Patch Notes and PC System Specs

DAI ran fine at mostly high settings. 

GPU is R9 280 3GB.  Not great anymore, but still more than minimum specs.
RAM is 16 GB DDR3
Thanks for the info about BF1 on Origin Access.  I might try that.  If MEA is only a little more demanding than DAI, I think I might be okay.  DAI ran fine on my machine with fairly high settings. 

I don't know if anyone's seen this yet but I saw this bit of info on the ME:A subreddit. It provides a lot of well-needed context.

Link to PC Gamer's updated article: www.pcgamer.com/mass-effect-andromedas-recommended-system-predicted-to-run-30-fps-at-1080p/
Here's what the update says:
"We've received a little clarification on the question of exactly how well Mass Effect: Andromeda will perform on a 3GB GTX 1060. At PAX East today, we asked producer Michael Gamble if the card would really deliver 30 fps at best on high.
"No, I mean, it depends on your machine," said Gamble. "And it’s really hard to benchmark individual machines. We’re just saying that that’s the bare minimum that it’ll run at. It’ll probably run at higher than that for most of the game, it’s just really hard to be specific about it. We just want to do the minimum and we want to do the recommended. The recommended, at least on my machine at home, I have a 1060 I run at higher than 30 [fps] for the majority of the game. But it’s hard to actually to say, 'This is the specs, and this is exactly what you’ll run at.'"

So basically don't take what those recommended and minimum specs are at face value. Most likely your setup if it isn't waaay outdated will achieve good results on the system. A few other people compared setups with mine so lets say that you have a

GTX 1060 6GB
i5-6400
8 GB (I just upgraded to 16GB)

You should be good if you have something around that or better. Someone also mentioned in the reddit that Mike Gamble has a GTX 1060 and plays at ultrawide at 3440x1440 and he achieves higher than 30 fps, from his previous comments. So if that resolution achieves 30fps+ I'm sure 1080p will achieve much better results.

Like I said before my CPU is an i7-4790K, and my GPU is a GTX 970. I also have 12 GB of RAM. So...I don't know what this means for me, in regards to the overall performance of the game itself. The 21st is not here yet, and I don't have Origin Early Access. They only mention how the game will play out for those who have the minimum and recommended requirements, not for someone who is just under the recommended range.  :rage:

The punishment for having a GTX 970 is non-stop crashing and frame rate lower than 30. What a slap in the face. 

This sounds like another case similar to Assassin's Creed: Unity, and Batman: Arkham Knight. They were the first fully "new generation" games of their franchises. They were said to have been optimized poorly. 

Is this some sick attempt to force their hands on this, making people buy a 1060 or higher?

How's that possible?  The 1060 is obvious a more advanced model, according to Nvidia. The question is can I play at "High" settings, or mid-low? With the original ME Trilogy, the graphic settings were simple. Now, you have all these other settings to look out for. I remember when Anti-Aliasing was just "On" or "Off." I don't even know what the settings are now.

The 1060 comes in two variants, a 3GB model, and a 6GB model - the 970 goes neck to neck (+-3%) with the 3GB model. Obviously the 6GB model takes the lead (+3-6%), but the 970 was never a bad card for 1080p.

You could look to upgrade it of course, depending on if you wanted to throw any Money at it. As for "High" Medium" etc, we can't really say yet. I would assume it will play like DA:I did, so if you played that game it would be a good reference point I think.

DA:I is the only yardstick we have though, since BF1 is not the same sort of game.

People realise that, but they also know that BF1 had the same system requirements as MEA and still runs a lot better than DAI even on below minimum specs. That's what makes it hard to predict MEA's performance.

BF1 and DAI are the closest reference points we have; BF1 because of Frostbite 3, and DAI because it was the last Bioware game.

There are just too many factors to consider, like Bioware not having the same level of expertise as Dice when it comes to optimizing for Frostbite, and DAI being developed with last gen consoles in mind. It's just that we have nothing else to go on.

Has hairworks gotten any better? I remember on release hairworks literally decreased my FPS by 10-20 on my GTX 970. Good looking hair isn't worth that much 

whats the download size for this game on pc?

55GB if I recall correctly.

According to Ian, it's 55GB on PC.