If any of you have managed to play the game reasonably well with a below minimum spec computer, please post your system specs and comment on your settings, results, playability, and enjoyment. Please provide as much detail as you are willing to share.

This might give hope to people who cannot afford to purchase new computer parts (example: $200-$300 video card to meet minimum specs; all other parts meet or exceed minimum).

light487 posted in the following thread that he is able to play the game reasonably well with below minimum spec GPU but did not detail what video card he is using (his post gave me hope and is the reason for my posting this thread. I wish to learn details on the possibility of running the game reasonably well on a below minimum spec computer.):

http://www.gog.com/forum/the_witcher_3_wild_hunt/witcher_3_minimum_cpu_requirements_may_be_a_bit_more_flexible/post3

Thanks for taking the time to read, consider, and reply to my query.

Cheers!

Ham08

Hi, playing the game with
CPU: intel core 2 duo e8400 overclocked to 4GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte ep45-ud3p. clocked FSB to 450MHz
Memory: 4GB DDR2 1066MHz Timings 5-5-5-15 54 trfc and 2T CR
Graphic card: Geforce GTX 580. unclocked, but i lock the fan speed at 85% (
Windows 7 64bit. SSD systemdisk.
I think that I managed to optimise settings etc to give as much as it could.

Have no idea about what fps I currently play with but i can guess its is below the possibility to measure ;( (that was a joke) (20-30ish?) I dare not find out.

playing with everything as low as it goes.With the exception of Vignetting on and resolution. 1920x1200.

Fullscreen!!!.... and I have to change it to fullscreen with every game start. And alt/tabbing may put it in window mode, it is sneaky that way!

And I have the standard game freeze and crash/lockouts with audio playing etc etc.

~5 hours into the game atm. Passable to play, not more that that, gives me the feeling "I really should buy a new computer" Feel sad about forcing the game to this level of starvation. Have not been inside big towns and guess that I fear "bigger" towns more than monsters!

My specs:
Core i5 4440
GTX 750 Ti 2GB (slightly below minimum specs)
8GB DDR3 1800Mhz

Graphic settings:
Everything in post-processing enabled, except for Motion blur, Blur, Anti-aliasing and Ambient Occlusion.
Resolution: 1080p
Number of Background Characters: Low
Shadow Quality: Low
Terrain Quality: Medium
Water Quality: High
Grass Density: Low
Texture Quality: Medium
Foliage Visibility Range: Medium

FPS: 40~45 most of the time, sometimes it slows to 35.

Problem is, if I set everything to Low and disable all post-processing effects it only gives me ~5 fps more. So, if you are planning to play the game on 1080p and have specs considerable below mine, I don't think you'll get a playable FPS.
On 720p, I'm sure even a GTX 650 can run the game.

I think this game is CPU bound, I heard that people with a FX-6300 are getting more trouble running it.

AMD FX8350 4.0GHz (Turbo Core disabled)
AMD Radeon HD7850 2GB
Dell U3011 30" DFP @ 2560x1600 native resolution (16:10)
32GB RAM
Windows 7 64bit

My Radeon 7850 GPU is just under the minimum spec listed of Radeon 7870, however the game autoconfigured it and I played with those default settings without touching anything just to get a feel for what it felt I could run on this card. I really didn't expect the game to work at all considering my monitor (2560x1600) has more than double the pixels of full HD (1920x1080), so double the burden on the GPU which is already underpowered.

To my shock and surprise though it puts out between 20FPS and 40FPS with these default settings which have many things set to LOW, some to MEDIUM and a few to HIGH, and while it isn't smooth it isn't unplayable either. I find almost any game to be unplayable below 30FPS and many are unplayable below 45FPS although everyone's eyes work differently to a degree and some can tolerate it more than others. I don't know what is different with this game but even though the FPS I'm getting are low it has a feel to it like it is 50% or more better than it is for some reason. I'm not sure if it is the motion blur or something else but my eyes are comfortable with it like this although in Skyrim if I put mods in or whatever the dropped the FPS below 40 or so it got really annoying.

Since the initial install and default settings I have experimented with lowering the resolution down from 2560x1600 to 1920x1200 figuring half the pixels, half the burden on the GPU, double the frame rate. Well that turned out to not be true. I got a slight boost in frame rate but only about 5FPS or so which was surprising and not worth the lost resolution definition.

At any rate, I continue to play the game with the default video configuration and find it is playable and enjoyable and have not encountered anything in-game yet with 12+ hours of gameplay, battles etc. that caused it to slow down at all yet.

AMD Radeon HD 7770 1GB vram
@1080p
2.4 Core 2 Quad (Q6600)
8 GB System Ram
Windows 7 64bit

Way below minimum specs but it runs smooth at 30-45 fps. Can't say the same for the areas past starting zone, not there yet.
- Will update this if i see any difference.

