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johnmalone (6 posts)
Aug-05-01, 10:35 PM (EST) "WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I am using a AMD athlon 4 1.2GHz . 256mb RAM, 60GB hard drive, and 64mb Graphics card.I have good frame rates...I was wondering what computers everyone else us using and what does the game handle like on them?John M Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
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Subject Author Message Date ID RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... LuckyRailFan Aug-05-01 1 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Splatter Aug-06-01 2 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... JMSteven_W98 Aug-06-01 3 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Holliday Aug-06-01 4 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... ccyko Aug-06-01 5 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... pirpen Aug-06-01 8 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... johnmalone Aug-07-01 19 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Moeraki_Pete Aug-08-01 21 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... buzzbenz Aug-13-01 24 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... chucksc Aug-13-01 25 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... jvizoso Aug-06-01 6 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... buzzbenz Aug-06-01 7 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... 2vain4u Aug-06-01 9 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Tepic Aug-06-01 10 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... dgauci Aug-06-01 11 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Signalmaster Aug-07-01 12 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... donnyman Aug-07-01 13 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Lars Aug-07-01 14 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... HAC Aug-07-01 15 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... Hentis Aug-07-01 16 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... throttleup Aug-07-01 17 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... johnmalone Aug-07-01 18 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... throttleup Aug-07-01 20 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... TrainFreak Aug-08-01 22 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... landnrailroader Aug-13-01 23 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... beluga Aug-14-01 26 RE: WHAT PC's are people generally ... iangrove110 Aug-14-01 27

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LuckyRailFan (6 posts)
Aug-05-01, 11:24 PM (EST) 1. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" My Good PC: Celeron 733, 128 MB Of Ram, Onboard Intel Direct-3d Video Card, Onboard Sound Card, Windows ME(I Hate ME Hoping To Get XP When It Comes Out), And A Good 'Ol 56K Modem, I Get Fairly Well Framerates, 20-30, Even Ge That With Max Quality On Lowest Res Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Splatter (28 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:09 AM (EST) 2. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" LAST EDITED ON Aug-06-01 AT 01:09 AM (EST)T-bird 1ghz,40 gig hd,512meg pc133,diamond mx400 sound card,64 meg geforce2 pro and dsl to boot.I usually get anywhere from 20-60 frames,i guess average of 30. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
JMSteven_W98 (276 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:03 PM (EST) 3. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" As a MS employee/programmer, I'm required to develop code on a slow system (333 MHz) to avoid writing things that work quickly on a fast machine.BUT - my gaming system is another matter.Intel Motherboard - dual Pentium IV 1.6 GHz with 4GB RamBUS memory. (The system is 64 times faster than anything AMD ships - the standard Train Sim routes show 70+ FPS)Each processor has 2 Gigabytes RAMbus memory (4 GB total)
