KSP1 Computer Building/Buying Megathread

[DerkyJerkyWreaksHavoc]

On 4/19/2013 at 10:28 PM, Leonov said:

Welcome to the KSP Computer Building/Buying Megathread.

Post your Specs and Builds of your Work in Progress, Current, or Future Builds; or ask for advice on computer purchases. This is also a place for constructive discussion, Please keep it an open and friendly enviroment. No fanboys just honest facts would be appreciated.

Feel free to post Anything Computer Related here.

Some hardware fixes.

Some videos to help you with building your rig.

How Not to apply Thermal Paste.

How to correctly apply Thermal Paste.

Looking to buy a Mechanical Keyboard?

A Nice Form to fill out if you want help from someone with planning a build.

When trying to recommend a build to you, there's some information that's extremely helpful for us to know. If you could answer these few short questions, we'd be happy to help!

• What are you planning to do with this compuer? Please be as specfic as possible.

• What is your budget?
  1. Does this include a copy of Windows?
  2. Does this include peripheals (a keyboard, monitor, mouse, speakers, etc.)?

  [*]Are you from the United States or a different country? Are you ordering from your own country or from across borders?

  1. Wherever you may be from, does the store that you are planning to order from have a website? It's okay if it isn't in English, we can manage.
  2. If you are from the United States, do you live nearby a Microcenter?

• Do you have any specific requests with the build?
  1. Do you plan on overclocking? If yes, do you have a specific goal in mind?
  2. Would you prefer the build to be particularly small?
  3. Would you prefer the build to be particularly quiet?
  4. In general, do you prefer this to be a computer that you can spend money on now and let it rest, or a box built for continuous upgrading?
  5. Do you ever plan on utilizing NVIDIA's SLI or AMD's CrossfireX technologies? These features, with a compatible motherboard, allow a user to link multiple identical graphic cards together for added performance. In real world terms, this lets you buy a second identical graphics card down the line as a relatively cheap and easy way to gain a fairly large boost in performance. However, this requires buying a SLI/CFX compatible motherboard and PSU now, which may result in slightly higher initial cost.

(OPTIONAL) Have you already looked at or considered any parts (it's okay if you haven't)? If so, please list your top 1-2 choices for each category. If you've only picked out a few of the below, just list those.

• CPU
• Motherboard
• RAM
• Graphics Card
• Power Supply
• Case
• Hard Drive
• Solid State Drive (optional)
• Mouse (if necessary)
• Keyboard (if necessary)
• Monitor (if necessary)
• Speakers/Headset (if necessary)

Once again, thank you in advannce for taking the time to answer these.

My Build.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

My parts list can be found here.

Look at these temps. LOOK AT THEM.

Me: Enable Brain Self Destruct Auto Shut Down Sequence Start (EBSDASDSS)

[Popestar]

55 minutes ago, Electricity 123456789 said:

Hello guys,nice to meet you all.Actually the main reason of my post is about the performance of Kerbal space program on my laptop.Specs-i3 7100u,4gb ram(which is sadly soldered) and HD 620 graphics from Intel.I have been wanting to buy this game but everytime I am worried about perfromance as my laptop is pretty old and garbage by standards.Plz if anyone could share my their performance in systems with similar specs and ways to improve performance

The concern I see is the RAM.  I'm not sure how old your laptop is, nor do I know what type of RAM you have (DDR, DDR2, GDDR, etc.), but I can tell you that 4 GB isn't enough.  The minimum recommended RAM for KSP is 3 GB...but you should shoot for at least twice that to avoid any potential issues that may crop up with multiple things running at once.  Remember that, in addition to whatever application you may be running (KSP, in this case), your machine, whether it be Windows or Mac, will have processes running in the background that take up RAM space.  I'd personally recommend having no less than 8 GB of RAM (which is what I have on my laptop).

 

[Geonovast]

9 minutes ago, Popestar said:

I'm not sure how old your laptop is, nor do I know what type of RAM you have (DDR, DDR2, GDDR, etc.), but I can tell you that 4 GB isn't enough

With an i3-7100U, it's not terribly old.  The RAM would be DDR4 or DDR3L.  GDDR is for graphics cards only.

But 4 GB definitly isn't going to cut it, especially since I'm not seeing dedicated memory for the iGPU, which means your "graphics card" (built into the CPU) will be using system RAM.  KSP isn't graphically intensive, but it's still going to drag it down.

