My desktop PC

[Ultron]

Two best things you can do, Prideboy, is to get an ATI Radeon X1950 AGP or an ATI Radeon 2600Pro AGP. 256MB or 512MB (not sure which card has what option) followed by an increase in RAM. But it appears that you probably have a motherboard so old you may not get much more than you currently have.

[cel4145]

In short: You need a new system or you need to play a different game.

Stop asking about upgrading components. There is nothing in your system that you could singly upgrade that would make any noticeable change in your experience. If you upgrade the CPU alone, your vid card and ram are insufficient. If you upgrade the vid card, the CPU and RAM are insufficient. If you upgrade the ram, the vid card and CPU are insufficient. This is the bottom line...and yes, i know it sucks.

He's right. Your system is well below the minimum requirements. I just upgraded my son's computer. It was previously an AMD Athlon64 3000+ Newcastle with an Nvidia 6600 and 2GB of RAM which is right near the bottom of minimum requirements. It was sort of playable at 800x600 with the demo, FPS average in the high 20's. I couldn't figure out a way to put any more money into that would make it worthwhile. I'm so glad now that I didn't go that path.

Try the demo before buying the full game. If it plays like absolute ****, don't expect your system to do any better with the full game. By the time you buy a new processor, more RAM, and new vid card, you'd be much better off putting the money into a motherboard upgrade, too.

BTW: What is your maximum budget? Then people might suggest a possible complete upgrade that would be a significant improvement. For example, I would imagine you could do a very cheap rebuild for under $400 that would give you FPS in the mid 40's at 1024x768. It wouldn't have all of the eye candy, but the game would play very well.

[Trepænima]

download the demo. see if it runs. why haven't you done this yet?

[Socratatus]

I would agree with the other guy to buy RAM first. It may not technically increase performance, but it will speed up load times, access and smoothness that will become a performance boost to you.

When I had a weeak system, the first thing I did was increase ram from 512 meg to 1 gig. the difference really felt like a performance boost, and unreal played much better. 2 Gig would be even better if you can go that far. Even Unreal`s Readmes has always said to increase Ram first for a cheaper, easier option. Don`t expect anything incredible, but it will be better.

After that i`d change processer, but with your system, you`ll need to change the motherboard too, so ram is your easiest cheapest bet.

[Maximum_Jason]

BTW: What is your maximum budget? Then people might suggest a possible complete upgrade that would be a significant improvement. For example, I would imagine you could do a very cheap rebuild for under $400 that would give you FPS in the mid 40's at 1024x768. It wouldn't have all of the eye candy, but the game would play very well.

Yeah good idea. Help us to help you.

Tho not that I disagree, but under $400? That seems a little cheap for the kind of upgrade we're talking here.

[cel4145]

Tho not that I disagree, but under $400? That seems a little cheap for the kind of upgrade we're talking here.

Not at all. I used many of these components in the machine I built for my son. I'm still waiting on the vid card, but for right now, it is getting in the 30's at 1024x768 running a 7600GS with that 4200+ and 2GB of RAM until the 8600GT gets here (sometime today). The 8600GT should bump the FPS at least 10 FPS.

• AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ @ $79.99
• ABIT AN52 AM2 NVIDIA nForce 520 @ $68.99
• EVGA 256-P2-N753-TR GeForce 8600GT @ $99.99
• A-DATA Extreme Edition 2GB @ $53.99
• Thermaltake Purepower W0100RU ATX 12V 2.0 500W @ $69.99

Total $373 before shipping. Note that there are also two rebates here for a total of $48.99 (I actually bought the cheaper AData RAM with cas 5 for my son's machine, but there is no rebate with it right now). I did not include the rebates in the totals since there is no guarantee he would get them, but it's a nice lottery ticket :-)

Of course, for another $50, one could upgrade from here to the 8600GTS or comparable ATI card. Or one could wait until later.

[greenplant]

ur system a bit behind to try to spend any money on it...

if you can't drop that 400$ to get a low price system to will run them totally fine.... u might as well not upgrade at all and wait till you can afford it..
i won't even bother installing ut3 on that current system.
only gonna make u feel sad.

u do need all 3 cpu/ram/videocard upgrade..
ungrading just 1 of them itself won't get you to play ut3

[cel4145]

I should add that I ended up going with the Antec Earthwatts 500 for the budget box I built for my son. It's a little more expensive @ $78.99. I've had good luck with Thermaltake in the past, but I went with the Antec because the 12v rails are a little better and it has better energy efficiency which should mean less heat in the system. I've used a 420 watt Thermaltake Purepower with a similar system, and it did fine (but it did put out more heat).

[kaluro]

Get a 1950xt PCIe for 60 euro and don't forget to buy a MoBo which supports PCIe.

