Doom 3

[Duggan18]

is anyone else extremely excited for this game? i can't wait till august 3rd. im spending like $500 on my computer just so i can play it good

[Jeff_Favelle]

I'm spending $650 on a damn video card alone to play this game, LOL!!

Duggan, you and me, fragfest on August 3rd buddy! Its going to be sweeeeet! Only 4-player multiplayer though.

[Duggan18]

Originally posted by Jeff_Favelle
I'm spending $650 on a damn video card alone to play this game, LOL!!

Duggan, you and me, fragfest on August 3rd buddy! Its going to be sweeeeet! Only 4-player multiplayer though.

haha, i live in victoria too, remember me? anyways, i doubt we'll get it august 3rd because we're in canada.

august 3 in the US, later worldwide. the guys at electronics boutique said between august 3 and 5th. i have mine pre-ordered.

what kind of card are you getting favelle? i just got a 9800pro today, along with a new power supply, and hopefully ill get my 2.2 athalon before it comes out :)

[Duggan18]

and about the 4 person multiplayer, thats just with what the game ships with. mod makers and what-not will be able to have more, like 8 or 16 probably. im not worried about multiplayer much for doom, i think half-life 2 will have better multiplayer, i just want doom for single player, which i heard takes about 20-25 hours to beat.

ill play with you anytime, i actually have a couple people from other forums (bands,computers etc..) who wanna play :)

[Jeff_Favelle]

Radeon x800. I still may get a 9800pro though, if I can be guaranteed to get the r360 core. Check yours. Its under the heat sink. 'Cause if you do, you'll be able to EASILY overclock it to a Radeon 9800XT!!! And that's a $699 card!!! :)

If you're getting an Athlon, get the Mobile 2500XP. It can be EASILY overclocked to 3200XP status, and that's a $300 chip. That would be insane!

Yeah, they'll hack multiplayer, for sure. Quake 4 will be the big multiplayer game from Id Software.

HL2 "might" be out by 2010, if we're lucky, LOL!!

I'll see you on the battlefield bro! :D

[ChunkyMunky]

I went to this EB Games they let me reserve half life 2, i asked the guy when it will be released and he said something like mid october, but there is a great possibility that it will be put back AGAIN!!

[Jeff_Favelle]

THat would be toooooo cool!!!

[Darren179]

August ten black arrow for xbox live :D

[Spreeguy]

a friend ;) of mine recently downloaded the E3 demo of Doom III.

I can't wait, til i can play the whole game. :)

[Duggan18]

man favelle, you really know your computer stuff too hey? i don't really, but my brother is good with all that. i don't think getting an X800 is really worth it right now, atleast for me it isnt, the next card i get is going to be a 512mb one, supposedly you need a video card with 512mb to run doom 3 perfect, there's an ''ultra mode'' box or something thats filled in right now until better stuff comes out :)

what are all your guys' specs like?

AMD Athalon XP 1900+ (hopefully getting a 3000+ soon)
ATI Radeon 9800pro
512mb Corsair 3200
8 gigs free HD space

and about half-life 2, i guess it will be out in late september/early october. they can't keep delaying it or noone will wanna buy it anymore

[Derrick]

I have:
xp1800 OCed to 2100 stable
1 gig of corsair 3200
gforce ti 4400 (holding off to upgrade)
500Gb of hard disks 40gigs free

Also have another box i run linux and FreeBSD. Great box but a little weak. satisfies my comand line and tinkering fix.

[Cruciform]

I'm hoping it will run decent on my current hardware. I've pretty much stopped playing games on the PC. Burned out on crappy titles and high prices over the years. It's the irony of the job.

Lucky for me most of the titles I want to play in the future will be coming out on Xbox or PS3 :) Sudeki, Fable, Jak and Daxter sequels, etc. etc.