I work on Windows XP, so that's the OS I use. It's required for Direct X and Symmetric MultiProcessing anyway.Two 31 GB IBM SCSI drives and one 18.2 GB SCSI drive for the O.S. Drives have under 4mS access time and 8 MB on board cache. (14,000 RPM)Two video cards: Creative Labs GeForce 3 BIOS in TNT-2 Annihilator (64 MB DDRAM - 460 MHz) and a Creative Labs TNT-2 PCI card for the second monitor.Two Sony F-500 21 inch 0.18 dot pitch flat screen monitors running Train Sim in 1920x1600 mode.Two Creative Labs SB Live Platimum cards with 32 speakers and four sub woofers. Two Microsoft USB Digital Sound systems and two Cambridge Sound Works 4 Point Digital Surround sound boxes.Microsoft Game Commander voice interface.All nine drive bays are full.I built it because with 25 years of hardware engineering exposure and plenty of data on the OS and chip sets, I wanted to prove how bad the AMD design was and why sticking with an Intel-only solution made sense.I'm able to run Train Simulator, AutoCAD AND Unreal Tournament at the same time on the system, and stay online without seeing anything bad. Stable as granite.I can also run the Route Editor and the runtime game at the same time using two Virtual Machines - You cannot do that with AMD's design.Jim Steven, MCSE
Sr Microsoft Windows Application Developer Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Holliday (28 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:13 PM (EST) 4. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I have a 1.8Ghz P4, 512mbRDRAM, and a Geforce3. MSTS runs, uh, fast. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
ccyko (182 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:19 PM (EST) 5. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" LAST EDITED ON Aug-06-01 AT 01:21 PM (EST)550 K6-2... Voooo 3... 192mb PC-100 ram... SLOOOOOOOWWWWalso I'm using Windows XP, so far I have been able to run everything but the DEM extractor ok-Chris Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
pirpen (8 posts)
Aug-06-01, 02:35 PM (EST) 8. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" My system: Duron 750, MSI K7T Turbo, 256mb SDRAM PC133, GeForce 256 DDR. I run TS at 1024x768x32, getting 30-50 FPS (lower on NE Corridor, about 15-30 FPS). To the people, braging about their, monstercomputer. Just stop! Sure, i would like to have: P4, Geforce 3, 1500mb SDRA......... but normal people, with a normal income, don´t have that kind of money. And talking about AMD, in that way, is really silly. If you don´t like it, don´t buy it! /Pierre Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
johnmalone (6 posts)
Aug-07-01, 10:41 PM (EST) 19. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Please stop showing off...u have a fast coimputer...thats gr8....but lets face it..your a sad anorak who shows off..get a life. Peace NiggaJohn Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Moeraki_Pete (6 posts)
Aug-08-01, 03:29 AM (EST) 21. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I am wundering Jim if you have someting in plain English or could write something in regard to the below quote of yours as i seem to see many attractive AMD computer offers around and am trying to resist them in my desire for a new PC.>I built it because with 25
>years of hardware engineering exposure
>and plenty of data on
>the OS and chip sets,
>I wanted to prove how
>bad the AMD design was
>and why sticking with an
>Intel-only solution made sense. >Jim Steven, MCSE
>Sr Microsoft Windows Application Developer
Thanks in anticipation
Peter
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buzzbenz (170 posts)
Aug-13-01, 08:07 PM (EST) 24. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" As an AMD user, and longtime fan, i'd just ignore Jim. He NEVER posts the specs on the AMD systems that "Suck" so bad. For all i know he's testing a Dual Pentium 1.6 with 4 GB RamBus Ram against a K6-2 450 with 128 MB. I hope not, but he has been very evasive when it comes to saying what AMD system he is pitting this monster machine up against. Every respectable hardware site on the net shows the Athlon Tunderbird on-par with the P4. Each has their strengths and weaknesses, and the diffences are rather small! I use a "meager" 800 MHz Athlon with a GTS 32MB GeForce II card, and i am more than satisfied with it. I could even overclock it or tweak it a bit more and squeeze more performance out of it, but it's not worth my time.
