The Test

We should note that for the AMD cards we are using two sets of drivers. The drivers distributed to reviewers for use with the 5870 are version 8.66, and contain support for the 4000 and 5000 series. We are told that these drivers will be made available to 5000 series owners when the “board is released”, which should mean today.

For the 3000 series, we are using Catalyst 9.9, the most recent driver set that supports that series.

CPU: Intel Core i7-920 @ 3.33GHz
Motherboard: Intel DX58SO (Intel X58)
Chipset Drivers: Intel 9.1.1.1015 (Intel)
Hard Disk: Intel X25-M SSD (80GB)
Memory: Patriot Viper DDR3-1333 3 x 2GB (7-7-7-20)
Video Cards:

ATI Raden HD 5870
ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2
ATI Radeon HD 4890
ATI Radeon HD 4870 1GB
ATI Radeon HD 4850
ATI Radeon HD 3870
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 275
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260 core 216
NVIDIA GeForce GTS 250
NVIDIA GeForce 8800GT

Video Drivers:

NVIDIA ForceWare 190.62
ATI Catalyst Beta 8.66
ATI Catalyst 9.9

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

AA Image Quality & Performance Crysis: Warhead
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  • SiliconDoc - Wednesday, September 30, 2009 - link

    No, it's the fact you tell LIES, and always in ati's favor, and you got caught, over and over again.
    That is WHAT HAS HAPPENED.
    Now you catch hold of your senses for a moment, and supposedly all the crap you spewed is "ok".
  • SiliconDoc - Friday, September 25, 2009 - link

    Once again, all that matters to YOU, is YOUR games for PC, and ONLY top sellers, and only YOUR OPINION on PhysX.
    However, after you claimed only 2 games, you went on to bloviate about Havok.
    Now you've avoided entirely that issue. Am I to assume, as you have apparently WISHED and thrown about, that HAVOK does not function on NVidia cards? NO QUITE THE CONTRARY !
    --
    What is REAL, is that NVidia runs Havok AND PhysX just fine, and not only that but ATI DOES NOT.
    Now, instead of supporting BOTH, you have singled out your object of HATRED, and spewed your infantile rants, your put downs, your empty comparisons (mere statements), then DEMAND that I show PhysX is worthwhile, with "golden sellers". LOL
    It has been 1.5 years or so since Aegia acquisition, and of course, game developers turning anything out in just 6 short months are considered miracle workers.
    The real problem oif course for you is ATI does not support PhysX, and when a rouge coder made it happen, NVidia supported him, while ATI came in and crushed the poor fella.
    So much for "competition", once again.
    Now, I'd demand you show where HAVOK is worthwhile, EXCEPT I'm not the type of person that slams and reams and screams against " a percieved enemy company" just because "my favorite" isn't capable, and in that sense, my favorite IS CAPABLE.
    Now, PhysX is awesome, it's great, it's the best there is, and that may or may not change, but as for now, NO OTHER demonstrations (you tube and otherwise) can match it.
    That's just a sad fact for you, and with so many maintaining your biased and arrogant demand for anything else, we may have another case of VHS instead of BETA, which of course, you would heartily celebrate, no matter how long it takes to get there.
    LOL
    Yes, it is funny. It's just hilarious. A few months ago before Mirror's Edge and Anand falling in love with PhysX in it, admittedly, in the article he posted, we had the big screamers whining ZERO.
    Well, now a few months later you are whining TWO.
    Get ready to whine higher. Yes, you have read about the uptick in support ? LOL
    You people are really something.
    Oh, I know, CUDA is a big fat zero according to you, too.
    (please pass along your thoughts to higher education universities here in the USA, and the federal government national lab research facilites. Thanks)
  • SiliconDoc - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link