Pentium 4 2.4GHz HT
1 gig DDR 400 RAM (dual channel config)
Radeon 9700
120 gig drive
Case is a Shuttle XP mini-system with an FB61 mainboard (8x AGP, 800 mhz bus)

Derrick, have you benchmarked that Corsair RAM against generic stuff? I was looking at a hardcore RAM test on Slashdot the other day, and the Corsair stuff kicked major butt :)

If I wasn't relegating my computers to purely surfing or work stuff I'd be slapping that in along with an X800 :)

If anyone was thinking about grabbing a PCI express mainboard and video card to really go nuts it had no effect on Doom whatsoever. Hope it's not overhyped technology.

[Jeff_Favelle]

NO no, Doom 3 requires 512 of RAM, not video card RAM. Huge difference Duggan.

The next gen of cards is going to be PCI express, but that's a year off, and I'd wait to run the two cards in RAID style (2 video cards processing at the SAME time, woo - hoo!!). But PC Gamer ran a test on 4 different systems and all the stuff made no difference. For the first time in a LONG time, the CPU is now the bottleneck of your system.

The best buy right now is an MSI Radeon 9800pro and then overclock it to a 9800XT. Only problem is, Doom 3 uses OpenGL, which Radeon cards SUCK for, but nVidia cards rule at. But I can't support anything but ATI, so if I take a 5 fps hit, then so be it.

Derrick, that system ROCKS!! Do you game man? You, me, Duggan, August 3rd at midnight! LOL!!!

Duggan, get the AMD 2500XP mobile, and overclock it to a 3200XP. Its now $140 at www.ncix.com. BEST value for our buck man! But you'll need at least PC3200 RAM, which you have, so you're set!!

Here's how to overclock it:

http://inquirerinside.com/?article=14245

[Derrick]

lmao my system is so outdated everything but the ram and the DVD burner is 2+years old. and the DVD burner

thier havent been to many games worth my time as of late Jeff. But like everyone else I am eagerly awaiting half-life2 and Doom3

here an article on alienwares pci-express video array http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=43

[Spreeguy]

my system specs:

amd 64 3200+ GHz
1Gb ram (pc3200)
ati radeon 9800xt
Creative Audigy 2 ZS 5.1
etc.

I think i'll be ok for doom and halflife... :D

Has anyone seen the screenshots of the upcoming unreal engine? Looks like an upgrade might be in order then.
http://www.unrealtechnology.com/html/technology/ue30.shtml

[Kyle Barker]

that looks awsome! I still play doom 2, even play wolfenstein. classics!

just curious will this run it? Its from that "AIDA32 Enterprise System Info." thing, i really have no idea what it means.

CPU: AMD Athlon XP, 2079 mhz (6.25x333) 2600+
Motherboard Chipset: nVIDIA nForce 2
Video Adapter: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX Intergrated GPU (64 mb)---think i need better, this one bites for crappy games

should it run it? i am thinking a 128 video card, but thats about all i know about it...bigger numbers gotta be better, right?

[Jeff_Favelle]

Your video card will NOT run the game. Get a new video card (Radeon 9800pro or 9600XT) and the game will FLY!

What RAM you got bro?

[Duggan18]

Originally posted by Jeff_Favelle
NO no, Doom 3 requires 512 of RAM, not video card RAM. Huge difference Duggan.

The next gen of cards is going to be PCI express, but that's a year off, and I'd wait to run the two cards in RAID style (2 video cards processing at the SAME time, woo - hoo!!). But PC Gamer ran a test on 4 different systems and all the stuff made no difference. For the first time in a LONG time, the CPU is now the bottleneck of your system.

The best buy right now is an MSI Radeon 9800pro and then overclock it to a 9800XT. Only problem is, Doom 3 uses OpenGL, which Radeon cards SUCK for, but nVidia cards rule at. But I can't support anything but ATI, so if I take a 5 fps hit, then so be it.

Derrick, that system ROCKS!! Do you game man? You, me, Duggan, August 3rd at midnight! LOL!!!

Duggan, get the AMD 2500XP mobile, and overclock it to a 3200XP. Its now $140 at www.ncix.com. BEST value for our buck man! But you'll need at least PC3200 RAM, which you have, so you're set!!

