New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

[HexiumVII]

Seeing as FFXI is totally CPU bound (Radeon 9800Pro runs it as fast as a X1900XTX) anyone see any numbers on the Core 2?

[neighbortaru]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

my guess is that it won't help much seeing as how the existing software doesn't even take advanage of the current dual core cpus. however, i have not seen anyone test ffxi with the new cpus.

[Mhurron]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

my guess is that it won't help much seeing as how the existing software doesn't even take advanage of the current dual core cpus. however, i have not seen anyone test ffxi with the new cpus.

Real SMP provides at most a 30% performance increase to non-threaded single process applications by allowing the system to do background tasks on the other CPU. Even then thats only if the OS has a very good thread scheduler, and few OS's do. Dual-core processors share even more resources then real SMP so when one core becomes extremely busy it is a limiting factor on the other core.

There are so few applications that home users would use that would be threaded or aware of multiple CPU's there's no real reason to get one. Right now, dual-core systems are not all that much better then a single core processor of similar speed capabilities, but hey the marketing department loves it, like hyperthreading it's so easy to sell it on 2 must be better then one.

[sevenpointflaw]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

Yes, you will notice a difference (if you know where to look - but probably not in the game itself).

Curious myself, I opened up my benchmarking software and did a little poking around. When playing FFXI, the bulk of the processing power is used by Core #1, obviously. However any time I would cast magic, use a weapon skill, or any other "special effect" (such as the swirlng you see when you enter Promyvion), then the ussage on Core #2 would sky rocket. Core #1 saw peaks for excesive chat, loading zones, and loading new graphics (such as if someone logged on in front of you, or your ran around in circles in Lower Jeuno).
Also, there is a short time when you zone out, before you zone in, where system is doing nothing except waiting for more information. During this time, both cores are nearly entirely idle.

Now, all that being said (run benchmarking software for yourself if you don't believe), will you notice any difference over a single processor of the same speed? Uhm, resounding no. By the time you reach those speeds you're likely already running FFXI as good as it will run.

[HexiumVII]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

dual core doesn't help FFXI at all. However, Core 2 is about 75% as fast in brute force as a P4, hopefully a o/c 3.5GHz Core 2 can make Beseiged barable.

[kuu]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

Not much. Besides which ffxi is very badly programed to windows.

It's so bad the developer of windower contemplated on making his own little wrapper to speed up ffxi when he found out how badly the threads were controlled in FFxi-XP.

You have a better chance bribing him then a dual core.

With that said, it does give about a 10% difference because usually ffxi would take up 80-90% at max due to system piority(and XP is especially cpu hogging(they made it that way) and maybe 70% under windower due to the nature of it.

With a dual core you should be achieving 99% of the first core, give or take XP isn't that smart, but not that bad.

My own Althon X2 easily gives ffxi 100% first core.(turn on crazy stuff like hi-shadows at AH).

Onto the CPU itself

Core 2 is pretty powerful, but for FFxi...it's...complicated. FFxi is a like a idiot on windows. It only cares for really 1 thing. Raw power. No tricky stuff like cache, nor elegance, nor, SSE, etc etc etc.

If you look around one site tried to use FFxi as pure CPU bake-off. The results were very interesting.

A sempron 3000 would achieve nearly 90% of the power of it's big brother Althon 64 3000. It's a very ideal test in some ways to see what a cpu can do without tricks.

Core duo 2 sadly means that it'll not get much power. A lot of Core duo's power is from a very beefy cache, design, SSE, big FBS, DDR2, and power. -> Almost everything FFxi ignores.

So in all reality, a Pentium would do almost decently well as core 2 to or even a celeron(wince).

The best bang for a buck on a purely ffxi machine would be a sempron, cheap as heck, low power, small, easy to OC, etc. It's just for arguement sakes....ideally we would be doing more then ffxi.

P.S.

Dual Core cost near the same as a solo(reason it's good for the future) Therefore, it's not really bad for a computer, because you're not paying very much more. If the price is right, might as well get a dual core(pretty much every new computer is these days).

Edit:
My X2 4400 works find in Besiege. Server side lag is the big issue. That and turn off hi-shadows.

To my knowledge, hi-shadows+ 50ppl will bring any CPU to it's toes. (not 360 or ps2, they're programed differently). It's programmed that badly

[Palom]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

To my knowledge, hi-shadows+ 50ppl will bring any CPU to it's toes. (not 360 or ps2, they're programed differently). It's programmed that badly

so no matter what you are using this simply can't be done??
I'll going to be using a X2 3800+ so it wouldn't even come close if you're X2 4400 can't

[kuu]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

so no matter what you are using this simply can't be done??
I'll going to be using a X2 3800+ so it wouldn't even come close if you're X2 4400 can't

Yep it's that bad.

Med shadows, or no shadows is fine.

The shadows drawn on each characters you see ramps up quite steeply,

So 6 people on the screen is not bad, but Jeuno would crush you to less the 20 fps.

[Palom]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

ooooh man good lord all I want to do in this world is run this stupid game optimized why did they do this why????

[kuu]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

I currently have my hands on the new Core 2 Duo systems.

