Thailand Trainz computer

[Thai1On]

Here are the present specs. of a Trainz box I will be building later this month.

Intel i3 2120 3.30gz socket 1155

Asus P8Z68-V LX motherboard

Asus EAH6850 DC/2DIS/1GD5 256 bus video card ATI video card

Seagate ST500DM002 500GB SATA3 7200rpm 16MB NCQ Hard Drive
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Not sure on the power supply yet but I am going with a 700 or 750 watt model.

This will be from the ground up build so I will be buying monitor, keyboard, and so on so the budget is tight . The idea behind this build to to upgrade in a year or 2. Will this system run T2012 Appalachian Coal with the sliders on high at around 30 fps? Is there anywhere I can cut something to improve something else or do you think it is a balanced system?

Dave

 

[fran1]

Whether it will run the 2012 coal run I don't know.
Why build from base now to re build again in 2 years.
An i5 2500k would be a better choice cpu.
The 6850 from what I've just read is a low to mid card, although it can be overclocked very well. In tests it's behind 2 58-- series cards so because it's newer doesn't mean better.

 

[Thai1On]

Yes, I have read that the i5 can be overclocked but it is quite a bit more expensive. Will there be enough of a performance boost to justify the difference in price?

 

[Euphod]

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/

Find the two processors on the charts and compare them yourself. My rule of thumb is to not upgrade until an upgrade would provide at least half again as much performance over my current build. As far as the route goes, you may be better off trimming it down before declaring your PC can't handle it!

 

[fran1]

Yes, I have read that the i5 can be overclocked but it is quite a bit more expensive. Will there be enough of a performance boost to justify the difference in price?

I meant the 6850 can be clocked, the i5 has 6mb cache as opposed to 3mb cache of the i3, plus a .2ghz faster processor which won't make any odds. The more cache the faster the processor and higher the price also
Have a good slow look at comparison tables for cpu's and gpu's, according to ed's ref table above the i5 is 50% faster but who knows what difference that will make to trainz.

 

[Thai1On]

I guess I should ask for forum members running Intel i3's and i5's and get their opinions. Looking at the chart the ATI 6850 should be a good choice. The question is its really about the frame rates.

The reason for picking this motherboard is the way it uses a SSD (when I can afford one). Instead of having 2 different drives the motherboard uses the SSD as a super speed cache for programs you regularly run.

Dave

 

[William0d0]

I just finished a brief test running T2012 Appalachian Coal.

System specs:

ASUS Sabertooth P67 motherboard.
8 gigs Corsair Vengeance 1600 mhz DDR3 memory.
i5-2500(k) CPU, overclocked to 4.5 ghz.
Corsair H70 water cooler.
GTS450 video card, slightly overclocked core 900 mhz memory 1800 mhz.
2 WD Black Caviar 1 TB SATA III hard drives RAID 0.
Ultra 750 watt PS.
Thermaltake case with lots of fans.

Screen resolution 1280 * 1024.
Top 5 sliders all the way to the right.
Running FRAPS.

In cab view I get a pretty steady 30 FPS.
External view mostly 30 FPS with some dips.
If I pan the camera around in external view there is a drop in FPS, as far down as 10 FPS. When the camera stops, the FPS will come back up in a few seconds.
Switching from internal to external view will bring the computer down to it's knees, the game totally freezes up for around 20 seconds.

I normally run the game with the sliders in the middle and don't mess with the Appalachian Coal route.

The 6850 has a 256 bit bus which is double my video cards 128 bits, add in an SSD and the throughput might overcome the massive stutter I get.

The i5-2500(k) costs more then an i3 but it is an overclockers dream chip. Even with basic air cooling you should be able to reach 4.2 ghz. Without any manual tweaking of the voltages I can reach a stable 4.6 ghz (it crashes at 4.7).

I recommend Western Digital Hard Drives over Seagate. In the last 10 years it's more often been the Seagate drives that fail after only 2 years while the Western Digitals have lasted much longer.

 

[Thai1On]

I've noticed that hard drives are starting to become hard to get here due to the floods in Bangkok as it is a major hard drive builder for the world. I'll see what I can get . Looking at the price difference between the i3 and i5 works out to be an extra 2 days pay but is seems it may be worth it? Anyone else running an i3 or i5 based machine to tell us how it runs T2012?

If everything goes well I'll be ordering the parts later this week. Then I can install T2012 and get my hand on that new Y6b. By the way can it be reskinned? It just looks too new :hehe:

 

[Euphod]

By the way can it be reskinned?

Yes, using PEV tools.