will it be playable?

[nJett]

I've been looking for something new to play and hear a lot of good things about battlefield2 - the thing is I also here it's a total resource hog. Anyone know if it will be playable on my system?

AthlonXP 1700+ (oc'd to around 1900+ levels)
1gb RAM @ 415mhz
6600GT (stock speeds but I just got it, I'm sure I can OC it a good amount!)

Thanks in advance!

As a brief aside - it's damn hard to find AthlonXP's anymore - the few I can find available seem way overpriced too. I'm really regretting not buying a 2500-M back when they were $100 🙁

 

[Azndude2190]

On low...it should run.If you add another GB of RAM and upgrade your videocard you can play at max

 

[nJett]

I only have 3 slots and 2 are filled with 512mb sticks. I just got the video card too - so no changing it. I do really want to upgrade the CPU before AthlonXP's become even more difficult to find - would a 2900+ improve my lot significantly? (or would 512mb more ram be better?).

 

[gorcorps]

BF2 is a huge memory hog... I'd say go with the extra ram. Of course that processor is really old so that could help a lot too.

 

[ciproxr]

as far as his video card goes he can play bf2 with everything on high expept shadows and textures on medium, and u can have 2x AA on too......i dont know about the new patchs i heard those are what cause memory leaks but the first version which is what i play , 1 gb ram is more than enouph.

 

[biff 24 2000]

you should be able to play on medium to low settings with that setup, i think

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Originally posted by: ciproxr
i dont know about the new patchs i heard those are what cause memory leaks but the first version which is what i play , 1 gb ram is more than enouph.

1.01 caused massive memory leaks. This was true for only for the server. The client (read: what you have, the "game" itself) version of the game was unaffected.

This was fixed 1.02 has hasn't been a problem since.

Retail --> 1.01 --> 1.02 hotfix -- 1.03 --> (special forces) --> 1.12 --> 1.2 --> 1.21 hotfix (current)

As to the OP:

Yeah, that'll run it on low-medium details. More RAM would help more than anything.

I have a XP 2500+, 1GB, 9800 pro that runs everything medium( except dynamic light\shadows) @ 1600x1200, no AA

 

[duragezic]

I would estimate you could play smoothly enough at 1024x768 or a little higher with mid details. 1GB RAM won't be a problem for you as long as you shut down most running programs before you play. I played it smoothly enough (20-50fps) with a 3200+ XP, 1GB ram, and a 9800 Pro. 1GB is fine if you dont have a bunch of garbage running. For example, before I game, most of the time I only have Miranda open which only takes a few MB of RAM. No need for hard drive swapping to kill your play. Mostly your CPU is a bit slow but should be adequate around 1024x768. Start around there then tweak the settings (tweakguides.com) to find the graphics options that hardly make a visual difference but can help your framerates (in your case, definitely turn dynamic shadows and dynamics lights to low, keep the rest on medium to try out).

It won't be that pretty or that fast, but definitely playable. And you'll be more CPU limited at lower resolutions, so you might be able to enable a little more eyecandy for your graphics card to do the work but keep texture on medium to keep RAM usage down.

Also, may as well try to overclock that 6600GT. May as well get the extra speed to ensure it will look decent but play smoothly.



Also, if I don't sell my Barton XP mobile locally, I'll put it up on FS/FT if you're interested. I should know within a week. Its a 2400 mobile 45 W that I ran at 3200+ (but always ensured it had proper cooling) most of the time. I'm not sure on the price but I'm thinking $50-60 shipped.

 

[bob4432]

bf2 is a memory hog but you can do it fine with 1GB if you are running 1280x1024 or less pretty easy. read my bf2 ram usage guide in sig, it explains what setting to set to not go over 1GB total computer usage, and the rig i used to test it with idled @ 240MB. good luck and with the 6600gt you should be able to go 1024x768 and have decent fps.

 

[nJett]

Thanks for all the advice everyone, you guys are awesome.