HL2 promised hardware specs.

For those interested:

http://www.hl2fallout.com/articles/index.php?lang=1&skin=1&CODE=02&id=17

quite a hike from 700 mhz to a 1.2 ghz for minimum

Seems fair to me. Nobody plays FarCry or UT2k3 on anything less than that, so what is meant to be a super amazing new generation of game does quite well to run on the same hardware IMO.

Slightly ATI biased article I have to say. Won't go into that aain though :smile:

Well my parents just upgraded their computer to an Athlon 2500XP
333fsb, 512mb pc3200 ram, 80gb maxtor hdd, and an ATi 9600xt, so that
should run it perfectly well. I'm a little worried about my computer
however - Athlon 1800XP, 512mb PC2700 ram, 2x 40gb maxtor hdd, and a
Geforce4 4200ti. I guess a new graphics card would put me into safe territory however.

ReNo said:
Well my parents just upgraded their computer to an Athlon 2500XP 333fsb, 512mb pc3200 ram, 80gb maxtor hdd, and an ATi 9600xt, so that should run it perfectly well. I'm a little worried about my computer however - Athlon 1800XP, 512mb PC2700 ram, 2x 40gb maxtor hdd, and a Geforce4 4200ti. I guess a new graphics card would put me into safe territory however.

i think you are safe, on both machines duncan..

and jeff, i only commented cause originally it stated 700 as the bottom rung.

i have a 2.6 i should be fine.

There is something wrong with parents running a better pc than their
aspiring game developer son though :razz: At least my dad plans to make use
of it playing CS in HL2.

I'm waiting for Crono to come out and start bashing heads. I've already mentioned this and got a silly argument for my trouble :biggrin:

I supose I might scrape by. I run a 1ghz PIII, 256 MB RAM, 32 MB GF2 Go graphics... 15 fps here I come!

ouch

hm.. Need to upgrade CPU :S

Got Athlon XP 2200+ and ATI 9600XT atm.

Well my parents just upgraded their computer to an Athlon 2500XP
333fsb, 512mb pc3200 ram, 80gb maxtor hdd, and an ATi 9600xt, so that
should run it perfectly well. I'm a little worried about my computer
however - Athlon 1800XP, 512mb PC2700 ram, 2x 40gb maxtor hdd, and a
Geforce4 4200ti. I guess a new graphics card would put me into safe territory however.

I have the same card ... it runs fine. (along with doom 3) ... and I'm talking maximum settings.

If it is sluggish, it wont be because of your video card.

hm.. Need to upgrade CPU :S

Got Athlon XP 2200+ and ATI 9600XT atm.

Why? so your computer would continue to show no strain while playing run time intensive games with maxed detail??

I'm waiting for Crono to come out and start bashing heads. I've already mentioned this and got a silly argument for my trouble

glare ... my point stands though. A 2 ghz MAYBE is all you'd need processor wise to get this stuff running amazingly well ... not that any of you believe me

[ADDITION]

I know I seem to bitch about this subject a lot, but, my only point is that a highest speed computer is not what you need to run even the newest of games and run time dependant applications.

There is a reason why your hardware lasts for so long, most of the specs we have are what these games were built on and tested on, why would anyone design software for hardware no one can afford?

There are also so many factors in determining what does and doesn't make for the best: smoothest, prettiest gameplay. and more often then not, the CPU isn't a big factor.
You'll notice that the same people who boast that they've spent countless hundreds on the fastest cpu they could find only talk about frames per second, and then they say its a direct corrolation to their video card, which it isn't.

Most often, I'm only trying to save people money. I mean, if you live in the US and you spend more then MAYBE $700 on a computer, you're a chump and deserve to be raped by companies over and over again. Outside the US, I imagine it'd be closer to 900 for the currency difference.

My intentions are good ... at least recognize that. :smile:

I have the same card ... it runs fine. (along with doom 3) ... and I'm talking maximum settings.

...that makes me giggle.

I was just funning ya man, no hard feelings

KungFuSquirrel said:

I have the same card ... it runs fine. (along with doom 3) ... and I'm talking maximum settings.

...that makes me giggle.

somehow, having insiders info reduces the effect of your giggles andrew.. :heee:

Crono said:

Well my parents just upgraded their computer to an Athlon 2500XP
333fsb, 512mb pc3200 ram, 80gb maxtor hdd, and an ATi 9600xt, so that
should run it perfectly well. I'm a little worried about my computer
however - Athlon 1800XP, 512mb PC2700 ram, 2x 40gb maxtor hdd, and a
Geforce4 4200ti. I guess a new graphics card would put me into safe territory however.

I have the same card ... it runs fine. (along with doom 3) ... and I'm talking maximum settings.

