PPUs - Will they take the load off my proc?

[The Raven]

Hi guys. I just got this email from newegg and was wondering if a PPU would ease the burden of my aging Athlon 64 3400 when I play graphics intensive games such as FEAR.

I got a EVGA 7600GS several months ago, and while I was adjusting the graphics (gfx)and physics (phx) options I noticed that I could jack the gfx options all the way up and keep the phx on the recommended settings and it would run great. But as soon as I cranked the phx options up, my CPU cooling fan would go crazy and the framerate would drop significantly.

Now in regard to the PPUs, I know that they produce special effects in a very select # of titles but other than that, do they assist the CPU with the phx processing in normal games as well?

If they do, then I might consider getting one. Thanks for your help!

 

[schneiderguy]

no, they only work in PPU supported games (FEAR isnt one of them) and even in PPU supported games, they usually make your framerate go down by adding extra graphical effects for your video card to render. afaik the only game that actually shows performance increases from a PPU is City of Villains

 

[swtethan]

why not just get a new processor?

 

[sonoma1993]

it'll help in games that support the ppu. But ppu arent really worth the cost, until they start coming out in the pci-e 1x or 4x. Right now they just come in plain ol pci.

 

[BassBomb]

Originally posted by: swtethan
why not just get a new processor?

QFT

 

[BFG10K]

These things are a total waste of time and money. Get a faster processor.

 

[aka1nas]

I just got my PPU and I still wouldn't recommend it unless you had everything else in your machine maxed out and some money burning a hole in your pocket. I only got one now because I want to play around with programming with it.

 

[McArra]

Not the time yet. Buy a new proccessor. The Ageia manages to make a very very little use of the CPU when physX are hard (Around 4-8% of CPU use in Dual cores), but games must have the support for it, and the rest of the PC must be at the same level, high end machine needed.

it'll help in games that support the ppu. But ppu arent really worth the cost, until they start coming out in the pci-e 1x or 4x. Right now they just come in plain ol pci

PCI is not limiting the performance at all.

 

[josh6079]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
These things are a total waste of time and money. Get a faster processor.

QFT.

They can successfully add more particles to a scene and while that will save CPU cycles, it will also hurt your frame rate. The reason being that the GPU will then have to render that many more particles in what might already be a borderline-playable scene.

 

[McArra]

Originally posted by: josh6079

Originally posted by: BFG10K
These things are a total waste of time and money. Get a faster processor.

QFT.

They can successfully add more particles to a scene and while that will save CPU cycles, it will also hurt your frame rate. The reason being that the GPU will then have to render that many more particles in what might already be a borderline-playable scene.

But doing the exact same effects, the difference is huge: http://www.mod-pc.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=47

 

[biostud]

The 7600GS is the limiting factor in your framerates when you turn up details.