HL2 System Specs Announced

spudthedestroyer

Probably what people have been waiting on playing the leaked alpha/from screenshots, to go with the announced August Gold date, the developers have also added the required system specs to boot:

Quote:

Valve's Gabe Newell has posted on the HL2 Fallout forums and has revealed what the full hardware requirements will be for H-L 2. Information which comes right on time, if we are to believe the much talked about end-of-summer 2004 release date.

According to Mr. Newell then, the minimum machine specs for decent performance on H-L 2 will be a 1.2GHz CPU with 256MB RAM, Win 98/ME/2000/XP and a DirectX 7 capable graphics card. As you well realise such a box would not do justice to the various graphical wonders of the game so Mr. Newell was quick to add the recommended system specs which are as follows: a 2.4 GHz CPU with 512MB RAM, Windows 2000/XP and a DirectX 9 graphics card.

What Mr. Newell does not clarify is how the XBox version will differ since Microsoft's box does not reach the optimal hardware requirement and in some instances even fails to meet the minimum requirements. How will the limited, 64 MB DDR 200MHz, memory impact the game and how will Valve respond in order to make H-L 2 playable on XBox? Or how will the 733 MHz CPU affect gameplay. All perfectly logical questions which will need a great dose of Valve magic and some eye-candy cutbacks, to be resolved.

http://www.megagames.com/news/html/pc/h ... aled.shtml

Clear and detailed hardware specs can be found here:
http://www.hl2fallout.com/articles/inde ... E=02&id=17

spudthedestroyer · **Posted:** Mon Jul 12, 2004 11:20 pm **Post subject:**

Quote:

The first thing to remember when buying a graphics card is the bottom line. Realistically speaking, you're not going to get a decent card for under ?100 inc. VAT ($120 USD). If it costs less than that then either it's either out-dated technology or you've scored yourself one sweet deal. Every time I have spent less than ?120 on a graphics card I've been severely disappointed.

Secondly, if it's in the GeForce FX 5xxx series, it's really not going to perform as well in HL2 as an “equivalent” ATI card. Valve have not specifically optimized HL2 for ATI cards, it's just a result of the way the cards work the DX9 and the Source code paths. If you look at the early performance of any FX card in Far Cry (or any shader benchmark) and at the image quality you will see Valve's concerns with this particular line of NVIDIA cards. Valve have repeatedly said that these FX cards will really not do the job well. This has nothing to do with “fanboyisms”, it's just down to the simple fact that FX 5xxx cards have issues with SM2.0. NVIDIA have done their best to increase performance on these cards, but this has often led to decreases in image quality.

If you're short on cash then you may want to consider a Radeon 9600XT or a 9800pro (not SE), the 9800Pro costs a bit more but is significantly faster. The 9800XT is a bit faster than a 9800Pro but not really worth the extra cash. Anything slower/cheaper than that is going to be dodgy -- it's not going to last very long and soon you will be upgrading again, it won't run HL2 at or close to the highest settings either.

If you have wads of cash and are looking for a long term upgrade then you have a hard choice ahead of you. NVIDIA have come back on form with the 6800 series and ATI have kept up with the x800s. Although ATI's new cards will be faster in HL2 (unless Gabe Newell is a filthy liar) they may not beat NV in other games, especially Doom III and possibly S.T.A.L.K.E.R which will apparently take advantage of SM3.0 (shader model 3.0). Another point to consider is the API support. The 6800's seem to outperform ATI's new cards quite markedly in OpenGL games (e.g. Doom III). HL2 is DirectX only, so it's a moot point in that regard.

The x800s do not have support for the full SM3.0 feature set which won't cause them to lose any image quality in SM3.0 games, but may give NVIDIA a speed advantage. This has yet to be proven*. The x800s have something called 3Dc which will help boost performance in games that support it. One of which should be Half-Life 2.

The new NVIDIA cards eat up more power and twice the space of the x800 (thanks FS).
If you can't decide which one to get then take into consideration heat, power requirements and size. The x800 seems to come out on top in all these areas. On the other hand, if money is no object and you've got a beefy power supply and case, it might be best to wait for actual benchmarks of HL2 (not from the HL2 leak) and Doom III. Even if you're not going to buy D3, you will likely end up playing a game based on the D3 engine.

*It has been tested in FarCry and there was some improvement, however it's early days yet.

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Mon Jul 12, 2004 11:23 pm **Post subject:**

And is this the box and disks too?

It's not

But it's a DAMN good fake

spudthedestroyer · **Posted:** Mon Jul 12, 2004 11:53 pm **Post subject:**

hehe, well it would be a damn good fake indeed, but as you can see, the co ver doesn't fit in the box correctly and you can see the white mark where he's cut it with scissors. Always the same with fake DVDcovers, the printouts are never the right size :lol:

Can't believe someone went to that length to fake it as cool as it looks, wonder whats on the cds?

