Best bang for my buck ESO gaming rig.

vanddalx · April 2015

Hello all! I am hoping to pick some brains here. It's time to upgrade. I know I can go top of the line and probably achieve my goals, but I'd rather shoot for that known sweet spot. Would you guys please post your experiences with your hardware setups and ESO PvP performance on ultra settings.
I will probably keep my nVidia 770GTX unless it hamstrings the performance too much, and my Corsair SSD, but I'm open to anything else, Intel or AMD for processors, whatever works.

I also understood early on that ESO is CPU bound meaning the CPU still has to "tell" the GPU what to do. So if it has to send a lot of info to the GPU and still has a lot of (non-graphic) info that it needs to process itself, things slow down until one can catch up with the other. I want to optimize this in every way possible and understand it better.

Thanks so much for your time and comments.

Ranique · April 2015

Any program that is big, I would always recommend intel. AMD is just not so good in big programs. I5 and I7 are always a good buy for pc's (laptops it is different, cause I5 for laptops uses core emulation where the I7 is truly multi-core). I7 is clearly better, but the performance notable is smaller then e.g. the performance upgrade going from I3 to I5. So I7 is top notch, but I5 is still ok if you are not too demanding. Keep in mind that the effect is most notable when it comes to fighting lag.I7 can do this better, but you still get some in the most renown laggy area's.

Another thing to put on the table is wether or not to bring an SSD. I'm currently playing from an SSD and really wondering if it is worth it. Specially loading times are better, but it comes with a price. A good SSD cost you still bout 40-50 cents per GB (Euro, but more or less the same with USD). an HDD is now half a cent per GB. So with a 80 GB game, for just ESO it will cost you 40 euro with an SSD and 4 euro with an HDD. But cause the typical size (specially with upcomming windows 10) of the OS and drivers and other programs, you likely want to go for a 256 GB SSD (or more), cause the 126 GB one is a bit small if 80 GB is used for just ESO. This means you spent a lot of money more on it. The choice is yours, but wanted to put it on the table.

ThePonzzz · April 2015

When I got my new rig, I put ESO on my SSD, but like @Ranique mentioned, my SSD was only 128GB and I didn't want to blow the majority of space on this game. Having a 2TB HDD, I had options.

Having installed the game on the HDD, I noticed little differences. Initial startup was a second or two faster. Loading in game was not noticeable to me.

But I also have an i7-5820K @ 3.3GHz with 16 GB of RAM. My GPU is a AMD Radeon 290x TurboDuo.

Sharee · April 2015

vanddalx wrote: »

I will probably keep my nVidia 770GTX unless it hamstrings the performance too much

I am running TESO on a 750Ti, and it has no problems running with maxed settings.

MissBizz · April 2015

Built myself a new PC in the fall

i5-4690k (haven't brought myself to overclock it yet)
GTX 770 OC
8GB Gskill Sniper RAM (2x4)
Inexpensive ASrock mobo

SSD - at first I was running windows & ESO on one.. update 6 came and I had to delete programs to make room. I got myself another SSD to put ESO on, but of course, use a good ol' regular hard drive for all my actual files.

I can stream and play ESO no problem. One thing I DID upgrade was to a water cooler, as I previously was using stock. I am really happy with my rig and it has no problems playing this game. I run on Ultra with a couple settings tweaks for personal preference.

Fleshreaper · April 2015

I recently just purchased the following upgrades for my computer and have loved the results. About $1000 from online vendors.
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vanddalx · April 2015

Fleshreaper wrote: »

I recently just purchased the following upgrades for my computer and have loved the results. About $1000 from online vendors.
[img][/img]

Thanks for the specifics!

Fleshreaper · April 2015

This video card requires two power cables, so make sure your power supply supports that. Also, memory is 16 Gb, i7 processor.

vanddalx · April 2015

Fleshreaper wrote: »

This video card requires two power cables, so make sure your power supply supports that. Also, memory is 16 Gb, i7 processor.

Which processor is it exactly?

Fleshreaper · April 2015

Intel® Core™ i7-4790K Processor - Quad Core, 4.0GHz, 8MB Cache, Up to 4.40 GHz, 2 Memory Channels, 16 Max PCI Express Lanes - BX80646I74790K

This is the combo

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=9174223&Sku=M69-10180

Robbmrp · April 2015

Here's my systems as they stand currently. With the exception of the video cards, my systems are almost three years old now and they run ESO with no issues on Ultra settings. We get the occasional server sided lag that hits the whole group at times but that has to be fixed by ZOS.

Intel I7-3770k Ivy Bridge
Asus P8Z77 V LE LGA 1155
Zalman 9900 CPU Fan
Mushkin 240GB SATA III SSD OS and ESO installed on
32GB G.SKILL SNIPER DDR3 1600(PC312800)
Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200 RPM Internal HD
New Oct 2014 GIGABYTE GV-N970G1 GAMING-4GD GeForce GTX 970 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 SLI Support Video Card

My wifes system I built in 2011 is almost identical as mine part for part including the new video card.

Natjur · April 2015

My current desktop PC runs ESO on Ultra with no issues but my new job means I will be traveling alot.

So time for me to look at a gaming laptop. (in the past that was now really a thing as the laptop graphics cards sucked)

But now I am trying to get recommendations of gaming laptops which will run ESO on Ultra but not cost the earth...

vanddalx · April 2015

I got out out of control some. I'm going to give this a shot.

Thanks for all of your input.

Robbmrp · April 2015

Natjur wrote: »

My current desktop PC runs ESO on Ultra with no issues but my new job means I will be traveling alot.

So time for me to look at a gaming laptop. (in the past that was now really a thing as the laptop graphics cards sucked)

But now I am trying to get recommendations of gaming laptops which will run ESO on Ultra but not cost the earth...

I have an Asus Republic of Gamers Laptop with an I7 that I got back in 2009 that still works great. It even runs ESO on High settings as it has a 1GB dedicated video card. Take a look at Asus as they have a ton of laptops available at all kinds of prices.

Also check out www.newegg.com, they have a wide variety of laptops of all price ranges and brands.

Deheart · April 2015

I have upgraded a stock AMD 3500 mhz cyberpowerpc with 4 gig memory and crappy AMD video card up with 16 gig gskill Ripjaws memory, a new powerbox supply, and an EVGA Geforce GTX 970 with 4 gig onboard memory.

I overclocked a tad to 4000 mhz but I am reluctant to push it further. I know that I do eventually want to completely replace the motherboard and processor but what I have is working for now.

Basicly I can play with everything to the highest settings with a min of 25 fps and an average of 30-40. Due to overheating concerns and rather have better framerate than the minuscule visual improvements that I will ever notice, I actually set my graphics settings from ultra down to high, and get usually 40-60 fps no problem. A lot of the time it is stuck on 60 fps as that seems to be the ceiling of frame rates.