Help Me With My Blog Post

[kamolahy]

I write a blog about online gaming. You can check it out here if you like.

I'm doing a segment on "how to build a rig that's catered to online gaming". By online gaming, I mean MMORPG games. I want to inform my readers on how to have a computer that will best handle both graphics, but also heavy loading of persistenly changing worlds. I realize that there are some hardware things that are specific to these kinds of needs.

I would like to enlist some help from the geniuses in this forum. LEt me ask a few questions and see what answers get put out there.. my readers and I will greatly appreciate it.

1. What system components are the most important when considering online gaming?
2. What are the best offerings for these components.. what brands/models of items should I tell them they should get?
3. What are some components that are real expensive, but good at handling online gaming.. ya know.. the dream hardware? What are some more affordable options?
4. We would even love some technical explainations as to why these components are important and how they interact with large persistent world games.


Sorry if the questions are vague. I'll specify if you all need me to. I just want to write a how-to on creating the best gaming rig. I want to help them focus on the right stuff...

[blue60007]

An online gaming machine wouldn't be a different than an off-line gaming rig I wouldn't think. Look for the video card, amount of RAM, and CPU to make the biggest difference. My guess is that MMORPG games would benefit from a good CPU and RAM moreso than say, a FPS - which rely heavily on the video card. I don't play any MMORPG games so I don't how graphically involved they are. I play a couple RTS games and the CPU makes a big difference there with lots of AI running around on screen. You can't go wrong with a well balanced system especially if you (the player) play other types of games.

You might look around the Build Your Own PC section of the forum for ideas on gaming rigs at different budget levels.

[pam123]

Any good games machine should do the job but actually MMORPG are less demanding then current FPS games and the requirements don't increase by leaps and bounds ( Considering they have to cover a wide market credibly they can't.).
Thus the current recommended specs for WoW ( take the most popular game out now.) are :

Recommended Specifications

Windows® System 2000/XP OS:

* Intel Pentium® IV 1.5 GHz or AMD XP 1500+ MHz
* 1024 MB RAM
* 64 MB 3D graphics card with Hardware Transform and Lighting, such as NVIDIA® GeForce™ FX 5700 class card or above
* Broadband Internet connection
* Two-button scroll-wheel mouse

They're not asking much.
The two things that really hit your eye are the need for ram and the broadband connection but any decent agp card out now would have no trouble.
Given Vista's system demands the ram should double but you'd still be good to go with any decent DX9 pci-e card.
So for a new machine to play it a basic 6300/X2 3800 introductory build would do the job with no trouble and most older machine will manage it as well but might need more ram.

The other MMORPG are the same .
The current set of recommended specs for Eve on Line :
Recommended system configuration

* OS: Windows® System 2000 SP2 / XP
* CPU: Intel Pentium® IV 1.5 GHz or AMD XP 1500+ MHz
* RAM: 1024 MB
* HD space: 6.0 GB
* Video: 128 MB GeForce 6200 class card or higher
* Network: Broadband Internet connection

The minimum screen resolution for EVE is 1024x768.
Audio hardware must be Direct Sound compatible. For optimum performance, use latest drivers available.

Please note that Windows 95, Windows 98, ME, NT and 2000 below SP2 are not supported.

The video card kicks up a notch but that's it.

What all this means is that any would be MMO gamer with a basic rig, and some extra ram and a broadband connection, will have the same great time as the guy whose super set up can take down anyone in the latest on line FPS.

[Staren]

Yep. Any good off-line gaming machine is what you want for an MMO. I'd say if you're wondering what to put money into, Broadband, RAM, CPU, Video Card. in that order. Now that doesn't mean get a crappy Video card for 4 GB of RAM. That's pretty stupid, but get Broadband, 2 GB of RAM, a mid-rage of the current gen processor (the Intel 6600, or AMD equivalent) first, then you can put the rest into your video card. Heck I'm still playing WoW on my first build with a 9800Pro and I'm happy with it. No it's not as intense as a current system, but it's very playable on medium settings. Doesn't mean I won't be building a replacement box very soon, but I'm not going nuts waiting for it.