Tanukitsune

Can you trust the "Can You Run It?" site?

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I've lost all confidence in that site....

First it lost me I could run Batman: AA with no problems... I still got the demo to see if it would well with the gamepad, but I had to remove almost eveything and it still ran slow...

Now it says it can run Dead Space PERFECTLY while Steam says that I can't even run it...:erm:

Am I the only one who has had trouble with this site?

One thing is for sure... I have to save up for a 1Gig graphic card....:blink:

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I'm fairly sure that site only bases its conclusions on a simple comparison between your hardware and the publicly known requirements of the game.

You *should* be able to run Dead Space, but for some unknown reason, you can't. It's likely a simple configuration error. Perhaps a faulty driver or the lack of some inane piece of software.

This is the not so uncommon burden we PC gamers bear. Though for the record, I've used systemrequirementslab.com once, and it told me but one thing: It's irrelevant. If you know what's inside your computer, looking at a page with minimum/recommended requirements will tell you the exact same thing that site will.

Edit: What exactly does Steam state about the game?

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And if the hardware is so old that you can't work out how it relates to what's listed under the requirements, best to assume it's not sufficient. ;(

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According to Steams requirements Batman can run on a ATI 1300, mine is a 2400 HD and it runs slow and molasses...

And it specificay says that Dead Space won't work with an ATI 2400, because it's 256, although the Pro is 512... I wasn't going to risk it...;(

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Ah. I was assuming you had bought it and Steam was giving you an error message.

You should be able to run Dead Space. The minimum requirements stipulate the need for a radeon x1600. If I remember correctly, the 2400 isn't bad, but it was never a mainstream card.

To clarify, when "Can You Run It?" says you will have no problems, it's only speaking to your ability to enter the game and play it. Sadly, the algorithm isn't so intelligent as to detail your frames per second. And even more sad is the fact that "minimum requirements" have never -- and seemingly will never -- accurately described the necessary hardware for an enjoyable experience.

Neither do the recommended ones, which I daresay is even worse.

My point is this: Never trust a website to tell you how a game will work on your machine. Never trust a developer/publisher to tell you how a game will work on your machine. If you're unsure, always come to a forum (such as this) for your questions.

Oh, and I find a nice golden rule in system requirements is always multiplying the minimum by two and the recommended by one and a half. Unless we're talking about maybe Valve.

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I've lost all confidence in that site....

First it lost me I could run Batman: AA with no problems... I still got the demo to see if it would well with the gamepad, but I had to remove almost eveything and it still ran slow...

Now it says it can run Dead Space PERFECTLY while Steam says that I can't even run it...:erm:

Am I the only one who has had trouble with this site?

One thing is for sure... I have to save up for a 1Gig graphic card....:blink:

Damn, that's a bit sucky. That site sounds like a great idea, shame it's giving such poor results back. I wonder if they just take the publisher's spec and run a pass on your system...? It would be better to do a bunch of tests themselves, surely?

When it said you could run Arkham, was it on "minimum" or "recommended"? If it was on "minimum", I think it's fair that you have to disable everything.

Also, I'm not sure why Vista's ranking system never took off. Seemed like a good idea to me :-/

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I had downloaded Arkham Asylum demo to see if it was running on my PC and it did; but inside Steam and with mandatory Game for Windows on top, whatever the level of detail is (I've tested all the way from max to minimum detail in 860*640) when there are more than 5 guys on screen or if there's a bit of details or breadth in the scenery; the game slow down to a crawl. It's frustrating even more when I know that Crysis just runs fight in medium quality :/

ShowFPS was an awesome site, but for unknown reason it died :/

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Too bad most studios don't bother making benchmark demos anymore. Granted even they aren't 100% reliable but still...

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Damn, that's a bit sucky. That site sounds like a great idea, shame it's giving such poor results back. I wonder if they just take the publisher's spec and run a pass on your system...? It would be better to do a bunch of tests themselves, surely?

When it said you could run Arkham, was it on "minimum" or "recommended"? If it was on "minimum", I think it's fair that you have to disable everything.

Also, I'm not sure why Vista's ranking system never took off. Seemed like a good idea to me :-/

It was in the middle point...

Until I save up enough for a good graphic card, I'm only buying indie or older PC games.... Or games from Valve... Then again Dreamkiller is kinda indie and has the most ridiculous requirements ever... :erm:

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According to Steams requirements Batman can run on a ATI 1300, mine is a 2400 HD and it runs slow and molasses...

And it specificay says that Dead Space won't work with an ATI 2400, because it's 256, although the Pro is 512... I wasn't going to risk it...;(

First of all, you say that you have a 2400 HD with the seeming implication that it's better than the ATI X1300. If I did read that right, then let me tell you that they're basically in parity. Furthermore, the listed Steam requirements are obviously minimum requirements - practically no modern, HD game will run without hiccup on the indicated 3ghz single core/Geforce 6600 setup they list. So, it really shouldn't be incredibly surprising that the game doesn't run great... all I can say is that you should ratchet down all of the graphics options to their lowest and see what you can do from there.

For future reference, Tom's Hardware puts out a monthly feature called "Best Graphics Cards for the Money" and at the end of each installation, they provide a graphics card hierarchy. For instance, this month's chart is here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-graphics-card,2464-8.html

To be honest, you shouldn't expect a game to run very well if your graphics card meets just the minimum requirements. Furthermore, I would go as far as to say that you shouldn't expect anything special unless you're a good two to three tiers on that chart higher than the minimum spec.