1 hour ago, Electricity 123456789 said:

Hello guys,nice to meet you all.Actually the main reason of my post is about the performance of Kerbal space program on my laptop.Specs-i3 7100u,4gb ram(which is sadly soldered) and HD 620 graphics from Intel.I have been wanting to buy this game but everytime I am worried about perfromance as my laptop is pretty old and garbage by standards.Plz if anyone could share my their performance in systems with similar specs and ways to improve performance

You may be able to play bone stock with the graphics settings turned way down, but I wouldn't expect a good experience.

What laptop is it?  My laptop has 4Gb soldered but also has an actual DIMM slot as well, so I'm running 12 GB in it.  There's not much you can do about the GPU, though.

[GuessingEveryDay]

What actually matters when it comes to the graphic cards? Is it video memory, or? Considering that the requirements from KSP for the GPU just talk about having VRAM. Is that all I need, or?

[Elthy]

Video memory is just one aspect, but the easiest one: You either have enough (for a game/setting) of you dont. If its not enough you will experience extreme stutter, making the game unplayable. The other main aspect is the graphics processor performance, which is depending on so many factors that there is no way to predict it from raw numbers like FLOPS, only to measure it.

[Electricity 123456789]

9 hours ago, Popestar said:

The concern I see is the RAM.  I'm not sure how old your laptop is, nor do I know what type of RAM you have (DDR, DDR2, GDDR, etc.), but I can tell you that 4 GB isn't enough.  The minimum recommended RAM for KSP is 3 GB...but you should shoot for at least twice that to avoid any potential issues that may crop up with multiple things running at once.  Remember that, in addition to whatever application you may be running (KSP, in this case), your machine, whether it be Windows or Mac, will have processes running in the background that take up RAM space.  I'd personally recommend having no less than 8 GB of RAM (which is what I have on my laptop).

 

Mine is ddr4 2400mhz.Acer aspire E-15,and a nice news is that the ram isnt soldered (I just contacted the Acer service centre to inquire about this matter).I generally don't use anything in background with this laptop and to avoid steam hogging stuff I am even going to buy KSP from store.I just wanted to play ksp(stock only).I haven't seen anything regarding the perfromance with similar specs hence I was a bit worried.

8 hours ago, Geonovast said:

With an i3-7100U, it's not terribly old.  The RAM would be DDR4 or DDR3L.  GDDR is for graphics cards only.

But 4 GB definitly isn't going to cut it, especially since I'm not seeing dedicated memory for the iGPU, which means your "graphics card" (built into the CPU) will be using system RAM.  KSP isn't graphically intensive, but it's still going to drag it down.

You may be able to play bone stock with the graphics settings turned way down, but I wouldn't expect a good experience.

What laptop is it?  My laptop has 4Gb soldered but also has an actual DIMM slot as well, so I'm running 12 GB in it.  There's not much you can do about the GPU, though.

Thanks a lot for the reply.I contacted the Acer service centre and they said the ram isn't soldered but upgrading will void the warranty (mine is Acer aspire E-15).I wanted to play the game with 30fps and don't mind setting down the graphical settings till I upgrade the ram of this PC.

 

Can you confirm me one thing-The demo version runs without any hiccups,so will the perfromance which I have on demo scale up with the original game on steam aka will the performance be same as I have heard a lot of perfromance optimisation has gone into the game

[Popestar]

6 minutes ago, Electricity 123456789 said:

Mine is ddr4 2400mhz.Acer aspire E-15,and a nice news is that the ram isnt soldered (I just contacted the Acer service centre to inquire about this matter).I generally don't use anything in background with this laptop and to avoid steam hogging stuff I am even going to buy KSP from store.I just wanted to play ksp(stock only).I haven't seen anything regarding the perfromance with similar specs hence I was a bit worried.

Even if you aren't actually running anything in the background, Windows will.  All kinds of operating system processes that need to run will be, and they all chew up RAM.  As an example, I have 8GB of RAM, and when sitting idle I only have 7.29 GB available.  Click Start, then type System Information in the search bar.  Open that up, and under General (you may have to scroll down) you will see RAM/Memory.  It will list Physical and actual, and you don't want to be near the 3GB needed; you want to be well above that.

