again until youre ready for a whole new build.
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Well the thing about this "build" I'm making is that it's based off of hand me down parts. Besides, the parts I'm buying to add to it (dvd burner, wifi card, monitor, headset, hard drive), I can always take out and put them into a new computer (which I'm going to do with the 4670 in my current pc). If everything I bought was only going to stay in that computer build, then I'd consider getting the E6300, however I can see myself getting a completely new PC within a year, so again, this is only temporary. Even so, I've seen some videos on Youtube of the Pentium D 915 and the 9600gt and the games ran decent.
 
Sell your 820 and 915 annd put that torwards an e6300 @1.86ghz. I use to have that chip and it was awesome. I oc'd it, but even at stock it was a huge upgrade over my a64 3400+ s754 @ 2.8ghz. Temp. processor or not, that's what i'd do since the e6300s are cheap.

My gf gma has a pentium d @ 2.8ghz (not sure which model it is) and the gpa has an e6320 (same as e6300 but has 4mb cache instead of 2mb) with all other parts the same. The diff. is night and day even though the pentium D is at 2.8ghz and the e6320 is at 1.86ghz.
 
Pentium D is very cheap to buy maybe pickup a 930 or 940 <$40. It'll give you more punch and not spending a lot.
 
If his motherboard is an Asus I bet it can't handle the E6300.

He'd only be asking about Pentium D if he were stuck with it like I was years ago. I never want to look at a Pentium D processor ever again, nor any Asus moterhboard.
 
OldMX said:
My wife has a D 945 with a 4850 and runs every single game without issues or low framerate .
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that may be the case for most games but that cpu is severally holding that 4850 back and does not run every single modern game smoothly. there are games like Red Faction Guerrilla, Far Cry 2, GTA 4, Ghostbusters, and others that will have very low framerate and in many cases be basically unplayable because of that cpu. overall the majority of games will be perfectly playable but that poor 4850 is having over 50% of its performance thrown right down the drain with that Pentium D.

I dont think you realize how slow that cpu is compared to modern offerings. even if I lowered my E8500 to 1.4 it would match or beat that 3.4 Pentium D. if you doubt me just look at reviews for when the Core 2 Duos came out because even the 1.8 E4300 could beat a 3.4 Pentium D. http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2903&p=6

as for an example of a modern game that will struggle a bit, you can see even a faster Pentium D 955 EE can only muster 25 fps in Far Cry 2 with a gtx280. http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?b=49
 
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Aaron11 said:
Well, I'm going to get a Hans-G 24.6 inch monitor off of Newegg for $200 which runs at 1920x1080, but I'll go down to as low as 1280x720 if I have to to get good performance. I'm currently running a Pentium D 820 with the 4670 and it runs CoD 4 buttery smooth never dropping below 30 fps. Here's a video I made of CoD 4 on my current pc with a Pentium D 820 @ 1280x1024 w/ 4xAA. I tried NFS: Shift on here and that didn't fare so well (above 30fps when few cars were in sight, but once there were many cars on screen, it dropped to about 20fps). I figured it was just the processor. I might get MW2 despite the lack of dedicated servers (How dare Infinity Ward do that!:)). And maybe L4D2 when it comes out. If games runs decent with a Pentium D 820, I would think it would work way better with a 915, but what do you guys think?
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When your CPU is the bottleneck, resolution usually make a whole lot of difference. Lowering it will raise your max fps and your average too (Since the max will affect that) but the minimum and the real world play fps won't move all that much lowering it. You'll still hit the same slow downs, youll just have higher fps in places where the CPU has little load on it, the places that aren't the problem. When your CPU is way outclassed by your GPU, its a good time to go ahead and take advantage of higher resolutions, AA, and Anisotropic. The GPU is already waiting on the CPU before it can do more work and render more frames, might as well give it something to do while it waits ;). It does depend on the game though, some increasing the resolution does put more stuff on the screen for the CPU to have to calculate. Others it just adds pixels to what's already there.

