The Fastest 3D Cards Go Head-To-Head

Features
By Tino Kreiss
published

Half Life 2: Episode 2

Half Life 2: Episode 2 runs on DirectX 9. A CrossFire configuration results in good performance increases with the AMD cards. Since the CPU and frame rates are already running at their limits when using the Radeon HD 4850 CrossFire, the frame rate improvements can only be seen at 1920x1200 with anti-aliasing turned on. The HD 4870 CrossFire loses 3D power, as the CPU and the second graphics chip slow each other down.

With Nvidia and SLI the situation is similar. The weaker graphics chips are able to increase frame rates at the higher resolutions, and the more powerful graphics cards almost all lose speed in SLI mode. The new GTX 260 and GTX 280 generate more power in single mode.

It doesn’t actually matter for playing the game—all of the current graphics cards are well over 60 fps, even with 1920x1200 pixels and anti-aliasing. Even the GeForce 8600 GT can produce 35 fps, where the Radeon HD 3650 is too slow in the 1680 and 1920 resolutions with AA.

Tino Kreiss
146 Comments Comment from the forums
  • San Pedro
    Looks like the results for SLI and Crossfire were switched with the single card results. . .
    Reply
  • Duncan NZ
    Not a bad article, really comprehensive.
    My one complaint? Why use that CPU when you know that the test cards are going to max it out? Why not a quad core OC'ed to 4GHz? It'd give far more meaning to the SLI results. We don't want results that we can duplicate at home, we want results that show what these cards can do. Its a GPU card comparason, not a complain about not having a powerful enough CPU story.

    Oh? And please get a native english speaker to give it the once over for spelling and grammar errors, although this one had far less then many articles posted lately.
    Reply
  • elbert
    No 4870x2 in CF so its the worlds top end Nvidia vs ATI mid to low end.
    Reply
  • Lightnix
    It'd be a good article if you'd used a powerful enough CPU and up to date Radeon drivers (considering we're now up to 8.8 now), I mean are those even the 'hotfix' 8.6's or just the vanilla drivers?
    Reply
  • elbert
    Version AMD Catalyst 8.6? Why not just say i'm using ATI drivers with little to no optimizations for the 4800's. This is why the CF benchmarks tanked.
    Reply
  • at 1280, all of the highend cards were CPU limited. at that resolution, you need a 3.2-3.4 c2d to feed a 3870... this article had so much potential, and yet... so much work, so much testing, fast for nothing, because most of the results are very cpu limited (except 1920@AA).
    Reply
  • wahdangun
    WTF, hd4850 SHOULD be a lot faster than 9600 GT and 8800 GT even tough they have 1Gig of ram
    Reply
  • mjam
    No 4870X2 and 1920 X 1200 max resolution tested. How about finishing the good start of an article with the rest of it...
    Reply
  • I agree, the 4870 X2 should have been in there and should have used the updated drivers. Good article but I think you fell short on finishing it.
    Reply
  • @pulasky - Rage much? It's called driver issues you dumbass. Some games are more optimised for multicard setups than others, and even then some favour SLi to Crossfire. And if you actually READ the article rather than let your shrinken libido get the better of you, you'll find that Crossfire does indeed work in CoD4.

    Remember, the more you know.
    Reply