Technically of course it will in some games at some resolutions but not in the way you are thinking. The bottleneck will be instead of getting 90 FPS like you would with an intel SB 2500k you'll be getting 80 FPS with your phenom X4. No game out now or in the near future is going to have issues that you'll notice, your GPU will be the difference in you getting 40 fps maxed or 25 not your CPU.

I'm not totally familiar with what is required to run batllefield 3 but I can tell you I have a hd 6670, an AMD phenomX4 at 3.2 ghz and 4gb of ram and I can run Battlefield bad company 2 at fairly high settings around 40fps at 1080p. I turn shadows low and turn off HBAO (I think thats what it's called) AA is only at 1X AF at 16X and all other settings are maxed, with the exception of lots of action and explosions the game rarely dips below 20fps and only does so for a couple seconds at most and doesn't affect gameplay much at all. If I drop down to 1680X1050 I get closer to 50 fps. Shadows in most games really put a dent in FPS, turn them to low and it generally makes a huge difference without affecting the looks too much. In BFBC2 the difference between low and med is barely noticable and the difference between low and high isn't as big as you'd think.

The 1gb 6670 with ddr5 memory (ddr3 is much slower) is a very under rated card especially if you play at lower resolutions. I play Dirt 3 (basically maxed at 50fps with 2XAA), Battlefield BC2, Mafia II, GTA IV, COD 4 MW2 all at 1080p all at med to high settings and get anywhere from 35-50 fps depending where in the game I am.

They are also great overclockers, I have mine at 900mhz (800mhz standard) and overclock the memory to 1150 (1000 standard) and the card has never missed a beat and never cracked 60 degrees.

You can get a 6670 for a hundred dollars and you don't need a 6pin cable, you just pop it right in, no extra power needed. At max load overclocked they use about 85 watts of power which means with your system you are looking at maybe 225 watts total power which is well within the reaches of your PSU.

I think it's your best bet considering your PSU, it's low price and most importantly that you plan to play at 720p which is far less demanding than the 1920x1080 and 1680X1050 that I play at.

I'm not going to whine and complain about the score, it's been scored an 8.5 and that is that I just don't understand how? Just watched the video review and all I heard was how the graphics were better, the tracks look better, the car controls are better, the AI is improved, they added 5 new tracks and the online is better so how is it possible the game scores lower by a full point? I understand progession of the console and expecting more in 2011 than 2009 but from everything I heard they did improve on everything in the game and in some cases by a fair bit with the exception of weather and night races. ( I understand the weather not being implimented to allow rock solid 60fps and improved graphics, the night racing is something the game should have even though it's not something I'd really miss)

Maybe someone can explain to me how the reviewer came to that score because frankly I'm baffled? Was it as simple as weather and night racing not being included because I've never heard somebody rave about how amazing a game is compared to an already amazing game (Forza 3) and then give it a score so much lower than the previous version.

Any other helpful hints as to the best settings for this card would be great!

I just got an AMD HD6670, I have a 1280x1024 monitor but I sometimes like to play games at 1280x960 so I can get a few extra FPS. When I play my games if I set it at 1280x960 it just stretches the image to fit the screen what I want is to just leave small black bars along the top and the bottom of the screen but I can't seem to figure out how to do this with an AMD card. I had no issues doing it with my old nvidia card.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks guys.

There's no such thing as a decent prebuilt. The only ones with good all-around specs are heavily overpriced istuffedsunny

If it's not made in a big factory assembly line and loaded with unneeded software, but instead they just take parts they are selling off the shelves (the same ones I would be buying to build it myself) and they are then put together buy an empolyee in the store in the same way I would at home why could it atleast not be a "decent" comp. What would be so much better about me buying essentially the same parts at a higher cost and putting it together myself. As far as a final product what have I lost other than the fun of building it myself?