Also, if you can overclock the lil bugger it would help. If I remember right they were great clockers. Round 4ghz+ it wont hold you back quite so bad.
 
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cannondale06 said:
that may be the case for most games but that cpu is severally holding that 4850 back and does not run every single modern game smoothly. there are games like Red Faction Guerrilla, Far Cry 2, GTA 4, Ghostbusters, and others that will have very low framerate and in many cases be basically unplayable because of that cpu. overall the majority of games will be perfectly playable but that poor 4850 is having over 50% of its performance thrown right down the drain with that Pentium D.

I dont think you realize how slow that cpu is compared to modern offerings. even if I lowered my E8500 to 1.4 it would match or beat that 3.4 Pentium D. if you doubt me just look at reviews for when the Core 2 Duos came out because even the 1.8 E4300 could beat a 3.4 Pentium D. http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2903&p=6

as for an example of a modern game that will struggle a bit, you can see even a faster Pentium D 955 EE can only muster 25 fps in Far Cry 2 with a gtx280. http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?b=49
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It's faster no doubt about it but if all you have is a pentium d it will still work. Hell I'm running a p4 2.8 and a 9600gt 1gb in a second box and it will run crysis at 12x10 with most the settings at performance but I can actually still turn up a few and have playable performance.
 
butterfliesrpretty said:
It's faster no doubt about it but if all you have is a pentium d it will still work. Hell I'm running a p4 2.8 and a 9600gt 1gb in a second box and it will run crysis at 12x10 with most the settings at performance but I can actually still turn up a few and have playable performance.
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well it doesnt really matter which settings you use since they mostly are for graphics and you are basically completely cpu limited while running a 9600gt with a single core 2.8 P4. I also guarantee that your average and especially minimum framerates are VERY poor and not what people would consider playable. btw Crysis is also normally very gpu dependent once you have a decent dual core cpu so your example is not very good. plenty of modern games will not be very playable with a Pentium D and there is certainly no point in using a fast card with one.
 
cannondale06 said:
well it doesnt really matter which settings you use since they mostly are for graphics and you are basically completely cpu limited while running a 9600gt with a single core 2.8 P4. I also guarantee that your average and especially minimum framerates are VERY poor and not what people would consider playable. btw Crysis is also normally very gpu dependent once you have a decent dual core cpu so your example is not very good. plenty of modern games will not be very playable with a Pentium D and there is certainly no point in using a fast card with one.
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I think any game out can be played with a faster pentium d with no issue. These are slow by todays standards but still usable, by all means he should upgrade if he's got the money but I'm just saying it will work.

I'm thinking about making a youtube video with my $120 pc showing that it can play crysis fine.

edit: btw this is crysis warhead, I don't have the original.
 
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butterfliesrpretty said:
I think any game out can be played on a faster pentium d with no issue. These are slow by todays standards but still usable, by all means he should upgrade if he's got the money but I'm just saying it will work.

I'm thinking about making a youtube video with my $120 pc showing that it can play crysis fine.

edit: btw this is crysis warhead, I don't have the original.
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well your thinking would be wrong. I already gave examples of some modern games that would not be very playable at all with a Pentium D. again the POINT is that a Pentium D is too slow to fool with sticking a decent video card with. putting a card like a 4850 with a Pentium D is stupid unless you like throwing over 50% of performance right down the drain.
 
cannondale06 said:
well your thinking would be wrong. I already gave examples of some modern games that would not be very playable at all with a Pentium D. again the POINT is that a Pentium D is too slow to fool with sticking a decent video card with. putting a card like a 4850 with a Pentium D is stupid unless you like throwing over 50% of performance right down the drain.
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You realize these old chips were good for 4ghz + on air? Yeah that isn't much by todays standards but it wont land you a slideshow.

Also, you don't throw GPU performance down the drain, its still there.

Think of this

A mediocre chip with a good video card: Able to run higher image quality in every game...
vs
An awesome chip with a mediocre video card: Wins at 3dmark0X...

the good video card wins every time. Even though its max is being held back by the cpu, it can crank the image quality settings much higher. By the time you crank the game to the highest playable settings you wont even be able to tell the difference.
 
