System requirements

[Cobzz]

" Recommended system requirements: OS: Windows 7 64; CPU: Intel Core i7-970; RAM: 4+ GB; Graphics: 512+ MB ATI HD4850+ or nVidia GTX260+; Sound card; 6 GB of free space on HDD; Copy protected, requires internet activation; Joystick."

 

I know the product is only in beta, however it's obvious the recommended system requirements need to be changed, in my opinion. Black Shark was pretty much exclusively single-threaded, from what I've heard, A-10C Warthog will be no different. Hence, it would be best to have the fastest processor in terms of single-threaded performance rather than overall multi-threaded performance. It therefore baffles me that the recommended system is a Core i7 970 which is a $900 hexacore processor. 85% of it will be sitting idle during DCS.

 

Change it to the 3.4ghz (3.8ghz turbo) Intel Core i7 2600 or the 3.3ghz (3.7ghz turbo) Intel Core i5 2500. Both have higher single-threaded performance than even the i7 980X, yet cost significantly less. They also use less power. Core i5 2500 is $210 while Core i7 2600 is $300. The versions that can overclock (2500K & 2600K) to 4.5ghz on air cooling are $225 and $330 respectively.

 

Just sayin 'cause I would hate for someone to blow $900 on a largely inferior processor.

Edited January 11, 2011 by Cobzz

[WarriorX]

" from what I've heard, A-10C Warthog will be no different.

 

You heard wrong.

 

(from the FAQ Sticky at the top of this forum)

 

Q: Will DCS: A-10C use all cores on my CPU?

A: Not fully. It does include the new sound engine which operates in a separate thread, and does take advantage of some DirectX threading features when running on Windows Vista or 7.

 

The recommended specs are high because this Sim pushes hardware pretty hard.

 

If you don't have the Sim and have not run it on your machine, I suggest you do so. That way you will see first hand how it taxes your system.

Edited January 11, 2011 by WarriorX

[PedroTheGoat]

I agree with OP.

 

I have a quad AMD and this game makes almost no use of any core but 1.

 

It almost strikes me as silly for this simulation to call for the finest hardware when it only uses a fourth of what my machine is capable. My graphics card and RAM barely warms up for this simulation. It's not the hardware that needs an upgrade, it's the software that is going to need to play catch up.

 

NO... This is not me being snarky. I love DCS and built my WHOLE machine just to be able to play Black Shark/A-10... But my comments are true.

 

We eventually are going to need software that uses the full potential of hardware that some of us bought to play this sim.

 

ED knows this, we know this.

 

But this Goat is just happy to have an excellent sim to play with likeminded fellows.

 

BTW My specs:

 

AMD Quad Phenom II Black O/C'ed to 3.8

 

8 Gigs of DDR 3 1600

 

ATI 5830 1Gig (O/C'ed)

 

500gb drive @ 7,200rpm

 

etc. etc. etc.

 

 

I have a good machine. Yet I run this sim and Black Shark and can find my FPS chugging down at times... Yet I log what is going on with my CPU/Mem/GFX card and they aren't even put through their paces at the slightest.

 

 

I am in love with ED... But I PRAY they are working on fixing the infrastructure of their code to make more use of the ridiculously powerful machines we've bought to run their top notch simulations.

 

(And yes, I think it is awesome that they made DCS A-10 64bit, so I am well aware they are making progress)

Edited January 11, 2011 by PedroTheGoat

[Conure]

Just as a general question, is it actually possible (i.e with sufficient time + resources) to program the sim such that, for example on my I5, you could run the physics engine on one core, mission stuff (spawning of tanks etc) on the second, ballistics on the third and the fourth as a general helper...I know that's obviously not everything the engine does but I mean it purely in a theoretical sense...It seems common sense that that would be the most efficient use of the CPU....I think RoF does something like that, at least it benefits hugely from a quad core.

 

I think I remember EtherealN once telling me the simulation had three layers (or something to that effect)...Seems strange that it runs on one core! (granted, the sound core runs on more)...

 

Not that I'm complaining, I get a good consistent fps now...

[nomdeplume]

Anything is theoretically possible, it's just a matter of time and resources. It's hard to pull a program designed for single-threaded operation apart and put it back together as a multi-threaded application.

 

The main constraint is that you can't generally have the same data being used simultaneously by two or more different things, so you need to have locking in place to prevent e.g. the physics engine tampering with data the AI or graphics engine needs. That synchronisation of data access adds overhead, which reduces the performance gain you'd see by running it on separate processors.

 

Then there's the fact that processors have a lot of on-board cache (L1 and L2 cache) so that they don't have to fetch data from system memory every time it's worked on. This is a good part of what makes modern processors so fast. But if processor 1 works on some data and caches it locally, then processor 2 works on the same data, that means the cache on proc 1 needs to be invalidated - again trashing your performance gains.

 

None of these issues are insurmountable and we are starting to see some games and other programs that are designed from the start to utilise multiple processors efficiently, but it's very hard to retrofit that into an existing design.

[Para_Bellum]

Just wanted to mention that I play the beta on a Core2Duo E6750@2.6 Ghz, GTX 260, 4 Gig RAM, Win7 64 bit system at 1920x1080 resolution with a mix of high and medium settings and the sim actually runs quite well, around 30FPS in cockpit with TGP on in most situations.

[Midwestboi]

Change it to the 3.4ghz (3.8ghz turbo) Intel Core i7 2600 or the 3.3ghz (3.7ghz turbo) Intel Core i5 2500. Both have higher single-threaded performance than even the i7 980X, yet cost significantly less. They also use less power. Core i5 2500 is $210 while Core i7 2600 is $300. The versions that can overclock (2500K & 2600K) to 4.5ghz on air cooling are $225 and $330 respectively.

 

Just sayin 'cause I would hate for someone to blow $900 on a largely inferior processor.

I agree. Just checking out the reviews on the Sandy Bridge... interestingly, with some games, the i5 2500K actually beat the i7 2600K. But what is also interesting, is how the i5 is just slightly slower than both the i7 and i7-970 in most applications.

What makes me laugh... is how so many people are defending the 970's... still recommending them over the newer, cheaper and equally performing Sandy Bridge. But, I guess that shouldn't be surprising... if you paid $$$ for something and someone was able to get something equal for much less... wouldn't you want to defend your choice as well, no matter how silly? :smartass:

 

With that being said, I'm currently assembling my own i5-2500K system. It was either upgrade the graphics card (which I did, to the HD 5870)- then settle for less than premiere performance with the E5200 and DDR2 RAM- or - upgrade to a system that will allow me much better results. With the i5 retailing for $225... and based on the reviews I've seen... it's a no-brainer.