Help with system requirements for new computer

[Cesartje]

I´ve been reading some posts saying that the system requirements at LL page being outdated, so I need help with that, since I plan to buy a new computer next week.

Wich are the system requirements to play second life in a nice decent way? Please help, the computer I am using might die at any moment

[bigmoe Whitfield]

16gb ram minimum,  980 GTX minimum (you can swap this with an amd gpu if your budget does not allow)   i7 5820k or better (or what ever amd has that will work)  and ssd 256/512gb

You just want to make sure you have enough for windows and SL to run at the same time and other tasks.  

[Odaks]

I've no idea what your budget will be, but, if you can afford it, definitely get an SSD to hold your operating system, programs and SL's caches, in addition to a standard type hard drive to hold all your other stuff. I got a noticeable improvement in performance that way.

Whatever GPU you get, think memory here, too. @bigmoe Whitfield's recommendation above is a pretty good start. If you are prepared to spend more, look for a better GPU with more onboard memory.

People never seem to realise how much memory gets mopped up by Windows 10 and other things that's nice to have running right from the start. Right now I have two instances of Chrome running and 7.1 GB of memory are being used! There won't be much left for things like SL if you've only got 8 GB installed, so think 16 GB as a good start.

I've also found that buying off-the-shelf "gaming" computers, which is where you'll find the sort of specs you're looking for, will often have a lot of unwanted features (that you'll be paying for) like colour-changing keyboards, selectable case-lighting etc, often at the expense of better hardware. Have a look at the specialist pc dealers who will build a computer to exactly your specs - or, even cheaper, maybe put one together yourself?

 

Edited February 14, 2020 by Odaks

[cheesecurd]

40 minutes ago, bigmoe Whitfield said:

16gb ram minimum,  980 GTX minimum (you can swap this with an amd gpu if your budget does not allow)   i7 5820k or better (or what ever amd has that will work)  and ssd 256/512gb

You just want to make sure you have enough for windows and SL to run at the same time and other tasks.  

This isn’t much better than the SL system requirements page, pardon my sounding like a ***** about it.

16gb of ram is not a minimum by any means. A GTX 980 is now 3 generations out of date and isn’t sold new anymore.

Broadwell extreme editions? im just gonna leave it at that on the 5820k

As for @Cesartje, this really depends on what your budget is and what kind of performance you want.

Because if you’re destitute broke and don’t care about having over 20fps, a 9 year old budget laptop will play SL. But there are a few stepping stones for modern PC builds and part combinations that fit some good general needs at each budget level.

Playable performance wouldn’t require too much, any current gen entry level cpu, ideally 4 core 8 thread or higher, 8-16gb of 3000mhz+ ddr4 ideally but 2666mhz is fine. A GTX 1650 or Radeon 5500xt are nice current entry level gpu options.

Something like a Ryzen 3 3200G with 8gb of 3000mhz ddr4, a decent AM4 B450 motherboard, Radeon 5500XT, an NVMe SSD over a sata one, would make for a pretty good system that would play SL without issue. Look for something along those lines

[cheesecurd]

And if you want it simple, look for any prebuilts from the big names with an i5 9400 and some form of Nvidia GTX 1650. There’s lots of those out there and they’ll accomplish the same goal.

Dell has a bunch of those in the Inspiron gaming line.

[Cesartje]

Thanks guys -  i wrote down the suggestions, on monday I go to the store with a good idea on what to get. ♥ 

I will build around your suggestions and my budget, that is like a medium budget.

[bigmoe Whitfield]

I recommended what could be easily affordable,  I know some of the thigns are a few generations old, but I have no issues with any games or SL.  

[cheesecurd]

7 hours ago, bigmoe Whitfield said:

I recommended what could be easily affordable,  I know some of the thigns are a few generations old, but I have no issues with any games or SL.  

