Do New Drivers Really Boost Performance?

3D Performance Sorted According To Resolution And Anti-Aliasing

Below are the results of the frame rate and percentage evaluations split according to resolution and anti-aliasing. This makes a comparison easier if you’re looking for a graphics card suited to a particular screen size or resolution.

The image quality of liquid crystal displays looks best in the native resolution (for example, a 22-inch display with 1680x1050 pixels).

The driver updates had an effect of 1 percent to 2 percent improvement. Overclocking the CPU ensured a large increase for all cards.

With anti-aliasing, the driver update for the GTX 280 can be measured clearly; the increased CPU clock rate results in a clear frame rate boost as well.

Even in the 1680 resolution, the greater CPU power has an effect. The driver update doesn’t do anything for the HD 4870, but the other cards all perform around two percent faster.

The driver update has very little effect on the Radeon HD 4870. With the GeForce 9600 GT, the optimizations for the 1 GB graphics memory start to work, and it gains about 3.6 percent; the rest are about 2 percent faster. CrossFire profits considerably from the CPU overclocking.

The faster graphics chips accept the additional CPU performance well, but the GeForce 9600 GT starts to run out of steam.

The driver update slows the HD 4870 slightly. CrossFire doesn’t show much of a gain, but is able to do more with the CPU overclocking—it tops the table.