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Half-Life 2 Upgrade Analysis
RaidRaider writes "Hardware Analysis makes a good effort at answering the question that has been on every enthusiast's mind; what are the specs for a baseline system I need to enjoy Half-Life 2 to the fullest? They take a good hard look at the Steam survey results and work their way up from there, replacing CPUs, graphic cards and add more memory. They back it all up by offering the demos used up for download so you yourself can gauge exactly what kind of upgrade you need."
I find it disturbing that performance on the average system (according to Steam stats) is considered unacceptable.
What the frick is happening to the prices of video cards?
In the old days (ie three years ago) the price of each card would fall over time, and then fall dramatically once a couple of video card 'generations' had passed.
Nowadays it seems that the price of existing video cards is stable and that newer cards are coming out at ever increasing prices.
For example the 9800 pro came out over a year ago but is still $350-400 dollars. The new ATI cards coming out are over $500...
This can't really represent the mass market for video cards can it ?
"Free software as in beer, copy protection as in racket" - Telsa Gwynne
I think most surprising for me was how having a dedicated sound card, rather than using on-board sound really affects the performance. I've never been one to care for sound quality, so I haven't bothered with purchasing an actual sound card for my system, but I didn't realize that the onboard sound uses up CPU.
That's probably the only upgrade I'll really need to make before I get the game.
Forget the whales - save the babies.
I will admit, I downloaded the game off the internet. Here are a few things I noticed as a result:
1. The game itself runs amazingly well on my system - the recommended settings not only look better, but also play much smoother, than Halo PC on minimum detail at 640x480. I never would have purchased the game because of the assumption that my system would almost, but not quite, be able to handle it. Now I am thinking otherwise.
2. The physics engine is amazing. If this engine will run on my friends' PCs, and if Counterstrike: Source is as open an environment as Half-Life 2 is, then we will definitely all buy a license to it for use as our latest LAN game. I never would have considered this without playing it first.
3. The gameplay is very well done, except for the three hours I spent in that goddamn airboat thing. It's freaky.
4. Before playing the game, I was very doubtful, even after all the good things I'd heard. Now, I am raving about all the cool things to my friends, who DO want to buy the game. I've probably made a few sales already, and will likely add myself to the list.
Finally, here are my specs:
Dell Inspiron 5150 Laptop
P4 2.8HT
512 MB / 60G 5200RPM HD
Nvidia GeForce Go FX5200 64mb
As I said, this system will not run Halo smoothly (I blame Halo - everything else runs fine), but Half-Life 2 was not only smooth, but beautiful as well. I can't imagine what it would look like at full detail at 60fps. Because it is capable of this, I will likely buy a copy soon, if only to show my support for a game so well-coded.