Here's how to overclock it:

http://inquirerinside.com/?article=14245

thanks man, ill look into that further for sure :)

and about the 512mb video card, i was right you just didn't understand what i was saying. doom supposedly has a setting ''ultra'' or something for the graphics probably sets all the effects extremely high, which is shaded out right now in the game because no video cards right now can handle it. and supposedly you need a 512mb VIDEO CARD to run doom at that ultra or highest settings.

none of this is fact to me yet, but i've heard it from numerous sources.

also that XP mobile, im not sure if my motherboard can run anything other than athalon thunderbird

[Jeff_Favelle]

Yeah, the ultra mode, I hear ya.

Here's the full review by PC Gamer:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=27&threadid=1351899

[Ian]

Jeff you and your ATI, I'm going to get the geforce 6800 ultra $815 baby, but wow!
http://www2.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjQy

[Jeff_Favelle]

You're crazy man. That's a female het albino Ball dude. Even Mandic would say you're a foooool!

But how will the gay-force hold up to the DIRECT-X9 of Half Life 2 (when it comes out in 5 years)??

[Ian]

by then I'll be running two geforce 6800 ultra's in pci-e ;)
Oh yeah, I just found a cheapier price for that card..... $749, I think I'll be ordering that tomorrow morning heh

Also could be me but I believe that the geforce was developed with directx9 with microsoft.... also ask all those people out there about ATCry's and how good far cry runs

[Jeff_Favelle]

Dude, if you're going to go gay-force, just get the 6800GT man. You're crazy.

And if you sell that female Pastel to fund your insane video card purchase, I'm going to put the beat-down on you.

[Duggan18]

yeah get a 6800GT if you're going with gay force

[Ian]

when did you guys start buying stock in ATI?

"if it's fast and it works, who cares if it says Pinto on it"

GT's are going for $660 so if you can get an Ultra for $749 so that's not that big of a difference and also if you spending that king of money anyways then go with the best.

We'll see once the fragging begins!

[Jeff_Favelle]

Ultras just went down again bro. I'm reading the review on the 6800GT. I might have to betray my country (ATI) and get one:


http://atic.ca/index.php?page=LongDesc&sku=06917

[Duggan18]

**** favelle, you see the new OFFICIAL benchmarks? the 6800 did awesome, alot better than the x800 (****** ogl drivers), the 9800 did ok though i guess, 50fps on 1024x768 or whatever with no AA/AF and medium settings.

i lost the link, but should be easy to get

[Jeff_Favelle]

Duggan, it looks like we gotta get the Geforce 6800GT. Within a month, it'll be down to an even $600.

Dammit. But it'll be worth it to gang up on Ian on August 3rd.

[Jeff_Favelle]

I guess this is it. Also, overclockable to 6800-Ultra levels (with extra cooling, of course).

Ahhhh the future........

http://www.geekjosh.com/flip/killermnn/gt1.jpg

[Kyle Barker]

that is crazy. didnt know video cards needed a fan.

is "512" enough ram? it runs at 448.

[Cruciform]

You think THAT's a fan? You should see the Geforce 5700s. They look like someone strapped a lawn mower and mulcher on to the top of the card :)

[hhw]

God bless you people who fund all the research an development for computer hardware.

Meanwhile, I go by the rule of only upgrading to 2nd newest generation hardware when it's twice as fast as what I have. Right now, I'm running
Shuttle SN45G
AthlonXP 2500+ @3200
GeForce4 Ti4200 128MB
Which is great for Counter-Strike, the only game I play. However, I've had to give it up because if I play in pubs, I get banned and if I play in leagues/tournaments, it takes over my life. (Anyone going to Fragmart this year?)

I'm considering buying the Radeon 9800 Pro now... I've been waiting for it to drop a bit more in price, but I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon.

I heard someone mention FreeBSD and Linux? Of course, all my really sweet hardware is the in 2nd hand UNIX boxes I buy from eBay for a song:
2xSun Sparc5 (170MHz $30USD each)
2xSun Ultra5 (333MHz, 360MHz)
1xSun Netra T1 (360MHz $150CDN)
2xSGI Indigo2 (R4400 $15CDN, R10000)
1xDEC Alpha PWS 500au
1xHP Visualize C180 (Price circa 1997: $38,000USD. I paid $36CDN!!! God I love eBay)
tons of old x86 boxes
I run FreeBSD (-CURRENT and -STABLE), NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris9, Irix 6.5.22, HP-UX 11, Debian GNU/Linux, and Slackware GNU/Linux.

