Supreme Commander benchmarks

Hans Maulwurf

Junior Member
Nov 14, 2004
4
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0
Hi,

dont know if this should be posted in the software forum, but I will try it here first. Probably some of you have already heard of the recently released successor to Total Annihilation called Supreme Commander. Unfortunately hardware requirements seem to be enormous and many players will have to buy new hardware, including me.

As with many RTS games lack of benchmarks is a big problem. I would like to get Anand or another capable person to bench it intensively. There are so many different scenarios (map size, number of units/players, AI-players) that would make benching so much more interesting than benching another FPS (not that I didnt like FPSs). SC is computed as a simulation, that means your rockets flight to the plane is simulated and doesnt depend on a probability table, if you know what I mean.

The game seems to require a good graphics card(even at low details) and 1 or 2 GB of RAM, surely depending heavily on number of players/units and map size. Is also demand a fast CPU and it looks like it runs like crap on about every single core CPU in the late game. It is said to be a really multithreaded approach from scratch and seems to scale with quad core as well. So it is not only interesting to compare AMD/Intel and ATI(oh, sorry, AMD :D )/Nvidia but also core scaling among different architectures. As dual monitor is supported as well I could also imagine it scales different from other apps with Crossfire/SLI, but honestly I dont know if cards are dedicated to monitors in this case.

So how can I get Anand or one of his guys to bench it intensively and how could be benched? Im interested both from a hardware fanatics and a gamers perspective.

Any comments xept "piss off" and so are welcome :)
 

Bateluer

Lifer
Jun 23, 2001
27,730
8
0
SupCom didn't seem that demanding to me. I was running it at 1680x1050 with all the settings maxed, and it ran smoothly.

This was on an E6600, 2GB RAM, and a X1900XT, with stock clocks.
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
135
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Ive spoken with chris taylor (my gaming hero :D ) a couple of times about the game, i was on the beta from October 6th. the game doesn't require high end graphics cards as much as it requires CPU cycles. if your not on a mid to high end dual core, you may have a little trouble after about 45 minutes.

The game basically is designed ahead of its time, much like total annihilation was which sported the first in game physics and polygon based graphics ever used. its a game to grow in to. :)

personally im running 1 x 19" TFT 1 x 17" TFT on X1900XT 512mb
2 gig corsair XMS
AMD opteron 170 dual core at 2.9Ghz per core

it does slow down a little at around 1hour 20 minutes but its barely noticeable thankfully, in the early beta you were lucky to get past 25 minutes before it slowed to 5 frames a second :)
 

Lonyo

Lifer
Aug 10, 2002
21,938
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I would second the dual core requirement.
My single core struggles from the very start with an 8 player AI skirmish, and doesn't like 1 vs 1 skirmish after around an hour.

RAM wise it doesn't seem that hungry actually. Not early on at least.
 

Hans Maulwurf

Junior Member
Nov 14, 2004
4
0
0
Oh, sorry, I forgot to say that my rig is:

A64 3000@2.5 GHz
GeForce 6600@a bit more than 6600GT (Is it a problem that my video RAM is only 128 MB?)
1 GB RAM

The demo ran quite crappy after some time(maybe 300 units) especially when attacking the enemy base with all units. Even at low setting. Some 5 fps with high detail and without AA.

I guess my problem is single core and probably graphics. But how much RAM would I need to play with 6 Players on a LAN or to play only 2 vs. 2 against AI?I would love benches of different scenarios.so much.
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
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if your systems not too cluttered with background applications you can run supcom on a gig, but your cpu is whats stopping you so you have 2 options,

1, overclock your current CPU, if its a venice core then it will do 2.7 Ghz with the right air cooler, 3Ghz on water cooling.

2, buy an X2 4200+ and a zalman cooler from ebay for $179 with free postage

http://cgi.ebay.com/AMD-64-X2-4200-2-2-...19QQcategoryZ80139QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

or you can get an X2 4400+ bare CPU from newegg.com for $179 with free postage.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103045

or if your boards really good at overclocking, you can get an opteron 165 with opteron cooler for $179 from newegg, provided your board clocks well, you should see 2.7 to 2.8Ghz per core from it with the air cooler thats provided.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103588


my friend is playing supcom on his pc with the same graphics card as you, so long as your not looking for uber quality graphics (i.e. MEDIUM DETAIL, not high!! ) youl get away with it.

p.s. ive taken the liberty of presuming your American, im a brit myself but its my business to know who is selling what and for how much in the American pc parts market, i promise those links are the cheapest you can find :)
 

chizow

Diamond Member
Jun 26, 2001
9,537
2
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I ran the demo with everything maxed out and 4x AA @ 1920x1200 and got smooth frames with the rig in my sig. I didn't have Fraps running to check frame rate, but I did have RivaTuner open and found the game doesn't use much video memory, like 120-180MB max.

