Upgrade PC Help

[Cosmin]

Hi. I would like to upgrade my PC. The reason is that when ever I play GTA IV and turn all settings to MAX I still have space memory thingy indicator at the bottom left and when I go in-game it start to lag like hell. My PC is HP Pavilion Elite HPE -590uk. Check out all the specifications and tell me why my PC can't handle the game even tho I have the correct things. Tell me if I somehow upgrade and what to upgrade. GPU, CPU, RAM or all of them.

[-pops-]

I am unable to find references to this model.

[AlanHo]

GTA 4 Recommended System Requirements :-

• Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad 2.4GHz or equivalent AMD Phenom X3 2.1GHz

• Memory/RAM: 2.5 GB for XP or Vista

• Video Card: 512MB Nvidia 8600 or 512MB ATI 3870

• Hard Disk Space: 18GB free

• Operating System: Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista SP1. Windows 7

While the above claim to be the minimum/ recommended specs, experience indicates that even with a high-end quad-core/ hexa-core coupled with 6870’s/ 580’s, the game doesn’t seem to perform well on maxed settings. Of course, there will be exceptions where people have managed to play the game smoothly, but it’s safe to assume that there are few who have been fortunate to do so!

The general opinion is that the game, which was originally designed for consoles, wasn’t really given nearly enough importance for the PC version. It is therefore a common feeling amongst PC gamers that the game is ‘badly coded’ or ‘poorly optimized’ for the PC.

To run GTA 4, a quad-core CPU seems to be the preferred choice as the game utilizes a lot of juice from the processor. As for the GPU, it really can’t be said which GPU’s are ‘minimum’ or ‘recommended’ as GPU’s across the board seem to be able to ‘run’ the game, even if on the lowest of settings. It’s a resource hungry game when it comes to the PC, so the more power you have the better the performance will be.

At the end of the day, it all boils down to how well you want to run the game. The actual ‘recommended’ requirements remain a mystery even to date. Suffice to say that the more powerful your rig, the better are your chances of running the game at higher settings. If you have a console, you may want to run the game on that instead!