[Duggan18]

favelle i just got my 9800pro, can't get a 6800 now. my card should hold up fine anyways, online you have to put it down to 800x600 anyways, or atleast you should. it says i get 50fps with 1024x768 on medium settings no AA/AF, which is pretty good, since i never use AA/AF anyways.

i can't wait for this game :)

[Jeff_Favelle]

I'm considering buying the Radeon 9800 Pro now

hhw, go here, this is the cheapest you will find the 9800pro, and this particular brand, MSI, is EASILY overclockable to 9800XT levels, which is still a $600 card.

Go here:

http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=12289&vpn=RX9800PRO-TD128%20&manufacture=MICROSTAR

Ha ha he said "lawn mower". Too funny.

[Jeff_Favelle]

More news and screens on the game!!!


http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/doom3/preview_6103236.html

[Duggan18]

hey favelle, i have an ATI radeon 9800pro, do you know anything about overclocking those ones? i don't know anything about over-clocking, or have the slightest idea how to it.

also the only fans i have are one big one on the motherboard, and another in the power supply. if i overclock my video card and processor, will i run a chance of overheating? also how do i set my computer to shut off if it gets at a high temperature at risk of overheating?

[Jeff_Favelle]

Powerstrip my man. Powerstrip. Google search it and it will tell you everything.

[Duggan18]

alright jeff, i think im going to get an AMD Athalon XP 2.08 2800+. its $100 cheaper than the 2.2 and i won't have to upgrade my motherboard, and it can't make that big of a difference right? do you know anything about that specific model?

[Jeff_Favelle]

no no no no no. AMD MOBILE Athlon XP 2500. It overclocks to a 3200XP with EASE. Its really the only option for people still living in the 32-bit world.

Here's is the article why. Its a GOOD read:

http://techreport.com/reviews/2004q1/athlonxp-m-2500/index.x?pg=1

[Jeff_Favelle]

And its CHEAP right now. $140 at www.ncix.com

[SDSnakes]

sorry to say it guys, but its all about HALFLIFE 2!

[Jeff_Favelle]

Sure, in 2010 when it actually comes out. If they were dumb enough to leak the source code, how smart of a game can they actually make. It'll be fun, but probably no better than Far Cry.

[marisa]

You guys and your DOOM this and DOOM that.

I am still a die hard Counter Strike player.

:D

Marisa

[Siretsap]

Specs:
Athlon xp 2000+ overclocket to speed of 2.1 ghz :-)
pc 133 768 megs of ram.
video card 128 mb ge-force 4.
hdd 2 times 40 gigs in raid 0 mode.
sb live drive.
plextor 12/10/32A cd rw
creative 6x pc-dvd
creative 32x.

My favourite game at the moment is counter-strike.
Am playing max pain 2 and Deus ex 2 at the moment along with the usual star-craft.

Games waiting to play:
Half-Life 2
Half-Life 2
and Half-Life 2 hahaha

[marisa]

Siretsap- I love Deus Ex!!!! It's a great game.

Marisa

[Jeff_Favelle]

The Queen is a gamer?? Too coooooool! ;)

[Kyle Barker]

nobody else a GTA junky?

[Duggan18]

how can you be a junky for a single player game that gets boring extremely fast? >_<

also jeff, im not sure if my motherboard can handle that mobile card. my brother told me it only takes thunderbirds, and don't you have to buy a seperate heatsink and fan for it too?

have you been to siliconsolutions.ca? its the best computer store in victoria, great prices and service.

AMD AthlonXP 2800+ 2.08GHz 512K 333FSB Socket A BOX Info $186.00

thats what i've been thinking of getting. i really just want it to last a couple years until the 64bit ones are the ''norm''.

doom 3 > hl2 bwahahahha!!!!!!!!!!!