I apologize for this post, i try not to be so blantantly cruel, but as much of a die-hard AMD fan as i am, even I have not just come out and said "Pentium Sucks Dude!!". Because it doesn't. And neither does AMD's Athlon. They are both great processors, each has distinct performance advantages that are really too small to matter. I happen to like AMD's lower price, and the dirt cheap price of RAM it takes to run it. So if you see an AMD system that looks good, get it. I don't know why Intel fanatics have to just come out and flame the competition. Of course, the more they publicly try to bad mouth the competition, doesn't that usually happen only if the copetition is a real threat? Think about it .------ BUZZ
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chucksc (135 posts)
Aug-13-01, 09:32 PM (EST) 25. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I'm Ignoring Jim also! I too am a MCSE (just like him) (passed the upgrades to Win2K) and am working on a MCT.... I work as a Systems Engineer for a fortune 500 co. my background was as a EE dropout in the late 60s and worked as a field engineer for 20 years before switching to systems engineering and integration over 10 years ago. If there is one thing I have learned in the over 30 years in the business is that some people take this stuff Intel vs AMD, Microsoft vs Apple very seriously. In fact it is almost a religion to them. My experience vis a vis AMD vs Intel is that they both work and they are both good! I am writing this to you on a AMD 1.2 gig T-bird that replaced a PIII/650... why did I go with AMD this time? Price! Price! Price!They'll both do the job! You just go with whatever the best deal is at the moment. And at the moment I upgraded this machine it was Tbird 1.2 Gig w/266mhz FSB (known as a "c" bird for the rev C chip). If Jim was really what he claims to be he would understand how foolish he sounds to issue a blanket endorsement/condemnation like he does.... My 2 cents.... Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
jvizoso (42 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:26 PM (EST) 6. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" A bit kt7a mb, Duron 800 running at 1 Gig, 256 Meg 133MHz memory
ATI Radeon 64Meg DDR Graphics Card, AGPx4.
1024 Live Player soundcard, Windows 98.
Monitor is 17" TVM AS6S
Running six F7a's with 5 passenger carriages across the Marias Pass on the Introductory train Ride at 1280x1024x32bit colour
I get around 11 to 20 fps ...
JMStevens is having a good laugh ! jv Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
buzzbenz (170 posts)
Aug-06-01, 01:44 PM (EST) 7. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Athlon T-Bird @ 800 MHz
Soyo K7VTA mobo
256MB CAS2 Mircon PC133 RAM
30 GB WD 7200 RPM HD
13.2 GB WD 5400 RPM HD (music storage only)
Creative Annihilator GeForce2 GTS 32 MB DDR
Creative SoundBlaster Live! Value
32X CDROM/12X DVD
32X Read/8X Write/4X Rewrite Sony SPressa CDRW
56K Fax Modem
RealMagic Hollywwod Plus DVD Card
Win98 SE
DirectX 8.0aGame runs pretty well (occasional stutters, nothing serious).
Sound ain't too great but i may have a blown speaker, i'm not sure. I also do not have the newest drivers for the sound card, but again, it's nothing i am really concerned about.------- BUZZ Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
2vain4u (13 posts)
Aug-06-01, 09:13 PM (EST) 9. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I have an older system:Celeron 333 with 64Meg RAM on a 66Mhz bus. Video card is an ATI Rage Pro with 4Meg on an AGP slot. OS is Win 98 SE. I get 10 to 15 fps with everything turned on or maxed out. I set up custom display settings to have max scenery density and decent object quality with 15 to 20 fps. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Tepic (20 posts)
Aug-06-01, 09:44 PM (EST) 10. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I have a Athalon 650, 192MB RAM and a Voodoo 3. Frame rate is okay with a bit of stutter occasionally.Graphics card is my next upgrade, any ideas? (around £150) Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
dgauci (111 posts)
Aug-06-01, 10:41 PM (EST) 11. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" LAST EDITED ON Aug-06-01 AT 10:42 PM (EST)Dell Dimension XPS-T600 / PIII 1ghz SECCII Slot 1
Dell P990 19" Triniton monitor
Win98SE (soon Windows XP Pro)
512MB ECC RAM
Diamond Viper V770 Ultra (32mb)/ Nvidia 12.41
70gb 7200 rpm ATA/100 HD
Promise ATA/100 Card
Hitachi GD-5000 8x DVD
Sony CD-RW CRX100E USB
Zip 100 USB
Cinemaster 3.0 decoder card
SoundBlaster Live! Value 1024
Altec Lansing ADA880 speakers
3Com 56K hardware modem
Hauppauge WinTV USB
(2) Belkin 4 port USB hubs
Logitech Mouseman Wheel
HP 6350C USB scanner
APC Back-UPS 500Runs great, everything maxed, no complaints. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Signalmaster (43 posts)
Aug-07-01, 09:10 AM (EST) 12. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" WOW! I guess around these digs, the car is truly dead as a measure of manhood.Why doesn't someone come up with a reasonable recommendation/configuration for a PC to run MSTS, that doesn't require mortgaging the kids and without all this techno-macho jargon. Perhaps a laptop, for those who want this whole mess portable. In a separate thread or as an FYI in the file section.
