Final Fantasy XIV news

[abigsmurf]

ah, I forgot about that.

[elaniel]

That's okay, I've sent them an email just to double check with them (so I cover myself in case it doesn't work)

This is what I got from the previous one you recommended:
Ultra Athena SE
Thermaltake V3 Black Mid-Tower Case
AMD Phenom™ II X2 550 Black Edition Dual-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology
AMD ATHLON64 CERTIFIED CPU FAN & HEATSINK
ASUS M2N68-AM SE2 NF630A AM2 DDR2/1066 SATA PCI-Express MBoard w/GbLAN, USB2.0, &7.1Audio
(Req.DDR2 MainBoard)4GB (2x2GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory
Corsair Value Select or Major Brand
ATI Radeon HD 5770 PCI-E 16X 1GB DDR5 Video Card
CyberPowerPC 600W Quiet Power Supply
500GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache HDD

And the monitor and speakers:
Samsung Lavender SM-P2250 2MS 1920x1080 TRUE HD LCD Wide Monitor
Logitech S120 2.0 Stereo Speaker Set

Everything else I left as default.

Worried that it won't be good enough as it's not quad core though (or is a quad core really necessary?)

[abigsmurf]

In the majority of games, that CPU will perform better than all but the most expensive 4 core ones there (also overclocks well if you're feeling adventurous) . Few games are properly optmised for more than 2 cores.

All seems to be good, Samsung monitors in general are pretty good.

[elaniel]

Awesome, I will be making sure the Dell return is sorted tomorrow, and order that one immediately.

If you're ever in Coventry, I'll buy you a pint as a thanks! Really, I do appreciate all your help.

[mikewl]

This has me concerned, my HD3800 is a couple years old, I don't get why these newer cards are scoring so much less, I thought my card was bottom of the barrel for current gaming.

I've ordered a new Nvidia Fermi card so im hoping it is a decent step up from the HD3800.

On a side note, did anyone else play the beta yesterday?

[abigsmurf]

first number = age of the card
second number = Line of card (8 tends to be the high end line)
third number = model

There's probably some sort of formula for determining roughly how comparatively good your card is.

*thinks*

(1.5 * first digit) + second number + (0.1 * third)

putting a few cards in, seems crudely accurate.

[Hohum]

There are plenty of new cards released that aren't suitable for gaming. They may have extra capabilities compared to older cards (such as hardware acceleration for certain formats of video), but just because they're newer doesn't make them better performers. Most pre-built systems contain cards intended for media use as they are considerably cheaper.

[mikewl]

Thanks guys, I think the one I ordered is geared for high end gaming so it should be ok.

[Daragon]

Is this really going on sale as early as September?

This has all the hallmarks of a rushed release if so.

[mikewl]

Is this really going on sale as early as September?

This has all the hallmarks of a rushed release if so.

Im mixed on this, on one hand you have to remember that its already been in development a fairly long time, longer than most mmo's so it should be in good shape.

The other hand is something we don't know, how close is the Beta client to the final version as what I played last night needs alot of optimization, now its hard to tell if its server or graphics related but I and many others found it to be very poor last night in the frame rate, could be server lag though, which was something else, the response time in selecting actions seemed slow, more lag than on FFXI, so hopefully this is something that will improve.

I think in the next two months they should get it to a satisfactory state as far as stability and performance, though who knows how much content is actually going to be in there, the only guess I have is that it will hopefully be as big as FFXI pre Zilart which would be fine for the first year.

One thing I can say is its far more ready to go than games such as Age of Conan, Vanguard, Pirates of the Burning Sea and Warhammer Online all clearly felt like unfinished products that were way away from resembling a finished state, FFXIV should after what 3 years dev time, plus a strong fanbase from FFXI, it should survive the early stages without too many issues.

[abigsmurf]

WAR was horribly underfinished.

Identical armour, poor PvE, Battlgrounds were far too lucrative (which again hurt the PvE and the brilliant public quests), awful awful crafting and no reason to explore.

I'm cautious about FFXIV going from unveiling to retail in 'just' 14 months but at the same time, they did say the game was very far into development when it was first shown off

[shafropuff]

I'm putting my imac on ebay 2morro, hopefully can get a decent 600 from it about 200 will go towards fixing my macbook pro and then be placed on ebay and I hope to make around 400 form that so I should have around 800 to spend on building my first ever PC... mind you I don't really wanna spend it all so a 400-600 limit I'd think.

The idea of giving up macs for a PC scares the **** out of me but the idea of not playing FFXIV unless I spend a hell of a lot more then needed scares me more. Ah the things I do for FF...

So I have no clue where to start...

I have 2 working 200GB HDDs Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 and I don't have the need for a monitor as I'd wanna connect it to my TV via HDMI.

I looked at the links that were posted by abigsmurf and I want the Thermaltake Element-T with a Yellow trim... Can someone help me build up the rest? I dunno if I should just use the HDDs I have or get a new one...

[mikewl]

I would imagine your HD's would be fine as long as they are SATA, just make sure you go for dual core or better cpu, at least 2 gig ram, preferably 4 gig and then get the best Gfx card you can afford.

[abigsmurf]

You'll get much better value building yourself as you've already got some parts (but you can't get that yellow case you want, you'll only get similar ones in black)

Otherwise your options are the configuration elaniel got (cheapest option) with your case or using this one as a base:

http://www.cyberpowersystem.co.uk/system/mega_sales_III/

600W PSU
ATI 5770
4gb ram
AMD phenom x2 550

Slight bit more but with faster ram which should enable you to do a bit more overclocking if you wish (you can try to unlock the 2 disabled cores as well).

If you don't want to buy an OS with it, you can upgrade to a 700W PSU and a 5830 and keep to your budget.

[elaniel]

When I use that link, it looks like using that one is £10 cheaper than the one you recommended me when I match up the configuration (Unless I'm looking at some of the specs wrong?)