Jakalwarrior said:
You realize these old chips were good for 4ghz + on air? Yeah that isn't much by todays standards but it wont land you a slideshow.

Also, you don't throw GPU performance down the drain, its still there.

Think of this

A mediocre chip with a good video card: Able to run higher image quality in every game...
vs
An awesome chip with a mediocre video card: Wins at 3dmark0X...

the good video card wins every time. Even though its max is being held back by the cpu, it can crank the image quality settings much higher. By the time you crank the game to the highest playable settings you wont even be able to tell the difference.
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wow you just dont get it because that cpu is way too slow to keep up with a modern high end card. for example a 3.4 Pentium D with a 4850 will not even get 50% of the performance that card is capable of even at realistic gpu limited settings in modern games. so yes that is performance down the drain. even at 1920x1080 if I put my cpu at 1.6(which will still beat a 3.4 Pentium D) several games become very sluggish and some even unplayable. realistically I would get the same performance with a much slower gpu because my card is being bottlenecked so badly that the performance of the video card cant even be tapped. a Pentium D is still okay for a low end rig but using one with a fast video card is very stupid.



EDIT: wont be able to tell the difference? lol. just to pull you out of fantasyland for a while I have some numbers from a few modern games with my cpu at stock and then 1.6. remember even at 1.6 my cpu would still easily beat a 3.4 Pentium D. please dont say anything stupid like bringing up that I only used AA in one game. these were all ran at the highest possible realistic settings the gtx260 could play the games at. in other words I was VERY gpu limited before even lowering the cpu to 1.6. the performance gap would be even bigger of course if I was running lower settings or resolutions.


the screenshots are just to show you exactly where I was testing and they ARE NOT average framerates. they are taken at almost the identical spots for comparison purposes though. as you can see there most certainly is a LOT of performance wasted even at completely gpu limited settings for a gtx260. a 3.4 Pentium 4 would be even slower than this so dont tell me it wont make a difference.


Fallout 3 = still very playable but framerates drop from around 50 fps at 3.16 down to low 30s when lowering the cpu to 1.6.

1920x1080 ultra settings and 4x AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=50fps
http://img23.imageshack.us/img...ut3200910280207151.png

E8500 @ 1.6=32fps
http://img39.imageshack.us/img...ut3200910280051323.png



Batman AA = averages go from around 40fps at 3.16 to just upper 20s when lowering the cpu to 1.6 and becomes pretty laggy during action. the minimums drop from around 30-31fps with stock E8500 to 18-19 with the cpu at 1.6.

1920x1080 all very high settings high physx no AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=39fps
http://img203.imageshack.us/im...ingpcbmgame2009102.png

E8500 @ 1.6=27fps
http://img42.imageshack.us/img...ingpcbmgame2009102.png



Crysis Warhead = the averages seemed to be only 5-6 fps lower but thats a lot when you are not even getting 30 to begin with. it was certainly way more laggy as min framerate dropped from 23-24 fps with stock 3.16 down to 15-16 with cpu at 1.6.

1920x1080 custom DX9 config almost equal to all enthusiast no AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=29fps
http://img27.imageshack.us/img...is2009102805103118.png

E8500 @ 1.6=22fps
http://img4.imageshack.us/img4...is2009102804581867.png



Far Cry 2 = there is a massive framerate drop from lowering the cpu to 1.6 but its still playable although laggy at times with some dips into the teens.

1920x1080 all ultra settings no AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=41fps
http://img194.imageshack.us/im...y22009102802273389.png

E8500 @ 1.6=23fps
http://img248.imageshack.us/im...y22009102801132941.png




Red Faction Guerrilla = went from playable to basically not playable at all with close to only half the framerate at times when lowering the cpu to 1.6. certainly a very cpu dependent game here and quite miserable with the E8500 at 1.6.

