It's time to revamp the Graphics Charts section! For 2012, we're increasing the number of games and resolutions, dividing the results into three segments. But that's not all. We also include GPGPU benchmarking, power consumption, temperature, and noise.
This year, we massively expanded the number of benchmarks in our graphics charts. Just to give you an idea, a complete run through our benchmark suite now takes three hours and 12 minutes for the fastest board, not counting installing and uninstalling hardware, measuring sound, or taking thermal readings.
As a result, we're consciously splitting the workload up and focusing on high-end and premium cards. Don't worry, though. We'll add up to 20 new boards each month until the lower end of the performance range is filled out, too. As this quarter progresses, we also plan to add the fastest dual-GPU cards and reference models of lower mid-range and entry-level cards, as well as custom-designed variants of already-tested reference cards. It's a long process that takes a lot of planning, but if you don't see what you're looking for today, you can be sure we're in the process of adding it!

Due to numerous requests, and in response to feedback in the forum, this article strives to explain the charts, the underlying test methodology, and the settings we use to generate the results you'll see in the charts section. This should increase transparency and make comparisons easier. Although we can't anticipate and test all possible use cases, we're trying to include as broad a range of benchmarks as practically possible.
You can visit the 2012 Graphics Charts by clicking this link
The 2012 Test Rig
We were starting to see some evidence of a processor bottleneck using our Core i5-based platform in tests able to apply a heavy CPU load, like DiRT 3. Since the Radeon HD 7970 and GeForce GTX 680 push performance to new levels, demanding a more powerful processor, we chose Intel's Core i7-2600K overclocked to 4.5 GHz for this year's test rig. Hyper-Threading is enabled, in the event an application can make use of it.
| 2012 Graphics Charts Test Bench | |
|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i7-2600K (Sandy Bridge), 3.4 GHz, LGA 1155, 8 MB Shared L3 Cache @ 4.5 GHz (45 * 100 MHz) |
| CPU Cooler | Prolimatech SuperMega plus Noiseblocker Multiframe |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte Z68X-UD7 B3, Intel Z68 Express |
| RAM | 2 x 4 GB Kingston HyperX DDR3-1600 |
| System Disk | Kingston V100+ 256 GB SSD |
| Chassis | Cooler Master Lab |
| Power Supply | Corsair AX1200 |
| Operating System | Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1 |
We set off on this journey at the beginning of the year, meaning Z77-based boards weren't yet ready. There was also no reason to mess with the memory subsystem from last year's reference platform. However, we are using a power supply, Corsair's AX1200, which easily drives up to four graphics cards when we start paying more attention to SLI and CrossFire performance. We're also using Kingston's V100+ 256 GB SSD for all of our applications and games.
The test system is mounted on a rolling desk. This way, we can move the whole rig into a sound-proof test chamber for the acoustic measurements without installing the graphics cards in a second test rig. This is important, since we do all the benchmarks in an air-conditioned room kept at 72°F that is not suitable for sound level measurements below 32 dB(A).
Next, we'll take a look at our choices for monitor and resolutions.
- Meet Our 2012 Graphics Charts
- Selecting A Monitor And Choosing Resolutions
- Preset Levels: Entry-Level, Performance, And Extreme
- Synthetic Graphics Benchmarks
- DirectX 9 Game Benchmarks
- DirectX 11 Game Benchmarks, Part 1
- DirectX 11 Game Benchmarks, Part 2
- GPGPU Benchmarks
- Measuring Noise Level
- Measuring Temperatures
- Measuring Power Consumption
- More Data, More Transparency, And Better Recommendations

I want to see how the base performance is in games with full detail, and save the heavy AA and resolutions for extreme.
The 5760x1080 resolution will also push the GPU's harder than a 2560x1440/1600 could so why limit the resolution there?
I agree. I know Tom's spends a lot of time benchmarking, but Folding@home is something that is a bit more common. I would love to see F@H in some articles.
BTW, I appreciate all the work you guys do.
The 5760x1080 resolution will also push the GPU's harder than a 2560x1440/1600 could so why limit the resolution there?
How far back in GPU generations are you going to test, if at all? I saw the power consumption charts and could only see GTX 500, 600 and Radeon 6000, 7000 series. I have an EVGA GTX 480 SC for two years and do like to know how it compares to the newer series of GPUs. Much appreciated.
So what would YOU like to see used then? If they were trying to push Nvidia wouldn't Hawx 2 be in the suite?
More than likely, it's the sequence the German team picked that is less CPU-bound than other StarCraft II tests we've used.
I would love something like this as well, but as Tom's has a world wide market and the prices vary so greatly from place to place such charts become impractical.
What I miss about the old charts is that you could easily compare old GPUs to new ones. When upgrading I think people like to have a reference of what they currently have compared to what they are looking at getting. To throw in a few old cards like the 8600GT, 8/9800GT in the mix may help people feel more secure in their purchases, and have a better feel for what they are getting because they can relate the new card to their old one. Not saying Tom's needs to put in every single card from every generation, but a card or 2 from each generation from the last 6 years or so would be nice.
Another thing I would like is something like Anandtech's bench where when you select your cards you get bar graphs instead of raw numbers in a chart. It is just easier to visually see a 1/3rd difference in performance on a line graph rather than in raw numbers.
I want to see how the base performance is in games with full detail, and save the heavy AA and resolutions for extreme.
-Some cards (though not all) show up as their name, others have a picture of the card with a sales link, and others give very little information at all. It would be nice to make this consistent so that at the top of each column we could see the pic (if available), the name of the card, and then a sales link (hey, you have to pay of the site somehow)
-organize the comparison charts a little. On the comparison page it just throws all the charts together with no apparent rhyme or reason. It would be nice to have groupings such as physical considerations (temps, noise, and power usage), gpgpu benchmarks, and game benchmarks sorted either by game.
-Could we add physical dimensions? It would be helpful to some to know how long a card is, and now many slots it takes.
-lastly, under "02 - Unigine Heaven DirectX 11 Performance 1920x1080, 4xAA, AFx16 Shaders medium Tessellation normal" the "score in" has a blank spot to enter in text (pretty sure it should say 'FPS' here) followed by a broken "Go" link.
None of these changes should be all that hard to make, and would make the charts much simpler to use when comparing specific cards.
This. I, along with probably a large chunk of your readers, are probably more interested in performance at maxed out settings at 1080p than skipping from mid-range settings at 1080p to maxed out settings at higher resolutions.
Now that would just be to obvious.
Gabriel
Lol. Good question. My tinnitus gives me a couple of the lows and several highs (but, just for fun and to keep me noticing them, the pitch and loudness vary). To be honest, I'd rather not hear any of them! ;O)
Regarding charts, I think it's way past time that you provided dynamic, configurable graphs generated from the data rather than static images. Images are fine if that's all that the web savvy that a site has. Surely Tom's is better than that?! [tease, tease] ;o)
I'd like graphs that have options, including choice of colours (I sometimes can't easily see the difference between the colours that you use) and scale (so that I don't have to opening images in another tab and manually enlarging them to read the finer details).
Someone above mentioned scatter diagrams. And why not, if that would suit him? A page that downloads the data rather than an image has scope for creating whatever kind of graph can help represent the data meaningfully.
Tom's, I invite you to kill me with kindness. ;-)
ps. By "dynamic", I don't mean animated. That's pointless, even annoying, eye candy. It's only necessary to show the data more clearly, in a form that people prefer.