Edited December 4, 2020 by Popestar

[Electricity 123456789]

39 minutes ago, Popestar said:

Even if you aren't actually running anything in the background, Windows will.  All kinds of operating system processes that need to run will be, and they all chew up RAM.  As an example, I have 8GB of RAM, and when sitting idle I only have 7.29 GB available.  Click Start, then type System Information in the search bar.  Open that up, and under General (you may have to scroll down) you will see RAM/Memory.  It will list Physical and actual, and you don't want to be near the 3GB needed; you want to be well above that.

I have 4096mb RAM and 3890mb available.And does ksp offload itself fully into Ram, but I have 3+GB ram even after cutting the igpu memory (512mb).I guess I have to play on stock and low

46 minutes ago, Popestar said:

Even if you aren't actually running anything in the background, Windows will.  All kinds of operating system processes that need to run will be, and they all chew up RAM.  As an example, I have 8GB of RAM, and when sitting idle I only have 7.29 GB available.  Click Start, then type System Information in the search bar.  Open that up, and under General (you may have to scroll down) you will see RAM/Memory.  It will list Physical and actual, and you don't want to be near the 3GB needed; you want to be well above that.

I just wanted to know whether it will be playable as it's 3.3gb including IGPU memory and system reserved memory.World of warships- takes up 95% of my ram,CSGO-takes 85% of ram, Minecraft is pretty light weight takes up 80% of my ram.I have disabled the Xbox game bar and my antivirus software which(McAfee) which used to erect havoc sucking up my system resources subscription ended,so my system is running much much faster.How much ram does your game use???

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

Is this where we express our frustration at not being able to buy a new GPU?

[Crazy Kerbal]

Hello,I since purchased Kerbal Space Program it is very laggy,so I have to buy a new RAM 

 

Can any body help me how much GB ram is need to run 15-20 mods easily

[Gargamel]

8 GB is about the minimum you can get away with to run a modded KSP.   I ran about 80 mods on a very old i3 machine with 8gb of Ram, and it was pretty stable.   

[VoidCosmos]

1 minute ago, Ujjiban Bhattacharjee said:

Hello,I since purchased Kerbal Space Program it is very laggy,so I have to buy a new RAM 

 

Can any body help me how much GB ram is need to run 15-20 mods easily

Hi there

What are the mods that you want to run exactly 

[Crazy Kerbal]

Hi there!,I run-Environmental Visual Enhancements,Paralax,Astronomers visual pack,Scaterer,Kerbal engineering redux,Hanger Extender,Mechjeb ,Docking port Alignment Indicator and Kerbal alarm clock

[VoidCosmos]

Just now, Ujjiban Bhattacharjee said:

Hi there!,I run-Environmental Visual Enhancements,Paralax,Astronomers visual pack,Scaterer,Kerbal engineering redux,Hanger Extender,Mechjeb ,Docking port Alignment Indicator and Kerbal alarm clock

Yes 8GB should work well

[VoidSquid]

7 minutes ago, VoidCosmos said:

What are the mods that you want to run exactly 

which is the real question here, yes. I don't have that many mods myself, just a little over 100, but I do have a couple of multi-part part mods, and they do eat a lot of RAM, right after starting, KSP takes 16GB, and it grows easily to 20+ GB after 1-2h.

[Crazy Kerbal]

Thank  you,curently I have 4.00 GB of RAM from which 3.90 GB is usable

 

Now I can play with Jeb smothly

Edited December 29, 2020 by Ujjiban Bhattacharjee

[VoidCosmos]

4 minutes ago, VoidSquid said:

which is the real question here, yes. I don't have that many mods myself, just a little over 100, but I do have a couple of multi-part part mods, and they do eat a lot of RAM, right after starting, KSP takes 16GB, and it grows easily to 20+ GB after 1-2h.

And I have 4 Gigs of RAM

And the game runs smoothly 

With about 20 mods 

By luck

[Crazy Kerbal]

And I am playing this game for 7 months so I don't know much about the game

[adsii1970]

50 minutes ago, Ujjiban Bhattacharjee said:

Hello,I since purchased Kerbal Space Program it is very laggy,so I have to buy a new RAM 

 

Can any body help me how much GB ram is need to run 15-20 mods easily

For a long time, until my PC upgrade (Thanks to @Geonovast's help) I was running 8 GB RAM. In KSP 3.0, I was running 122 mods with a little lag. In my 1.9 game, I was running 50 mods with no lag. I am now running 32 GB and definitely have no lag unless I've been playing longer than 2 hours at a time.

