How much of a performance improvement?

[mazeroth]

I just installed the v1.01 patch with dual processor support for CoD2 and can't tell any difference. I have a stock Opteron 165 and stock eVGA 7800GT and run the game at 1280x960 with 2xAA and can't tell the difference. I saw the charts for Quake4 and it really only seemed to help at lower resolutions. Is this the same for CoD2? Any other comments?

Thanks!

 

[mazeroth]

Anyone?

 

[deadseasquirrel]

At this point, dual core makes little-to-no difference in games. That could change in the near future. AFAIK, Elder Scrolls Oblivion is pretty much the first game to come out that has dual core optimizations built-in (i.e. not added via patch later). One of the designers claimed that dual core does make a difference, but he does not know how much.

These days, with the recent releases like FEAR and COD2, we're seeing less and less CPU involvement in framerates. See here for COD2 and here for FEAR. They tested at 1024x768, which, in the past, was a resolution that showed CPU scaling. Well now, we can see that an FX-57 is no more a help in FEAR than a Celeron D.

There's plenty of other reasons to have a dual core chip these days, but, at this point, gaming isn't one of them (unless it's for the ability to multitask while gaming-- such as encoding a DVD at the same time). I eagerly await the release of Oblivion to see how much of an improvement dual core will show, as I myself would love a dual core chip, but can't justify it if it would only help me encode faster or allow me to encode while gaming. Not worth the $200 after I sell my chip. But if it helped in gaming too, I might be able to persuade myself it's worth it.

 

[Furen]

Have you checked your minimum frame rates? Quake 4 (I think, I dont play games myself so I dont have it) had huge minimum framerate improvements so it basically kept the video card running at its max all the time.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Yeah, Quake 4, according to Firing Squad, gets a nice 15%+ bump with the dual core patch available. I don't know if it's the min frames, max frames, or what... but average frames go up a good 30% for the 3800+ X2 and 17% for the 4800+ X2. These gains were at 1280x1024 with 4xAA. At 1600x1200, there was no gain whatsoever.

Mazeroth, if you have Quake 4, apply the dual core patch, and test at 1280x960-- you should notice some increases. However, on COD2, you will not see any.