how do I optimize my PC for gaming?

[BDani]

I just installed Watch Dogs and I use low resolution, the lowest options for graphic quality and yet still my screen freezes every 10 seconds for a couple seconds.

I have an Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz
and a GeForce GTX 560 Ti

I've had similar problems with the latest games such as AC Black Flag, Crysis 3, etc...
I'm not asking for ways to run the games at max quality, I just want to play them smoothly, even if its low graphics.

 

[badger906]

in short.. you cant. your cpu is rather old and not powerful enough to handle the games.

for games you want a quad core processor, most games have highly compressed audio that is often assigned to one core, you only have 2, which leaves you with one under powered core to do the rest.

your best option without spending loads is to buy a core 2 quad Q9650. it uses the same lga 775 socket as yours, and should be supported by most mobos, without knowing yours I cant say, but a quick google and maybe a bios update later and youll be set.

these go for about £100/$100. it will dramatically improve your gamimg capabilities.. but dont expect ultra settings.

 

[LuzTeTT]

These new games are written for modern hardware. Whether your hardware is the most powerful of its generation or it is super overclocked or what ever is not going to help you because it is all sorely out of date.
Still, to freeze every ten seconds as if intermittently sounds like a software issue somewhere.
Do not spend money on this computer. If you find a cheap (as in, $5) QX9650 or something then get it and see if that helps but then you risk blowing more money anyway because LGA 775 was not designed to be tampered with after all of these years. The plastic pins might break. Your heatsink might break. Socket pins might bend.

I would suggest getting another HDD of any sort and installing Windows XP or Windows 8 with some base gaming drivers on it just to launch your games on that fresh installation and see if you're still having that every ten second problem then. If so, then you know it isn't old hardware related for sure.
I don't think freezing every ten seconds is normal even for old hardware that is out of date.

 

[badger906]

the freezing is perfectly normal, its affectively buffered. the game loads a small amount which is playable, then the workload to render the next part is put upon the cpu to which it craps a brick, loads a bit more ect ect.

old hardware will play new games, theres just the limit of how quickly it will do so.. in this case very very slowly.

a q9650 will play modern games, so the op wouldnt be wasting money, it will still standup to games at reasonable settings and frame rates.

 

[LuzTeTT]

the freezing is perfectly normal, its affectively buffered. the game loads a small amount which is playable, then the workload to render the next part is put upon the cpu to which it craps a brick, loads a bit more ect ect.

old hardware will play new games, theres just the limit of how quickly it will do so.. in this case very very slowly.

a q9650 will play modern games, so the op wouldnt be wasting money, it will still standup to games at reasonable settings and frame rates.

But for two seconds every ten seconds at regular intervals across multiple different software titles?

 

[badger906]

lol I think the OP was generalising on the lagging not saying it was identical to the second on all titles

 

[LuzTeTT]

lol I think the OP was generalising on the lagging not saying it was identical to the second on all titles

I hope so. That's pretty scary stuff. I still think spending money that could be better spent on groceries or your children on an ancient temperamental CPU for lackluster gaming is not worth it.

 

[AstaLaVista]

Have you seen the requirements for WatchDogs? add that to the shoddy and unoptimized state of the game and you have a recipe for disaster. I hate to say it but you need to update your rig or play older games that don't put a heavy strain on the pc... Crisis 3 is a heavy hitter as well.

Perhaps Call of Duty or Medal of Honor is more your style of play with the rig you have at the moment.

 

[badger906]

yeah I just looked and the recommended cpu for watchdogs is a core i7 =/ that means its a hugely cpu intensive game! seeings as the i7 has 4 physical and 4 logical cores..

 

[Boozad]

I'm running it fine on an i5-4670k at stock. If games at the moment really needed hyper threading then the developers would be cutting off half of their income straight away.

That being said, the OP shouldn't consider buying Watch Dogs for his PC as there are plenty of still frames already available online, why pay for them?