I take it is to back up "Well my uncle has Half Life 2 retail" argument a kiddie got himself into? :mrgreen:

Polityk · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 11:50 am **Post subject:**

LOL, that's nice...

Quote:

...the minimum machine specs for decent performance on H-L 2 will be a 1.2GHz CPU with 256MB RAM, Win 98/ME/2000/XP and a DirectX 7 capable graphics card.

Heheh, Mr. Newell is very specific here. Most machnes nowadays match these requirements, but I don't think you could play the game on them. I think the "recommended" specs establish the bottom line here.

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 12:13 pm **Post subject:**

spudthedestroyer wrote:

Can't believe someone went to that length to fake it as cool as it looks, wonder whats on the cds?

I take it is to back up "Well my uncle has Half Life 2 retail" argument a kiddie got himself into? :mrgreen:

God only knows, but he did the same with doom 3 too! :
<img src="http://www.planetdoom.com/images/photo/big/071004.jpg" width="600">

spudthedestroyer · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 5:09 pm **Post subject:**

hehe, his doom one has a better case... as you can see it fits the DVD case this time :lol:

lol @ 4cds for doom3... how many levels of find blue key, find red key, find yellow key --> end can you have?

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:51 pm **Post subject:**

Spud, you've proved you can read, but not count, there's 6 (!) CD's there mate :lol:

spudthedestroyer · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 7:47 pm **Post subject:**

ai but its CD1-4 and then 2 extras like with his fake HL2 isn't it? See the counterstrike and the one with the band across it

He'll have done the same with Doom

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 8:00 pm **Post subject:**

That's very presumptious Spud, or could it possibly be that you're wrong? :lol:

spudthedestroyer · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 8:24 pm **Post subject:**

damn it, what you talking about there's quite clearly 4cds... you can go about your business... move along...

ps. if you hadn't noticed, I only glanced at the picture and it said CD4 on the top one :lol:

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Tue Jul 13, 2004 8:29 pm **Post subject:**

hehe

paul-scream22 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 14, 2004 1:12 am **Post subject:**

I prefer to be a bit more retro :wink:

Or I think Spud would rather count this doom 3 format

Some Random Dude · **Posted:** Wed Jul 14, 2004 2:57 am **Post subject:**

Hilarious

That picture actually reminds me of this time when a friend of mine came by with 36! diskettes and told me he got hold of Duke Nukem 3D. Man we've been busy for hours installing Duke3D :wacky:

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Thu Jul 15, 2004 10:21 am **Post subject:**

BTW for those of you interested (and don't already know) doom 3 has gone gold

Quote:

Finger toddh@idsoftware.com

Welcome to id Software's Finger Service V1.5!

Name: Todd Hollenshead
Email:
Description: CEO
Project:
Last Updated: 07/14/2004 12:36:49 (Central Standard Time)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
7-14-2004 11:52 AM CDT

IT'S DONE!!!!!!!

Yes, this is the official word that DOOM 3 has been code released and has been approved for manufacturing! It won't be long now until the anticipation ends and the PH34R begins ;-)

We literally just hung up with Activision and have confirmed that our latest release candidate has been mutually approved and is finally GOLD. Thanks to everyone for their patience (yeah right! =) and for everyone at id, Activision and our numerous partners for helping us create what I believe is absolutely the best game we have ever made.

So, the next question is release dates. Retailers in the States will be allowed to pick up games starting at 12:01 AM on August 3rd. The official street date is actually August 5th in the U.S.A., but some of your favorite stores will probably have it early for those of you who have to have it first. Check with your local retailer for that information.

Internationally, the game will take a few more days to make it to the store shelves. The UK will probably get it first, on or about August 6th. Everywhere else will probably be Friday, August 13th (que Twilight Zone Theme) or close to that date, with just a few exceptions (e.g. Russia and Poland). This isn't because we don't have love for you folks outside the U.S., but the localization and manufacturing process takes a bit longer outside the U.S. where we will have JVC run 24/7 to get the units built. I guess the European manufacturers prefer to give their employees nights and weekends off. Go figure!

The champagne is flowing here at id and smiles abound!

I'll update again with some DOOM 3 preparation tips (not what hardware to buy - you'll have to wait for a programmer for that sort of thing). In the meantime, I want to see those "DOOM 3 GOLD!!!" threads set new records for swamping message board servers, destroying productivity, and post counts ;-)

Recapping today's headlines....DOOM 3 GOLD!!!

PC_Arcade · **Posted:** Thu Jul 15, 2004 2:19 pm **Post subject:**

Doom 3 had better be good, the hopes of the entire industry are resting on it : http://money.cnn.com/2004/07/14/comment ... /index.htm

and the official website is up : http://www.ua-corp.com/
although ATM it's pretty bare, with only a countdown until launch.

HL2 System Specs Announced

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