Im new to PC gaming. I used to play on a PS3. Is OCing a CPU or GPU on Skylake necessary to get an avarage of 60 FPS on Arma 3

[KM1776]

What Components for Skylake Arma 3 gaming?

 

[Forever Oleg]

If you want to game, you need a discrete GPU. i7 is not necessary for gaming either, neither is Skylake. Haswell i5 will do the job just as good as the Skylake i5 when paired with a proper GPU.

Do you have a budget in mind? Do you already have a PC?

 

[Geekwad]

Not necessary, but some choose to do it to squeeze out a bit extra performance from their hardware.

Do you already have some equipment, or have a budget or list of hardware you've been considering?

 

[KM1776]

The only things i have is an XFX 650 gold psu and an Asus 660 ti that i bought a couple years ago. I cant seem to find an Z97 MB(asus hero) for a decent price. I also have a case i can use, full tower. Id like to keep it under $800 for now, and get a gtx 970 when i get the funds.

 

[xShadow6208]

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/NGRXK8 / Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/NGRXK8/by_merchant/

**CPU** | [Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80662i56600k) | $249.99 @ Micro Center
**CPU Cooler** | [Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/cooler-master-cpu-cooler-rr212e20pkr2) | $29.99 @ Amazon
**Motherboard** | [Asus Z170-A ATX LGA1151 Motherboard](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-z170a) | $153.88 @ OutletPC
**Memory** | [G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-3200 Memory](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/gskill-memory-f43200c16d8gvkb) | $59.99 @ Newegg
**Storage** | [Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/seagate-internal-hard-drive-st1000dm003) | $45.88 @ OutletPC
**Video Card** | [Asus GeForce GTX 980 4GB STRIX Video Card](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-video-card-strixgtx980dc2oc4gd5) | $469.99 @ SuperBiiz
**Case** | [Fractal Design Define R4 (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/fractal-design-case-fdcadefr4bl) | $68.99 @ NCIX US
**Power Supply** | [EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply](http://pcpartpicker.com/part/evga-power-supply-220g20750xr) | $95.98 @ Newegg
| *Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts* |
| Total (before mail-in rebates) | $1224.69
| Mail-in rebates | -$50.00
| **Total** | **$1174.69**
| Generated by [PCPartPicker](http://pcpartpicker.com) 2016-01-03 00:15 EST-0500 |

 

[digidoggie18]

Try checking out PC part picker and playing with combinations. It will tell you if anything you select is incompatible also for a good Z97 board I reccomend an Asus Z97A they are about 140$ and you can pick up just the Z97 board for 99$ it's a great budget board and Asus is top of the line right now. As for playing Arma... You don't need a skylake to do it an i5 or i7 will do the trick. hte i7 4790k price is a little steep at 350ish but well worth it another option would be the i5 4690k which is a great budget CPU with lots of overclock head room. (when I overclocked it I was sitting at 4.8Ghz) Also do discreet graphics. A GTX 970 will get you almost anywhere you need to be and once you find it won't Running two in SLI will get you everywhere.

 

[thews86]

My only comment is that you should get the R9 390 over the GTX 970, they are the same price and the 390 averages 7-10 more fps on games and has 8 GB of RAM opposed to 3.5 + 0.5.

 

[Oktyabr]

My son and I are both ARMA3 players. I just built him an i5-6500 skylake system (Gigabyte Z170XP SLI with 16GB of DDR4 3000) for Christmas and he's reusing the R9 280 he got last year for his birthday. Benchmarks are running the "Combined Arms" showcase @ 1920x1080 without touching a single thing beyond selecting the basic video quality setting and letting ARMA3 set everything automatically:

"Low" 39-42 fps
"Standard" 29-36 fps
"High" 26-35 fps
"Very High" 24-32 fps
"Ultra" 22-27 fps

ALL post processing turned off (everything on that page including trees and grass, AA, etc.): "Ultra" = 35-48 fps, "High" = 44-60 fps. I've watched him crank the view distance all the way up to 12,000m and still get playable frames (25+) with these settings on his system. Makes me jealous!

My system, by comparison, is older except for the video card. Water cooled AMD FX4100 OC'd to 4.4Ghz on a Sabertooth 990FX R2 with 16 GB of DDR3 1866. I bought myself a new XFX R9 390 "DD" for Christmas thinking that might keep me happy in ARMA3 for another year. My son's benchmarks, with "only" a R9 280??? I get those, subtract 10 fps. All the other games I play can be maxed out at their highest settings and I consistently get 60+. Not ARMA3! "Ultra" on that showcase is a slideshow around 15 fps average. Crank the view distance up and it becomes a screenshot.

Trying to figure out how to convince the wife that I need to build a second skylake system now 😀