It does appear to be pretty poly/shader intensive though and in many early reviews and user posts brought some systems to their knees. One review clearly stated it doesn't seem too CPU intensive but I've found that a beefy CPU always helps in RTS games for AI and positional calculations.

Take everything I've said with a grain of salt though, from what I've heard the retail/online battles in Supreme Commander can get insane with exponentially more units on screen at once compared to anything you'd see in the demo. Can't tell how well it scales but I've heard it can get pretty ugly for even top of the line rigs. I won't be buying this game though, sounds like a massive Zergfest at its "best"
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
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Originally posted by: chizow


It does appear to be pretty poly/shader intensive though and in many early reviews and user posts brought some systems to their knees. One review clearly stated it doesn't seem too CPU intensive but I've found that a beefy CPU always helps in RTS games for AI and positional calculations.

whoever wrote that review you read clearly had nothing to do with the supcom beta otherwise he/she would of known the background behind the games construction. Supcom puts the REAL into real time strategy, everything you see on that screen is being calculated in real time, resources, trajectory's, movements, command orders, physics, shading, everything. Its never been done before. Hence your CPU is your most important factor with ram and graphics second.


Originally posted by: chizow
I won't be buying this game though, sounds like a massive Zergfest at its "best"

then due to that lack of foresight youl be missing out on a game that was built with future gaming in mind and a game that will eventually be known as the game that redefined the RTS genre, just like Total Annihilation did ten years ago when I was 14 :)

Suffice to say ive been waiting a long time for this.
 

chizow

Diamond Member
Jun 26, 2001
9,537
2
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Originally posted by: locutus12
Originally posted by: chizow


It does appear to be pretty poly/shader intensive though and in many early reviews and user posts brought some systems to their knees. One review clearly stated it doesn't seem too CPU intensive but I've found that a beefy CPU always helps in RTS games for AI and positional calculations.

whoever wrote that review you read clearly had nothing to do with the supcom beta otherwise he/she would of known the background behind the games construction. Supcom puts the REAL into real time strategy, everything you see on that screen is being calculated in real time, resources, trajectory's, movements, command orders, physics, shading, everything. Its never been done before. Hence your CPU is your most important factor with ram and graphics second.

Ya I didn't put too much stock into it. I doubt that review compared performance at different CPU speeds and the reviewer (like so many others) was just taking the power of the latest multi core CPUs for granted. After about 10 minutes I was impressed by the game's engine, that reviewer was probably used to the GPU being the bottleneck in gaming performance and drew the conclusion because the QX6700 wasn't breaking a sweat. :roll:

 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
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Originally posted by: chizow
I won't be buying this game though, sounds like a massive Zergfest at its "best"

well im glad you realise that about the review but id like to point out that due to the lack of foresight in the quote youl be missing out on a game that was built with future gaming in mind and a game that will eventually be known as the game that redefined the RTS genre, just like Total Annihilation did ten years ago when I was 14 :)

Suffice to say ive been waiting a long time for this.

 

chizow

Diamond Member
Jun 26, 2001
9,537
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Originally posted by: locutus12

Originally posted by: chizow
I won't be buying this game though, sounds like a massive Zergfest at its "best"

well im glad you realise that about the review but id like to point out that due to the lack of foresight in the quote youl be missing out on a game that was built with future gaming in mind and a game that will eventually be known as the game that redefined the RTS genre, just like Total Annihilation did ten years ago when I was 14 :)

Suffice to say ive been waiting a long time for this.

Oh, the review didn't have an impact on my decision to play the game. I don't have too much interest in RTS right now anyways, but the ones that interest me more or smaller scale "squad-based" games that focus on micro management of few units rather than large scale "zerg-based" games that focus on macro management of lots of units.

I might be totally wrong about SupCom but the units in the demo seemed to drop like flies even at Tier 2 and Turtling with Cerb Cannons would be like /godmodeturnon11one11!!one.
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
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there are ways around every defence :) and if you cant find one you can always drop a nuke on it and obliterate half a continent.
 

Ichigo

Platinum Member
Sep 1, 2005
2,158
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There's a built in benchmark, at least for the retail game. Something along the lines of adding /perftest to the command line. You get total framerate and a couple of numbers, which approximately correlate to:

~25: Near flawless.
~75: More than playable.
~125: Playable if you don't mind drops to maybe 10fps during huge battles.

