Hello there! I need some help with a compatibility question that’s been driving me nuts for a while. I decided to upgrade my dying laptop computer so I could dive into programs like EU4 and rendering bigger projects in Blender/After Effects. I want to try my hand at special effects, animation, and hobbyist game development with my friends. However, my main focus will be furthering my 3D texturing and lighting to start with, so having a high fps isn’t a huge deal.
I didn’t want to do a custom build right off the bat. Wiring and mounting components is not something I’m knowledgeable with and I’d rather do several more months of research before I attempt, but I need a computer now. I’ll research anything I need to but in general I’m more of an artist, so it’s been difficult trying to find a new computer that is capable of running UE4.
Looking for opinions on this DESKTOP setup I just bought, and most of all very nervous if this will even run EU4:
3.6 GHz Intel Core i7-4790 CPU
12GB of 1600 MHz DDR3 RAM [max 32, I’ll be upgrading this later]
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 745 GPU (4GB GDDR3)
8MB L3 Cache
Motherboard Socket: LGA 1150 Type: Intel Z97
I’ll definitely be upgrading to a GTX 950 once I save more money (the power supply is 460w and I don’t want to kill it), but the CPU and motherboard chipset seemed to be a really solid start for single-thread AND multi-threading without spending over $1k on the base build. But am I DOA with the 745? Could I even poke around with the lighting engine with such a weak little card?
If this setup is entirely out of the question for EU4, I’m open to any feedback. I still have time to return the computer, but everything about it seemed like it was something I could grow with for a while.
I know there are a million threads like this, please forgive me if I sound redundant.
It should be OK, though you would want to upgrade the GPU a bit–if that’s what you can afford at the moment then you don’t really have a choice, you could test it out and then decide if you want to upgrade the GPU later.
By the way, building a computer is really not difficult–there’s no special electrician skills needed or anything. There should be some easy to follow tutorials but it’s mostly just figuring out the parts you want and then hooking them up and ******** things into the case.
I agree, I build all my computers. The first time it was kind of daunting but after you will see that it’s not hard at all.
The hardest part would be the motherboard link to the front panel (front usb, power, reset, led, HDD, etc) but nowdays motherboards come with a very handy thing where you plug all your front cables on it and plug the thing (I forgot the name) on the motherboard.
Also motherboards manuals are quite easy to understand.
And usually when you build your computer by yourself it’s cheaper than buying a already build one.
Thank you all very much for your replies, I appreciate them. I’ve been thinking on these things for the last few days as my computer has been shipped, and I almost felt like I should return the computer before I open it and just build my own, but in the long run (according to PCPartpicker) I’m going to spend the same amount building as I will after upgrading the prebuilt Dell I bought. The disadvantage being I’ll null the warranty, but it’s kind of a crappy one anyway? The only thing that makes me hesitate to build now is getting components that are compatible, but I guess that isn’t as difficult as I thought.
The GTX 745 card is considered to be a very weak card, almost on par with integrated. This stinks, but I figured anything is better than my 5 year old integrated laptop dual-core graphics.
I also have another option, which I was contrasting with the computer I bought. It’s the Lenovo h50. It has the same CPU but at least it has the gtx 750 Ti. The drawbacks are a different motherboard that only supports 16 GB of RAM, and a 280watt PSU. Upgrading those two components would also make it just as much as building from scratch or upgrading the Dell.
Long and the short of it, I feel like I’m splitting hairs worrying about which of the three options is better at this point.
You’ll be absolutely fine running the engine with those specs, I’d say. At home, I’m using a machine with the following specifications (most of which are identical to what you have listed), and I’m able to run it perfectly fine, even in complex scenes:
Intel Core i7 4790 3.6 GHz CPU
NVIDIA GeForce GTX750 2GB GPU
12GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM
250GB SSD + 1TB SATA Hard Drive
I noticed a large improvement in loading times and performance overall when I added the SSD to the machine. I’d recommend one, for sure. Otherwise, as aforementioned by others, I can’t imagine you’ll really have any problems.