If it is sluggish, it wont be because of your video card.

hm.. Need to upgrade CPU :S

Got Athlon XP 2200+ and ATI 9600XT atm.

Why? so your computer would continue to show no strain while playing run time intensive games with maxed detail??

I'm waiting for Crono to come out and start bashing heads. I've already mentioned this and got a silly argument for my trouble

glare ... my point stands though. A 2 ghz MAYBE is all you'd need processor wise to get this stuff running amazingly well ... not that any of you believe me

[ADDITION]

I know I seem to bitch about this subject a lot, but, my only point is that a highest speed computer is not what you need to run even the newest of games and run time dependant applications.

There is a reason why your hardware lasts for so long, most of the specs we have are what these games were built on and tested on, why would anyone design software for hardware no one can afford?

There are also so many factors in determining what does and doesn't make for the best: smoothest, prettiest gameplay. and more often then not, the CPU isn't a big factor.
You'll notice that the same people who boast that they've spent countless hundreds on the fastest cpu they could find only talk about frames per second, and then they say its a direct corrolation to their video card, which it isn't.

Most often, I'm only trying to save people money. I mean, if you live in the US and you spend more then MAYBE $700 on a computer, you're a chump and deserve to be raped by companies over and over again. Outside the US, I imagine it'd be closer to 900 for the currency difference.

My intentions are good ... at least recognize that. :smile:

I basically reiterate what you said, there are a lot more underlying things with hardware than base #s and such. It's a combination of just about everything. I get higher fps in say DoD with my GF2 and 1.3T-Bird than many who boast with their sig'ed 3Ghz, 1GB RAM, 128MB Video Card etc. etc. because I chose wisely, I built the computer myself, had it cost half of what retail would charge. Got the -right- drivers, NOT the newest. Trial and error and a little research goes a long way. Don't worry about the min or recommended specs for a specific game...worry more about what your exact configuration is. For example, a little thing like paying $5 more for 8MB cache on a HDD can go a long way.

Damn straight G-man.

To be quite honest, the parts of your computer that effect your speed in crucial ways are built onto your motherboard, your system bus is basically the flaw of the architecture ... so studying up on that it a good idea.

The issue about HDD cache sizes is that, not all models and sizes come with numerous amounts of cache differences. Also, games that don't load external sounds often wont make much of a difference on either type of HDD. It only really comes into play when loading and such ... but every piece of speed helps ... eventually.

Yak, I know :smile:

KFS, ... word. (I just pre-ordered Doom 3 the other day, and I also bumped up my pre-order of HL2 to the collectors edition, I figured ... what the hell, why not?)

I'm in a much better mood since I finished my mid term yesterday :smile:

Why? so your computer would continue to show no strain while playing run time intensive games with maxed detail??

Because I can. And I was thinking of starting 'old skool'-map contest with my old Athlon XP 2200+ (+fan) as first price :O

Will HL2 run with onboard graphics? I know Painkiller
requires you to have a video card it will not recgonize an
onboard card.

To be honest, there isn't really an on-board graphics solution that doesn't just plain suck at 3D - this isn't what they are designed for. It should run if it is DX7 compliant, but if you compare normal DX7 cards like the GeForce 2 to an on-board DX7 solution, the on board version gives like... 10-20% of the performance.

A few years ago it was pretty much anything built on board was crap.

They still have yet to perfect the VGA aspect (which will never happen)

Damn i thought i would at least have another year with this ol beast.....now she doesnt met minimum requirements!

1.2 GHz here, with 128 ram, and a 16 mb vid card....sigh...looks like ill be behind the bandwagon once again.

hehe, looks like my graphic card will only 'just' cut it, GF4 MX440 [but its OC'ed and with an added intel celeron 500mhz cooler :razz: ] But i'm sure my amd athlon 2500 will be sufficient.

Dragon, you need a minor upgrade for things the be peachy (I'd suggest mainly a videocard and a big 'ol stick of ram, shouldn't be more then MAYBE $120 (about $70 US) for 512Mb of ram ... a video card can go as expensive or cheap as you're willing to go ... I'd suggest nothing over $200 (US). You would only need to upgrade your CPU if you weren't/aren't happy with your fps.

sloth, your processor means nothing if you have a GF4MX when talking about games, that card is pretty low performance. I'm not saying its a bad card, its worth all $40, but ... its not really a gaming card, since it can't handle most 3 year old games topped out. But it can run them, which is good.

I really view the MX series for people who have a computer and play games sometimes. Thats where the card really makes sense.

Crono, i know that my cpu isn't the most important spec where games are concerned,what i was pointing out [ although i didn't make it clear] is that my cpu can handle HL2.

But have no fear! I'll be getting a new graphics card in august!

August may still bring a rapping of a millennia when buying a video card ... I'm in the same boat ... kind of. I'm planning on buying a new video card when the time is right, I just hope it around August.

