AMD's Radeon HD 5000-Series: Measuring Power Efficiency
-
Page 1:An Eye For Power
-
Page 2:Performance Per Watt
-
Page 3:The Tests
-
Page 4:Test Setup And A Side Note
-
Page 5:Test System
-
Page 6:Benchmark Results: Crysis, The Classic Approach
-
Page 7:Benchmark Results: Desktop Usage, Less-Than-Ideal Conditions
-
Page 8:Benchmark Results: Cinebench R11
-
Page 9:Benchmark Results: Cyberlink PowerDVD 9
-
Page 10:Benchmark Results: Cyberlink PowerDirector
-
Page 11:GPU Vs. CPU
-
Page 12:Measuring Power Consumption: Let's Recap
-
Page 13:Don't Forget Idle Power Consumption
GPU Vs. CPU
Next, we installed all of our test cards on a platform powered by AMD’s Athlon II X2 250. The objective was simple: using such a setup, does it make more sense to upgrade your processor (to an AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE) or a graphics card instead? We've limited testing to just two filters for this test (Chinese Painting and Kaleidoscope).
Offloading the filters and the encoding to the GPU really makes a difference. Accelerating the filters does offer some savings, but the most significant improvement comes from offloading the encoding task.
For those interested, you can see the differences in running these cards on the two tested platforms from the table below.
Athlon II X2 250 Chinese Painting | Athlon II X2 250 Kaleidoscope | Phenom II X4 955 BE Chinese Painting | Phenon II X4 955 BE Kaleidoscope | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Radeon HD 5670 | 313 | 240 | 298 | 211 |
Radeon HD 5770 | 283 | 222 | 265 | 190 |
Radeon HD 5870 1 GB | 231 | 205 | 202 | 167 |
Radeon HD 5870 2 GB | 233 | 205 | 203 | 169 |
*seconds
So, is a new GPU a better choice than a quad-core processor for these sorts of apps? The difference between using the two processors with the Radeon HD 5670 and HD 5770 is about 15-18 seconds for the Chinese Painting filter and 30 seconds for the Kaleidoscope filter. Both Radeon HD 5870 cards show a difference of about 30-40 seconds. We would say that it’s worth investing in both upgrades. It would be interesting to see how a more affordable quad–core chip like the Athlon II X4 fares in this test.
These numbers represent total power consumed during the test. They paint a very positive argument for offloading tasks that are well-suited for the GPU. Below, you can see those results compared to those taken with the system equipped with the AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE.
Athlon II X2 250 Chinese Painting | Athlon II X2 250 Kaleidoscope | Phenom II X4 955 BE Chinese Painting | Phenom II X4 955 BE Kaleidoscope | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Radeon HD 5670 | 10 | 7 | 12 | 9 |
Radeon HD 5770 | 10 | 8 | 12 | 9 |
Radeon HD 5870 1 GB | 9 | 8 | 10 | 9 |
Radeon HD 5870 2 GB | 11 | 10 | 12 | 10 |
*Watt hours
Only 2 to 3 Wh separate these cards. Now, let’s look at the average power used for these two tests. We threw in the results for the AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE for comparison's sake.
Phenom II X4 955 BE Chinese Painting | Phenom II X4 955 BE Kaleidoscope | Athlon II X2 250 Chinese Painting | Athlon II X2 250 Kaleidoscope | Phenom II X4 955 BE Chinese Painting | Phenom II X4 955 BE Kaleidoscope | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Radeon HD 3300 (GPU not used) | 147 | 133 | ||||
Radeon HD 5670 | 111 | 112 | 147 | 153 | ||
Radeon HD 5770 | 125 | 126 | 168 | 164 | ||
Radeon HD 5870 1 GB | 141 | 139 | 185 | 185 | ||
Radeon HD 5870 2 GB | 169 | 167 | 210 | 210 |
*Watts
Unless you have very tight restrictions on maximum power draw, the differences are not that great. If you're already considering or already using a quad-core processor, such as the AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE, using a GPU like the Radeon HD 5670 still roughly falls within the same power envelope. Though we can’t know for sure without generating the benchmark data, pairing an AMD Athlon II X4 with the Radeon HD 5670 seems to be a very good idea from the perspective of balance. Our experience with an AMD Athlon II X4 620 indicates that you could see savings around 20 W compared to the AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE. The Radeon HD 5770 and both Radeon HD 5870 cards are a different matter, though.
If you prefer to use a dual-core processor, you can employ the Radeon HD 5670, 5770, or even the Radeon HD 5870 1 GB and still remain within the same power draw as the system with an AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE and integrated graphics. The only exception here is the Radeon HD 5870 2 GB. System power draw with an Athlon II X2 250 and the Radeon HD 5870 2 GB is higher than a Phenom II X4 955 BE without a discrete graphics card.
- An Eye For Power
- Performance Per Watt
- The Tests
- Test Setup And A Side Note
- Test System
- Benchmark Results: Crysis, The Classic Approach
- Benchmark Results: Desktop Usage, Less-Than-Ideal Conditions
- Benchmark Results: Cinebench R11
- Benchmark Results: Cyberlink PowerDVD 9
- Benchmark Results: Cyberlink PowerDirector
- GPU Vs. CPU
- Measuring Power Consumption: Let's Recap
- Don't Forget Idle Power Consumption
Oh, wait, this just in:
My next PC will be used mostly for movie DVDs and Diablo 3. Apparently if I get a 5870 1GB I get the best of both worlds - speed in Diablo and low power consumption when playing movies.
How about nVidia cards, would I get the same behavior with a GTX 480 for example?
Next questions: First, where does the HD5750 fall in this? Second, if you do the same kinds of manual tweaking for power saving that you did in your Cool-n-Quiet analysis, how will that change the results? And finally, if you run a F@H client, what does that do to "idle" scores, when the GPU is actually quite busy processing a work unit?
I'd love to see nvidia cards and beefier CPUs used as well. Normal non green hdds too. Just how big of a difference in speed/power do they make?
Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for reading the article.
Have no 5750 sample yet, but they should relatively be close to 5770. For this article, we simply chose the best bin for each series (Redwood, Juniper and Cypress).
The second question, what will happen when you tweak the chip? Glad you ask!! I can't say much yet, but you'll be surprised what the 5870 1 GB can do.
As for NVIDIA cards, I'm hoping to have the chance to test GF100 and derivatives very soon.
Take care.
Interesting comments about Furmark.
I have to disagree, there are several ways a user can fully load their graphics card in normal use. I have found that my GPU utilization and fan speed go to %100 when I play the dice mini-game in The Witcher. The game only has to render a small game board and the frame rate goes into the 200-300 range. Some thing similar occurs when I hit the pause key in stalker.
bad penis joke?
Well i think this article inspired form the movie that AMD has release lately.
That movie called as i think "Mis understanding"here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QkyfGJgcwQ
As we all know AMD is innovative in power consumption as well It's Graphics I read such this review in Anandtech.com ...Just WOW....Loads Of Noise and power flowed for Fermi VGAs . In this review we see the smooth performance for 5670 and 5770.
and another thing that we should give a hint on is You know releasing Fermi after six month of releasing 5000 series...I think it's good in performance but not after 6 Months!!! but awful in power consuming and noise and heat!!
Take care guys