Looking for recent good experiences with new hardware and Trainz

P

pcas1986

Well-known member
My PC is allegedly under powered for T:ANE according to N3V, at least in the video processor, and since test versions will be out soon, I need to look around for some new bits.

I've been building my own PCs for ages so this will be yet another rebuild. This time around I intend replacing the case, the motherboard, processor, memory and the video card. My existing power supply is relatively new and is rated at 600W which should be adequate but I need to check this. I have a couple of SSDs and a 3TB fast HDD so I have no intention of changing those.

What I'm looking for are recent experiences with motherboards, processors and especially video cards. My current processor is an I7 but an early one. The current crop (4th gen) of I5s look to be more than adequate for my purposes but, if my SO is feeling generous, I might buy an I7 again.

I do note that someone said the Gigabyte Radeon R9 PCi 3.0 video card worked well for them which is good since it is on my list as a possibility.

If any Australian Trainzers want to respond, and have a good news story about a supplier in this country, please let me know by PM.

Many thanks in advance.

Cheers
 
pcas1986 said:
What I'm looking for are recent experiences with motherboards, processors and especially video cards.
Cheers
Click to expand...

Running NVidia GTX 780M with i7M on a gaming laptop is smooth is silk smooth for TS12, so the desktop version, GTX 780, about 30 to 40% more powerful, ought to run TANE well w/i7. That is NVidia's best card now, before the Titan version, so TANE must be developing on that or something lesser. Trainz is typically recommended with NVidia & Intel. I doubt two video cards would be in the recommended system specs. 64 bit also helps for bus speed, even if the sim is only released as 32 bit.
 
Last edited:
The 780 would be my choice if it were not for the price! But then Trainz takes up a lot of my time so maybe the cost can be amortised against that. :hehe:
 
pcas1986 said:
The 780 would be my choice if it were not for the price! But then Trainz takes up a lot of my time so maybe the cost can be amortised against that. :hehe:
Click to expand...

The price might definitely be an issue unless you can sneak it into the house past the wife and hide the credit card bill when it comes in. :)

I've got the 680GTX which was expensive a couple of years ago and runs quite well still.

John
 
JCitron said:
The price might definitely be an issue unless you can sneak it into the house past the wife and hide the credit card bill when it comes in. :)

I've got the 680GTX which was expensive a couple of years ago and runs quite well still.

John
Click to expand...
I'm too honest for that and fibbing is not my strong point. My wife is smarter than me.

The 680 doesn't seem to be available any more - at least with a cursory look. Curiously, my positively ancient 4850 video card, which ranks 191 on the April 14 video card pecking order, still runs TS12 quite well.

I would like a faster machine though. My new hobby is compiling the Blender source files which takes a very, very long time. Though a bit faster than the 80486 that took 6 hours to compile a program I was working on back in the mid 80's. :eek:

Cheers from a soggy Canberra
 
I'm currently running an E3-1275 v3 and a GTX-660; 16GB RAM, a SSD, and Windows 8.1. Seems to run just fine here, though I tend more toward building than running.
 
Paul,

I was only teasing of course. :)

Anyway, given that you create rather than run the simulator, you might want to look towards a CAD-card instead of a game card. I know they're expensive, but these cards are aimed at pushing polygons around rather than producing pretty images. A faster system would definitely help too as the newer processors have many of the features that were once only found in the lower-end of the Intel Xeon CPUs such as intelligent branch caching, larger primary and secondary caches, and other features.

Even though I am running last year's Intel I-7 3770, I have excellent luck with that processor and corresponding motherboard. Compared to the older I7s, this processor runs extremely cool right out of the box. I see perhaps 52-54C which is nothing for a CPU. Given that I use a large 3rd-party cooler along with a substantial case, the processor stays pretty cool. The fan too barely spins and that had me a bit worried when I first setup the system. The fans are speed controlled off the motherboard so they don't always spin at their maximum speed.

On my early forays into 3d modeling, I used 3ds4 for DOS on a 486 and later an early Pentium 100. We would setup a render farm at the studio where I worked and we'd let it run overnight. The setup would take all night and then some to render a few hundred images for the training program I was working on.

John
 
Hi Paul,

Ive had this build for about 4 months now,and like yourself have built my own pc's for about 20 years.I'm running AMD quad core black edition 3.4Ghz stock,OC to 4Ghz on air.Just recently purchased
990FX Extreme 4 mobo with an EVGA 760GTX 4gig,I play at high resolutions above 1920x1080 - so that extra memory on the card helps with frame buffer-not to mention future proof for a bit longer.

I have a 2 TB SATA3 and running windows 7 64 bit with 8 gigs of corsair DDR3 @1600,I've just recently come back to trainz after a few good years away,purchased T12 ramped up to 2500x1600
frame rates are very high - my system seems to like DX11 sims better than DX9 - the gameplay is more fluent in DX11 as I mainly play simulators that need raw power - I'm very happy with this setup
as every game defaults to ultra settings. Compare this to my first pc 486 dx 50mhz with an S3 virge 4 meg graphics chip....oh the good old days with HI MEM sys boot disks.Looking forward to getting
TANE running on this.
 
