Battlefield 2 Performance
This benchmark is performed using DICE's built in demo playback functionality with a few added extras built in house. When using the built in demo playback features of BF2, frames rendered during the loading screen are counted in the benchmark. In order to get a real idea of performance, we use the instantaneous frametime and frames per second data generated from a benchmark run. We discard the data collected during the loading screen and calculate a result that represents the actual gameplay that was benchmarked. While DICE maintains that results over 100fps aren't reliable, our methods have allowed us to get useful data from high performing systems.
During the benchmark, the camera switches between players and vehicles in order to capture the most action possible. There is a lot of smoke and explosions, so this is a very GPU intensive Battlefield 2 benchmark. The game itself is best experienced with average in-game framerates of 35 and up.
We ran Battlefield 2 using the highest quality graphics settings we could (excluding antialiasing). Shadows, lighting, and especially view distance are very important in order to best play the game. In our opinion view distance should never be set to less than the max, but other settings can be decreased slightly if a little more performance or a higher resolution is required.
At 1600x1200, the 6600 GT, stock X800 GTO, and X1600 XT just aren't able to hit playable frame rates, while everything else is quite capable of running at this sweet spot resolution. Dropping lower than 1600x1200 without enabling AA is generally not desired, as the game has many high contrast edges in many of the urban desert settings. The motion issues caused by aliasing can sometimes be very distracting when searching for approaching enemies.
In this game, we even see a hard CPU limitation coming in at 800x600 with our Core 2 Extreme X6800 running at 2.93GHz with the X1900 XT. The stock 7900 GT does lead the X1900 GT at every resolution in this test, but with the recent price cuts pushing the X1900 GT down to about $230, the added performance gain of the 7900 GT might not be worth the money in this case. Overclocked 7900 GT parts will perform much better in BF2, but stay tuned for our look at factory overclocked performance.
The 7600 GT is definitely a better card for Battlefield 2 than the X1600 XT performing on par with the X1800 GTO. For about $60 more, an X1900 GT could bring a lot more performance to the table, but at a bare minimum price point the 7600 GT is the way to go.
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gmallen - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Most of the PC enthusiast population interested in mid-range cards are still running AGP motherboards (this is based on sales of pci motherboards vs. agp motherboards). Where are these cards?Josh7289 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
They don't exist.
arturnowp - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
HiIt's written that all card in oblivion was tested with HDR Lighting with X800GTO doesn't support. I think your results are misleading. The same with SC: Chaos Theory...
BTW: Who plays Oblivion with Actor Fade at 20%, Item Fade at 10% and Object Fade at 25% you get better graphics and performance setting those option to 50-60% and turning off grass with consums a lot of power and doesn't look good. In foliage it's better to see your enemies from greater distance the say with a horse ;-)
arturnowp - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
OK there's writen about SC: Chaos Theory but all in all conclusion are misleading "Owners of the X800 GTO may have a little more life left in their card depending on how overclocked the card is, but even at stock clocks, it might be wise to hang on for another product cycle if possibl" where GeForce 6600GT performe on par with X800GTO. It would be better to exclude X800GTO from charts or mark it as SM 2.0 card. What's better GeForce 6600GT should be tested in SM 2.0 mode...nv40 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Don't why?http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/pow...">http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/pow...
Some difference of test are so large that it almost shocked me
For instance:
7900GT@84.21 with FX-60 can run 54 FPS avg in 1600x1200 with 4xAA 16xAF in X-bit lab
7900GT@91.33 with X6800 just be 35 FPS ave in 1600x1200 with only 4x AA in Anandtech
Problem of 91.33? Intel 975X? X6800? nVidia?
more than 40% performance difference despite X6800 is far superior to FX-60
coldpower27 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
They probably aren't running the same time demo sequences.nv40 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Maybe... but only 9% dif in X1900GT (41 vs 38)And 7900GT test in Anandtech definitely performed much worse then X-bit lab in general
nothing with which is correct or not, but if both are right, the the conclusion may be probably draw like below:
1. Driver problem: 91.33 is much slower than 84.21 (nV Cheat, or 91.33 problem)
2. CPU problem: X6800 is much inferior than FX-60 in game (Rediculous, and far from true in every test)
3. Platform problem: nVidia cards perform much worse in intel chipset (975X)
Sharky974 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
I agree. I clearly remember Xbit declaring the 7900GT to win the vast majority of benches vs the X1900GT.In fact overall the X1900GT wasn't warmly recieved. I really feel this deserves some looking into.
For example, I'll have to go look, but I think Firing Sqaud also showed the X1900GT as inferior to the 7900GT.
As it stands now, it's like Anand's platforms are somehow ATI biased, on the other hand I believe Xbit platform is Nvidia biased. Xbit reviews nearly always show Nvidia winning.
Sharky974 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/sapphire_radeo...">http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/sapphire_radeo...I started on the first page of benches.
As one glaring example:
Firings squad: Quake 4 1280X1024 4XAA 8XAF 7900GT-87.2 X1900GT-60.6
http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/sapphire_radeo...">http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/sapphire_radeo...
Anand: Quake 4 1280X1024 4XAA 7900 GT-45.1 X1900GT-49.8
http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/video/roundups...">http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/video/roundups...
With similar settings, FS has the 7900GT getting nearly double the frames Anand does. The X1900GT also gets significantly more in FS review, from 49 to 60 FPS, but nowhere near the change the 7900GT sees, with the net effect the X1900GT eaks out a win at Anand, but loses by nearly 27+ FPS at FS.
The X1900GT is definitly a better card than I had remembered, even at the FS benches though.
Also, FS was using a FX-57. Anand a much more powerful CPU, making results all the more puzzling.
In addition to some of the other suggestions, I'd question drivers. FS was using older drivers on both since it is an older review. Perhaps Nvidia drivers have seen a large performance decrease, or ATI's a similar increase? This seems fairly unlikely, though, as I dont think you normally get huge differences from driver to driver.
Unless Nvidia really was cheating RE 16-bit filtering as the INQ claimed a while back, so they fixed it causing a massive performance decrease? :) Again though, that suggestion is made half-jokingly.
This definitly needs a lot of looking into I fell. Anand's results are quite different than others around the web at first blush.
JarredWalton - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Levels can make a huge difference in performance. For example, Far Cry has segments that get about 80 FPS max on any current CPU (maybe higher with Core 2 Extreme overclocked...), but other areas of the game run at 150+ FPS on even a moderate CPU like a 3500+. I don't have a problem providing our demo files, but some fo them are quite large (Q4 is about 130 MB if I recall). SCCT, FEAR, and X3 provide a reference that anyone can compare to, if they want. The only other thing is that ATI driver improvements are certainly not unlikely, especially in Quake 4.