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what is a good pc that can run ark


Kodking194

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what is a good pc that can run ark

so i recently got a decent job where i can begin saving for a decent pc to run ark. thing is i dont know of a good pc to run ark on. i have been told alien ware PCs are good but i figured asking people who play ark on pc would be better. i would like to know the price of the pc and its statistics, so like ram and memory and all that. also how well it runs ark.

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1 hour ago, Kodking194 said:

what is a good pc that can run ark

so i recently got a decent job where i can begin saving for a decent pc to run ark. thing is i dont know of a good pc to run ark on. i have been told alien ware PCs are good but i figured asking people who play ark on pc would be better. i would like to know the price of the pc and its statistics, so like ram and memory and all that. also how well it runs ark.

I wouldn't recommend buying an alienware (or any other pre-built system for that matter) because you really just pay for the logo. Do your researches and build one yourself; much cheaper for better performance.

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17 hours ago, invincibleqc said:

I wouldn't recommend buying an alienware (or any other pre-built system for that matter) because you really just pay for the logo. Do your researches and build one yourself; much cheaper for better performance.

thx for the advice. got any minimum reccomendations on what the pc should contain to run ark well.

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6 minutes ago, Kodking194 said:

thx for the advice. got any minimum reccomendations on what the pc should contain to run ark well.

i'd recommend at least 16gb memory, and a SSD drive, both will help game play.  graphics cards … meh … many are pretty spendy people would recommend, i'd say no less then a geforece gtx 980 4gb, I'm grabbing up a 1060 6gb card for mine though, just to give it a little more umph, mines a older system to start with though, so even a top end card in my machine (better then the 1060) isn't going to do much good for me.

All really depends on your budget for the pc, If you have the skills to build one yourself, or have a friend who does. There are systems you can get assembled for you with your choice of gear in them from different companies but even then your limited on what you can put into them.  I'd say the first and foremost for building any pc is figuring out exactly how much you can afford to spend on it, then try to shoot under that number for what you buy.  Take shipping / tax / vat into consideration when figuring out if you have enough to buy it.

If you can afford it, aim high, build a pc that's not only going to play ark for you, but is going to last you for the years to come. Minimize how often you'll have to upgrade the machine to keep up with the games coming out in the future you may want to play, and anything else you may want to do on it..

When I built mine originally it cost me 2.5k USD, to have a company assimble the same thing, but name brand, and smaller companies, it would of cost me the upwards of 4-5k instead, that is something to keep in mind, same parts, but higher price.

 

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3 hours ago, caleb68 said:

i'd recommend at least 16gb memory, and a SSD drive, both will help game play.  graphics cards … meh … many are pretty spendy people would recommend, i'd say no less then a geforece gtx 980 4gb, I'm grabbing up a 1060 6gb card for mine though, just to give it a little more umph, mines a older system to start with though, so even a top end card in my machine (better then the 1060) isn't going to do much good for me.

All really depends on your budget for the pc, If you have the skills to build one yourself, or have a friend who does. There are systems you can get assembled for you with your choice of gear in them from different companies but even then your limited on what you can put into them.  I'd say the first and foremost for building any pc is figuring out exactly how much you can afford to spend on it, then try to shoot under that number for what you buy.  Take shipping / tax / vat into consideration when figuring out if you have enough to buy it.

If you can afford it, aim high, build a pc that's not only going to play ark for you, but is going to last you for the years to come. Minimize how often you'll have to upgrade the machine to keep up with the games coming out in the future you may want to play, and anything else you may want to do on it..

When I built mine originally it cost me 2.5k USD, to have a company assimble the same thing, but name brand, and smaller companies, it would of cost me the upwards of 4-5k instead, that is something to keep in mind, same parts, but higher price.

 

well me being in my teenaged years i have no knowledge of building PCs. i ahve a friend who built his PC into a table but he lives in america and i am australian. my dads friend builds PCs and is a real pro at it. when i first made the post i planned to buy a PC. if anyone has suggestions for a good gaming PC i can purchase from an professional IT shop or somewhere that sells gaming PCs. also thx @caleb for the suggested requirments to run are. are these the minimum. also i would like the pc to run ark smoothly so i wont crap itself ever 5-30 minutes of gameplay. i dotn mind how i looks so long as it does not affect my effectiveness in gameplay, for instance everyhting is blurred. other game si play are minecraft, conan, tf2, slimerancher and a few other minor games. i tend to stick to games that dont require high performance PCs or laptops so i can play them on my lap top which i use for school.