1920x1080 all highest settings including ambient occlusion no AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=24fps
http://img23.imageshack.us/img...fg2009102802331780.png

E8500 @ 1.6=13fps
http://img5.imageshack.us/img5...fg2009102517402044.png




Ghostbusters = goes from playable to not very playable as the framerate is nearly cut in half at times outside with dips even into the single digits with the cpu at 1.6. overall the game does average much more than these screenshots indicate but it is very cpu dependent.

1920x1080 all highest in game settings no AA

E8500 at stock 3.16=21fps
http://img203.imageshack.us/im...w32200910280215226.png

E8500 @ 1.6=11fps
http://img5.imageshack.us/img5...w32200910252030393.png
 
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cannondale06 said:
wow you just dont get it because that cpu is way too slow to keep up with a modern high end card. for example a 3.4 Pentium D with a 4850 will not even get 50% of the performance that card is capable of even at realistic gpu limited settings in modern games. so yes that is performance down the drain. even at 1920x1080 if I put my cpu at 1.6(which will still beat a 3.4 Pentium D) several games become very sluggish and some even unplayable. realistically I would get the same performance with a much slower gpu because my card is being bottlenecked so badly that the performance of the video card cant even be tapped. a Pentium D is still okay for a low end rig but using one with a fast video card is very stupid.






Fallout 3= still very playable but framerates drop from around 50 fps at 3.16 down to low 30s when lowering the cpu to 1.6.

1920x1080 ultra settings and 4x AA

E8500 @ 1.6=32fps
http://img39.imageshack.us/img...ut3200910280051323.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=50fps
http://img23.imageshack.us/img...ut3200910280207151.png


Batman AA = averages go from around 40fps at 3.16 to just upper 20s when lowering the cpu to 1.6 and becomes pretty laggy during action. the minimums drop from around 30-31fps with stock E8500 to 18-19 with the cpu at 1.6.

1920x1080 all very high settings high physx no AA

E8500 @ 1.6=27fps
http://img42.imageshack.us/img...ingpcbmgame2009102.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=39fps
http://img203.imageshack.us/im...ingpcbmgame2009102.png


Crysis Warhead = the averages seemed to be only 4-5 fps lower but it was certainly more laggy as min framerate dropped from 23-24 fps with stock 3.16 down to 16-17 with cpu at 1.6.

1920x1080 custom DX9 config almost equal to all enthusiast no AA

E8500 @ 1.6=22fps
http://img4.imageshack.us/img4...is2009102804581867.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=29fps
http://img27.imageshack.us/img...is2009102805103118.png


Far Cry 2= there is a massive framerate drop from lowering the cpu to 1.6 but its still playable although laggy at times with some dips into the teens.

1920x1080 all ultra settings no AA

E8500 @ 1.6=23fps
http://img248.imageshack.us/im...y22009102801132941.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=41fps
http://img194.imageshack.us/im...y22009102802273389.png


Red Faction Guerrilla= went from playable to basically not playable at all with close to only half the framerate at times when lowering the cpu to 1.6. certainly a very cpu dependent game here and quite miserable with the E8500 at 1.6.

1920x1080 all highest settings including ambient occlusion no AA

E8500 @ 1.6=13fps
http://img5.imageshack.us/img5...fg2009102517402044.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=24fps
http://img23.imageshack.us/img...fg2009102802331780.png


Ghostbusters= goes from playable to not very playable as the framerate is nearly cut in half at times outside with dips even into the single digits with the cpu at 1.6. overall the game does average much more than these screenshots indicate but it is very cpu dependent.

1920x1080 all highest in game settings no AA

E8500 @ 1.6=11fps
http://img5.imageshack.us/img5...w32200910252030393.png

E8500 at stock 3.16=21fps
http://img203.imageshack.us/im...w32200910280215226.png



so even at a gpu limited 1920x1080 with the highest playable settings possible for my 192sp gtx260, an E8500 would provide a VERY LARGE advantage over a cpu like a 4200 X2. so just imagine the GIGANTIC difference you would see at a lower res with an even faster card on a poky cpu like a 4200 X2. if that doesnt wake you up to the reality of how important a decent cpu is with a fast graphics card then I guess this debate will go on forever.
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nobody is arguing that you will be cpu limited, but take into the fact I just bought a 4850 for $65 used here on the hardforums. Now I couple that with a very cheap pentium d setup (not saying I am but I could). I could very well have a decent gaming pc for under $160.