    Yes, another excuse monger. So you basically admit the text is biased, and claim all readers should see the charts and go by those. LOL
    So when the text is biased, as you admit, how is it that the rest, the very core of the review is not ? You won't explain that either.
    Furthermore, the assumption that competition leads to something better in technology for videocards quicker, fails the basic test that in terms of technology, there is a limit to how fast it proceeds forward, since scientific breakthroughs must come, and often don't come, for instance, new energy technologies, still struggling after decades to make a breakthrough, with endless billions spent, and not much to show for it.
    Same here with videocards, there is a LIMIT to the advancement speed, and competition won't be able to exceed that limit.
    Furthermore, I NEVER said prices won't be driven down by competition, and you falsely asserted that notion to me.
    I DID however say, ATI ALSO IS KNOWN FOR OVERPRICING. (or rather unknown by the red fans, huh, even said by omission to have NOT COMMITTED that "huge sin", that you all blame only Nvidia for doing.)
    So you're just WRONG once again.
    Begging the other guy to "not argue" then mischaracterizing a conclusion from just one of my statements, ignoring the points made that prove your buddy wrong period, and getting the body of your idea concerning COMPETITION incorrect due to technological and scientific constraints you fail to include, is no way to "argue" at all.
    I sure wish there was someone who could take on my points, but so far none of you can. Every time you try, more errors in your thinking are easily exposed.
    A MONOPOLY, in let's take for instance, the old OIL BARRONS, was not stagnant, and included major advances in search and extraction, as Standard Oil history clearly testifies to.
    Once again, the "pat" cleche' is good for some things ( for instance competing drug stores, for example ), or other such things that don't involve inaccesible technology that has not been INVENTED yet.
    The fact that your simpleton attitude failed to note such anomolies, is clearly evidence that once again, thinking "is not reuired" for people like you.
    Once again, the rebuttal has failed.
  • kondor999 - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link

    This is just sad, and I'm no fanboy. I really wanted a 5870, but only with 100% more speed than a GTX285 - not a lousy 33%. Definitely not worth me upgrading, so I guess ATI saved me some money. I'm certain that my 3 GTX280's in Tri-SLI will destroy 2 5870's in CF - although with slightly less compatability (an important advantage for ATI, but not nearly enough).
  • Moricon - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link

    I have been a regular at Tomshardware for a while now, nad keep coming back to Anandtech time and again to read reviews I have already read on other sites, and this one is by far the best I have read so far, (guru3d, toms, firing squad, and many others)

    The 5870 looks awesome, but from an upgrade point of view, I guess my system will not really benefit from moving on from E7200 @3.8ghz 4gb 1066, HD4870 @850mhz 4400mhz on 1680x1050.

    Such a shame that i dont have a larger monitor at the moment or I would have jumped immediately.

    Looks like the path is q9550 and 5870 and 1920x1200 monitor or larger to make sense, then might as well go i7, i5, where do you stop..

    Well done ATI, well done! But if history follows the Nvidia 3xx chip will be mindblowing compared!
  • djc208 - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link

    I was most surprised at how far behind the now 2-generation old 3870 is now (at least on these high-end games). Guess my next upgrade (after a SSD) should be a 5850 once the frenzy dies away.
  • JonnyDough - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link

    They could probably use a 1.5 GB card. :(
  • mapesdhs - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link


    Ryan, any chance you could run Viewperf or other pro-app benchmarks
    please? Some professionals use consumer hardware as a cheap way of
    obtaining reasonable performance in apps like Maya, 3DS Max, ProE,
    etc., so it would most interesting to know how the 5870 behaves when
    running such tests, how it compares to Quadro and FireGL cards.
    Pro-series boards normally have better performance for ops such as
    antialiases lines via different drivers and/or different internal
    firmware optimisations. Someday I figure perhaps a consumer card will
    be able to match a pro card purely by accident.

    Ian.

  • AmdInside - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link

    Sorry if this has already been asked but does the 5870 support audio over Display Port? I am holding out for a card that does such a thing. I know it does it for HDMI but also want it to do it for Display Port.
  • VooDooAddict - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link

    Been waiting for a single gaming class card that can power more then 2 displays for quite some time. (The more then 2 monitors not necessarily for gaming.)

    The fact that this performs a noticeable bit better then my existing 4870 512MB is a bonus.

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