A Free-To-Play MMO? Neverwinter Performance, Benchmarked
Neverwinter is a new free-to-play MMO in the Dungeons And Dragons universe, sporting an action RPG flavor. We benchmark it with a number of graphics cards and CPUs, uncovering a processor-oriented bottleneck along the way. Does your platform measure up?
Test System And Graphics Hardware
Free-to-play MMOs are all about attracting as many players as possible, so we're hoping that Neverwinter can accommodate low-end rigs. On the other hand, gamers with high-end hardware should get to enjoy better-looking graphics for their platform investment. Therefore, we're testing graphics cards that range from the Radeon HD 6450 and GeForce 210 to the Radeon HD 7970 in CrossFire and GeForce GTX 690.
In addition, we're adding multiple CPU tests and even mobile AMD A10 and Intel Core i5 processors with integrated graphics to the mix.
| Test System | |
|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i5-3550 (Ivy Bridge) 3.3 GHz Base Clock Rate, 3.7 GHz Maximum Turbo Boost |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte Z77X-UP7, LGA 1155, Chipset: Intel Z77 Express |
| Networking | On-Board Gigabit LAN controller |
| Memory | Corsair Vengeance LP PC3-16000, 4 x 4 GB, 1600 MT/s, CL 8-8-8-24-2T |
| Hard Drive | Western Digital Caviar Black 1 TB, 7,200 RPM, 32 MB Cache, SATA 3Gb/s |
| Power | ePower EP-1200E10-T2 1,200 W, ATX12V, EPS12V |
| Software and Drivers | |
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 8 |
| DirectX | DirectX 11.1 |
| Graphics Drivers | AMD Catalyst 13.5 Beta 2Nvidia GeForce 320.00 BetaIntel Graphics Driver 9.18.10.3071 |
| Benchmarks | |
| Neverwinter | Custom THG Benchmark, 60-second Fraps run, Hall Of Justice area |
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Prev Page Image Quality And Settings Next Page Results: Low Quality, 1280x800Don Woligroski was a former senior hardware editor for Tom's Hardware. He has covered a wide range of PC hardware topics, including CPUs, GPUs, system building, and emerging technologies.