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22 minutes ago, Kodking194 said:

well me being in my teenaged years i have no knowledge of building PCs. i ahve a friend who built his PC into a table but he lives in america and i am australian. my dads friend builds PCs and is a real pro at it. when i first made the post i planned to buy a PC. if anyone has suggestions for a good gaming PC i can purchase from an professional IT shop or somewhere that sells gaming PCs. also thx @caleb for the suggested requirments to run are. are these the minimum. also i would like the pc to run ark smoothly so i wont crap itself ever 5-30 minutes of gameplay. i dotn mind how i looks so long as it does not affect my effectiveness in gameplay, for instance everyhting is blurred. other game si play are minecraft, conan, tf2, slimerancher and a few other minor games. i tend to stick to games that dont require high performance PCs or laptops so i can play them on my lap top which i use for school.

out of all those you listed Ark is probably the most demanding, conan can be depending on the server your playing on and how many large structures are still up on it. but ark being the highest of them all.  My system has 32gb memory in it, a 4tb drive space (have alot of games installed, server software, coding applications, etc) I'm currently running on a 760ti 2gb slot powered card (which i don't recommend) and it caps out at 58-59fps max, dropping to about 32 on medium settings and most the extra effects shut off, makes ark look really blan, far as performance wise though while playing its good.

CPU, GPU, Memory and drive space will all play part.  Far as a newer prebuilt system,  I couldn't really tell you, I've been out of the loop for a few years myself. sorry I can't be more help. 

I wouldn't go with anything less then a 8 core processor and i'd go with at least 4ghz or better, if you go with less your going to have stuttering while playing single player / unofficial off and on. 

16gb is minimal i think even though ark says it can run on 8, its clunky at best.  32gb is great though, never run into memory issues even with other applications running in the background, i.e. multiple browser windows, obs, and discord for instance (if your interested in streaming).

GPU is going to be a important thing like i was saying before. i've heard the 20xx series gtx cards are still having some issues with ark, don't know if that has been resolved yet.  I will say get a powered GPU, not one that relies on the PCI slot for the power, you'll get much better performance out of the card. Talk to your dads friend, see if he has any suggestions for a high performance gpu.

Most importantly - Cooling, doesn't matter how great the system is if it has improper cooling.  Fan cooled, water cooled or both, if the cooling isn't up to par for the pc, or the airflow fights itself, its going to cause slow down and over heating.

far as playing Official servers - any pc is going to crap itself every 15 minutes as the servers aren't up to par and they are having lag issues when saving, players joining, even sometimes during boss battles depending how busy the server is.  they've really needed to upgrade the hardware on those servers for a couple years now, but they haven't yet.

Even if your not going to build the system yourself its a good idea to research it and find whats going to work best for what you want, that way you can at least look for a prebuilt system that falls as close as possible to it.

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57 minutes ago, caleb68 said:

out of all those you listed Ark is probably the most demanding, conan can be depending on the server your playing on and how many large structures are still up on it. but ark being the highest of them all.  My system has 32gb memory in it, a 4tb drive space (have alot of games installed, server software, coding applications, etc) I'm currently running on a 760ti 2gb slot powered card (which i don't recommend) and it caps out at 58-59fps max, dropping to about 32 on medium settings and most the extra effects shut off, makes ark look really blan, far as performance wise though while playing its good.

CPU, GPU, Memory and drive space will all play part.  Far as a newer prebuilt system,  I couldn't really tell you, I've been out of the loop for a few years myself. sorry I can't be more help. 

I wouldn't go with anything less then a 8 core processor and i'd go with at least 4ghz or better, if you go with less your going to have stuttering while playing single player / unofficial off and on. 

16gb is minimal i think even though ark says it can run on 8, its clunky at best.  32gb is great though, never run into memory issues even with other applications running in the background, i.e. multiple browser windows, obs, and discord for instance (if your interested in streaming).