Something that will play anything out today, sure the video card isn't getting the power it deserves from the cpu, but it is still playable at a playable framerate. That's the point. I might have to turn a few things down, I might not be able to run at a super high resolution, but a friend can use it to play some games with me.

Not everyone is made of money, and this is a viable option for some people.
 
butterfliesrpretty said:
nobody is arguing that you will be cpu limited, but take into the fact I just bought a 4850 for $65 used here on the hardforums. Now I couple that with a very cheap pentium d setup (not saying I am but I could). I could very well have a decent gaming pc for under $160.

Something that will play anything out today, sure the video card isn't getting the power it deserves from the cpu, but it is still playable at a playable framerate. That's the point. I might have to turn a few things down, I might not be able to run at a super high resolution, but a friend can use it to play some games with me.

Not everyone is made of money, and this is a viable option for some people.
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wow you quoted me before I could edit. I was copy and pasting this from another forum I am on and thats why a 4200 X2 was being mentioned. you could just edit it all out and put in "snip" since there is no need to quote all of that anyway.


the point of that post was for Jakalwarrior who was claiming there would be no noticeable difference at gpu limited scenarios and that is total bs. also its NOT playable in EVERY game so you really need to stop claiming that.
 
cannondale06 said:
wow you quoted me before I could edit. I was copy and pasting this from another forum I am on and thats why a 4200 X2 was being mentioned. you could just edit it all out and put in "snip" since there is no need to quote all of that anyway.


the point of that post was for Jakalwarrior who was claiming there would be no noticeable difference at gpu limited scenarios and that is total bs. also its NOT playable in EVERY game so you really need to stop claiming that.
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well i got the next 3 days off so I'm going to make that youtube video just for you, would you agree that if it plays crysis it will play anything?
 
butterfliesrpretty said:
well i got the next 3 days off so I'm going to make that youtube video just for you, would you agree that if it plays crysis it will play anything?
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no. I already showed that it likely can "play" Crysis fine. it will be pretty sluggish at times compared to having a better cpu but it will play it. Crysis is very gpu limited and the 3.4 Pentium D is enough to keep the framerates at a reasonable level for large portion of the game. GTA 4, Red Faction Guerrilla, and Ghostbusters I know will not be be playable for the most part and you will be in the single digits for minimum framerates in those games. I would think RE5 would certainly struggle a bit at times too.

please do edit your earlier post though because that was not the edited version of what I said. plus there was no need to quote the whole comment anyway since your reply was directly under mine.


EDIT: oh you are the guy with the single core 2.8 P4. Crysis will barely run on that and if you are happy with that performance then more power to you. if you are saying that all modern games can run just fine on a 2.8 P4 then you are sadly mistaken. there are much more cpu intensive games out there and a 2.8 P4 would make some of those a slideshow.

according to this even a 4000 A64 single core, which is WAY faster than a 2.8 P4, can only muster 22fps for an average on medium settings at 1024x768. I would hate to know how low the minimums are but they are likley in the single digits at times. http://www.gamespot.com/features/6182806/p-6.html
 
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Notice the part where I said "Overclocked above 4ghz"?, in other words with the core and fsb cranked atleast 20% above the ones you tested and I didn't say it would be awesome I said it wouldn't be a slide show. Especially in games capable of using two cores. Yeah some games are CPU whores with heavy physiscs, intricate world calculations etc... going on. In that case he just outright can NOT play the game, reguardless of the GPU, but in games he can play at all, the better GPU will always allow higher settings.