[kaluro]

cel4145
You should really stop trying to get people to obtain an 8600gt

the 8600 series are the BUDGET series of the 8xxxx series, for people who don't have lots of money but still want a DX10 card. That card is there to support DX10 features, it's not built to play games with, i repeat it is NOT.

a 1950xt is cheaper than the 8600 and performs lets say twice as good, the only downside is that it doesnt support DX10, but UT3 doesn't have any DX10 features as it is now anyway.

[Maximum_Jason]

Not at all. I used many of these components in the machine I built for my son. I'm still waiting on the vid card, but for right now, it is getting in the 30's at 1024x768 running a 7600GS with that 4200+ and 2GB of RAM until the 8600GT gets here (sometime today). The 8600GT should bump the FPS at least 10 FPS.

• AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ @ $79.99
• ABIT AN52 AM2 NVIDIA nForce 520 @ $68.99
• EVGA 256-P2-N753-TR GeForce 8600GT @ $99.99
• A-DATA Extreme Edition 2GB @ $53.99
• Thermaltake Purepower W0100RU ATX 12V 2.0 500W @ $69.99

Total $373 before shipping. Note that there are also two rebates here for a total of $48.99 (I actually bought the cheaper AData RAM with cas 5 for my son's machine, but there is no rebate with it right now). I did not include the rebates in the totals since there is no guarantee he would get them, but it's a nice lottery ticket :-)

Of course, for another $50, one could upgrade from here to the 8600GTS or comparable ATI card. Or one could wait until later.

Wow, I guess I should be a little more thrifty in the future

Lately i've been trying to go as High-End as possible.

[cel4145]

cel4145
You should really stop trying to get people to obtain an 8600gt

the 8600 series are the BUDGET series of the 8xxxx series, for people who don't have lots of money but still want a DX10 card. That card is there to support DX10 features, it's not built to play games with, i repeat it is NOT.

a 1950xt is cheaper than the 8600 and performs lets say twice as good, the only downside is that it doesnt support DX10, but UT3 doesn't have any DX10 features as it is now anyway.

Not from Newegg. The only 1950XT available is almost $200, where as a reference board, non-overclocked 8600GT can be found for $100. Meanwhile, the 8600GTS is comparable to the 1950PRO according to AnandTech's performance tests. Since they are pretty close in price, I personally wouldn't wish ATI driver hell on anyone. LOL

[Maximum_Jason]

cel4145
You should really stop trying to get people to obtain an 8600gt

the 8600 series are the BUDGET series of the 8xxxx series, for people who don't have lots of money but still want a DX10 card. That card is there to support DX10 features, it's not built to play games with, i repeat it is NOT.

a 1950xt is cheaper than the 8600 and performs lets say twice as good, the only downside is that it doesnt support DX10, but UT3 doesn't have any DX10 features as it is now anyway.

The 8600GT might not be the best, but it's better than nothing if you dont have the cash to burn.

Tho I would recommend the 8800GT over the 8600 if at all possible.

[cel4145]

One other consideration, and then I have to quit posting. I have work to do

I tend to believe that it's a better bet if building an AMD system to match Nvidia cards with Nforce boards and ATI cards with AMD chipset boards now that ATI and AMD are the same company. AMD and Nvidia have obvious incentive to do more to produce drivers and cards which are more stable with boards that use their chipsets. Moreover, they are likely to have better knowledge about their chipsets and have a better range of boards to test on.

[TPSFan]

One other consideration, and then I have to quit posting. I have work to do

I tend to believe that it's a better bet if building an AMD system to match Nvidia cards with Nforce boards and ATI cards with AMD chipset boards now that ATI and AMD are the same company. AMD and Nvidia have obvious incentive to do more to produce drivers and cards which are more stable with boards that use their chipsets. Moreover, they are likely to have better knowledge about their chipsets and have a better range of boards to test on.

This is completely WRONG.

I just built a new rig (summer) that was less than $400, and I have an NForce board (Biostar T-7050) with an ATI X1950 Pro and the system runs every single game on the market very well.

I am currently adding to the rig this Christmas via present requests from friends and family (more RAM and new PSU).

Also, I wouldn't recommend anyone buy the 8600GT. It is mostly for casual gamers and HTPC use. Not heavy gaming like UT3 requires.

I would recommend the 8800GT, or the ATI 3850 for good, mid-range DX10 cards. Just look at the specs: The 8800GT has 131 streams and the ATI one 320. These are paired down versions of the big boys (8800 GTX and 2900XT). Not crippled versions with only 128-bit interface.

In fact, I am going to sell an old PC I have laying around for hopefully $200 and just upgrade to the ATI 3870 512 MB because I feel it is good bang for the buck...