New PC For FFXIV:ARR (need It Cheep)

My computer is 10 years old~ (Pentium D, Nvidea 9800). It didn't run XIV well enough for me to continue to play when the game went pay-to-play nor did the content make me want to step up and purchase a new machine.
My little junker can run Starcraft II, Guild Wars II, and it would run Final Fantasy XIV. No hiding it though the frame rate was bad. Now I'm considering one of two options.

1) Buy a PS3 to play FFXIV:ARR, retail price 300~400$ including accessories.

2) Finally upgrade my computer... which I'd want to do for under 700$. I know jack squat about this so I'm trying to figure out what I'd need as baseline to get me through the next decade. I figure given the age of my system this will be mostly a new build instead of a rebuild.

That being said I need to find that baseline, I have always used Nvidia graphics cards and Intel processors. They've worked well so I would like to stick with them. I don't know how powerful my power supply is so for now I'm just going to assume it needs to be replaced.

So my shopping list will be:
Motherboard:
CPU:
RAM:
Graphics Card:
Case:
Power Supply:


OS: ??? (running windows XP still might be time to upgrade, this wouldn't be against the cost of the upgrade)
Hard Drive: -0$- (I have a 500GB and 300GB, I don't need more)
Keyboard/Mouse: 100$ (not part of the rebuild cost, I know what I want here and I want it even if I don't rebuild my PC)
Other: ??? (I've heard very good things about loading from SSD, but I'm not sure if it's really worth the investment)

Hmmm... have you tried seeing how your current computer handles the updated FFXIV:ARR benchmark (I've heard it's not as resource-intensive as the original release)?

Also: I've found the System Guide articles on Ars Technica to be somewhat helpful.

So I just ran the benchmark again on Medium settings (1440x900) I get a 3376 which is marked as "fairly high" I can't say as to how this will really relate to the game however. The official specs don't say they support XP either, so I'm not sure how that will play with everything.

From the link you sent me...
Budget Box:


Value Box:


*plays lots of tabs* So this seems to be a middle of the road option between the two... I think...

Now is there any reason to worry the Value Box graphics card says it needs a 450W or better power supply and the one they have is ranked at 430W?

How much performance difference would there potentially be between the Budget and Value boxes? Especially since the budget box would be running on on-board graphics.

How much longevity would I gain from changing from the set that I have listed there (assuming that all the parts work together), to the Value box? or increased performance if that might be a better judge.... replacing computers every decade doesn't make me very good at this!

(Note—I'm really not qualified to give you detailed hardware advice—as I've never actually built my own system! So if you find you can't get the advice/specifics you're looking for here on FFXIAH, you can try the forums at Tom's Hardware.)

This article (and PSU calculator) seems to suggest the GTX 650 will work with a 400W PSU.

Also from the article:

You'll probably want to avoid on-board graphics. I think the Budget box from Ars Technica is mostly intended as a home-theatre-type computer (i.e., well suited for playing FarmVille, video, Netflix, etc...), but not so much for 3D graphics.

Personally, I'd suggest waiting until FFXIV releases (August 27, 2013) and then seeing if your current machine can play it acceptably (your benchmark scores sound promising!). Mostly because Intel's set to release its new Haswell architecture soon (June 4, 2013), which could change a lot of the options out there.

you're damned right Caritwo... chirping included :P

I may be waiting till after release to get a new PC anyway given I don't make much to be able to save 4-500$+ in a short period. I just know how poorly my PC runs Guild Wars/Starcraft II (1 FPS or lower sometimes) and how poorly I ran XIV the first time around. I know they're mentioning lowering requirements I just don't know how far I want to trust that.

let's see looking through


So looking that over I do... alright as it is, I would really like to see myself in the 5000~6000 on medium... and maybe 3000 on maximum. Just because these sound like where you won't run into problems with drastic frame rate dropping when panning the camera or passing through moderately crowded areas (assuming the correct graphics settings).

Does anyone else remember being able to run from one side of Lower Jeuno to the other without seeing a single other character because of how many your computer had to load? because I do.

Sadly that has more to do with how Windows (and FFXI) works than the machine performance really. That's because the PC has to fly through a enormous amount of files in a quite complex file system (NTFS) and additionally the hard drive might be fragmented which slows down even further the files seek process.

A lot of games try to optimize their files loading by making a single file with a enormous quantity of smaller files inside (sort of a virtual filesystem) to save the time the OS need to check file system indexes for each small file that needs to be read.

That's one of the reasons why a measly PS2 could draw like 50 player characters nearby almost instantly while on the PC they seem to pop one after another if you stay put for a minute or two. (FFXIV had that issue too, no ?)

SE could fix that if they wanted by making the ROM folders be like zip files. But do they want to do so ?

The original FFXIV also used a TON of loose files. The ARR benchmark folders hint they might have the small files bundled on bigger archives on the final game and that gives me the idea that disk might not be such a serious bottleneck for FFXIV this time.

I can do a build for you for around 700 that will be plenty beefy enough to play FF14 and then some.

though if you really want to save money AND have a great pc, you will wait 5 more days for the new line of intel chips to come out >.>

PM me if you are interested and would like me to do a paper build for you. (I would just post the parts you need to buy, you would have to build it all yourself)

I do builds for friends and myself and keep up with current tech for pc builds as well.


~~~~~~~~~~
Why you should wait for the new line of Intel chips.

- The new line of intel (haswell) chips (and i can't even believe i'm saying this) but they have really really GOOD integrated graphics. almost on par with a GTX 550.

go look up benchmarks for a GTX 550. not the best card by far but for a cpu to run that off just a mobo is INSANE imo.

it should be good enough to run ff14 by itself on medium~high settings 720p. It will let you get by till you can save up some more dough to spend on a really really nice video card.

Main issue with FFXIV was due to the engine can only load 40char. So later on they made it so mobs/npcs would load first then Players. But the issue did not end there. Every action you do in the game must be check with the servers. So when you do a spell,move or do anything client base it would first ask the servers then send information back to you saying yes you can. Which then in turn made the game very slow to load or do anything.

In later patch they fix this by making the check happen less but still had lot of issue. Having a SSD made FFXIV 100x better with loading but overall the engine and even the coding for the servers sucked so much it took months for them to even make updates.

Thank god ARR was rebuild from the ground up lol and we going to have Servers in NA,EU :)

To Eleborate a little on how the servers will work in FF14 ARR;

During Character Creation screen when it comes time to choose your world, it will tell you if it is an EU,US,or JP based Server. You can freely choose whichever server you would like, but you now have the option of choosing a server that might give you a much better latency and less lag while playing.

If you're on a budget I recommend going with a AMD APU system. Just make sure to buy 1866 ram for best graphics performance or simply get a PS3 for a lower chance of having to RMA a defective part, it happens and more often on budget components.

Though I don't see how you're going to speed 400 usd on a ps3 when they're 250 on amazon and the standard retail package for FF14 is 40, and a standard usb keybard for 15/20.

The problem with buying a game system, is that you never get out for just the system. You inevitably need to get another controller (or two, or three), and there are probably a few games you're going to buy... it all adds up fairly quickly so I figure 400$ to get the PS3, things that I would get if I had one, and then a keyboard/mouse just for use with that.