Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box, Performance Analysis

Benchmarks: SSAO Enabled

While the ambient occlusion feature has some drawbacks in Burnout Paradise, specifically with the dark halos around thin geometry, like telephone wires, we still thought it would be interesting to benchmark the game with the setting enabled. So without further ado, here are the results:

Even with AA disabled, the SSAO feature brutalizes all of the cards across the board. Only the Radeon HD 4830 and GeForce GTS 250 are barely playable with SSAO enabled at 1680x1050. Even the Radeon HD 4850 and GeForce GTX 260 are running significantly below the 60 FPS vsync barrier.

With the resolution increased to 1920x1200, only the Radeon HD 4830 and GeForce GTS 250 barely pass the playable standard with over 30 FPS minimum frame rates.

At 2560x1600 with SSAO enabled, it’s a wash. Nobody is left standing, with even the best cards in the test able to squeeze out only 20 FPS.

While it’s mostly academic at these low frame rates, it is interesting that the Radeon cards seem to handle the SSAO feature better than their similarly-priced GeForce counterparts. The Radeon HD 4850 meets and sometimes beats the more expensive GeForce GTX 260 and easily outpaces the GeForce GTS 250. Likewise, the Radeon HD 4830 meets or beats the more expensive GeForce GTS 250. Even the bargain-basement Radeon HD 4650 one-ups the more expensive GeForce 9600 GT.

  • cruiseoveride
    Where is the people's champion? The HD4870?

    I felt the lighting looked a little more natural on the geforce. The colour on the radeon looked better though
    Reply
  • IzzyCraft
    I like the nvidia shadows more makes it less bland look imo a more definitive look which i like.

    I was wonding why no 4870 like above.

    SSAO on :) reminds me of ripping dvd's and messing with sharpness, debanding etc the telephone wire atleast.
    Reply
  • enterco
    Considering how 'hardware friendly' is this game, probably it will be very successful.
    Reply
  • SpadeM
    The first screen shot comparison is quite tricky :) on the first look you might think the geforce does not render the red car at all.
    Reply
  • ufo_warviper
    Nice article so far. I'm still reading the article, but I just wanted to point out that on page 7 of this review, I think the author somehow confused (a couple times) the 4830 with the 4850, and also the GTS 250 with the GTX 260 cards.

    With the resolution increased to 1920x1200, only the Radeon HD 4830 and GeForce GTS 250 barely pass the playable standard with over 30 FPS minimum frame rates.

    Clearly, he meant the other cards here.
    Reply
  • IzzyCraft
    SpadeMThe first screen shot comparison is quite tricky on the first look you might think the geforce does not render the red car at all.A roll over png or jpg would have probably done better then the color restrivie .gif that was used, Shame that IE8 doesn't support APNG like opera and ff does, it would def make the format much more popular.
    Reply
  • chyll2
    I really like the additional benchmark that imitates different number of cores and clocks. It gives us an idea of performance we would get on similar specs with our system.
    Reply
  • linaaslt
    Somehow i missed benches from hd4770 or 4870/4890 and gtx275. but maybe it's because this game doesn't require good GPU to be playable.
    Reply
  • zehpavora
    I think that, if you want to play this game with 8x MSAA, 8x AA, and High settings, a GTX 275 SLI will work. This game must be amazing at those settings! I like Race Games too, but NSF also lost me on Pro Street. I hope Burnout delivers what EA couldn't...
    Reply
  • DjEaZy
    Phenom 940 @ 3400 HD4870 core@790 GRAM512Mb@4400Mhz
    2x2GB 1066Mhz 5-5-5-15
    this all on 22"@1680x1050 all fx crankt up...
    50~100fps
    Reply