Hopefuly if everyone goes mad buying graphics cards when D3 comes out, the prices might go down for a while.

Back to the "Post Your System Specs" thread: I own a Dell since I needed a computer quick before I went off to college, and my parents paid for everything. So far it's been a pretty good machine, I think.
Pentium 4 2ghz, 256MB PC2100 ram, 40gb hd, GeForce4 440MX.
I'm buying a stick of 512 later this summer to bring that up to 768, that way I can actually load the Fluid Soundfont without crashing my machine. I run Slackware Linux 9.1 and play a fair amount of Quake 3.

I don't remember if the 2GHz P4 is capable of running dual channel mode on the memory, but if it is, you want to check what memory is already in. If it's two 128mb sticks, you need to get two 256mb sticks in order to keep dual channel (almost double bandwidth) memory. If it only has one 256mb stick, you need to either try and find two 128mb sticks, and one 256mb stick, giving you your 768, or go for three more 256mb sticks to give 1024 (you may not be able to find 128mb sticks).

Hope that is more helpful than confusing.

Nope, it's just one 256 megger in there right now. I've only got two sockets anyway and they'll each go up to 512. One day I'll have a gig, but the biggest performance boost I can get right now is to drop a 512 in there alongside the 256.

Hopefuly if everyone goes mad buying graphics cards when D3 comes out, the prices might go down for a while.

That would kick so much ass.

Err... I'm quite sure that supply and demand works on the opposite principle: if people are going mad buying a product and the demand can't be met, shouldn't the price skyrocket for those few remaining?

If you want advice in economic matters, ask a hobo :razz:

Minimum Requirements

[list]
[*] 1.2 GHz Processor
[*] 256MB RAM
[*] DirectX 7 level graphics card
[*] Windows 2000/XP/ME/98
[*] Mouse
[*] Keyboard

</LI>[/list]

Me

• 1 GHz Processor
• 640MB RAM
• Radeon 9600Pro
• Windows XP
• Mouse
• Keyboard

Curses! Foiled again! All I need is 200 more mhz...

Hey, Leps away! What CPU does he have? Will he notice it missing? :biggrin:

SumhObo said:
Err... I'm quite sure that supply and demand works on the opposite principle: if people are going mad buying a product and the demand can't be met, shouldn't the price skyrocket for those few remaining?

Exactly. Higher demand will drive up prices because people will be willing to pay higher prices and the suppliers will glady ablige them. Eventually demand will drop back to normal levels and the prices will go with them. /economist

thats how supply and demand work but there is also the matter of two very competitive companies ati and nvidia who I'm sure wouldn't mind lowering their price a bit if it means someone will buy their product.

Also since this thread has turned into a tech question kinda thing. I was hoping somebody could clear something up for me. Is windows 98 only capable of handling 256 mb ram or is that wrong?

He's talking about the previous generation, and the early next gen cards. People will shell out for the newest and best stuff, driving the older crap into the ground, that's the time to buy.

Also, I have no doubt manufacturers are building these buy the bundles. There will most likely be more then the entire populus can buy, meaning when the next shipments come in the price of the previous shipments go down. But that mostly depends on your location.

yays! i will be able to run Half life 2 :biggrin: :D:D

AMD athlon XP 2000+, 256mb Ram, Geforce 4 MX 440 64mb 4x edition ( :sad: ) and 512kb/s internet speed :biggrin:

The GeForceFX 5200 is barely capable of rendering a scene using DX9 technology

DAMNIT! Mine just arrived yesterday! Oh well - an AMD Athlon 64 3000+ should help! :biggrin:

I'm certain thats wrong JFry, two of my flatmates still run windows 98
and both of them have powerful computers with at least 512mb.

<DIV>I'm pretty sure you're thinking of 95 there, JFry, as well as some early Linux editions.</DIV>
<DIV>.</DIV>
<DIV>Yay, should have no problems on HL2 - XP 2800+ (Barton), Radeon 9500 Pro, 512 RAM.</DIV>

I was actually thinking more along the lines of economies of scale. If someone is making twice as many of something, the price per unit comes down, and obviously they will charge the smallest price possible so as to gain maximum market share. Supply and demand rules for price increases only apply when the supply is limited; I don't see how that is the case here.

Supply and demand rules for price increases only apply when the supply is limited; I don't see how that is the case here.

Yes, but the basic underlying principle for all economics is that supply is ALWAYS limited. If they do have reduced unit costs due to economies of scale (which I think is unlikey, given the rate theyre churning out cards already), that may cause the price to drop, but only slightly. Or, they could leave the price the same, and grab more revenue. There are only 2 major firms anyone really cares about, ati and nvidia, and in an oligopoly market like this, price competition is rare (except in the event of a pricewar, but thats not going to happen). When you get into the high-end video card market, people care less about price and more about performancce, and the company that can deliver the best performance will sell cards.