Affordable isn’t always the best choice. Haswell E (pardon my mistake, I keep forgetting broadwell was slightly later) is about 6 years old now and the 5820k being 6c/12t is beat in every real world performance test and synthetic benchmark by the 2nd gen Ryzen 5 2600, which you can get for about 100-120$ brand new. 
Versus buying used LGA 2011v3 stuff, x99 motherboards are extremely expensive unless you’re buying recycled/rebuilt chinese options off of aliexpress and even then you should be buying a compatible Xeon since they’re way cheaper. But then you have a dead end platform that can’t go anywhere, there’s no upgrade path at all.

980 = 1070 = 2060 super, give or take a little bit in favor of the newer cards, I think the 980ti is actually closer to a 1070, but regardless, the performance would be good but maybe not needed, a 2060 super Is definitely a good choice if you’re running 1440p+ but SL will play fine with lower end Gpus 

[Qie Niangao]

On 2/14/2020 at 11:26 AM, cheesecurd said:

ideally 4 core 8 thread or higher

Why? When is hypertheading useful other than for heavily multithreaded applications (which SL certainly isn't)? Maybe for running some graphics creation or 3D modelling programs? Some of those processes can be painfully time consuming, although I don't know how parallelized they are.

[Qie Niangao]

[grr. Duplicate post]

Edited February 16, 2020 by Qie Niangao
duplicate

[Jackson Redstar]

Nvidea for the GPU. Make that a must

[bigmoe Whitfield]

2 hours ago, cheesecurd said:

Affordable isn’t always the best choice. Haswell E (pardon my mistake, I keep forgetting broadwell was slightly later) is about 6 years old now and the 5820k being 6c/12t is beat in every real world performance test and synthetic benchmark by the 2nd gen Ryzen 5 2600, which you can get for about 100-120$ brand new. 
Versus buying used LGA 2011v3 stuff, x99 motherboards are extremely expensive unless you’re buying recycled/rebuilt chinese options off of aliexpress and even then you should be buying a compatible Xeon since they’re way cheaper. But then you have a dead end platform that can’t go anywhere, there’s no upgrade path at all.

980 = 1070 = 2060 super, give or take a little bit in favor of the newer cards, I think the 980ti is actually closer to a 1070, but regardless, the performance would be good but maybe not needed, a 2060 super Is definitely a good choice if you’re running 1440p+ but SL will play fine with lower end Gpus 

 

I have zero problems and cpu never breaks 31c under load either.   I wish windows would stop saying it was at stock clock, it's not.

 

 

 

okay I'm done lol,  but just saying what I build has no issues, I know others will not be able to afford most of it, but just throwing out what I did to just get SL to be playable and this thing plays every AAA game without issue.  

[cheesecurd]

1 hour ago, Qie Niangao said:

Why? When is hypertheading useful other than for heavily multithreaded applications (which SL certainly isn't)? Maybe for running some graphics creation or 3D modelling programs? Some of those processes can be painfully time consuming, although I don't know how parallelized they are.

It’s a generalization to keep people from buying overall lower performance parts. Quadcores are entry level now, the above mentioned Ryzen 5 2600 is a generation old (almost two whenever the rest of 4th gen drops), it’s a 120$ processor and it’s 6c/12t

If you’re buying anything under 4c/8t that means very low end hardware now, because while a 9th gen Intel i3 or Ryzen 3 1200/2200g will be fine, below that comes 2c/4 stuff like the current athlon APU lines, Pentiums and celerons. They’re just not ideal from a price to performance perspective. I think the cheapest AM4 processor new is a 2c/2t athlon and it’s like 60$ or something? But why get that when for double the price you get more than 3x the raw specs out of a Ryzen 5 chip, and drastically better performance to match.

SL may not use a lot of cores/threads at all, but the single core performance of a 2c/2t option will be dwarfed by the 6c/12t options or even the mentioned 4c/8t entry level stuff from Intel.