Keep in mind this is just a budget gaming machine, just needed for normal computing with some mid to hopefully high (not maxed) gaming at 1280x1024

CPU-AMD Phenom II X4 840 3.2GHz Quad-Core (Propus)

GPU-AMD 6670 1GB DDR5

HDD-1TB 7200rpm

RAM-4GB DDR3 1333

PSU-420 Watt (assuming middle of the road PSU)

OS-Windows 7 64bit home premium

The system is in a Cooler Master mid tower that has pretty good ratings on sites, it also comes with a new keyboard and mouse which I'm sure are nothing special but what I'm using now are old and certainly nothing special either, it also comes with some 8 watt stereo speakers and a card reader which is always nice to have.

Total cost $600 and has a 1 year parts and labor warranty.

This is not an HP or Gateway, it is custom made by a a smaller computer store franchise in the Toronto area (not a mom and pop shop but not big either, just a few locations) so I'm assuming it shouldn't be filled with bloatware and other crap that major computer makers cram on their desktops?

I know the CPU is a little limited when compared to even middle of the road Sandy Bridges and top flight Phenom's but it is a true quad core and runs at a 3.2ghz which is more than respectable I think? Is this CPU without it's L3 cache going to be something I seriously regret in a year? Keep in mind this is just a stop gap comp for me, I plan to go all out in 18-24 months and get a high end rig that can mow through any game at 1080p when i get a 1080p monitor.

I have been putting together multiple configs for months through Newegg and NCIX and to be honest can't do much better if at all than this in the $600 range after shipping and most times that doesn't include an OS or speakers which I don't have because I'm using an old office comp with built in speakers that blow.

For now I will only be gaming at 1280x1024 (1280x960 sometimes to steal a few extra FPS!) Will this system be able to handle most games released recently (I'm just assuming anything other than Crysis over a couple years old it will tear through) at 1280x1024 with mid to high settings and at 2xAA and 8xAF or am I in for a big surprise when and if I do buy this?

I have never built a computer (I know I could, everything goes where it goes and youtube is my friend for problems) Around here I always here just build your own, is this another one of those situations or is this one of those rare times where even building my own I probably couldn't do much better than what I'm getting in this package?

The Phenom is $5 dollars cheaper and a decent motherboard for the AMD will cost $25-$30 less than if I go Intel. Price is a major factor in my choice as I have to keep the total system including operating system under $650. What would be the better CPU strictly from a gaming perspective when gaming at 1280x1024. It will be paired with either a ATI5770 or a nVidia gtx 460, I'd like to be able to play most modern games at high settings for the next 12-18 months before I build a true high end rig when bulldozer or the next gen Intel chips come out and come down in price.

I know that while not many games take full advantage of 4 physical cores that more and more that seems to be the case, the I3 2100 only has two real physical cores and sorta acts as a 4 core cpu because of hyperthreading, what are the limitations of hyper threding compared to 4 physical cores when it comes to gaming and do you see those limitations becoming more of a factor in the near future? I will not be playing RTS games which I know are very CPU demanding, I like FPS and racing games if that makes one better over the other.

Thanks for any help

If you live in the united states this is all you should need ($20 after rebate aint bad) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150544&cm_re=5450-_-14-150-544-_-ProductAs for power 200 watts should be enough (wouldn't be suprised if this video card using less than 30watts under full load based on tech reviews of not only this card but low profile cards in general)

mastershake575

thats a 2.1 card which like i said from what I've heard (maybe I'm wrong?) have issues with old pci express 1.0 slots. If anyone can confirm that's not the case I would jump all over that if it would allow mre to play my older games at decent settings. Thanks for the input either way!

To my last post please don't say we always think we are near maxing out because myself personally i always have seen areas where games can improve up untill now. I wanted more colors, less slowdown, more on screen, 3d (in the gaming sense not the viewing sense) better AI, faster loading. Now all I see is minor improvments that can be made and I beieve next gen will make them at a high enough standard that if a new system never came out most would be very happy with the games that will be being produced.