Is a core 2 duo good for games

[georgewilson]

So my grandads old computer has an inter core 2 duo inside but is way easy to upgrade then my ho elete desk 800g1 so can u tell me if the core 2 duo is good for gaming such has for its rocket league and Roblox

[whispous]

Core 2 Duo processors came out 17 years ago, so there is no upgrade path to anything that can play modern fully featured games.

 

You'd likely struggle to run Minecraft with acceptable settings and framerates.

 

Core 2 Duo is idea for a retro PC build for games made much longer than a decade ago.

 

That platform was often typically Maxxed out at an "extravagant" 4GB of RAM, far less than you'd need now. Today 8gb is a BARE MINIMUM.

[Needfuldoer]

Just now, georgewilson said:

So my grandads old computer has an inter core 2 duo inside but is way easy to upgrade then my ho elete desk 800g1 so can u tell me if the core 2 duo is good for gaming such has for its rocket league and Roblox

That processor is closing in on 20 years old. It's going to struggle with just about any relatively modern game.

 

If you want a retro XP machine to play Quake III Arena on, it will do that easily. But for everything else, your HP EliteDesk G1 is much faster.

[georgewilson]

2 minutes ago, whispous said:

Core 2 Duo processors came out 17 years ago, so there is no upgrade path to anything that can play modern fully featured games.

 

You'd likely struggle to run Minecraft with acceptable settings and framerates.

 

Core 2 Duo is idea for a retro PC build for games made much longer than a decade ago.

 

That platform was often typically Maxxed out at an "extravagant" 4GB of RAM, far less than you'd need now. Today 8gb is a BARE MINIMUM.

Do you thing it whuld be easyer to case swap my hp elete desk to that case so I can upgrade it easyer

 

[whispous]

Just now, georgewilson said:

Do you thing it whuld be easyer to case swap my hp elete desk to that case so I can upgrade it easyer

 

No. If the case is "non standard" on your HP, it's likely the motherboard will be too, stopping it from fitting in a standard case properly.

[georgewilson]

Just now, whispous said:

No. If the case is "non standard" on your HP, it's likely the motherboard will be too, stopping it from fitting in a standard case properly.

It’s atx motherbored

 

[whispous]

Just now, georgewilson said:

It’s atx motherbored

 

What's wrong with the HP case?

[Needfuldoer]

1 minute ago, georgewilson said:

Do you thing it whuld be easyer to case swap my hp elete desk to that case so I can upgrade it easyer

 

Which version do you have? Small form factor? Tower?

 

It's likely the motherboard isn't ATX-standard, so it won't fit properly in a generic case. (The power supply is usually proprietary in those as well, so you'd need adapters to make a generic power supply work.) 

 

You should be able to at least install a GPU that doesn't require power connectors, and get a couple more years out of it. 

 

I recommend you keep saving for a newer PC instead of putting too much money into that HP.

[georgewilson]

1 minute ago, whispous said:

What's wrong with the HP case?

It’s sff

[whispous]

Just now, georgewilson said:

It’s sff

What upgrade problems are you having

 

[georgewilson]

Just now, whispous said:

What upgrade problems are you having

 

Gpu 

[whispous]

Just now, georgewilson said:

Gpu 

What problems are you having upgrading the GPU

[georgewilson]

Just now, whispous said:

What problems are you having upgrading the GPU

So there is a no Ida gerfoce 210 the problem is not power there is a modern power supply in there with pau power 6 pin ita the length 

[whispous]

Just now, georgewilson said:

So there is a no Ida gerfoce 210 the problem is not power there is a modern power supply in there with pau power 6 pin ita the length 

Sorry, can you rephrase this? I'm not sure I quite udnerstand.

[freeagent]

This system will never run modern games unfortunately. Core2  had a good run that ended many many moons ago.

[jaslion]

No

 

This pc is 16 years old and will have a hard time browsing the internet let alone play games.

 

I see you want to put in a geforce 210?

 

The geforce 210 is NOT CAPABLE OF PLAYING GAMES. It is EXTREMELY LOW END and is also 15 years old. Back when it came out it was barely able to run games older than it at 30fps.

 

Current rocket league DOES NOT WORK on a geforce 210 it is far too old.

 

This computer can be easily found for free these days. It is very old and not worth any money. Also not worth to put money into this pc as it is just too old to really do anything.

 

I advice you to save your money and get something new/newer used that will do what you want. This one has had its time and its just not capable of what you want.

