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Doom 3 Specs Revealed

By David Worthington, BetaNews

July 21, 2004, 12:41 AM

The Houston Chronicle has the skinny on how much computing power will be needed to run id Software's Doom 3. Since its introduction in 1993, Doom has a history of pushing hardware to its limits and the 3rd release of Doom is no exception. According to CEO Todd Hollenshead, the newly minted Doom will require at least a 1.5 GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor or AMD Athlon 1500, 384 MB of RAM, 2 GB of free hard drive space and either an nVidia GeForce 3 or ATI Radeon 8500 (or better).

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By rw.taylor

edited Mar 13, 2007 - 9:29 PM

neato

Score: 0

By mikey23

posted Aug 14, 2004 - 9:32 PM

save your money people we at www.tomatolinux.org have the answer to your upgrade nightmares."Operating" System--it's possible but better to just run Linux and make a compatibility system that is more efficient and can play Doom3 on a Athlon 1700+ with an ATI9000 at full graphics and 110 fps (yes that's what's been happening this week).

Score: 0

By Soft_Warewolf

posted Aug 23, 2004 - 7:54 AM

i dont belive you when saying this hardware aint stunningly high
i got a ati radeon 8500 and 1,4ghz AMD
when having 640x480 on low quality it runs on 2fps!!
however unreal 2004 runs great with very high quality and 1280x1024 resolution
but even that has it issues.. very long loading time,
personaly i almost only play Starcraft. and EVEN THAT can lagg for alot of ppl when the units numbers are high and alot of trigger code is looping

Score: 0

By mattx

posted Aug 2, 2004 - 10:56 PM

Personally, I think that this is great. I am actually amazed at how LOW the specs are for this incredible game! Bravo to id for finally creating a game for the next gen (expensive/cool) hardware that we enjoy spending our cash and time on! I (as are many others) am tired of the games that look horrible just cause they are written to run on something that came out five years ago!

Score: 0

By Ominus

posted Jul 27, 2004 - 5:41 PM

How is the image quality playing on a projector, I've they look washed out and often fade around the endges.

Score: 0

By LostProphet

posted Jul 29, 2004 - 3:54 PM

When a projector is fuzzy or light around the edges there are a couple of factors. 1) is the projector further away than the distance it can handle or is recommended? 2) LUMAS!!!!!! if your only about 1300-1800 lumas it is going to expecially if your have light in the room. recommend atlest 2400 or higher. 3)what you are projecting onto? should be a solid surface or a screen that is close to the wall> If a screen has room behind it, it could allow light throught or around the edges also giving that effect.

Score: 0

By Inquisitorx

posted Jul 23, 2004 - 4:37 PM

UPGRADE THIS !

really, I mean come on. I love doom and all, but for me to upgrade means major scrimping and saving on my part.

Score: 0

By pliebrand

posted Jul 23, 2004 - 8:23 AM

i'll just play the xbox version... hell, it has co-op too!

Score: 0

By scriptee

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 7:34 PM

I got myself one of those 9600XT cards a while back so that I could enjoy HL2.

I dont think the Doom 3 specs are as hard-core as they initially made them out to be, but they are pretty high.

Also, we can never trust "minimum specs" nowadays cos different company's have a different idea of what this is. some think it should be the spec to play the game comfortably, while others think it is the rock bottom spec the view the menu type thing.

I just hope it runs playable when I rush home with my copy in 2 weeks time.

Score: 0

By psyranix

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 7:29 PM

Cutting edge technology would be 64bit processor support. The industry needs to junk the idea that slow machines need to be supported, what's a 1.5gig machine in another 6 months time?

My machine has been a bottom dweller over the past 5 years through all the good game releases and it absolutely sucks having to turn everything off to get games to run. I think a lot of people have been waiting for a good reason to upgrade and Doom3 is it.

Minimum specs = don't go outside in any outdoor maps to keep your framerate up.

Score: 0

By Mark Gillespie

posted Aug 3, 2004 - 3:59 AM

What on earth is 64bit going to give? 64bit computing allows memory addressing over 4Gb, nothing more.

Why on earth would ID want to product a 64bit version? There is no OS support, and a miniscule proportion of the population have 64bit CPUs.

