Hardware What's the Fastest Current Graphics Card?

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2009/09/17/what-s-the-fastest-current-graphics-card/1

With a new generation of DirectX 11 graphics cards just around the corner, we take at the fastest cards currently on the market to decide which card from this generation has emerged victorious. Hold onto your shaders - this one's going to bumpy!

 

I just hope that, with the introduction of the next generation cards, prices drop so much of the current hardware, that I can actually buy one!

 

Am I hoping too much for consistent performance across a range of titles? The quickest card question currently seems based upon which game you're playing and which side of whose bed the driver authors got out on.

 

Not long now until the HD5870 launches....

 

Personally I would only ever go single card single GPU solutions. Pretty much I would rather shell out a little bit extra to get a top of the range single GPU card with the chance of SLI or crossfire later. As you did prove, performance on duel GPU cards is pretty inconsistent, I would only ever use one if it was given to me or if I won one, even then I would probably sell it off.

 

Some surprising results - just based on the sheer increase in processing power, you'd expect to see a dual GPU setup utterly trounce a single GPU in every test (except power consumption, maybe).

It's disappointing to see that drivers remain such a massive factor in performance, even though it's been more than 10 years since the launch of the first proper 3D accelerators. Honestly, Nvidia and ATI have been in this game pretty much since the start, so they should really have it figured out by now (OK, 3dfx's Voodoo was the first real attempt at a 3D accelerator in 1996, but where are they now...) . It would be interesting to compare the performance of the drivers that accompanied the cards at launch against the drivers that are available now.

 

This doesn't really make much sense(the highlighted bold section). The GTX 285 has more memory available than the GTX295, so why is the reason for its relatively poor performance put down to a lack of memory? Surely it should be put down to a relative lack of absolute GPU grunt, this would make sense given the GTX295 (with less avalable memory) returns a higher framerate.

Other than that its a great roundup.

Side note - What on earth is going on with the GTX295 in Fallout3? Could this be a driver related issue as I have not noticed this sudden drop in framerates on my comparable GTX260-216 SLI setup?

 

but the review states that variable framerates occur on SLI setups too.

multi gpu is just too gimmicky for me, the 295 seems to have got it mostly right (low temps, fairly consistently high frames) but its still far from perfect. the moral of the story? buy the best single gpu and save your cash

 

That it does, hence why I said with the 'chance' to SLI or crossfire later. I would only really consider it if there were guaranteed gains. Anyway when the time comes for me to look at the second card It would be smarter to get rid of the old card and invest in a brand new top of the range one, just my reasoning anyway. Personally I just see SLI/Crossfire as a way to turbo charge your 3DMark score, if it literally did double your performance then yes I would be interested but 2 GPUs getting what a 25-30% increase? I don't find it worth while, better off hanging onto the cash for 6 months and getting a better card that has that extra performance built in.

 

On the first page you talk about the 4870x2 and its "revolutionary interconnect".
it was never used.

A simple PCIe bridge chip was used solely in the end, the "special interconnect" was left dormant.

Hopefully it will be back with the 5870x2.....I'm still waiting for the multiple GPU cards to SHARE memory instead of duplicating.
AMD have the HT tech to do it for CPU's, shouldn't be long before GPU's get it also...

 

Lol - I still have my 8800GTX, it still plays everything.

Might get the 5870 but right now the prices look ridiculous. £400-£450 for the 2GB version?

 

I can't understand how the hell you got the minimum 20 or so fps in CODWAW.
My HD4870x2 has never slowed down that badly. What version was CODWAW patched to?

 

No, that's the price in US$. Expect it to retail for around £300, perhaps less, although prices are expected to be higher initially due to low stock. In any case, we'll find out next Wednesday when they're officially released.

 

Nice article, but what was the point? No matter what the results were, waiting just a week for the next gen to hit still makes the most sense!! Ran out of ideas for articles this week? This time could have been spent playing with the new AMD quadcore

 

it's minimal, may be just for a second and at 20 FPS, it's barely noticeable.

it could also due to micro-shuttering, some people don't notice it while others hate it. and with Bit-tech releasing almost all their benchmarks with such vital data, i choose BT as my primary source.
(and it's also the reason i think multi-GPU are a waste of money+time)

looks like one of your lucky writer had a field day, playing with all the latest and fastest GPU's.

 

Hmm, yes, what was the point in us updating our test rigs and drivers and re-testing a bunch of high-end graphics cards when there's a new high-card soon to be launched? I wonder... :b

And it's not like we've recommended buying any of these cards, we just wanted to get an interesting article out to get people thinking and talking about high-end graphics cards and multi-GPU again after all Lynnfield and CPU/motherboard coverage.

 

My current solution: one 8800GT and one 8600GT. I use the 8600GT just for Physics. works wonders...

 

Touche

Looks like you won this round... "I'll get you next time, Gadget... NEXT TIME!"

 

Haha, so do I, was and still is a very good card. Mine still has some life in it, I am due for a whole system overhall about mid next year, I have had this one for over 2 years now.

 

Indeed... I believe this article to be a waste of time and have therefor only scanned it. The people who normally buy these cards do not consider budget as important and constantly just want the latest, most expensive products regardless of exactly how far they actually are from the rest of the field.

I have nothing against this, it's just not for me.

I am happy with my rig using an overclocked 9600GT as I game at 16x10.

As for 'The boy 4rm oz''s comment about system overhall, I too am looking to build a new rig but not until Windows7 is settled along with DX11 GPU's, SATA3 and USB3...... then we shall see what is what.... buying anything major right now is just silly to me.