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donnyman (1 posts)
Aug-07-01, 10:50 AM (EST) 13. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" AMD k62-350 @ 40032mb tnt2 m64192MB pc 100get frame rates of about 15-25fps with 1024x768 and on second highest graphics quality.on 640x480 i only get 4fps for some weird reason. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Lars (1 posts)
Aug-07-01, 11:35 AM (EST) 14. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" I use a PIII 1 Ghz(EB) @ 1125 Mhz, Asus P3B-F MB with 384 MB ram @ 150 Mhz cas2 (and yes that is a totally stable Intel BX board @ 150 Mhz fsb), Creative GF3 @ 240/530 Mhz, Promise Fasttrak100 controller with 2 IBM gxp75 30GB disks in raid0, Pioneer DVD 10/40, Plex Writer 121032A, Zip250, SB Live and Cambridge fps1500 surround speakers, and a Sony G200 monitor.I play MS Train Sim at 1600x1200x32 with everything on and/or maxed out. It is absolutely beautiful, I'm very impressed with the graphics. Fps varies a lot, like 20-60 (usually in the high 20's or low 30's), but the sim is very playable and I never get any real stutters, maybe an occasional slowdown, but they're very minor and only occur when I insist on going 100+ mph on the Acela Express
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HAC (186 posts)
Aug-07-01, 04:23 PM (EST) 15. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Intel PII 300, 192Mb RAM 350W PS (redundant)
2xIDE drives, ATA-33 1x4GB, 1x20GB
Adaptec 2940AU scsi controller, with the folloing SCSI devices
- 1HP 4GB drive,
- i 4MM DDS3 tape drive
- HP 6020 external CDR
- 12x Scsi CD-ROM
Matrox G400 Max dualhead 32MB video
Creative SB Awe63 (ISA)
3Com Etherlink XL ethernet card (Cable modem)
External Zip drive (parallel)OS - Win2K Pro, SP2
All this lives in an old tower case, with a bunch of cooling fans..Only thing I did to get MSTS running was to ditch my POS Voodoo
graphics card.. funnym, but after going to the Matrox, win2k got a lot more stable.. drivers for the Voodoo were junk..cheers
Harold Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Hentis (85 posts)
Aug-07-01, 06:05 PM (EST) 16. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?"
Heres my details. OH both PC's are home made as well.First PC
AMD K62 450
96 Meg Ram
Sound blaster live 1024 + 4 point surround cambridge sound works speaker system.ATI All in Wonder Pro 128 32 meg TV graphics Card with DVD Hardware Support. (Latest drivers)
Creative Labs DVD ROM
Hewlett Packard 32 speed CD Rom.600 x 800 x 32 Graphics setting just before middle system crashes like hell from changing views even shunting / switching crashes. FPS between 10 - 15600 x 800 x 16 Graphics as above, system is relatively Stable ( 1 crash tonight, 1st one since I changed down a few days ago and I had been running the sim for about 4 hours!!!!!!!) FPS 12-36640 x 480 x 16 or 32 Graphic settings as aboveRuns damn fast but not much detail..... bit of a shame really..... well at least it dont crash!!!!!.PC 2Intel PII 333 mmx
128 meg Ram
Vood 3 2000 16 meg Vid card *
Internal Zip Drive
52 x CD Rom
Some lame early version Soundblaster card (Way crap) and Trust 3d surround speakers..... seen there day me thinks.to be honest there is not much difference as the above specs apart from 640 x 480 x 32 I can run at Best Graphics and it dont crash. * Although both systems are running on a network as well.... damn shame It aint Multiplayer...... think of the possibiliites Also I plan to upgrade towards the end of the year as well so that might improve the graphics a bit.