Something like that.
 

Hans Maulwurf

Junior Member
Nov 14, 2004
4
0
0
thanks for the infos.

locutus, Im from Germany. My system is already overclocked to 2.5 GHz and I cannot get higher without making my PC noisier. Its unhearable at the moment and should stay so.

Very interesting to hear your friend plays with a 6600gt. For me that means its alost only the CPU thats holding me back. And not because of its frequency, but because of single core.
A friend of mine played the demo(with a better graphics card) with everything maxed out and it ran smoothly on a non-overclocked(!) X2 3800+. He also has only 1 GB RAM.

I dont know of any other game that runs so much better on on a dual core 2 GHz than on a single core 2.5 GHz. Maybe they just didnt want to write dual core as recommended system requirements...

Although I would never buy a P4 or PD I am curious about their performance in this context. PD as a dual core solution that usually sucks(sorry) in gaming and a P4 with one physical and two logical CPUs. Does anyone have the possibility to test this or has anyone done so?
 

Roguestar

Diamond Member
Aug 29, 2006
6,045
0
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Originally posted by: locutus12
Ive spoken with chris taylor (my gaming hero :D ) a couple of times about the game, i was on the beta from October 6th. the game doesn't require high end graphics cards as much as it requires CPU cycles. if your not on a mid to high end dual core, you may have a little trouble after about 45 minutes.

The game basically is designed ahead of its time, much like total annihilation was which sported the first in game physics and polygon based graphics ever used. its a game to grow in to. :)

personally im running 1 x 19" TFT 1 x 17" TFT on X1900XT 512mb
2 gig corsair XMS
AMD opteron 170 dual core at 2.9Ghz per core

it does slow down a little at around 1hour 20 minutes but its barely noticeable thankfully, in the early beta you were lucky to get past 25 minutes before it slowed to 5 frames a second :)

Choo choo, imma derail here:

do you use your dual monitor setup to display the game on both, or game on one and desktop/apps on another? Is that easy enough to pull off? Does it know to just fullscreen one monitor and leave your desktop alone in the other one?

/derail
 

bl4ckfl4g

Diamond Member
Feb 13, 2007
3,669
0
0
I keep reading the same thing over and over on the SupCom boards relating to performance. If you turn the sound off, at least for most people, your performance will almost double.

Not true for everyones rig but it seems to be working for alot of people.
 

Lonyo

Lifer
Aug 10, 2002
21,938
6
81
Originally posted by: Roguestar
Originally posted by: locutus12
Ive spoken with chris taylor (my gaming hero :D ) a couple of times about the game, i was on the beta from October 6th. the game doesn't require high end graphics cards as much as it requires CPU cycles. if your not on a mid to high end dual core, you may have a little trouble after about 45 minutes.

The game basically is designed ahead of its time, much like total annihilation was which sported the first in game physics and polygon based graphics ever used. its a game to grow in to. :)

personally im running 1 x 19" TFT 1 x 17" TFT on X1900XT 512mb
2 gig corsair XMS
AMD opteron 170 dual core at 2.9Ghz per core

it does slow down a little at around 1hour 20 minutes but its barely noticeable thankfully, in the early beta you were lucky to get past 25 minutes before it slowed to 5 frames a second :)

Choo choo, imma derail here:

do you use your dual monitor setup to display the game on both, or game on one and desktop/apps on another? Is that easy enough to pull off? Does it know to just fullscreen one monitor and leave your desktop alone in the other one?

/derail

You can do either.
By default it will just use your primary monitor and leave your secondary as the desktop, but in-game there is an option to select the resolution and refresh rate for each monitor as you want, or you can leave the second disabled.
It's pretty easy to fiddle about with.
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
135
0
0
Originally posted by: Roguestar


Choo choo, imma derail here:

do you use your dual monitor setup to display the game on both, or game on one and desktop/apps on another? Is that easy enough to pull off? Does it know to just fullscreen one monitor and leave your desktop alone in the other one?

/derail

i use dual display for supcom, 1 screen for zoomed out radar, the other for zoomed in on the area im working with, i also use the second screen to watch out for flash points and skirmishes.

if you have dual screen and just want to use 1 screen in the game you can set this in the video options, it will then close the boarder of that 1 screen and leave your desktop displayed on the other. :)
 

Raduque

Lifer
Aug 22, 2004
13,140
138
106
As others have mentioned here, Supcom is really dual-core happy. I played the demo and had probably ~350 of my own units on screen at once, plus the enemies units and encountered no slowdown at all. E6300 @ 2.8, 1gb ddr2-800 7900gs

Originally posted by: locutus12

Originally posted by: chizow
I won't be buying this game though, sounds like a massive Zergfest at its "best"

then due to that lack of foresight youl be missing out on a game that was built with future gaming in mind and a game that will eventually be known as the game that redefined the RTS genre, just like Total Annihilation did ten years ago when I was 14 :)

Suffice to say ive been waiting a long time for this.