GPU is going to be a important thing like i was saying before. i've heard the 20xx series gtx cards are still having some issues with ark, don't know if that has been resolved yet.  I will say get a powered GPU, not one that relies on the PCI slot for the power, you'll get much better performance out of the card. Talk to your dads friend, see if he has any suggestions for a high performance gpu.

Most importantly - Cooling, doesn't matter how great the system is if it has improper cooling.  Fan cooled, water cooled or both, if the cooling isn't up to par for the pc, or the airflow fights itself, its going to cause slow down and over heating.

far as playing Official servers - any pc is going to crap itself every 15 minutes as the servers aren't up to par and they are having lag issues when saving, players joining, even sometimes during boss battles depending how busy the server is.  they've really needed to upgrade the hardware on those servers for a couple years now, but they haven't yet.

Even if your not going to build the system yourself its a good idea to research it and find whats going to work best for what you want, that way you can at least look for a prebuilt system that falls as close as possible to it.

i greatly appreciate your help. i knwo nothing about PCs. the complexity of it all was what sent me to consoles. anyway if u are able to list the minimum requirments for things like memory space and RAM just so i can copy paste and print it out and take the list to an IT shop and they could show me gaming PC's they have with those requirments. again thank you for your help. 

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Just my 2 cents 

Bellow is a run down of my Wife and myself have to run ark 

1st pc 

550w PSU 

CPU -AMD 2400g
GPU-R7 390 (4GB)

RAM-16GB (2x8gb 2999Mhz) 

Ark SSD 500GB M.2 

HDD 1tb 

Avreage FPS 45

 

2nd PC 

PSU-650w

CPU-AMD 1600x

GPU- GTX970

RAM- 16GB (2x8GB 3200Mhz)

SSD 256gb M.2 

ArkSSD  500GB 2.5'

HDD2x2TB

Average FPS 55

 

3rd PC

PSU-850w

CPU- AMD 3600 

 GPU-GTX1070

Ram- 16gb (2x8gb 3400Mhz)

SSD- 128gb NVME 

SSD- 500gb

Ark SSD- 500GB 

HDD- 3x2tb 

Average FPS 65

 

Hopeing that helps a little more

Ive built a few ZAR8600.00 (USD750) pc's that run ark well 

 

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2 hours ago, 7RobFrost said:

3rd PC

PSU-850w
CPU- AMD 3600 
GPU-GTX1070
Ram- 16gb (2x8gb 3400Mhz)
SSD- 128gb NVME
SSD- 500gb
Ark SSD- 500GB
HDD- 3x2tb
Average FPS 65

Hopeing that helps a little more

out of those three I would go with this one as the minimal honestly, with a gtx 1060 6gb card as the minimal video, even that processor seems abit dated though.  For a powered video card, I wouldn't go with under a 700w power supply. 

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25 minutes ago, 7RobFrost said:

The CPU out dated ? 

It release 4 month back ? 

Rizen's already up to 9, the 3600 is a rizen 5, and only a 6 core processor, as I was stating before he'll get a lot better performance out of a 8 core,  even my old amd box here being upgraded from a 6 to 8 core, saw a drastic improvement in ark.

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Be careful going the build your own PC route, like many others I do recommend it and it's what I do myself but I do work in I.T and I have built many PC's. The biggest thing people don't tell you to watch out for when they give you the generic, "just build your own rig bro, I'm running x,y,z" speech, is that you need to watch out for compatibility issues, that is one of the biggest reasons for you to do your research whenever buying separate pc parts. You can very easily end up in a situation where you buy all your expensive parts but come time to put it together and boot up.... the motherboard wont take the ram you bought or the CPU isn't the right type for your board or the power supply inst adequate enough for the system.

Don't just listen to people who will spew what their system is running and then take bits and pieces from each of them, a good place to start is go for a slow upgrade rather than an all at once new build, especially for your first build. That being said parts to start with are an SSD, GPU(graphics card) and RAM as these are usually the most compatible friendly parts(excluding the RAM but the RAM will give you a noticeable performance boost) and for the RAM all you have to do is find out what motherboard you have and then a quick google search of compatibility  will tell you what RAM it can take.