[freeagent]

If that Core 2 is an E8600, I would buy it from you for my Rampage Formula  

 

Not looking for anything else

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Core 2 duo to play modern games? Nope not even if you get a golden sample thatll do 5ghz at 1.5-1.6v

 

Core 2 quad to play modern games? Youll have to go back a few years but somewhat doable at 4-4.5ghz an average 45nm quad will do

 

The thing is said core 2 quads and their xeon equivalents are stupidly overpriced to the point that you can get a much cheaper and much better performing i5 750/760 alongside not needing really good rams and a really good board to overclock and ddr3 being able to do 16gb for cheap unlike ddr2 which is stupid overpriced

 

Better off reselling or repurposing those old machines and buying some parts from atleast the ddr3 era, avoid crappy oem prebuilts as theyre not worth the hassle, oem workstations however may be a decent choice if x79 or x99 and paired with an e5 1650 (v2/3) or e5 1660 (v3) and if you can find em cheap enough that a used b3/450 and ryzen 3600(x) or 3100/3300x/3500(x) is not too close pricing wise

 

 

Lga 1366 1156 1155 have depreciated to shit and are dirt cheap

 

1156/55 boards can be found for 10-15$ and you can pair with either an i5 or i7 depending on price which will do ok ish for gaming and will handle both rocket league and roblox just fine

 

There are xeon equivalents for the i5s and i7s but they tend to have lower boost freq and for the 12x0 xeons theyre igpu less so unless you get em for dirt cheap prefer the i5s and i7s

 

If you get a z board a 2500k/2600k/3570k/3770k at 4.8ghz paired with 2133/2800 ddr3 are pretty decent performers, and the z boards have also heavily depreciated but if theyre significantly more expensive than the cheap h or b boards dont bother

 

 

1366 depends on local used market but x58 has depreciated alot over the past few years so lower end boards are anywhere from 20-40$, nehalem quadcore i7s that these boards are usually bundled with are basically worthless due to how cheap 6 core westmeres are and theyre only good for screwing around with since theyre pretty durable (handles >1.7v vtt just fine for 3000+ ddr3 1:1 uncore memclk)

 

xeon x are dirt cheap and theyre only worth a few $ nowadays, wouldnt bother buying a higher end x xeon unless pricing is not too different simply due to xeon w existing and they have unlocked cpu multi (which is pretty useless for the most part) alongside not being stuck on 10x ram multi which means 2600-2800 ddr3 on boards that are stuck with 1.5:1 uncore memclk ratio and 3600+ ddr3 for 1:1 usually on giga boards but this is rather useless due to lower end giga boards having a crappy 3rd channel so unless you find a cheap x58a oc or maybe even a cheap evga/foxconn board dont bother shooting for this kinda ram freq. 6 cores at 4.2-4.8ghz depending on both cpu bin and cooler will be more than enough to run your games and if you wish to play more demanding stuff as long as avx isnt neccesary x58 should be able to handle it

 

 

Though used b3/450 boards are ~50$ and abit less for lower end models and used 3600(x) are 50-60$ with the 3100/3300x likely being around 30$ and even that 3100 + b450 combo will demolish all of these old platforms even if theyre overclocked simply due to the newer architecture especially if you push it to 4.3-4.5ghz not to mention theres an upgrade path all the way to a 5700x3d/5800x3d (200-250$ used) or 5950x alongside better power efficiency cause x58 is a power hog and same goes for sandybridge especially when overclocked, and if you really need to save that much money you can get a couple used oem 8gb 2133 double sided samsung or hynix rams and run at 3800 for <20$ due to low speed bin and these will do 250-300trfc at 3800 so alot faster than any xmp kit

 

So if you can find used ryzen for cheap go for that instead of these ancient platforms, its just straigh up better all around with better power efficiency, performance, and a good upgrade path

[okkee]

1 hour ago, georgewilson said:

So my grandads old computer has an inter core 2 duo inside but is way easy to upgrade then my ho elete desk 800g1 so can u tell me if the core 2 duo is good for gaming such has for its rocket league and Roblox

great for like quake 2, doom and other older titles. like, games made before 2010. in any case, your elite desk should have a 4th gen processor. What's up with it? can you post full system specs?

[georgewilson]

1 hour ago, okkee said:

great for like quake 2, doom and other older titles. like, games made before 2010. in any case, your elite desk should have a 4th gen processor. What's up with it? can you post full system specs?

Has an intel core i3 and 16 gig of ram

 

[okkee]

38 minutes ago, georgewilson said:

Has an intel core i3 and 16 gig of ram

 

in my humble opinion the elitedesk with a 4th gen i3 and 16gb ram is much more suited for lightweight gaming than a core 2 duo.

you really only have 3 paths forward:

 

1) buy a new mobo, case, psu so you have standard parts and can plug in a proper gpu without any constraints,

the small case really limits the kind of gpu you can put in there and any gpu capable of playing those probably wont fit in the case. there are low profile cards but those aren't easy to find. another constraint is power. sata to pcie adapters are ok but i've point they aren't really ideal and your current power supply isn't all that great anyways. you can switch out the psu and case but a caseswap is a bit tricky (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxw_4KV5DHM) all in all, it's a bit much to spend ngl. (this is actually what i did with my build)

 

 

2) scrap both machines and use the money to get something a little better, or

alternatively you could just sell both machines, add a bit of cash and get yourself something a bit more reasonable. this would of course mean you wouldn't have a pc and you'd be starting from scratch but with a bit of money. if you plan on doing this, please start a thread in new build/planning so people can help you out.