I think you are underestimating the P4s. A pentium D at ~4.2 or so would be equal to a core 2 at ~2.0ghz. Imagine if that test were done over with the chip at 2.0 instead of 1.6. Sure you aren't going to be getting 60fps in modern games, but they will be playable and the 4850 will let you do so at higher resolutions with higher in game settings and with AA where as the cards you would reccomend for a P4 to not be "wasted" wouldn't.

Go try Crysis with a P4 and a 9600GT then with a 5870, let me know which one lets you crank the video settings higher...
 
Jakalwarrior said:
Notice the part where I said "Overclocked above 4ghz"?, in other words with the core and fsb cranked atleast 20% above the ones you tested and I didn't say it would be awesome I said it wouldn't be a slide show. Especially in games capable of using two cores. Yeah some games are CPU whores with heavy physiscs, intricate world calculations etc... going on. In that case he just outright can NOT play the game, reguardless of the GPU, but in games he can play at all, the better GPU will always allow higher settings.

I think you are underestimating the P4s. A pentium D at ~4.2 or so would be equal to a core 2 at ~2.0ghz. Imagine if that test were done over with the chip at 2.0 instead of 1.6. Sure you aren't going to be getting 60fps in modern games, but they will be playable and the 4850 will let you do so at higher resolutions with higher in game settings and with AA where as the cards you would reccomend for a P4 to not be "wasted" wouldn't.

Go try Crysis with a P4 and a 9600GT then with a 5870, let me know which one lets you crank the video settings higher...
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sorry but a Pentium D at 4.0 is still about equal my E8500 at 1.6-1.8. on average you likely couldnt overclock that Pentium D to beat an E8500 lowered to 2.0. do the math yourself...even at 1.8 the older E4xxx Core 2 Duos, which are about 15-20% slower clock for clock than the E8xxx series still beats a 3.4 Pentium D. basically my E8500 at 1.4 would be as fast or faster than the old 1.8 E4300. it already took more than 3.6 from a Pentium D just to match the E4300.

now in your Crysis comment if you are talking about a regular single core P4 cpu then you will have the same shitty experience no matter what card you go with above a 9600gt. even Crysis is completely cpu limited with any midrange card while using a single core P4. that link I just posted shows a single 4000 A64, which is faster than ANY single core P4, only getting 22fps average on medium settings at 1024x768 with an 8800gtx.
 
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cannondale06 said:
sorry but a Pentium D at 4.0 is about equal my E8500 at 1.6. you likely couldnt overclock that Pentium D to match an E8500 lowered to 2.0. do the math yourself...even at 1.8 the older E4xxx Core 2 Duos, which are about 15-20% slower clock for clock than the E8xxx series still smokes a 3.4 Pentium D. basically my E8500 at 1.4 would be as fast or faster than the old 1.8 E4300. it already took pretty close to 4.0 from a Pentium D just to beat the E4300.

now in your Crysis comment if you are talking about a regular single core P4 cpu then you will have the same shitty experience no matter what card you go with above a 9600gt. even Crysis is completely cpu limited with any midrange card while using a single core P4. that link I just posted shows a single 4000 A64, which is faster than ANY single core P4, only getting 22fps average on medium settings at 1024x768 with an 8800gtx.
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Ok, so you are telling me that texture detail, AA, HDR, etc... are CPU reliant? and you have to turn them off if you have a crappy CPU?

800x600 max in game no AA vs 1920x1080 8xAA. CPU at 1.3ghz (equal to a 3.2ghz presler). Did the faster video card do me no good?

Both have moving FPS of 29-34 dancing around. Very little change with change of settings. That is what I am talking about. Sure my average FPS is limited to 30 by the cpu. But would I rather it be limited to 30 at crappy video settings also? or a good video settings?
http://i48.tinypic.com/1qir78.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/6nxabl.jpg
 
Jakalwarrior said:
Ok, so you are telling me that texture detail, AA, HDR, etc... are CPU reliant? and you have to turn them off if you have a crappy CPU?