If you are choosing to build from scratch then start with the Motherboard and CPU, this is because they are the most tricky when it comes to being compatible, a good way around this is to look for CPU motherboard combos, also called upgrade kits, this guarantees the board and motherboard will compliment each other and be compatible. Then look at what RAM the motherboard can take(usually upgrade kits also come with RAM which will be a plus) and then the graphics card, most GPU's will be fine in most motherboards but you can always just google to make sure.

Once you have all that planned out then try work out the average power that the build will be using, the information for power consumption will be on the different parts specifications, add them together and then add some extra just to be safe, I usually aim for atleast 50 more watts than what my system will need incase I upgrade a part later or want to add more fans or whatever it may be, then look for a power supply in that range. Finally look at the cooling, a decent CPU cooler and an extra fan or two is usually all you need, especially if you are getting a new case as it will come with it's own fans, I highly recommend the coolermaster cases something like the coolermaster H500 mesh is the kind of case that will really help with your build temperature regulation.

Don't listen to people who want you to tailor build for a specific game, this is not a smart move as often those kinds of rigs  may leave you with short comings for other games/things that you may want to use the PC for, just aim for something that atleast covers the games recommended requirements and you will be good to go.

Be careful taking advice from other gamer's on PC parts as unless they are versed in I.T they can easily mislead you, many misconceptions exist which is why people still deem a graphics card memory as it's defining characteristic, it really is not at all, a 4gb card can out perform an 8 gb card depending on it's other specifications, you are much better off doing your own research or listening to those that come from an I.T background, so ask your dads friend for advice and maybe he will even help you build it. Believe me when you run into the issues that every person who builds PC's know will appear when building a fresh machine, having someone with an I.T background can save you a big headache when it comes to trouble shooting certain things.

I wish you good luck though and while it may seem complex, once you get into it, it really isnt hard at all ;).

 

EDIT: the reason prebuilt can be a risky option is that you don't always know that what you paid for is what you got, especially if you don't know much about computers, the amount of people's PC's I have opened up and what they said the specs should be isn't what was actually put in the PC would shock you. Not to say that this will happen to you but atleast with building your own PC you know what you put in there, and you know how you put it together, the things I have seen in prebuilt machines, like using glue to secure connectors onto the motherboard ?, or suffocating fans with poor cable management. If you do decide to go prebuilt, upon receiving the machine open the computer and run through the list to make sure you get what you paid for PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE check.

 

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Get a 1070 or a Vega 56 for graphics.  Those cards are a good "minimum" for running higher-level graphics setups with decent framerates.  You aren't spending 2080ti or Radeon VII money, but you still get to see the bells and whistles that ARK can provide.  1060 is a pretty respectable card too, but the 1070 just has a bit more oomph and is worth the extra money.  I personally have a Vega 56 and the game runs fantastically, but have ran it on a 980ti and it was nearly as good.  Really anything in that ballpark will be good for an entrance into the extra graphics options and/or full-resolution scale (arguably the most demanding setting to max out).

As far as RAM, considering the random memory leaks, it is best to have 16+ GB as @caleb68 said.  I used to run 8gb and would open ARK when it is memory-leaking, and see my RAM usage at full, running into the paging file (meaning I'm using every bit of the 8gb).  I upgraded to 16gb, and it still gets high but there is a cushion that helps prevent those crashes and instability.

CPU:  You really don't have huge worries if you are looking to scale up the graphics settings about your CPU.  ARK is one of those games whose settings can easily tip the bottleneck from the CPU to the GPU.  At lower graphics settings/quality, the CPU helps the framerate pace up quicker.  At higher graphics settings/quality, the GPU quickly pops up as a bottleneck.  It depends on where you want to end up in terms of quality.  View distance and resolution scale will dramatically lower framerate, but depending on graphical fidelity settings you will either slam against the CPU or the GPU with those 2 settings.

As I said, it just depends on where you want your graphics to end up.  ARK is a great looking game, though it runs on DX11 so in my opinion it is better to spend more of your money on more GPU power, and get a fairly stout CPU without killing your build budget for it.  But that's me, and my opinion, and isn't necessarily shared by you or anyone else in the thread.