[Jeff_Favelle]

Socket A is Socket A man. If it can support 333 front side bus, it can support mobile athlon. All a mobile Athlon is is an UNLOCKED desktop Barton.

[marisa]

LMAO!

Yes I have been sucked into the world of computer games to the point I barely play PS2 or XBox games at all.

I like
Deus Ex and Counter Strike, and the older Red Faction which I only just recently played...all that type of stuff...

I have also played other types of games such as Diablo II extensively, Neverwinter Nights (and all expansion paks) etc.
Then I have the lamer side of me which enjoys things like The Sims, RollerCoaster Tycoon, Age of Mythology type stuff, etc :P :P

Unfortuantly I do not know all the bells and whistles our computer has, but since my boyfriend is sooo utterly "into it" we have good stuff right now. And more than enough to play those games anyways ;)

Marisa
Edit to add:
I am going to be LIVING in the new game Spiderman 2 BTW folks!!!!!!!

[Duggan18]

more than enough to play doom 3? :D impossible!

btw, favelle have you seen the new doom trailer/footage? it looks even more awesome now. and marisa i hate spiderman 2, i played it for 5mins on xbox and turned it off

[marisa]

No actually I left that title out since I do not play Doom and I am not aware of what it takes to play :P....played the original a bit but nothing of the newer versions. :D

Marisa

[marisa]

No actually I left that title out since I do not play Doom and I am not aware of what it takes to play :P....played the original a bit but nothing of the newer versions. :D

And it's nice you hate Spiderman 2, but I doubt you have a real reason why you hate it, since you only played it for five minutes....but wow sounds like you really must have tried it out! I on the other hand am 1/2 through the game on XBox and enjoy it a lot!

Marisa

[Duggan18]

yeah see i don't get what people like about spiderman 2 so much. bad graphics and gameplay, the webslinging is pretty awful on manual. the graphics remind me of a bad ps2 game. but anyways, theres much better games than that on xbox, maybe you just haven't found them yet.

doom 3 > spider man 2 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[marisa]

I'd love to hear your description of Spiderman 2's "bad graphics" and "gameplay"

Why exactly is the gameplay bad? Not only is it in Vice City style, but it has three times the amount of available "missions" including petty crime, and civilian crime which have no relation to moving the story forward, but serve to up your characters stats. As for manual web slinging, it couldn't be easier with a small amount of practice, I have TERRIBLE hand eye cordination and I got the hang of it within about 10 minutes.

As for graphics, I have YET to see a similar styled game with better graphics. The zoom in and out of the 3-D map alone is amazing and FAR more usable than Grand Theft Auto ever hoped to be.

As for there being better games for the XBOX of course there are, but considering Spiderman 2 is for all gaming consoles including the PC..... with DIFFERENT story lines for each format, I think they did amazingly well. I have played on both Xbox as well as the PC. And this weekend I am going to attempt to try out the PS2 version as well.

In either case, by your own admission you played SpiderMan 2 for five minutes so...........

Marisa

[Coldthumb]

What names do you all use for Counter-strike?
We may well have been shooting at each other for several years now...lol

My current name in CS is Xanthic.

Previous names were:

1.5 /Quake 1
$ilver[Snook] /Quake III (I am a rail junky :p)
Theneverendingquarter.../C-S
burning1/C-S

a few more in there somewhere...

[Duggan18]

i don't play cs.

marisa, gameplay doesn't mean the amount of stuff there is to do in the game, its more about how good the controls are, how fun the game is to play, stuff like that. for me spiderman wasn't fun AT ALL. seems like a waste of $50+ for anyone who bought it.

[Jeff_Favelle]

The new Doom trailers looks INSANE! Its actually been out for a while now, but it looks like they upped the res. of the video.

When Quake IV hits, then we'll separate the men from the boyz! LOL! :D

[Jeff_Favelle]

New Doom news!!!

http://www.gamespot.com/news/2004/07/26/news_6103431.html

http://www.gamespot.com/news/2004/07/26/news_6103458.html

[Cruciform]

So, it's been out for a week.