So in conclusion, supply and demand pwnz j00.

And on the issue of win9x and ram, I beleve win98 did have a problem with >512mb ram, but its easily fixed by changing something in the registry.

Curses! Foiled again! All I need is 200 more mhz...

LOL! poor wil5on!

Windows 98 isn't a very good operating system any more, anyway. If your computer is sufficiently fast enough seriously consider switching to XP (or 2000 if you like) - the performance is still really good, the OS is the most stable of any Windows, and it doesn't randomly lag when you open two applications at once. Everyone claims 98 is the best for games, but XP really doesn't trail behind by much it seems, and it's easily worth the extra stability and reliability to sacrifice a little performance.

But if you're intent on sticking with 98, you won't notice any new problems until you get up past 512 megabytes of RAM, and the fix is (I think) something to do with HD caching settings.

wil5on said:

Supply and demand rules for price increases only apply when the supply is limited; I don't see how that is the case here.

Yes, but the basic underlying principle for all economics is that supply is ALWAYS limited. If they do have reduced unit costs due to economies of scale (which I think is unlikey, given the rate theyre churning out cards already), that may cause the price to drop, but only slightly. Or, they could leave the price the same, and grab more revenue. There are only 2 major firms anyone really cares about, ati and nvidia, and in an oligopoly market like this, price competition is rare (except in the event of a pricewar, but thats not going to happen). When you get into the high-end video card market, people care less about price and more about performancce, and the company that can deliver the best performance will sell cards.

So in conclusion, supply and demand pwnz j00.

And on the issue of win9x and ram, I beleve win98 did have a problem with >512mb ram, but its easily fixed by changing something in the registry.

I would argue that the 3d card market is not an oligopoly, especially since there's no reason for the two of em to collude to raise prices. It's much more of a monopolistic competition market. In addition, price competition between the two will be very present, otherwise one company would raise the price of their best card compared to the other without worrying about losing business, which I think is a ridiculous claim. Just look at the console market: once Nintendo lowered the price of the Gamecube they had tons of sales compared to the Xbox and PS2, forcing the others to respond. Even given the weak offerings of the GC compared to the other two more people bought it purely because of its cheaper price.

I would argue that the 3d card market is not an oligopoly, especially since there's no reason for the two of em to collude to raise prices. It's much more of a monopolistic competition market. In addition, price competition between the two will be very present, otherwise one company would raise the price of their best card compared to the other without worrying about losing business, which I think is a ridiculous claim. Just look at the console market: once Nintendo lowered the price of the Gamecube they had tons of sales compared to the Xbox and PS2, forcing the others to respond. Even given the weak offerings of the GC compared to the other two more people bought it purely because of its cheaper price.

/gets Economics textbook

Monopolistic competition is the market form with a large number of sellers of differentiated (heterogeneous) products.

So, its definitely not monopolistic competition, since moncomp has a large number of firms (btw an example of moncomp would be non-chain restaurants).

Oligopoly is the market form with a small number of firms. Product differentiation is an important feature of oligopoly, as it is in monopolistic competition.

Just to clarify that it definitely was an oligopoly.

I would argue that the 3d card market is not an oligopoly, especially since there's no reason for the two of em to collude to raise prices.

No reason? The only reason they dont collude is that its illegal.

In addition, price competition between the two will be very present, otherwise one company would raise the price of their best card compared to the other without worrying about losing business, which I think is a ridiculous claim. Just look at the console market: once Nintendo lowered the price of the Gamecube they had tons of sales compared to the Xbox and PS2, forcing the others to respond. Even given the weak offerings of the GC compared to the other two more people bought it purely because of its cheaper price.

I say there will be little to no price competition because it would be unprofitable for either company to lower their prices. I think the card market is at the point where any change in price will decrease total revenue, as such, neither company wants to change their prices. Nintendo probably only lowered their prices because they were selling so few GCs that the increase in sales would make up for the lost revenue/unit sold.

My economics exams on Wednesday... at least this means im studying! Now start a topic on something I dont know, so I can study what I actually need to study! :razz:

Well, that's what I get for never reading my econ books last year. :razz:

lol

I was thinking more along the lines of there are several board partners making cards for either (or both) chipset manufacturers, so if, for example, Asus suddenly decided to reduce the price of their cards by ?10 or whatever, they would suddenly get way more market share, because all cards using a given chipset are otherwise pretty much the same. A 6800GT made by Asus is pretty much the same as the ones made by AOpen or Leadtek or Sparkle or whoever, so price is a very critical aspect in deciding on a manufacturer, having chosen a chipset.

Thats not the market we're talking about tho is it?

Youre right btw.