 

3) make the best with what you have

you have an ok computer. unfortunately not much for gaming but it is what it is. the igpu isn't all bad, you could play some of the better retro games and some of the newer lightweight titles as well.

 

my personal advice would be to wait a bit, build up some cash and then scrap both machines and get something a little better. @Somerandomtechyboi has some great advice in that regard. i'll just throw in my two cents. keep the memory and sell everything else off and build something off of a 2nd/3rd/4th gen i7. cpu mobo combos for those are not too pricy and leaves a bit more in the budget for a gpu. if you have quite a bit of cash then a am4 build would be best.

 

if you have any more questions, i'll try my best to answer.

[jaslion]

6 hours ago, georgewilson said:

Has an intel core i3 and 16 gig of ram

 

Yeah you literally cannot have a core 2 system that can beat a 4th gen i3 desktop chip.

 

Even so that is very weak still but like a basic gpu like  gtx 750 is about 40$ and will allow you to play thr 2 games you listed in an ok fashion.

[georgewilson]

On 2/11/2024 at 4:19 PM, okkee said:

in my humble opinion the elitedesk with a 4th gen i3 and 16gb ram is much more suited for lightweight gaming than a core 2 duo.

you really only have 3 paths forward:

 

1) buy a new mobo, case, psu so you have standard parts and can plug in a proper gpu without any constraints,

the small case really limits the kind of gpu you can put in there and any gpu capable of playing those probably wont fit in the case. there are low profile cards but those aren't easy to find. another constraint is power. sata to pcie adapters are ok but i've point they aren't really ideal and your current power supply isn't all that great anyways. you can switch out the psu and case but a caseswap is a bit tricky (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxw_4KV5DHM) all in all, it's a bit much to spend ngl. (this is actually what i did with my build)

 

 

2) scrap both machines and use the money to get something a little better, or

alternatively you could just sell both machines, add a bit of cash and get yourself something a bit more reasonable. this would of course mean you wouldn't have a pc and you'd be starting from scratch but with a bit of money. if you plan on doing this, please start a thread in new build/planning so people can help you out.

 

3) make the best with what you have

you have an ok computer. unfortunately not much for gaming but it is what it is. the igpu isn't all bad, you could play some of the better retro games and some of the newer lightweight titles as well.

 

my personal advice would be to wait a bit, build up some cash and then scrap both machines and get something a little better. @Somerandomtechyboi has some great advice in that regard. i'll just throw in my two cents. keep the memory and sell everything else off and build something off of a 2nd/3rd/4th gen i7. cpu mobo combos for those are not too pricy and leaves a bit more in the budget for a gpu. if you have quite a bit of cash then a am4 build would be best.

 

if you have any more questions, i'll try my best to answer.

The computer itself came with no cou and ram I bought an ssd for 10 pund a Toshiba one I also got an intel core i3 that I found in a bin of recicled computer the pins where bent so I bent them back and now it works and ur prob thinking why didn’t u take the one with the i3 there was no case just a motherboard any I bought 16 gig of ram of Temu for 22punds and an anu Ida GeForce 210 for 10 pounds so over all about 80 pounds

[Pasi123]

7 minutes ago, georgewilson said:

The computer itself came with no cou and ram I bought an ssd for 10 pund a Toshiba one I also got an intel core i3 that I found in a bin of recicled computer the pins where bent so I bent them back and now it works and ur prob thinking why didn’t u take the one with the i3 there was no case just a motherboard any I bought 16 gig of ram of Temu for 22punds and an anu Ida GeForce 210 for 10 pounds so over all about 80 pounds

The iGPU in the 4th gen i3 is much better than the GeForce 210. The 210 is a display adapter from 2009 and uses a really low end GT218S chip from 2007

[okkee]

1 hour ago, georgewilson said:

The computer itself came with no cou and ram I bought an ssd for 10 pund a Toshiba one I also got an intel core i3 that I found in a bin of recicled computer the pins where bent so I bent them back and now it works and ur prob thinking why didn’t u take the one with the i3 there was no case just a motherboard any I bought 16 gig of ram of Temu for 22punds and an anu Ida GeForce 210 for 10 pounds so over all about 80 pounds

80 pounds is def a ton of cash. not easy to part with but you gotta get something decent. but i mean, a cheap upgrade that would probably be alright is a rx570 8gb. these should be like 40/50 pounds and should be ok for some ok gaming. and maybe just swap out the i3 for a i7. those go for like 30 pounds. 

 

the geforce 210 really isn't gonna do much that the igpu can't achieve.