Well your feedback is anticipated.Hentis.
Oh nice system to the guy from Microsoft....anychance you can let us know on when a patch is ready or in the pipeline?
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throttleup (4 posts)
Aug-07-01, 08:23 PM (EST) 17. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Hey help me out here guys. Just got a Dell 8100 1.4 Ghz, 256 mb ram and the Geforce 3 64 mb video card.I have a 21" Trinitron monitor.My frame rates with the game maxed out to best graphics is 15-25 fps. This is at all resolutions.Shouldn't my system be doing better? Any hints? That's with using Enditall.Thanks for your suggestions. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
johnmalone (6 posts)
Aug-07-01, 10:40 PM (EST) 18. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Hey dude..i have the exact same frame rates as u......and the exact same computer pretty much except i have a normal 19in Compaq Monitor to match my Compaq PC...hmm i have no suggestions i am a novice so far on Train Sim..howvere at Flightsim i am close to Pro status! hehehe Peace John Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
throttleup (4 posts)
Aug-07-01, 11:40 PM (EST) 20. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Yeah I heard with our systems are built on being stable and not necessarily for games. Am hoping some of the experts can maybe give us some tweaking advice. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
TrainFreak (56 posts)
Aug-08-01, 07:32 AM (EST) 22. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" PII-400, 128mb RAM, 13,5mb ATA/33 HD, 16 mb Voodoo3 3000 graphics..
At highest settings, the framerate is OK.. as long as there is only one or two trains on screen at any one time..
Heavy traffic on NEC = framerates drop like hell..
Also have to reduce my desktop resolution to 16-bit to be able to use the editors. And I experience some graphical glitches - sometimes the track disappears at Marias Pass, for example Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
landnrailroader (5 posts)
Aug-13-01, 07:07 PM (EST) 23. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Hold on to your hats now.I don't have, nor do I intend to soon purchase (being retired & on fixed income) a new PC, so here is mine. It's a bit slow, it's below what MS says is the minimum, but it works, and has only crashed once or twice, and then I am not sure MSTS was at fault.Intergraph TD-25 (professional CAD machine)
233 MHZ, Pentium, MMX
64 M. Ram
4G, and 15G hard drives
ATI,Radeon, PCI video with 32M of vram
Soundblaster-16 with decent Creative Lab speakers
HP-9150 CD/W writer (also used as the reader)With fairly dense scenery, frame rates vary from around 10 at night, when most of the scenery is not visible, down to 2 at mid-day. Not really pretty, but it's paid for and it works - and it's 4 years old, well the original box is.J. H. Sullivan,P.E.
Florida Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
beluga (21 posts)
Aug-14-01, 07:50 AM (EST) 26. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Perfectly happy with Compaq AP400- PIII 500, 256 meg RAM, 16 meg Viper 550, int. sound, 1 SCSI, 1 IDE, 17" Sony Trin. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
iangrove110 (4 posts)
Aug-14-01, 10:59 AM (EST) 27. "RE: WHAT PC's are people generally using?" Don't laugh, but
DAN with Pentium 2 350MHz
64MB Ram
SoundBlaster Value Card
and...even...the 'dreaded' Voodoo 3 with 16MB RAM.
Running under W98SE
(Pretty retro, huh!)Yet it all runs fine (very few crashes)with detailed and relatively smooth graphics (only noticeable slowness can be a momentary pause when switching views - but, hey, I can live with that. It ain't exactly a 'fast-reaction' game, after all?My heart bleeds reading the wails of some of the 'power users' on other threads who can't get it to run.All goes to show, the old saying is true:
IT AIN'T WHAT YOU GOT....
ITS HOW YOU USE IT!
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