They are from HP xw6400, Xeon 5140 Dual core 2.33ghz (a.k.a Woodcrest).

On ffxi vanadiel 3 benchmark, it seems my assumptions might be correct. That most of where its touted power comes from are from "tricks" that ffxi doesn't really care.

On high it only scored 4200-H ish. This is compared to my own Althon 64x2 4400 which scores 5800-h ish.

While the Woodcrest fairs well againist older Xeons dual 3ghz which scored 3700-h ish, it falls below a Althon.

To note that these are Xeon(at least by name, though technically they are little related) processors, which aren't really ment for consumer level products, the fact that they still scored under a the AMD CPU, is telling.

This does not mean Core 2 duo is a bad processor with hype, nor is Xeon's going to be close to desktop users (Conroe), but based on these results, Don't expect these to fly on FFxi

FFxi on Core 2 duo isn't going to be wowow, so shop wizely if you're just expected a super FFxi experiance. It may even lag behind AMD's 5000+ series.

Just goes to show you the gaps between HW and SW. It's not really simple.

P.S. They are really quiet though. The power wattage difference is probably very true. A regluar Xeon is like a firealarm compare to the Woodcrest.

[Bricklayer]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

I'll run FFXI benchmark 3 tonight on my system and post results later.

Currently running:
Intel 805D 2.66
Asus P5ND2-SLi
A-data DDR2-667 1GB (1GBx1)
Albatron GeForce 7600GT 256MB
WD 250GB Sata-2

Note: I tried OC'ing to 3.33GHz, but it caused pol.exe to crash to Windows, so I've reverted to 2.66GHz. Maybe the proc or ram was overheating? Anyway, will post results in about 12 hours.

[Thrasher]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

AMD 3200+ Venice core
Nvidia 7600gt
1gig ddr 400 Corsair Value Ram runing T1 timeings (I would overclock my memory but it's a pain to recover when I push it too far)
ASUS AN8-SLI (It was on sale)
Samsung Spin Point 250gb
Vana'Diel Bench 3 High
2.0ghz: 5324
2.21 GHZ: 5756 (highest stable overclock I can get w/o accually trying hard)

Also my 7600gt playes into my higher scores, with my 6600(overclocked almost to 6600gt levels) this pc got 4500ish (I cant remember the exact number) So videocards can play into the benchmark to a point. My 6600 did not experience the major issues some people with Nvidia 6 series cards did.

Note: I tried OC'ing to 3.33GHz, but it caused pol.exe to crash to Windows, so I've reverted to 2.66GHz. Maybe the proc or ram was overheating? Anyway, will post results in about 12 hours.

Im assuming you are using ASUS AI Booster, it is a nice lazy way to overclock but I doubt you will be able to overclock as high on stock voltage as if you had gone into bios and changed your FSB and memory settings. Also im assuming you used read this artical (since you tryed 3.33ghz)remember every cpu is different, and just because its the same CPU does not mean you will be able to clock as high as they did on stock voltage. But since windows did not crash you are close to your max overclock on the stock vcore. And I doubt anything overheated but a new heatsink would help quite down your computer, when P4's overheat they start underclocking to reduce heat output.

[Bricklayer]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

Im assuming you are using ASUS AI Booster, it is a nice lazy way to overclock but I doubt you will be able to overclock as high on stock voltage as if you had gone into bios and changed your FSB and memory settings. Also im assuming you used read this artical (since you tryed 3.33ghz)remember every cpu is different, and just because its the same CPU does not mean you will be able to clock as high as they did on stock voltage.

Actually, I set the FSB for mem and cpu manually in the bios to 166. I also manually set the mem timings. It ran stable in Windows, and registered 3.33GHz. I don't remember changing vcore (think it was at 1.38V stock).

But since windows did not crash you are close to your max overclock on the stock vcore. And I doubt anything overheated but a new heatsink would help quite down your computer, when P4's overheat they start underclocking to reduce heat output.

Increased vcore to 1.42V (my low is 1.388 vs. Tom's 1.337), and now it runs stable at 3.33GHz.

UPDATE:
High Benchmark @ 2.66GHz = 4734
High Benchmark @ 3.33GHz = 5603
High Benchmark @ 3.40GHz = 5694 (Vcore = 1.45V)

P.S. 10/10 for Thrasher's avatar.

[Omniblast]

Re: New Intel Core 2, will they help FFXI?

I recently built a new computer (8/21/06) and here are my specs.

Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 2.66 Ghz
Asus P5N32-SLI SE Deluxe
Corsair XM2 PC-8500 1 Gig
EVGA 7950 GX2
Hard drive (IDE old irrelevant)
Forceware 91.45



Did a old install and old data on it, ran the benchmark and came up with
8273-H or something similar.

Oddly Enough I got a higher benchmark when I was using a non-dul GPU.
BFGTech 7900 GT scored a 8473-H or something similar
I was baffled as to why a dual gpu card would be worst than a single GPU card, but since this is FFXI I guess I shouldn't have expected anything different.

I recently reformatted and re-installed windows (9/09/06), and I will update it with new drivers and new benchmark results.