The rest of the gaming world utilizes more cores better anyway and it would be a better idea to have and not 100% need than to need and not have.

7 minutes ago, bigmoe Whitfield said:

I have zero problems and cpu never breaks 31c under load either.   I wish windows would stop saying it was at stock clock, it's not.

okay I'm done lol,  but just saying what I build has no issues, I know others will not be able to afford most of it, but just throwing out what I did to just get SL to be playable and this thing plays every AAA game without issue.  

 

My apologies for coming off the way I did. What I mean is the era is not ideal to buy on recommendation, the performance 100% is worth it.

As I’ve said, the modern equivalent to your build is a Ryzen 5 2600/3600 and an RTX 2060 super. That would be a good choice.

Buying back into Haswell e and Maxwell would get you similar performance but you lose any upgrade path, slower DDR4, and at an overall much higher power consumption. Along with just having to buy these old parts which can be expensive for what they are.

You could buy a system with your specs for sure still, and it would perform great, but it would be power hungry, limited to 2133 (and I think 2400mhz ddr4) instead of 3200mhz+, and lose out on things like proper NVMe drive controllers. And above all, when it starts to get slow you can swap you r5 2600 for an R7 3700 or r9 3900, with Haswell e your options are used xeons that aren’t as much of a jump in performance.

[Lillith Hapmouche]

This will be a disaster.

[Qie Niangao]

1 hour ago, cheesecurd said:

It’s a generalization to keep people from buying overall lower performance parts. Quadcores are entry level now, the above mentioned Ryzen 5 2600 is a generation old (almost two whenever the rest of 4th gen drops), it’s a 120$ processor and it’s 6c/12t ...

Yeah, I see what you mean. I haven't shopped for a CPU for years but have been vaguely thinking about it, so I poked around newegg just now. Found it pretty surprising how expensive i5s are these days, and surprised they've moved to 6 cores. The best deal I found for a reasonably modern Intel was an i3-9100F (at 45% off), but it's not really that much faster than the ancient i5 I have now.

Because SL is really the only performance-intensive thing I do on my desktop often enough to matter, I've always been shy of benchmarks that depend on multi-threaded performance, and especially hyper-threaded CPUs, but it does seem as if they sorta throw them in for free these days.

[cheesecurd]

3 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

Yeah, I see what you mean. I haven't shopped for a CPU for years but have been vaguely thinking about it, so I poked around newegg just now. Found it pretty surprising how expensive i5s are these days, and surprised they've moved to 6 cores. The best deal I found for a reasonably modern Intel was an i3-9100F (at 45% off), but it's not really that much faster than the ancient i5 I have now.

Because SL is really the only performance-intensive thing I do on my desktop often enough to matter, I've always been shy of benchmarks that depend on multi-threaded performance, and especially hyper-threaded CPUs, but it does seem as if they sorta throw them in for free these days.

It’s kinda impressive how far cpu tech jumped in the last few years.

Consider bigmoes i7 5820k was about 400$ in 2014, and an x99 motherboard was another 150-200$. And that was an HEDT platform, the start of the very top end for Intel.

Now the same performance comes from a 120$ Ryzen 5 and maybe 60-70$ B450 motherboard.

Pretty cool, after AMD started being actually competitive again Intel stopped making 4c/8t i7’s the consumer high end and started with the higher core counts on 8th gen coffee lake just to keep up, the i5 8400 being their first 6 core i5. They held off on the i5 8600k for a while, and shipped the i5 8400 at low clocks because it was surpassing the performance of even the previous generations 4c/8t i7 7700k, which would’ve really pissed off anyone who bought a 7700K if your high end processor was blown out of the water by a now mid range product a year later for even cheaper.

Just to stir things up even more, there’s the Ryzen 9 line that came out with insane core counts but also the single thread performance to back it all up, with the Ryzen 9 3900x being 470$ got 12c/24t and not requiring any special motherboard or chipsets, it’ll work fine on the same B450 motherboard for 70$.