 

[badger906]

yeah I dont think it does need it, but its what they recommend. no game is truely optimised for even quad cores yet. bring on directx 12 for us nvidia owners! unless mantle goes cross card brand!!

op look at titanfall if you want a fairly decent modern game. the requirements are very low! then again even on max setting it still looks rubbish lol

 

[AstaLaVista]

Have you guys peruse the ubi watchdogs forum? it is full of complaints... from not being able to install to stutters, lags, freezes and the likes.

All points to normal ubi's ways of doing business but the most interesting part is that it seems the game is another bad coded port to pc... even though they claimed it would be done on a PC and then ported, hence, the heavy requirements.

I gotta say, it speaks volumes the amount of sheep out there buying games sight unseen just because they saw a trailer and it looked awesome!

 

[M1GU31]

Would need to upgrade that cpu also watch dogs is unoptimized just google it, ppl with high end rigs are getting stuttering and at 40 fps.

EDIT:

Have you guys peruse the ubi watchdogs forum? it is full of complaints... from not being able to install to stutters, lags, freezes and the likes.

All points to normal ubi's ways of doing business but the most interesting part is that it seems the game is another bad coded port to pc... even though they claimed it would be done on a PC and then ported, hence, the heavy requirements.

I gotta say, it speaks volumes the amount of sheep out there buying games sight unseen just because they saw a trailer and it looked awesome!

Yea and not to mention it looks nothing like in the E3, they totally downgraded and released is with problems which is going to need major patching, hell even that may not even fully fix it.

 

[Alex1986]

Have you guys peruse the ubi watchdogs forum? it is full of complaints... from not being able to install to stutters, lags, freezes and the likes.

All points to normal ubi's ways of doing business but the most interesting part is that it seems the game is another bad coded port to pc... even though they claimed it would be done on a PC and then ported, hence, the heavy requirements.

I gotta say, it speaks volumes the amount of sheep out there buying games sight unseen just because they saw a trailer and it looked awesome!

Hm basicly it dosen't matter what PC you have if they don't optimise their games.

I finished Watch Dogs at low-med settings and it's poor game not worth 60$...

I even added another 4gb ram it helped with shuttering(not lag) so i was able to play it fine but it was still ood thing to save-quit after 1-2 hours memory leak or something.

Basicly the physics,ai,graphics everything is worse than in gta4,sleeping dogs or any other game from 2012-2014 no joke...

Im suprised people with 8 cores,16gb ram and titan cards with 3gb ram got problem to run this in ultra.

Also game got minimum 6gb ram required and yet with 8gb it never did use more than 4.5gb and funniest was message while gaming i was running low on ram while still had 3.5gb left

So all the hardware in ps4,xboxone is just for lazy developers so they don't have to optimise their games so my advice don't buy from ubisoft and support companies like Paradox they make wonderfull strategy games and optimise them.

So if that's what next-gen is about i think gaming is dead...

Edit:

@BDani use gamebooster and in nvidia pick every option to max preformance.

Insted of crapy Watch Dogs effects disable them all and use for example SweetFX.

Too put it simply Watch Dogs is not optimised at all.

Oh and impotant if you have 1-2gb vram on gfx use medium textures(lowest settings) if you have 3gb use high settings(medium) and for highest you need more than 3gb vram no idea if there is even such card...

 

[Boozad]

I'm running Watch Dogs at ultra on a single reference 780 and apart from a bit of stutter when I'm driving it's fine. The 770 has a 4GB version and the 780 has a 6GB version, Titans have 6GB upwards depending on which version you buy, and some Radeon cards have more than 3GB I'm sure. So yes there are cards that have more than 3GB VRAM but Watch Dogs doesn't need it for highest settings.

 

[Alex1986]

I'm running Watch Dogs at ultra on a single reference 780 and apart from a bit of stutter when I'm driving it's fine. The 770 has a 4GB version and the 780 has a 6GB version, Titans have 6GB upwards depending on which version you buy, and some Radeon cards have more than 3GB I'm sure. So yes there are cards that have more than 3GB VRAM but Watch Dogs doesn't need it for highest settings.