800x600 max in game no AA vs 1920x1080 8xAA. CPU at 1.3ghz (equal to a 3.2ghz presler). Did the faster video card do me no good?

Both have moving FPS of 29-34 dancing around. Very little change with change of settings. That is what I am talking about. Sure my average FPS is limited to 30 by the cpu. But would I rather it be limited to 30 at crappy video settings also? or a good video settings?
http://i48.tinypic.com/1qir78.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/6nxabl.jpg
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thats your example? how about some real tests like I did. sure the vast majority of games will play fine but a few newer titles will NOT. face the FACTS that even at 1920 a Pentium D is piss ass slow and will hold back any modern high end card by a significant amount. you can see even in cpu benchmarks at realistic settings that some current low end cpus barely get by in some games. well those cpus barely getting by are usually a bit faster than a Pentium D.


EDIT: here is a quick one for you. I used Batman Arkham Asylum and kept the average of several runs for each setting. this is not even known as a cpu intensive game and I ran it at the highest playable settings. and remember an E8500 at 2.0 will still easily a Pentium D at 4.0.

1920x1080 all very high settings, no AA and high physx

E8500 at 2.0 GTX260 at 576/1188/1990

Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
2092, 63045, 21, 42, 33.183


E8500 at 2.0 GTX260 at 666/1392/2200

Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
2086, 61778, 21, 40, 33.766


thats right basically NO difference outside of margin of error for over a half dozen runs. a gtx260 is clearly bottlenecked in this game by a cpu that would be faster than the fastest Pentium D, even at 1920 with very high settings. overclocking even this 192sp gtx260 did nothing with a cpu of that level so that would be money down the drain with a high end card.


now lets put the cpu back at stock 3.16 and see what happens.

E8500 at 3.16 GTX260 at 666/1392/2200

Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
2742, 66301, 31, 53, 41.357

well even at 1920x1080 the cpu made much more difference now didnt it? 50% better minimum framerates by going back to 3.16. and again a Pentium D at 4.0 much less at stock clocks would not even be as fast as the E8500 at 2.0. basically a stock clocked 3.4 Pentium D would only average in the upper 20s which is lower than the min framerate with a decent cpu. also any stock Pentium D would be in the teens quite often in this game. sure you can get 1-2 more fps by overclocking that Pentium D cpu if you spend more money on a bigger cooler because of the massive power and heat those cpus put out.
 
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Because I don't own a 915? I don't know how the 4mb L2 65nm chips scaled or did in gaming. Not even sure how high they overclocked on average. Even if I did I wouldn't waste the hours to prove a point to a person to them decide whether or not to get something... when they have already done it.
 
Jakalwarrior said:
Because I don't own a 915? I don't know how the 4mb L2 65nm chips scaled or did in gaming. Not even sure how high they overclocked on average. Even if I did I wouldn't waste the hours to prove a point to a person to them decide whether or not to get something... when they have already done it.
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yeah we can stop the debate because it really doesnt matter at this point. facts are though that a Pentium D will severely hurt the performance of a decent video card and thats all I was saying.
 
cannondale06 said:
yeah we can stop the debate because it really doesnt matter at this point. facts are though that a Pentium D will severely hurt the performance of a decent video card and thats all I was saying.
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nobody was arguing that, that's common sense the point is it's still possible to game with these, also using low settings in a game is still playing the game, with crysis like I said most of it is low but some I was able to turn up with no performance hit.
 
Celestial Avenger said:
If his motherboard is an Asus I bet it can't handle the E6300.

He'd only be asking about Pentium D if he were stuck with it like I was years ago. I never want to look at a Pentium D processor ever again, nor any Asus moterhboard.
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It can. The hand me down parts I'm getting are from a Dell Dimension 9200 which came with a E6300, but my cousin salvaged that from the computer and got a new mobo and case and OCed it to over 3.0ghz. So in essence, yes, I could get a Core 2 Duo E6300, not only that, but any Core 2 that's 65nm and up to 1066mhz fsb (it's a P965 chipset).
 
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