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1 hour ago, Lycan187u said:

Well it was purchased at Walmart . Not too sure the exact model number atm but it's a great PC for the price I believe the 870-244 is a close model not 100% on that .

its just interesting because usually the Walmart models are down steps from the normal models with cheaper parts (model number usually always carries a w on it when its a Walmart pc).  That's why I was surprised, well, that and it being a HP ;) nice to see hp is stepping up their game though!

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10 hours ago, caleb68 said:

out of those three I would go with this one as the minimal honestly, with a gtx 1060 6gb card as the minimal video, even that processor seems abit dated though.  For a powered video card, I wouldn't go with under a 700w power supply. 

Funny how you call Ryzen 5 3600 dated when it is in fact the best cpu for the buck today(for gaming) and at the same time promote the 3 year old GPU 1060. (Which for the record is less powerful than a 980(which is not sold anymore)). I don't even think many stores are selling GTX 1000-series cards anymore, guess 1660 is still a thing tho.

To the thread creator: I'm running ARK on a i7 2600k(we are talking stone age here) and a GTX 970, 16gb ddr3, ssd, (27" 144hz monitor) bla bla bla. For me it is still the GPU that is bottle neck even tho the cpu will make some angry noises.

 That said, ARK uses the Unreal graphics engine that needs more GPU than CPU power and are only using 3 CPU cores(sure there are games that utilize more cores and more will come but most today only use 1-3).

I myself is in the market to buy a new PC for we can say... umm... my girlfriend.. totally not a second one for myself and I'm thinking about the following specs:

Motherbord: MSI X570-A PRO

CPU: Ryzen 5 3600 (Ryzen 7 3700, cost 150eur more and you get 2 more cores and 4 more threads. clock frequency is the same so if you dont use the extra cores you pay for nothing.)

GPU: Nvidia RTX 2070 (or maybe RTX 2060 Super, cost 120eur less)

RAM: 2x 8GB 3200hz

Inkluding PSU and chassi but excluding monitor this will land on somewhere around 1500 Euros.

 

 

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1 hour ago, AccOnlyCreatedForThisThrea said:

Funny how you call Ryzen 5 3600 dated when it is in fact the best cpu for the buck today(for gaming) and at the same time promote the 3 year old GPU 1060. (Which for the record is less powerful than a 980(which is not sold anymore)). I don't even think many stores are selling GTX 1000-series cards anymore, guess 1660 is still a thing tho.

Best bang for your buck but not the best performance.

1 hour ago, AccOnlyCreatedForThisThrea said:

 That said, ARK uses the Unreal graphics engine that needs more GPU than CPU power and are only using 3 CPU cores(sure there are games that utilize more cores and more will come but most today only use 1-3).

Funny, ark uses all 8 cores for me without using the -useallavialblecores command line, not 3 cores.

1 hour ago, AccOnlyCreatedForThisThrea said:

CPU: Ryzen 5 3600 (Ryzen 7 3700, cost 150eur more and you get 2 more cores and 4 more threads. clock frequency is the same so if you dont use the extra cores you pay for nothing.)

Speaking from personal Experience going from a AMD 6 Core processor to a 8 core processor made a big difference in the game itself. 

I can agree to disagree with your points.

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46 minutes ago, caleb68 said:

Speaking from personal Experience going from a AMD 6 Core processor to a 8 core processor made a big difference in the game itself. 

I can agree to disagree with your points.

That could have to do with how you use your computer. Your previous comments about 32GB giving head room for other applications sounds like you operate similar to me. Ark in fullscreen windowed mode, browser open for reference (and perhaps supplementary entertainment during long tames or breeding), and other tasks going on as well. The additional threads can definitely benefit multitaskers; but I am not sure how many games really take advantage of more than a few cores that well.

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4 hours ago, Uueerdo said:

That could have to do with how you use your computer. Your previous comments about 32GB giving head room for other applications sounds like you operate similar to me. Ark in fullscreen windowed mode, browser open for reference (and perhaps supplementary entertainment during long tames or breeding), and other tasks going on as well. The additional threads can definitely benefit multitaskers; but I am not sure how many games really take advantage of more than a few cores that well.

