GeForce GTX 680 2 GB Review: Kepler Sends Tahiti On Vacation

Hardware Setup And Benchmarks

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Test Hardware
ProcessorsIntel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) 3.3 GHz at 4.2 GHz (42 * 100 MHz), LGA 2011, 15 MB Shared L3, Hyper-Threading enabled, Power-savings enabled
MotherboardGigabyte X79-UD5 (LGA 2011) X79 Express Chipset, BIOS F9
MemoryG.Skill 16 GB (4 x 4 GB) DDR3-1600, F3-12800CL9Q2-32GBZL @ 9-9-9-24 and 1.5 V
Hard DriveIntel SSDSC2MH250A2 250 GB SATA 6Gb/s
GraphicsNvidia GeForce GTX 680 2 GB
Row 5 - Cell 0 AMD Radeon HD 7970 3 GB
Row 6 - Cell 0 AMD Radeon HD 7950 3 GB
Row 7 - Cell 0 AMD Radeon HD 6990 4 GB
Row 8 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX 590 3 GB
Row 9 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX 580 1.5 GB
Power SupplyCooler Master UCP-1000 W
System Software And Drivers
Operating SystemWindows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
DirectXDirectX 11
Graphics DriverNvidia GeForce Release 300.99 (For GTX 680)
Row 15 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce Release 296.10 (For GTX 580 and 590)
Row 16 - Cell 0 AMD Catalyst 12.2

Undoubtedly, a number of Tom’s Hardware regulars saw that some of my launch-day data was pulled from the CMS earlier in the week and quickly spread around the Web. Based on the data, many conclusions were prematurely drawn without the context of hardware setup, drivers, or lab time in front of all of these cards. Even another vendor got in on the action, wondering why the stolen Skyrim results with FXAA enabled were so much different from the Skyrim numbers with adaptive anti-aliasing from Don’s Radeon HD 7800-series story.

Understand that, for each of these reviews, we update our test bed to the latest BIOS, we download all of the latest Windows Updates, and we download the games themselves, along with their newest patches. Some variation is expected, and anything out of the ordinary is checked and checked again. In this case, because I looked at some of the feedback, I was able to go back, re-run tests, and have another lab validate the results—everything checks out.

Of course, if you’re truly interested in a discussion about graphics testing methodology, test settings, and analysis, I welcome constructive discourse.

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Games
Battlefield 3Ultra Quality Settings, No AA / 16x AF, 4x MSAA / 16x AF, v-sync off, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, DirectX 11, Going Hunting, 90-second playback, Fraps
Crysis 2DirectX 9 / DirectX 11, Ultra System Spec, v-sync off, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, No AA / No AF, Central Park, High-Resolution Textures: On
Metro 2033High Quality Settings, AAA / 4x AF, 4x MSAA / 16x AF, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, Built-in Benchmark, Depth of Field filter Disabled, Steam version
DiRT 3Ultra High Settings, No AA / No AF, 8x AA / No AF, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, Steam version, Built-In Benchmark Sequence, DX 11
The Elder Scrolls V: SkyrimHigh Quality (8x AA / 8x AF) / Ultra Quality (8x AA, 16x AF) Settings, FXAA enabled, vsync off, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, 25-second playback, Fraps
3DMark 11Version 1.03, Extreme Preset
HAWX 2Highest Quality Settings, 8x AA, 1920x1200, Retail Version, Built-in Benchmark, Tessellation on/off
World of Warcraft: CataclysmUltra Quality Settings, No AA / 16x AF, 8x AA / 16x AF, From Crushblow to The Krazzworks, 1680x1050 / 1920x1080 / 2560x1600, Fraps, DirectX 11 Rendering, x64 Client
SiSoftware Sandra 2012Sandra Tech Support (Engineer) 2012.SP2, GP Processing and GP Bandwidth Modules
CyberLink MediaEspresso 6.5449 MB MPEG-2 1080i Video Sample to Apple iPad 2 Profile (1024x768)
LuxMark 2.064-bit Binary, Version 1.0, Classroom Scene
Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini is an Editor Emeritus at Tom's Hardware US. He edits hardware reviews and covers high-profile CPU and GPU launches.
  • Hail to the new king.
    Reply
  • borden5
    oh man this's good news for consumer, hope to see a price war soon
    Reply
  • johnners2981
    Damn prices, in europe we have to pay the equivalent of $650-$700 to get one
    Reply
  • outlw6669
    Nice results, this is how the transition to 28nm should be.
    Now we just need prices to start dropping, although significant drops will probably not come until the GK110 is released :/
    Reply
  • Finally we will see prices going down (either way :-) )
    Reply
  • Scotty99
    Its a midrange card, anyone who disagrees is plain wrong. Thats not to say its a bad card, what happened here is nvidia is so far ahead of AMD in tech that the mid range card purposed to fill the 560ti in the lineup actually competed with AMD's flagship. If you dont believe me that is fine, you will see in a couple months when the actual flagship comes out, the ones with the 384 bit interface.
    Reply
  • Chainzsaw
    Wow not too bad. Looks like the 680 is actually cheaper than the 7970 right now, about 50$, and generally beats the 7970, but obviously not at everything.

    Good going Nvidia...
    Reply
  • run the test on the same speeds then lets talk...
    Reply
  • SkyWalker1726
    AMD will certainly Drop the price of the 7xxx series
    Reply
  • rantoc
    2x of thoose ordered and will be delivered tomorrow, will be a nice geeky weekend for sure =)
    Reply