Me too. TA:K was a poor substitute.
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
135
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0
Originally posted by: Raduque


Me too. TA:K was a poor substitute.


i presume on the day they made that, and i do mean day as thats probably all the time that was spent on it, they were on drugs, or drink, or both.

but TA:K was never intended as a sequal, just a different line in the series. TA2 was promised in 1999, but cavedog were bought out by infograme who licensed TA2 developement to phantagram who went bust, infograme were then bought by Atari and the project was shelved, officially Atari own the rights to TA and TA2, and they wouldnt come to a suitable deal with gas powerd games.

think of Supreme commander as a prequal to TA and it fits for the most part. Cybran = Core, UEF = ARM, Aeon = chris taylors wet dream.
 

Roguestar

Diamond Member
Aug 29, 2006
6,045
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Originally posted by: Lonyo
You can do either.
By default it will just use your primary monitor and leave your secondary as the desktop, but in-game there is an option to select the resolution and refresh rate for each monitor as you want, or you can leave the second disabled.
It's pretty easy to fiddle about with.

Originally posted by: locutus12
i use dual display for supcom, 1 screen for zoomed out radar, the other for zoomed in on the area im working with, i also use the second screen to watch out for flash points and skirmishes.

if you have dual screen and just want to use 1 screen in the game you can set this in the video options, it will then close the boarder of that 1 screen and leave your desktop displayed on the other. :)

Thanks guys. My department in work was tossing out a bunch of 17" CRTs the other day and I was wondering exactly how it'd work. Dual-screen is just not something I've messed about with before, though it is vaguely tempting!
 

locutus12

Member
Oct 13, 2005
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Originally posted by: Lonyo
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=620&p=1

Basically towards the end of the game, 4GB RAM helps.
A fast Intel processor is almost necessary with any graphics card.
Graphics cards aren't all that important really.
Overclocking is good.



im sure you mean a fast processor, not a fast "intel" processor. Theres no reason for high end AMD owners to go throw there CPU`s away and turn to the devil incarnate just for an extra 4fps. also remember 4 gig helps "under Vista" youl find very little difference with 4 gig under XP due to a rather inefficient memory controller in the operating system.
 

Roguestar

Diamond Member
Aug 29, 2006
6,045
0
0
WHOA THERE

No need to wade in at the deep end handing out punches because Lonyo made the 'mistake' of associating intel with "fast processor". He's right that the Core 2 line are the current best desktop CPUs and as such will be less of a bottleneck for your graphics card if you've got an 8800GTX. No-one's saying that an AMD owner should throw away their perfectly good 4400+ X2 yet.
 

Lonyo

Lifer
Aug 10, 2002
21,938
6
81
Originally posted by: locutus12
Originally posted by: Lonyo
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=620&p=1

Basically towards the end of the game, 4GB RAM helps.
A fast Intel processor is almost necessary with any graphics card.
Graphics cards aren't all that important really.
Overclocking is good.



im sure you mean a fast processor, not a fast "intel" processor. Theres no reason for high end AMD owners to go throw there CPU`s away and turn to the devil incarnate just for an extra 4fps. also remember 4 gig helps "under Vista" youl find very little difference with 4 gig under XP due to a rather inefficient memory controller in the operating system.

A 2.66GHz Core 2 Duo gets about 30fps with low settings. Which is just playable.

In gaming performance (from the Anandtech 6000+ article), the 6000+ loses to the 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo.

You need a fast Intel processor because you need almost the fastest processors there are :p The fact is that even the top end AMD is slower for games than a more mid-range Intel proc, and a mid-range Intel proc struggles, thus you need a high end Intel processor for optimal play :p
Also, 4 fps in a game where you're struggling for 25 is quite a lot :p

A fast processor for this game is a fast Intel processor. An average processor for this game is a medium Intel or a fast AMD, and a bad processor is almost anything else :p


Woah, lots of :p's.
I am also currently running a 3200+ and my last 3 purchases of processors were AMD. I am saying that the numbers show you need a very fast processor for good performance, and AMD just doesn't have one at the moment. They are adequate, and I never said anyone should throw any processor away.