Thanks for the advice so far. There have been a couple of interesting items that caught my attention.

For JohnC - After some limited searching it seems CAD specific cards might be harder to source in Australia unless I go for a packaged system - i.e. dedicated workstation for CAD/animation work. Probably outside of my preferred price range and of dubious benefit.

Yes, I prefer creating and writing software to actually running the simulator although I sometimes go for a spin in the S & C route. Something with a fast processor and fast disk I/O would equally be of interest to me. Yesterday I compiled Blender 2.70 from the source and that took about an hour - although I didn't actually time it. The compilation would have taken less time had I remembered the sequence. I really must write that down. :eek:)

My rough rule of thumb for buying hardware is that 3/4 of the capability of the most expensive item is generally half the cost. So, while it might be nice to have a video card with 12GB of memory, it will probably spend more time warming my feet in winter rather than actually doing anything useful. My toes might disagree.

I remain undecided about AMD vs Intel for the processor and that, of course, will influence the MB. But I think I will opt for an NVidia video card. I also remain undecided about the amount of memory although it is ridiculously cheap these days. Of all the times I have monitored memory on my current PC (6 GB), I have never seen it max out. And this is someone who often has Trainz running, a couple of Blender sessions, AssetX, PSP, Outlook, Chrome, UEStudio and all the other background rubbish.

We have a computer fair in town next weekend so I might pop down and see what's on offer.
 
If you're going for a new system, go for as much memory as you can afford. The reason I say this is, is everything is going 64-bit including T:ANE, and as you know 64-bit applications take use as much memory as you can throw at them, with a bit left over for system use. This is quite unlike the 32-bit applications that only see 4GB segments even on a 64-bit system.

I just replaced my RAM, giving the system 32GB, and this cost me about $300 US, which is pretty close to the Australian dollar these days. CAD cards can be pretty expensive and too bad you can only source them via pre-built systems. That seems to be the case here too from what I've found recently, although it wasn't quite like this in the past. Perhaps this is due to the VAR-purchasing market that they tend to be in. CAD-oriented businesses tend to go turn-key while hobbyists and consumers are more piece-parts oriented.

John
 
Just to close this out. I ended up buying a 3.4Ghz I7 4770 Intel processor, a Gigabyte Z87X UD3H Motherboard, a Gigabyte GTX 780Ti 3GB videocard plus a natty black CoolerMaster case with some integrated water cooling. Probably the most expensive computer I've bought since forking out $5K for an 803836 computer when they were the bees knees a long time ago. I try not to think about the cost of that particular PC in today's dollars.
 
Hi Paul.

This a great system. You'll get many years, hopefully, out of your investment. I think of this as being less painful than the initial purchase. :)

I too paid about the same for 80386 back then. Just think the processor was rated at 1 MIP, which was the equivalent processing speed, of a VAX 11/780.

John
 
JCitron said:
Hi Paul.

This a great system. You'll get many years, hopefully, out of your investment. I think of this as being less painful than the initial purchase. :)

I too paid about the same for 80386 back then. Just think the processor was rated at 1 MIP, which was the equivalent processing speed, of a VAX 11/780.

John
Click to expand...

John you are dating yourself again. Agree thats a great system.
 
I'm busy looking for a new computer now that Microsoft have abandoned us hard-core XP users recently. :hehe:

However, I didn't realise something until last Easter weekend, but, if obtaining Windows 7 as your OS, you need to have at least the 64 bit Professional version if you want to run more than 16GB RAM on, I was looking at 16/32GB for the future, so, I need to have Pro/Enterprise/Ultimate installed, which is at least 30/40 quid more expensive than the Home editions, in Britain, not, something I was aware of and I can't find anything related to the forums on this issue, not by a quick search anyway, just in case anyone was wondering.

Cheerz. ex-railwayman.
 
JCitron said:
Hi Ex,

No need to get the Pro, Enterprise, or Ultimate versions for 64-bit. There is a 64-bit Home Premium Edition.

John
Click to expand...

Hello John,

Thanks for that info, I'll be getting a 64-bit of whatever the OS is offered as standard, as that is the best for the future, however, I also read the wikipedia page on WIN 7 and it states that I can install WIN XP as an extra OS, but, only on the Pro/Enterprise/Ultimate versions, not on the Home Basics and Premium editions, they also only have a ceiling of 16GB RAM, so, should I require more, it's probably not the best version to personally obtain.

Cheerz. ex.
 
Read the Kickstarter project page and the information in the Trainz: A New Era + Kickstarter forum. N3V have made it clear that T:ANE will be 64-bit.

Shane
 
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