Fall 2003 Video Card Roundup Part I - ATI's Radeon 9800 XT
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Derek Wilson on October 1, 2003 3:02 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Command & Conquer Generals: Zero Hour
The recently released expansion to the very popular Real-Time Strategy (RTS) game Command & Conquer Generals seems to do a good job of living up to the standards set by its prestigious ancestry. RTS games usually get overlooked in GPU roundups and comparisons as they aren’t considered graphically intense. However, smoothness is very important to gameplay; goodness knows I’ve blamed plenty of lost armies on ill timed drops in framerate. For this benchmark, we created a multiplayer game consisting of 6 hard armies on one team with us, and one easy army. We then used the replay feature in conjunction with FRAPS to measure performance. This was done with and without 4xAA/8xAF.
In this first test we can see that all the ATI cards are huddled together at the top while the nvidia cards lag behind. Clearly this game favors the ATI architecture. One of NVIDIAs strong points, memory bandwidth, doesn't get a chance to shine in this game as its mostly small textures and low poly objects with some pretty cool particle effects. That kind of setup just doesn't tilt in NVIDIAs favor.
Even with AA and AF enabled neither camp is severely hampered; and the only card that really drops off significantly is the 9600 Pro. The fact that the FX 5900 and NV38 are neck and neck suggests that the reason for NVIDIAs performance in this benchmark has something to do with an aspect of the architecture that isn't directly (or significantly?) affected by GPU core clock or memory bus bandwidth/speed; more than likely we're talking about driver issues here.
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Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
I'd like to see higher resolutions being used. This would (partially) remove the CPU from the equation, if we're testing video cards. 1024x768 may not be enough of a test nowadays.Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
Does ANYONE read the first few pages of the review?I really like the new format. I have a limited amount of time to read this stuff so I'm glad it's coming in bite size pieces.
I can't wait for the companion reviews that cover image quality etc. Until then, I'm satisfied that I have the salient points.
Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
How about adding Battlefield 1942 to the test suite?Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
I would like to see Nascar Racing 2003 Season (Sierra/Papyrus) and Nascar Thunder 2004 (EA) added to the list for future testing; esp. NR2003.Thanks
Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
why are idiots allowed to post?Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
What surprises me is that NVIDIA let Anandtech use and benchmark a card that hasn't been even announced yet. I haven't seen any reviews or previews for this card anywhere, and it's not even listed on NVIDIA's site! It's a bad time to own a NVIDIA card, so I guess I'll get rid of mine real soon.assemblage - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
Star Wars Galaxies and Everquest. It would be nice if those games were benchmarked.Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
Add Rise of Nations, it needs alot of power at late game & after every wonder is built.Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
You know, it may be a bit overkill, but wouldn't it be a good idea to test video cards on a 8x846 opteron system, so that none of the tests is anywhere near cpu-limited?Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
Nah, Bigshit under whatever handle is an idiot. Most of the rest are just naive. I think it's fair to criticise this review in several areas - e.g. the constant use of 1024x768 - but give 'em a chance to get it right before you start the accusations.