Windows 7: 10-15 FPS lower in WoW...

I used to get 60 fps in WoW. I'm not sure if this is from going from 7068 to 7100 or going from an Intel E8400 Dual Core to Intel Q9400 Quad Core since I did both of them in the same day. Which would probably me to have 30-50 fps in World of Warcraft?



Also, for the new processor it's showing it as 4 Unknown Devices in device manager. Is there a way to fix this?

Watched my fps for a while and it's 10-30 under normal.

well. it saying unknown under device manger isn't a big deal. you can right click and install drivers.. it will find them from Intel online and then name the CPU. but it's not like windows isn't recognizing your CPU. cuz it is. it might be that the motherboard is older than the CPU. and it doesn't have the default support for it. the BIOS could need a driver update as well.

but if you want to check the cpu just get CPU-Z it's an amazing program.

CPUID

Also. the E8400 was a 3.0 Ghz CPU, and the Q9400 may be a quad but it's only 2.6 Ghz. WOW is not all that Graphics intensive, it plays well with integrated graphics. I suspect that WOW just could use a higher CPU clock.. usually that type of difference would balance out with a Quad Core.

You should overclock the Q9400 to 3.0 Ghz and then retest and they would probably be higher FPS.. but you should be able to take that Q9400 to 3.2 Ghz or 3.4 Ghz. (If you need a good overclocking guide let me know)

WoW is very light on the GPU and very heavy on the CPU. It's also not very good at using multiple cores. Therefore, per-core processing power is pretty much the most important factor in WoW performance.

And I'm sure making it be able to take advantage of multiple cores would be like a rewrite of the entire game, yes?

Exactly! My brother just bought a new computer, i7 SLI Nvidia 200 series(Not too sure on the particular card) and he was wondering why his FPS sucked compared to my Wolfdale and 9800gt.

It's all about the Pentiums baby....Wait, wrong time period.

They'd have to rewrite a bunch of crap in the game engine, but not a total rewrite. I'd imagine by the next expansion pack(if there is one) they'll do something in regards to CPU usage and SLI/Crossfire.

Even though WoW is getting dated, there is still a huge player base. So it would seem logical for them to listen to players with new systems. Since technology is evolving they should also renovate their product to comply with new standards.

But by then Starcraft II, Diablo III and their new MMORPG might be out :O

Would require a significant refactoring of their engine, yes. It probably wouldn't be worth the expense in the end.

Nah, they had plenty of time to do that for 3.0/Wrath, and all they did was implement shader-based dynamic shadows on top of their already ancient rendering engine. Yay, another feature that I won't use because I want good framerates in cities and raids.

Nah, it's not cost-effective. They already have a huge player base for now, and noone else has been able to suck people away with newer engines because the games just aren't as fun and/or polished. They're banking on their new MMO coming out before any serious competitors can enter the field, and they'll probably build that new MMO from the ground up to take advantage of more modern hardware.

Still, keep in mind that Blizzard is smart enough to know that they have to make the game downscale to mediocre hardware in order to maximize their potential player base. This means that their next MMO probably won't be World of Crysiscraft even if it does scale better on multi-core / multi-GPU setups.