NO and NO.

First of all if you get shutter it's still not fine...tip from me restart game once it starts to shutter it's prodobly memory leak helped me a least...

Secound there is no card with more than 3gb vram even with sli you got only 3gb becouse card needs to mirror information so you still get 3gb...

Third you think game is running fine when it's not look at ubi forums people with a lot better rigs got problems and your running this game fine on Ultra

Also it's suppose to use minimal 6gb ram when it's not going over 4.5GB but only 2.6GB was Watch Dogs...

It's not optimised can't you understand that?

Edit: I guess there is no point in argue about this **** game they made promises and they diden't deliver simple right? i did get from friend a copy of Sleeping Dogs and it's better in every way even has better Ai so question is where is this all hardware power going? answer is simple developers are lazy.

 

[Boozad]

NO and NO.

Wrong and wrong.

First of all if you get shutter it's still not fine...tip from me restart game once it starts to shutter it's prodobly memory leak helped me a least...

It started stuttering after I'd turned everything up to ultra, it was fine with three or four settings on high instead.

Secound there is no card with more than 3gb vram even with sli you got only 3gb becouse card needs to mirror information so you still get 3gb...

GTX 780 6GB
770 4GB
Titan 6GB
Titan 12GB

Third you think game is running fine when it's not look at ubi forums people with a lot better rigs got problems and your running this game fine on Ultra

If I can be bothered I'll ShadowPlay it. I'm not really bothered if you believe me or not to be honest.

Also it's suppose to use minimal 6gb ram when it's not going over 4.5GB but only 2.6GB was Watch Dogs...

And? That's a bonus isn't it?

It's not optimised can't you understand that?

Yes I can. I have read people are having trouble with it, I'm not saying they're not. I'm saying I'm not. I never said that because I'm getting decent performance 'it's fine' either so please don't put words in my mouth. This isn't the Battlefield forum.

 

[Alex1986]

OK i was wrong about gfx with more than 3GB vram.

EDIT: Ok i cheaked my shop and i only see 3gb vram cards so there are no better cards at the market atm so i was not wrong still buying this for 1 game is a joke 3gb vram should be for multi monitor setup right?

And? That's a bonus isn't it?

NOPE.

Earlier i was running it with 4GB ram it was unplayable so? why if it's not even using 3gb of ram and adding another 4gb that's never used removes shuttering? it's like a big virus to slow down your PC.

In my opinion they did this to PC version so people buy new cpu,more ram and better gfx. Intel,Nvidia,Amd guys bribed them.

 

[AstaLaVista]

I give this game 3 to 5 patches at the most and more than likely, like they always do, they will not fix all of their problems and even ruin other things that were working fine... Ever since 2005 with Vegas and GRAW UBI has gone down the tubes... Huge potential game, lazy and greed for money has stop them from accomplishing that potential.

Now, being said that, on this day and age, with technology at your finger tips, why people are getting bamboozled into buying things sight unseen is beyond my comprehension so I must admit that if you are constantly nagging about this type of games, you must not care about loosing your money all that much

 

[Alex1986]

I give this game 3 to 5 patches at the most and more than likely, like they always do, they will not fix all of their problems and even ruin other things that were working fine... Ever since 2005 with Vegas and GRAW UBI has gone down the tubes... Huge potential game, lazy and greed for money has stop them from accomplishing that potential.

Finished WD yesterday and hit uninstall button...so i really don't care if they fix it in 3 to 5 patches that might never happen...

Also you can't fix something that's fundamentaly broken i doubt ubi will update engine to at least gta4 level...

This is what i mean https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGRsrFdwb2c

Also there are no reflections in windows and when you shoot water there are no ripples...

Ok found videos of those...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COJ3QdMXWsw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xqw86y3Y03Y

How can you fix this if whole game is broken?

ALL HAIL NEXT GEN