Überclok Ion: Midrange Overclocking, with a Warranty
by Matt Campbell on February 12, 2008 4:10 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
Gaming/3D Performance
3DMark 2006
Let's start with the classic synthetic 3D benchmark, run with default options.
Once we venture into the realm of 3D, we see clock speed begins to matter more than the number of cores present. This is not universally true as some new games are multi-threaded, but in general speed still reigns supreme. The added cache (per core) of the Q6600 will help alleviate the clock speed deficit somewhat, but in most games an overclocked E4500 can beat a stock Q6600. (Overclocking the Q6600 would of course change matters.)
FEAR
The FEAR multiplayer demo, now showing its age (particularly since the full version was released for free), includes a short benchmark with AI and weapon usage. We run all tests at Maximum detail (with Soft Shadows disabled).
With antialiasing enabled, these two systems are virtually identical on this older title.
Unreal Tournament 3
We run the UT3 Demo flybys with details set to maximum (-compatscale=5 switch) in all cases. These flybys are part of the demo, run by copying the executable shortcut and modifying it with command line parameters. Bots are enabled for these runs, which decreases reproducibility but is more indicative of gameplay with active weapons and AI.
Crysis
Crysis is punishing to even the most recent PC hardware. This game also has two built-in benchmarks in the "bin32" folder, one "CPU" and the other "GPU". We ran several configurations to show the scalability of this game. We ran all benchmarks three times, discarding the first result and averaging the other two. We ran all tests at "High" quality unless otherwise specified.
The Ion does well here, beating the Shuttle by 4-8 frames per second across all resolutions.
World in Conflict
World in Conflict is a strategy war-game where the Cold War has erupted into a full-scale conflict between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The game has a built-in benchmark under Options->Graphics. Quality settings in the game also modify anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering; however, these were controlled independently while all other settings were left at the default for that quality.
This game has a number of large explosions that can really drag down the framerate at times. 1280x1024 was comfortably playable at Medium Quality, while anything above that experiences major slowdowns from time to time.
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Matt Campbell - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
Apologies if it was confusing, I probably could have worded it better. Suffice it to say that there's plenty of power left over :)7Enigma - Wednesday, February 13, 2008 - link
Not a problem. As I mentioned in my OP, the review was excellent. You guys are just victims of your own high standards, we have little to nit-pick other than wording and occasional typo's! :)HotdogIT - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
If only you guys could take it one step farther, and do like HardOCP did back in the day... love to see you guys review the customer service. That'd be a hoot. A hoot and a half.Then again, it clearly didn't work out too well for Kyle and team...
Syran - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
They used to do Customer Service stuff on AT back in the day on motherboard reviews, and some system builds too. Would definitely like to see that if I'm to think about recommending the possibility of this company to friends; so that I can avoid long-distance support.Uberclok - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
On the subject of long-distance support, I can assure you that we won't ever out-source our phones overseas. We know how quickly an aggravating customer support experience can lose customers for us, so we will always make sure our phone reps:A. know what they're talking about, and
B. can be easily understood.
Also, we C. feed them well - a happy rep is a helpful rep.
- Thomas Glen
Uberclok
(877) 211-4235
crimson117 - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
I think by "long distance support" he meant he could recommend you guys as system builders for his friends, rather than him building and supporting custom systems for his friends. Kind of like how system builders will often recommend Dell or someone else for simple systems, purely so they don't have to support it themselves.But it's nice to know you guys do feed your reps :) Otherwise they start eating each other, and you often lose your best ones to less technically inclined - but hungrier - reps.
CyberHawk - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
What a backround O_oWhere could I get one like that?
caliche - Tuesday, February 12, 2008 - link
That's a wallpaper from the PC game Hellgate London.http://www.hellgatelondon.com/media/wallpaper">http://www.hellgatelondon.com/media/wallpaper
I have not played the game so I can't vouch for it, but it does have some very nice "Techno Gothic" style artwork.