37 minutes ago, Ujjiban Bhattacharjee said:

Hi there!,I run-Environmental Visual Enhancements,Paralax,Astronomers visual pack,Scaterer,Kerbal engineering redux,Hanger Extender,Mechjeb ,Docking port Alignment Indicator and Kerbal alarm clock

Yes, those are some of my staple mods.  

34 minutes ago, VoidSquid said:

which is the real question here, yes. I don't have that many mods myself, just a little over 100, but I do have a couple of multi-part part mods, and they do eat a lot of RAM, right after starting, KSP takes 16GB, and it grows easily to 20+ GB after 1-2h.

Yes, this is because of the way Unity handles garbage collection. What I normally do is to save a game (<F5> for a quick save) about every hour and a half, close out the game, and use a brief time for a potty break and a quick trip to the fridge. I then start KSP all over again and load from the most recent quick save. This reduces the amount of stress from a slow and sluggish game and gives my butt a chance to get out of the chair for at least a few minutes.

25 minutes ago, Ujjiban Bhattacharjee said:

And I am playing this game for 7 months so I don't know much about the game

It's fine. But the more you begin to learn the way the game works, the better you'll learn to play it. I learned about the garbage collection issues by reading the forum's help threads and trial and error. I learned the optimum time (between an hour and a half to two hours) before the game gets sluggish and quick save then restart by trial and error.

Do not feel bad about asking questions to help you better understand the mechanics of the game. And do not be hesitant to ask modders, on the appropriate threads, about how their mods work with the game. I have been playing this game since 0.18 came out and bought my first copy when .20 was released. I've learned so much from this community and am glad to be in the position where I can give back.

[VoidSquid]

As per my experience, what requires (and eats  ) RAM are mostly part mods, as well as anything with big textures.

8 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

time for a potty break

TMI  

But yes, that's exactly what I do here as well, when the RAM consumption hits some 20+ GB.

By the way, I also highly recommend the Heap Padder mod from @linuxgurugamer if you have 16 or more GB of RAM, prevents GC related crashes 99% of the time (which I had before almost every 30 minutes).

Edited December 29, 2020 by VoidSquid

[adsii1970]

2 minutes ago, VoidSquid said:

As per my experience, what requires (and eats  ) RAM are mostly part mods, as well as anything with big textures.

TMI  

But yes, that's exactly what I do here as well, when the RAM consumption hits some GB.

Hahaha, probably was. But we have all had the experience of being in the middle of a sensitive maneuver - for me, it's either docking or landing on the runway, and the urge to rush to the water closet hits! So, might as well do the run when there's no chance of impending disaster or the distraction from having to settle back into the game after such a run...

And you're right. I am running three different planet packs (one is my own that I've been working on for four years now). I also have my 1.11 very lightly modded with @Nertea's Near Future and Far Future packs, SVE, PlanetShine, Kerbal Foundries, Scatterer, and a few other visual enhancement mods.

I will say that garbage collection is so much better in 1.10 and 1.11 than it ever was in 1.3. It's like playing an all-new game.

[VoidSquid]

2 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

I will say that garbage collection is so much better in 1.10 and 1.11 than it ever was in 1.3. It's like playing an all-new game.

You do remember those 1s-stutters every 20s or so before 1.8 then, eh?
So glad that is a thing of the past.

[adsii1970]

20 minutes ago, VoidSquid said:

You do remember those 1s-stutters every 20s or so before 1.8 then, eh?
So glad that is a thing of the past.

Remember them?!

I still play my fully modded 1.3 game and don't have to remember them! I still have them!

One of the reasons I still play in 1.3 is there were really great mods made back then which are no longer compatible with 1.9 and above.

 

[VoidSquid]

I see...

Played 1.3.1 for I-don't-know-how-long, switched to 1.7.x finally then.

Curious: what mods do you miss in particular?

[Nuke]

wonder if i can top my 8086k build with my stimulus check. core components only. could probably use my existing ram since were still on ddr4. pcie 4 would be nice too. would need just a mobo (mini itx probably otherwise id need a new case) and cpu (maybe cooler as well).