Verdict? :)

I got it the day of release but have only had time to play it for a couple of hours. I'm loving it though. The gameplay is typically shallow for an id game, but more than makes up for it in gunplay and ambushes.

I think a remake of Resident Evil is due from the mod community :) With full freedom of movement.

Between that and Quake IV (by Raven this time) it's going to be a nice winter for playing cool mods.

[Jeff_Favelle]

Still waiting for a video card before I even open the package! Ian went to Future Shop and got me a copy, where the 1st 10 customers also got a free SoundBlaster Audigy card and a free copy of Knights of the Old Republic! Sweeet deal!

Video card should be here by Monday! :D

[Siretsap]

I installed it on my pc, but only got a 3d prophet 3 64 megs.
I can run it in 1024 by 768 but it rushes, so play it 800 by 600, pretty good but not with all the extra features for the pixels and map rendering...

Still sure I will prefer Half-Life 2. But still Counter-Strike is my all time favourite, just love owning people on that game !!!

[Cruciform]

I tried it out on a Radeon 9700 and it runs great at 800 or 640. But I've been keeping it at 640 since it looks good and holds a solid framerate.

Today I stuck a Geforce FX 5950 Ultra that we had at work in my case to see how it will do at higher settings this weekend. It's pretty funny because I have a Shuttle case, and they're pretty small to begin with. I couldn't put the cover back on the case because the card is big enough to get in the way. I'd guess there's a pound and a half of copper on it.

[marisa]

My boyfriend has been playing Doom 3 for a couple days now, I myself haven't tried it but he says its awesome!

Marisa

[JeffT]

Im considering getting it, my buddy has had it for 4 days and put something like 19 hours of play on it haha. Im not sure if my system requirements are high enough though?

[Derrick]

Well I finally got round to installin DOOM 3 a couple of days ago. Its a great tech demo but im already kinda bored of it. Give me half-life 2 or a good game based on the doom 3 engine.

[Cruciform]

JeffT:

What have you got for a system?
I'm running a 2.4 P4 with a gig of RAM, and with a Radeon 9700 it runs perfectly smooth at 640x480.

If you have 512 meg of ram and a card like a Geforce 4 or MX, you might be able to get good frame rates as long as you stick to the 640x480. It looks surprisingly good at that resolution though.

Still, ultra high detail makes for some extremely detailed monsters :)

[JeffT]

lol I have no idea man, Im not framiliar with these kind of computer technical terms at all lol. I know I have a GeForce 4 graphix card, that would be sufficient. But I dont know how much RAM I have.

[Jeff_Favelle]

Go to My Computer, right click on it, then go to "properties" and it will tell you your processor speed and how much RAM you have.

[marisa]

Well my boyfriend played some more of the game and his verdict is now that he believes it did not live up to it's hype and the original Half Life for example is still a better game. He does think the graphics are excellent, but feels the multiplayer capabilities were not what you would expect......

What about you guys?

I have no played this game yet but that's his review.

Marisa

[JeffT]

Awsome, thanks Jeff,

It says: AMD Athlon(tm) Processor
1.15 GHz
512 MB of RAM

Do you think thats enough to run the game along with my GeForce 4 card? Or if it even were able to run, would it be kinda crappy game speed?

thanks

[Jeff_Favelle]

They purposely made multiplayer weak, that was known years before the game came out, as Quake IV was being made simultaneously, and will pick up the clack in the multiplayer department. Kind of like Half Life2 won't have any multiplayer, but Counter-Strike: Source will cover it and ship with the game.

Tough to say, as I haven't played the "REAL" game yet. All I've played is the leaked beta over a year ago, and then a few games on a display computer in Future Shop, but that was running at 640x480 resolution, so I don't count that. It looked typical first-person shooter to me. Nothing more, nothing less. I think the true measure of the new technology will be subsequent games. Always is. Can't wait!

No problem JeffT. I think you should be able to run he game at medium - low settings. Its a pretty forgiving game. Cormack is a GENIUS when it comes to coding for a broad spectrum of computer configurations.

[JeffT]

Alright awsome, thanks a lot.