Minimum requirements to play with ultra settings?

[TX_Angel]

I see a lot of claims in this thread of the CPU being the key factor, but all 4 cores on my i5-2400 have plenty of extra bandwidth, and the in-game FPS counter is red, meaning it wants more GPU power.

 

The in-game FPS meter hasn't been accurate for awhile now. I think it used to be, but it claims it wants more GPU power on my machine and my 980 TI is running at about 55% usage even in warzones (and that is on three 1600p screens running 12 million pixels).

 

On the other hand, when I overclocked my i7-4770k from 3.5GHz base to a fixed 4.2GHz speed, I did notice warzones smooth out a bit. It was enough of a difference to make it worth leaving there.

 

Side note, if you look at task manager, 100% CPU usage is all 4 cores being used. SWTOR will never use all 4 cores. At best, you might see 50% usage, but more likely something like 30-35% usage as it pegs one core and uses a bit of another.

 

Your CPU is also starting to get long in the tooth. It was fine two years ago for SWTOR, but each major release has clearly demanded more. My son had a i5-2310 (which is similar to yours) and he played on it for a year with a GTX 960 on three screens, and it was fine, but the upgrade to a i7-4790k made a world of difference in performance, warzones smoothed right out.

[TX_Angel]

In terms of CPU, strictly for SWTOR, just look for more horsepower in terms of GHz. In that sense, I believe it's small difference for this game whether it is 2500k or new Skylake, if they were to run on the same clock. I would go out on a limb and say that compared on the same clock, you would see no more than 4-5 FPS difference, assuming both configurations are sound otherwise.

 

I honestly have to disagree on this one. Your CPU is Ivy Bridge, which was the last big jump. Sandy Bridge is now the recommended upgraded point, that and older is worth replacing, Ivy Bridge and newer is not.

 

Even at the same clock rate, Skylake should be 40% faster than Sandy Bridge in most CPU bound tasks. There are 4 product generations between them, the IPC improvements between generations aren't huge, but they add up over time.

 

Now playing single player games, I'd agree. An overclocked Sandy Bridge 2500K against a new i5-6600K likely will do fine. MMOs, games like ARMA III, etc. that require lots of CPU, Skylake is worth it IMHO.