I've managed to get this mod running on my ancient computer within the last couple of weeks, and I am blown away. For once, I get the feeling that I'm running around with HUGE metal things than boxes with paint on them. The addition of non-mech units was awesome... Not just because I can't pilot a mech to save my life due to throttle issues.
Anyhow, I digress...already. I was astounded that I was able to run the game at all. My machine is a Abit KN8 Ultra mobtherboard running an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (socket 939 baby!), 2GB of DDR, and an 8800GS, Win XP SP3. If I rewound time say... 6-7 years my computer would be blazing fast. You read that right, DDR, without a number after it.
With this hardware, I need to have everything cranked to the bottom settings. Despite this, all of the units look awesome. The only catch is if combat gets moderately heavy, the game starts to chug worse than Thomas the Tank Engine going up a 30% grade.
Because of this, and I'm afraid to think of when my computer will decide to throw out a white flag in surrender. I realize that anything released within the last 3-4 years will be an improvement. If I'm not looking to crank all of my settings up to the max along with my resolution, but want to be thrifty for future upgrades, what would you folks suggest?
I've had the most experience with NVIDIA cards, though if I can get a cheap, relatively powerful ATI card, I won't complain. I'm a college student who doesn't have too much money to spend. If I can buy a mid-higher end motherboard as a base, and get lower-end RAM\CPU\video card which will be an improvement, but will make upgrades down the road cheaper I'm for it. Overall, I don't need miracle-leaps in performance, but if I can up the settings above 800x600, and turn up details here and there, while not bogging my computer down, I'll be happy.
For what I've described, what hardware would you folks suggest. I have other forums that I could post on, but you folk are much better in-tune with what this game requires, and how it performs. Additionally, this is the highest-end game that I play, and I'm not likely to be swayed to play any high-end games except this one.
Any advice you can give would be great! Thanks!
