HDR
Serious Sam II
| X1900XTX | 7900GTX | |||||
| Default | HDR | Default | HDR | |||
| 1024 | ||||||
| Min | 41 | 37 | 9.76% | 42 | 42 | 0.00% |
| Avg | 56.5 | 48.11 | 14.86% | 56.76 | 57.53 | -1.36% |
| Max | 78 | 64 | 17.95% | 79 | 78 | 1.27% |
| Average | 14.19% | -0.03% | ||||
| 1280 | ||||||
| Min | 38 | 33 | 13.16% | 42 | 43 | -2.38% |
| Avg | 54.89 | 43.6 | 20.56% | 56.62 | 52.28 | 7.67% |
| Max | 76 | 57 | 25.00% | 79 | 68 | 13.92% |
| Average | 19.57% | 6.40% | ||||
| 1600 | ||||||
| Min | 36 | 29 | 19.44% | 43 | 30 | 30.23% |
| Avg | 52.12 | 36.73 | 29.52% | 56.33 | 37.3 | 33.77% |
| Max | 69 | 46 | 33.33% | 79 | 48 | 39.24% |
| Average | 27.43% | 34.42% | ||||
| Weighted Average | 20.40% | 13.60% |
This game behaves similarly whether you chose to use HDR or AA. Interesting to note, HDR penalty is higher than AA with the GeForce 7900GTX and lower with the Radeon X1900XTX. However, for those who want to use HDR, the deal breaker here is not efficiency and frame rate alone. It's HDR with AA - and the frame rates are not that different on the Radeon X1900XTX. (see them here).
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
| X1900XTX | 7900GTX | |||||
| Default | HDR | Default | HDR | |||
| 1024 | ||||||
| Min | 75.26 | 61 | 18.95% | 76.91 | 65.13 | 15.32% |
| Avg | 109.61 | 99.59 | 9.14% | 115.02 | 101.42 | 11.82% |
| Max | 185.53 | 154.95 | 16.48% | 198.8 | 163.23 | 17.89% |
| Average | 14.86% | 15.01% | ||||
| 1280 | ||||||
| Min | 50.96 | 40.62 | 20.29% | 63.78 | 45.94 | 27.97% |
| Avg | 95.81 | 77.84 | 18.76% | 102.66 | 76.36 | 25.62% |
| Max | 161.2 | 147.89 | 8.26% | 186.06 | 144.67 | 22.25% |
| Average | 15.77% | 25.28% | ||||
| 1600 | ||||||
| Min | 43.84 | 34.47 | 21.37% | 47.94 | 34.94 | 27.12% |
| Avg | 75.93 | 59.95 | 21.05% | 79.68 | 58.09 | 27.10% |
| Max | 144.34 | 134.69 | 6.69% | 150.75 | 131.71 | 12.63% |
| Average | 16.37% | 22.28% | ||||
| Weighted Average | 15.66% | 20.86% |
We wish Ubisoft will make an update to allow this game to run with HDR and AA enabled. Come on guys, if those guys at Crytek can do it, why can't you? Or maybe you're saving that for Double Agent? Back to the topic - well, need we say more. It's obvious who has the raw fillrate and can maintain the penalty rate for HDR.
This has been an interesting exercise. The more reviews we do, the more we can understand what these cards can and can't do. We also find how little we can learn if we only look at average frame rate numbers. The GeForce 7900GTX is by far the fastest card in the GeForce 7 series, with all the peculiarities of the architecture and design. It's not bad, but we honestly expected something more - after all it's been nearly 1 year since the introduction of the original GeForce 7800GTX and now we only have a 'speed bump'
Conclusion:
Let's go back to the purpose of this article Will the GeForce 7900GTX be enough for future games with 4x AA and 16x AF? Yes, but most likely you will have to use a lower resolution or scale back on some graphical effects. Even on texture dependent games where the GeForce 7 series traditionally excel, you will hit that drop off point where there is just not enough bandwidth to keep up with the fillrate requirements. It is 1600 x 1200 for old games, but don't expect more than 1280 x 1024 for newer games. For shader heavy games, particularly those with HDR effects, it will likely be limited to 1024 x 768. Of course, you could rely on NVIDIA to spruce up performance with newer drivers every time a new, shader heavy game comes out. Battlefield 2, F.E.A.R and Oblivion comes to mind.There are three things you can gripe about this argument and here's our answer:
- Performance will be better with newer drivers. F.E.A.R is an example of this. But consider this, how long did it take NVIDIA to make 1024 x 768 with 4x AA and 16x AF really playable with Forceware 84.21. The answer: from the time F.E.A.R came out to the launch of the GeForce 7900GTX. That's quite a long time.
- You can over clock the card, at least the memory. Vendors are releasing higher clocked GeForce 7900GTX cards. Well, yes that's true. But it is still a GeForce 7900GTX and just like a GeForce 7900GTX is still a GeForce 7 architecture, it will definitely share the same traits. Which brings us to the next point.
- It doesn't matter - frame rates are high enough to play comfortably. This is also true and we're not saying they're not. What we're saying is that with additional burden to the memory bandwidth for texture dependent games or fillrate for shader heavy games, don't expect the same blazing performance. It's not there. The good news is you can still scale back some details maybe use 'High' instead of 'Extra' or 'Ultra' sized textures or some other additional tweaks.
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