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I'll probably buy one next year, I don't know whether to get a normal one or get a better one so it will last me longer...:hmph:

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I think that valve should make a button on every game's page that says "Check if i can run this" it would be awesome why have they not done this yet?

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The only way to actually check, if you can run a game at a certain quality level (which is already hard to define) is to actually run the game. There are simply too many variables (bad drivers, faulty RAM, too much running in the background). Benchmarking is in principle the solution to that issue, but generic benchmarks like the GfW score or 3D Mark probably focus on the wrong elements (e.g. is the game demanding for the CPU or GPU), so you would at least need a per game profile. And to enforce that is tough due to the open nature of the PC market.

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Can you trust the "Can you trust the "Can You Run It?" site?" thread?

I think Hyetal nailed it, and I only rely on demos if I'm not sure. I've been to occasional LAN parties with only older games, and sometimes despite a spec very far ahead of the requirements, a game just would not run well.

Sometimes you get lucky; for instance my old nail of an underpowered gaming PC with a notoriously unstable model of GPU got all the way through S.T.A.L.K.E.R. with only two crashes, and that was much better than it did with most games.

With all my gaming PCs, I've hit a point where "Will it run?" becomes too much hassle to answer, then just give up on current games for a year or two and shuffle over to consoles.

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Can you trust the "Can you trust the "Can You Run It?" site?" thread?

I think Hyetal nailed it, and I only rely on demos if I'm not sure. I've been to occasional LAN parties with only older games, and sometimes despite a spec very far ahead of the requirements, a game just would not run well.

Sometimes you get lucky; for instance my old nail of an underpowered gaming PC with a notoriously unstable model of GPU got all the way through S.T.A.L.K.E.R. with only two crashes, and that was much better than it did with most games.

With all my gaming PCs, I've hit a point where "Will it run?" becomes too much hassle to answer, then just give up on current games for a year or two and shuffle over to consoles.

At this point you can drop about £400 on a gaming PC, which will run everything, not maxed. Consoles being extended is helping this.

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Also, I'm not sure why Vista's ranking system never took off. Seemed like a good idea to me :-/

Hahahahahahahaha

Oh man, that's a good one.

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Hahahahahahahaha

Oh man, that's a good one.

It actually isn't a bad idea, although perhaps it was poorly implemented.

A lot of people don't know what all those numbers mean. Dumbing it down makes it easier for people to know what to buy. A difficult task, to be sure.

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It actually isn't a bad idea, although perhaps it was poorly implemented.

A lot of people don't know what all those numbers mean. Dumbing it down makes it easier for people to know what to buy. A difficult task, to be sure.

Oh it's certainly a good idea, but practically every part of it's implementation is miserable.

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In what way?

Here's an example that might explain this.

A friend of mines computer is rated at 5.7 by Windows. Mine is rated 3.4

Guess which one of us can't run Crysis 2 at max without his computer turning to molten slag?

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AFAIK It scores each of your components separately and then gives you the score of your weakest component. It doesn't really reflect how those components actually affect performance.

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AFAIK It scores each of your components separately and then gives you the score of your weakest component. It doesn't really reflect how those components actually affect performance.

Yeah. It's especially useless right now because hard drives are sticking people's scores down. If you have a non-solid state hard drive at this point, your score is essentially capped, regardless of whether your CPU, GPU and memory are blazingly fast.

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Here's an example that might explain this.

A friend of mines computer is rated at 5.7 by Windows. Mine is rated 3.4

Guess which one of us can't run Crysis 2 at max without his computer turning to molten slag?

That's seriously confusing. You can run Crysis 2 at max on your 3.4 machine? Wow. So what's the component that brings it down to 3.4?

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The problem with the Windows scoring thing is the score isn't an average or anything like that, it's simply the score of the lowest-rated piece of hardware you've got (click the score to see how each part is rated). So for example you could have a machine with the absolute best CPU, RAM, and graphics card going, but if your hard drive is an old PATA one and gets a low score that's the score you'll receive.

Also, games themselves can be very inconsistent. For example, we've all heard how absolutely incredible Battlefield 3 looks and how it brings most computers to their knees, right? Well actually it doesn't matter if you use a six-year-old dual core CPU or a cutting-edge i7, the performance doesn't change — because the game has all it needs once it's gotten about two cores of 2.2GHz. Any more than that is basically useless. Then you can go and play something like Command & Conquer where practically every last megahurtz of your CPU is important and you get huge gains from a faster CPU.

So yeah, the component-specific scores are probably a little helpful for figuring out how decent your bits are, but when it comes to determining overall performance and suitability for games you have to do that the old-fashioned way.

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That's seriously confusing. You can run Crysis 2 at max on your 3.4 machine? Wow. So what's the component that brings it down to 3.4?

My graphics card apparently. :blink: And my apologies, it's 3.8. (Note that all other components are anywhere from 7.3-7.9 with the exception of my harddisk, which is a 5.9) Apparently Gaming Graphics and WINDOWS DESKTOP GRAPHICS are calculated seperately. Guess which one is 3.8.

Fuck off, Windows.

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