32bit computing is gonna be around for a while yet.

PS. I assume you have a 64bit CPU, hence your post...

Score: 0

By muka3d

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 9:48 PM

These requirements are weak compared to what I was anticipating for this title. My previous computer, now 3.5 or 4 years old, exceeds these requirements. Apparantly the game is very efficient, or has some special compatibility mode that runs it with really low graphics, but can run on weak specs. such as these.

Score: 0

By valkyre

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 5:43 PM

We went through a period where games were being built to run on 5 year old machines, so they were all medicore as far as technology goes. Now we have all these new games requiring a top of the line computer to run even decent.

But who's complaining? I'm in the process of building a new computer that will have NO problem running Doom 3. ;)

Score: 0

By leveau

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 8:35 AM

Here's a link to the full story: http://www.chron.com/cs/...mpl/tech/weekly/2690450

Score: 0

By Hawk999

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 4:38 PM

Let the upgrading madness begin [again :)]!!!

Score: 0

By Pixelsmack

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 1:19 AM

Yeah I am sure it will run great with the min specs, heh. 640x480...16bit...textures low and you will still get 20fps if you're lucky.

Upgrade your box or vid card if you wanna truly enjoy this game! It will be worth it!

Score: 0

By guitardave78

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 10:59 AM

No Worse than what you need for Far Cry!!

Score: 0

By LostProphet

edited Jul 21, 2004 - 3:12 PM

I agree. although finally games push the limit of the hardware. For the past couple of years the hardware was there but no game. Everyone ran out and bought a G-Force 3 ( i being one of them ) but it was useless nothing could push it. I believe that aslong as the software keeps advancing it will always push the hardware into advancement.

Score: 0

By aburton261

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 3:06 AM

i'll wait for the xbox version(it looks good), than going out getting that new video card.

Score: 0

By deadmonkey

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 3:28 AM

Yeah the XBOX version looks very nice. I am thinking of buying an XBOX when it is released just for this game as I have a laptop and although it is good it is over a year old now so I doubt it would run Doom3 that well. I just wish Microsoft would release an official keyboard and mouse for the XBOX. How cool would it be to have a mouse with a XBOX green colour laser (no mice balls thanks) and an all black keyboard they glowed (just a little) in the same XBOX green colour. I think it would look f**king awesome!

Score: 0

By Baggio

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 4:47 AM

Technically, there was a keyboard of sorts already. For Fantasy Star Online, you could order an adapter that would plug into one of the ports on the XBox controler, and it would give you a place to plug in any USB keyboard.

The adapter really just demonstrates how the entire controler is acting as a USB hub, as you can also plug some flash drives into it, and instantly have a 256 MB memory card. :) I know from personal experience.

Don't expect keyboard and mouse support for the XBox version of Doom 3 though. The game is being tweaked to make the experience using the regular XBox controlers just as compelling. It's the reverse of what was done for Halo if you will. When everyone on the XBox is using the thumbsticks to navigate and shoot, then the control will be balanced. Those that master it, can be just as deadly with the controler as someone who has mastered the inverted-t and a mouse.

Score: 0

By FundeMentaL

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 10:03 AM

[QUOTE]How cool would it be to have a mouse with a XBOX green colour laser (no mice balls thanks) and an all black keyboard they glowed (just a little) in the same XBOX green colour. I think it would look f**king awesome![/QUOTE]

I don't want to spoil your dream but don't you think if they could make optical mouses with different color lasers in them they wouldn't already have done it? Red is the strongest color light, green and blue are to weak to function as a laser for an optical mouse.

Score: 0

By hobbified

posted Sep 2, 2004 - 11:01 PM

Red is, in fact, the "weakest" wavelength of visible light. On the other hand, red LEDs are also far cheaper to make.

Score: 0

By deadmonkey

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 10:29 AM

thanks for ruining my day :(

jking :)

Score: 0

By NoPopNoStyle

edited Jul 21, 2004 - 10:41 AM

Optical mouse, blue led. There's hope yet.

http://www.newegg.com/ap...image=26-171-003-04.JPG

Score: 0

By cPingN

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 1:06 PM

Ummmm is right! That's not a blue sensor led, just a normal optical mouse (see the little red dot below...?) with a blue LED near the roller ball.