Wondering what Intel is gonna pull out, they’re lagging behind. AMD has surpassed them on overall performance at every price point and just keeps going, every previous generation just gets cheaper too because they keep making new AM4 processors. 
 

It’s a good thing for the consumer, Intel went 7 years with marginal improvements because AMD couldn’t keep up, every time AMD catches up Intel steps up their game.

God awful Pentium D’s? AMD drops the Athlon 64 x2, Intel responds with Core2.

Core2 getting stale? AMD drops the early FX series, Intel responds with Lynnfield i-series.

Took em a whole but AMD brought Ryzen and Intel responded by upping core counts, maybe when they figure out 10nm production we’ll see it swing back again.

Just means better processors for us.

[Cesartje]

I bought it

i have now a 16 MB ram Intel I5 with a Radeon RX 570 graphics card

Compared to what I had - its paradise! No more black screens, or freezes. 

I ahve not tried it with other games yet. But its good for sl so far. Although some sims looks lag, i have no freezes or crashes.

[bigmoe Whitfield]

1 minute ago, Cesartje said:

I bought it

i have now a 16 MB ram Intel I5 with a Radeon RX 570 graphics card

Compared to what I had - its paradise! No more black screens, or freezes. 

I ahve not tried it with other games yet. But its good for sl so far. Although some sims looks lag, i have no freezes or crashes.

That's Great to hear! 16gb ram will get you pretty far and it's almost what's required.  the amd card for the gpu, not my first choice, but I believe it will do whats needed.

[bigmoe Whitfield]

On 2/16/2020 at 6:25 AM, cheesecurd said:

It’s a generalization to keep people from buying overall lower performance parts. Quadcores are entry level now, the above mentioned Ryzen 5 2600 is a generation old (almost two whenever the rest of 4th gen drops), it’s a 120$ processor and it’s 6c/12t

If you’re buying anything under 4c/8t that means very low end hardware now, because while a 9th gen Intel i3 or Ryzen 3 1200/2200g will be fine, below that comes 2c/4 stuff like the current athlon APU lines, Pentiums and celerons. They’re just not ideal from a price to performance perspective. I think the cheapest AM4 processor new is a 2c/2t athlon and it’s like 60$ or something? But why get that when for double the price you get more than 3x the raw specs out of a Ryzen 5 chip, and drastically better performance to match.

SL may not use a lot of cores/threads at all, but the single core performance of a 2c/2t option will be dwarfed by the 6c/12t options or even the mentioned 4c/8t entry level stuff from Intel.

The rest of the gaming world utilizes more cores better anyway and it would be a better idea to have and not 100% need than to need and not have.

My apologies for coming off the way I did. What I mean is the era is not ideal to buy on recommendation, the performance 100% is worth it.

As I’ve said, the modern equivalent to your build is a Ryzen 5 2600/3600 and an RTX 2060 super. That would be a good choice.

Buying back into Haswell e and Maxwell would get you similar performance but you lose any upgrade path, slower DDR4, and at an overall much higher power consumption. Along with just having to buy these old parts which can be expensive for what they are.

You could buy a system with your specs for sure still, and it would perform great, but it would be power hungry, limited to 2133 (and I think 2400mhz ddr4) instead of 3200mhz+, and lose out on things like proper NVMe drive controllers. And above all, when it starts to get slow you can swap you r5 2600 for an R7 3700 or r9 3900, with Haswell e your options are used xeons that aren’t as much of a jump in performance.

 

okay about my ram.

 

 

it will use that, believe it can use more or some such with another series if i7, but I'm not touching it, it works like it should.

[NiteRider Kahane]

i've got an amd rx-570 in an old amd a8-5k build here.. i know i need to get off the a8 to something better, but the rx-570 is a solid gpu, even if it isn't quite as good as an amd rx-5k or nvidia rtx-2k series