Actually i run 3 monitors, ark runs full screen non windowed mode on one monitor, another is used for obs and discord if I am streaming, and the third for additional windows.  One of my jobs required me to consistently monitor a server, So I always had putty and the server monitor application running up on screen while i was doing other things.  As myself and another poster has stated its best not to build around any one specific game, and to plan for furture use of the machine.  Building a system based around one specific function or application is just going to cause you more heartache futher down the road, finding that you'll need to upgrade memoru/cpu/gpu/hardrives because what you thought would last you years to come, was only good enough to last you a 6 months to a year.  Games come and go, people bounce through different games fast anymore, and with games getting more and more demanding as they come out for pc's, its easy for a new pc purchased just for a game to play to be considered out dated in a matter of months.  

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21 hours ago, 7RobFrost said:

 

 

3rd PC

PSU-850w

CPU- AMD 3600 

 GPU-GTX1070

Ram- 16gb (2x8gb 3400Mhz)

SSD- 128gb NVME 

SSD- 500gb

Ark SSD- 500GB 

HDD- 3x2tb 

Average FPS 65

 

Hopeing that helps a little more

Ive built a few ZAR8600.00 (USD750) pc's that run ark well 

 

so would this run ark a an average rate. if it can hold its sh*t together while doing things like breeding, boss fights and other high FPS events i will take it. also how much would a PC with the average rwquirments to run ar cost to build and or to buy. if i can find a way to build it i will do so. but if not i may just have to buy the PC. also i do plan on playing other games. its just that ark is the most demanding game out of all the games i have on the list. and i have 30 games i plan to play on the PC. not all at once but u get what i mean. my average gain is bout 75$ a week just over 100$ on a good week. 

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2 minutes ago, Kodking194 said:

so would this run ark a an average rate. if it can hold its sh*t together while doing things like breeding, boss fights and other high FPS events i will take it. also how much would a PC with the average rwquirments to run ar cost to build and or to buy. if i can find a way to build it i will do so. but if not i may just have to buy the PC. also i do plan on playing other games. its just that ark is the most demanding game out of all the games i have on the list. and i have 30 games i plan to play on the PC. not all at once but u get what i mean. my average gain is bout 75$ a week just over 100$ on a good week. 

yeah that one would work good for ark, and keep a decent frame rate.  Sense you mentioned your fathers friend builds pc's you might ask him and see what he would charge to do that for you.

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2 hours ago, Kodking194 said:

so would this run ark a an average rate. if it can hold its sh*t together while doing things like breeding, boss fights and other high FPS events i will take it. also how much would a PC with the average rwquirments to run ar cost to build and or to buy. if i can find a way to build it i will do so. but if not i may just have to buy the PC. also i do plan on playing other games. its just that ark is the most demanding game out of all the games i have on the list. and i have 30 games i plan to play on the PC. not all at once but u get what i mean. my average gain is bout 75$ a week just over 100$ on a good week. 

For Context 

 

Im runing ark, Chrome (youtube), Remote desktop and a V box with out any issuse 

Full break down as follows

Panser z case 

Antec 850w modualr PSU 

Asrock X470 killer one down from current BIOS update  

Corsiar Dom 8gb 3400Mhz memory (x2) 

XPG 128gb NVME 

Samsung 500gb 860 SSD 

Galaxy GTX 1070

LG 25" screen x 2 

As for as hardware clashes and compatibilty 

Other then the audio clash on HDMI on the screen every now and them ( fixed by selection the headset as always default) it all good 

If you need any help shout im sure there are a lot of people on here that will help 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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23 hours ago, 7RobFrost said:

The CPU out dated ? 

It release 4 month back ? 

It's actually the same setup I run except I got a GTX 2060 Super - mainly playing Valguero map atm but average 70FPS with full graphics settings. 

I previously upgraded from an old i5-4690k with 32GB DDR3 and a GTX 970 SOC which was awful in comparrison - mixed high/medium graphics settings and an average of 35-40FPS :(

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