Check out http://www.directron.com/ledkb.html

Score: 0

By Pixelsmack

posted Jul 21, 2004 - 1:21 PM

XBOX? No way man! The screenshots from the PC version versus the XBOX version...no comparo. The XBOX one looks good but man, the textures are no where near as detailed as the PC one. The framerates have been reported to be "choppy" in some areas as well. Frankly anything below HD res I don't like playing anymore. 1280x1024 or 1024x768 if I HAVE to. And I want 30fps MINIMUM, 60fps preferred.

Besides...with my HTPC it connects directly to my projector and home theaters...BAM, Doom3 at 100" baby!

Score: 0

By Baggio

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 4:50 AM

I agree... I'm going to be putting my MCE to use on this game; widescreen 1280x720p baby. :) I'll also get it for the XBox though for the cooperative mode and XBox Live multiplayer. You won't see that on the PC version.

Score: 0

By rejected

posted Jul 22, 2004 - 3:23 PM

Well if you want to get all scientific about it, red isn't the "strongest", it is a longer wavelength - I would consider blue "stronger" because it has a higher frequency - just a shorter wavelength. :P

Score: 0

By Baggio

edited Jul 23, 2004 - 9:57 PM

It would have the highest resolution potential, true; the power might be the same -- it depends on the implementation. I think that is meaningless though since the resolution on the sensor is most likely many nanometers larger than the red wavelenths.

As for human vision, we are far more sensitive to green. We are least sensitive to blue. Does that mean that green is the stongest color choice? Only if they used human eyes as the optical sensor. :)

The sensitivity of an electronic sensor that is tuned to a specific wavelength; I guess that is something that the engineers that designed the chips would know.

According to the spec sheet for the latest revision (http://cp.literature.agi...web/pdf/5988-9774EN.pdf), the chips have their greatest response to infrared light ~800nm, but are designed with a 639nm red LED in mind. This is intersting to me for a couple of reasons. This means that the light doesn't have to be in a wavelength that we can see, but I guess it would be kind of boring if you didn't see them light up, and the red LEDs might actually conserve some power since they could get away with a lower intensity light.

Green, being between blue and red in the spectrum, could certainly work, but I suspect the reason you don't see them is purely financially motivated.

This might make for an interesting mod. The lenses for the blue and red mice might be different to accomodate the different wavelenghts, but the green LEDs should work very closely to the blue ones optically. You might just be able to swap it out, and potentially change the R1 resitor value. The red or blue plastic would be the biggest obstacle, but if you just changed out what was visible externally, you might be able to still use the original base.

Score: 0

By rikai

edited Jul 27, 2004 - 2:09 AM

http://www.taconuts.org/...es/2000/dec/3/page1.php has a very nice article on modding your optical mice for diffrent leds(this one ofcuses on blue leds)
i've done this mod on my mouse, it worked rathe well, and its rather original... from the 'comments' section of that very article...
"The reason the manufactures use red LEDs is because the red light increases the contrast of the surface it is lighting up. This makes the simple little camera in the mouse see changes in the surface better, therefore causing the responsiveness to be normal. Find some clear red plastic and look around your surroundings with it, and you should see more contrast."

ive used a variety of colors, including, green, all worked fine.

Score: 0

By Baggio

posted Jul 29, 2004 - 5:26 AM

Perhaps the reason you cite, is why the red LEDs are prefered over the blue ones is correct, but then according to the spec sheet on it, all the manufacturers should be making them with infrared LEDs since that has the highest sensitivity of any wavelength. The white paper portion of the spec sheet tells us that the schematics are "designed" with the red LED in mind, so I think I could reasonably argue that the reason we see more red LED mice, is that it makes it far less work for the manufacturers to implement.

There are manufacturers that sell optical mice with a blue LED already. So my question is, why aren't there already manufacturer's selling them with green LEDs? After all, in the color spectrum, and in the chip sensitivity, green falls between both red and blue.

THAT, I attribute to the cost of green LEDs over red or blue ones.

Score: 0

By udio

posted Sep 25, 2008 - 10:42 PM

wow
wow

Score: 0

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