Medium to high settings optimized via nVidia Tweaking Guide (http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide#the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-geforce-experience-optimal-playable-settings).

Intel Core i3-530 @ 2,93 Ghz
8GB RAM
Nvidia GTX 750ti

Running the game at 1280x1024 on high details (no Hairworks). I have my fps locked at 30 fps (because it seems to reduce the number of crashes) but am getting smooth 60 despite my below minimum cpu.

Only cutscenes (sometimes) and the main menu are a little laggy for some reason.

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450
10GB RAM
AMD R7 260X 2GB (Unplayable on this card according to some list I saw - ha!)
Windows 8.1 x64

Hairworks off, Antialiasing off, Motion Blur off (hate the effect)
SSAO
Everything else set to high
1680 x 1050

Running very smoothly, no idea what my FPS are and don't really care. :)

Yup. I id eventually reply :) hehe

AMD Phenom II XT 1090T 3.2GHz (Overlocked to 3.7GHz)
Sapphire Radeon HD7850 2GB OC
12GB DDR3 RAM

As I said over on the other thread, it is admittedly not much lower than the minimum spec but the video card itself is around 11% lower than the minimum spec as advertised by CDPR. Of course the lower you go under the minimum spec, the worse the experience is going to get. Also need to consider that there are certain things that must be met to really get decent experience... such as the 1.5GB of VRAM required. If your card only has 1GB of VRAM, then it's not going to cut it. If you have a 2GB card, even if it's below specs, it will do ok in my opinion. Of course, there's also the need to be able to handle DirectX 11 instructions as well, so if your card can't handle anything more than DirectX 9, you're not going to have a good experience either.

There are obviously enough ticks in enough boxes for me to pull through respectably with my under min. specs setup but that doesn't mean every setup under min. specs is going to cut it.

This question interests me.

Lenovo Laptop-

I have a AMD E-2100 APU (Radeon HD graphics integrated) 1 GHz.

4 GB ram, /But it says only 3.45 are available for some reason)

How screwed am I?

Will an offer to Melitele let me play it?

I can play the game very well using the following configuration. It's also a mix of low-high graphics details.

Intel Core i3 3220 @ 3.3 Ghz (Dual-Core, Four Threads)
8 GB RAM
EVGA GTX 560 Ti @ 1GB RAM
1366*768 native resolution (I know, I know)
Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

Only 3.45 GB are available because the rest is taken by the integrated GPU. No way man. Sorry :/ Your best choice is to get an affordable gaming PC and give it another go. Melitele won't help with this one. You will definitely need to witcher a new PC :P Good luck! This game is well worth the effort!

I thougt so. I hate being in college and unemployed. Well, Time to blackmail my sister to get a new system. Just kidding.

Wait, just a quick question. Would a RAM upgrade make it work or I have no hope? I am planning to build a gaming PC anyway, but if a RAM upgrade solves it then it is worth a shot.

Intel i7 2600k 3,4 Ghz
8 gb ram
geforce gtx 460
driver 344.11 (I only update when it is absolutely necessary. Nvidia is crap with drivers)
windows 7 64 bit
No Overclock on anything.

resolution: 1680 x 1050
fps locked to 30
Everything set to off or low except textures and details at high, but the game had everything set to medium and on to begin with, so I'll try upping it when I play again later and see what happens.
Vsync turned off ingame, and on in nvidia control panel, solves camera-control sluggishness.

My performance: Stuttering during the first few seconds of pre-rendered video (like everyone else), but otherwise rocksolid performance. In-engine cutscenes are gorgeous, normal gameplay also looks as good as the Witcher 2 on very high settings did.

I am exactly at minimum except my cpu which is 3.2 instead of the minimum recommended 3.3.

I'm running on high and it runs perfect. Ultra runs well usually but I get a little slowdown from time to time so I dropped back to high.

Having said that, I do utilize a setting in my bios that allows my cpu to overclock dynamically as needed to 3.6.

I'm amazed at how well the game runs on my machine. To be fair, all of the new games seem to run well on my machine.

i5 3470 at 3.2
8GB
660ti w/ 4GB
installed on system SSD
win 8.1 64bit

As an fyi, the game looks fantastic at high settings.

I notice people tend to get upset when they can't play a game at maximum settings. They start spouting things like "un-optimized" and "resource hog".

Personally, I think if my computer can run everything I throw at it at max settings, then I've spent to much money on my computer because my hardware capabilities are not fully used. I prefer to have software(games) that push my hardware to it's max capability. This way I know I have not wasted money on my hardware and I get to see everything my hardware has to offer.

But that's just me. ;)

Oh yeah, running at 1920x1080
Sorry, you're processor is not up to the task, not to mention integrated video sharing system ram.

You really need a new pc. Luckily you could build one that would run W3 at high for the cost of a console.