NVIDIA’s GeForce GTS 450: Pushing Fermi In To The Mainstream
by Ryan Smith on September 13, 2010 12:02 AM EST- Posted in
- NVIDIA
- Fermi
- GeForce GTS 450
- GF106
- GPUs
Left 4 Dead
Introduced in 2004, Valve’s Source engine continues to live on in new Valve games. At this point even newer Source games like Left 4 Dead are rarely GPU limited to a significant degree, but we keep it on here due to the fact that we’re expecting at least one more souped-up Source game next year’s in Portal 2.
Left 4 Dead is an interesting title as when we throw a slow enough card at it, the CPU limitations give way for a new set of limitations: texturing. The GTX 460 could barely break away from the 5770 here, putting the GTS 450 in a particularly precarious position. Unfortunately for the GTS 450, it falls well below the 5770 and is even outdone by the 5750 by a few frames per second. At 87fps at 1680 this is largely academic, but it showcases where a worst-case scenario might lie.
On the plus side, even at 1920x1200 with 8x anti-aliasing, the GTS 450 still delivers better than 60fps, offering a solid example of why just about anything can play Source engine games at this point.
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lecaf - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
Oh my wrong I missed the SLI partsorry
:)
mino - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
That "SLI" detail ... :)jabber - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
Buy a 5770 and OC it to 900/1300 like most should out of the box.Sorted.
Quidam67 - Saturday, September 18, 2010 - link
Agreed. The article repeatedly pointed out that an overclocked 450 catches up to a 5770, but never mentions that the 5770 generally overclocks very well so is likely to take back the lead anyway.Zokudu - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
But it goes without saying that modern video drivers from both AMD and NVIDIA ridiculously huge, and this new installer doesn’t do anything to change that.I think your missing an are there. Otherwise wonderful article guys.
Lonyo - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
Well, that whole bit isn't entirely accurate anyway. The NV drivers are more than 2x the size of AMD drivers, and AMD drivers aren't that much bigger than the drivers for more "mundane" things like ever printers and sound cards.Either way it's not entirely relevant at all.
iwodo - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
Well Nv Drivers includes a lot more then ATI, otherwise they are about the same.But would Anandtech go on to find out just why Drivers Size is so huge. I have the feeling if the drivers were specifically written for one generation of graphics card it would save huge amount of space.
Taft12 - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
I agree that there is probably a ton of code in there to support cards all the way back to 6xxx but also that this would lead to a support nightmare for users that don't know what model is in their PC.Too bad, but it's the nature of the industry and graphics tech is the fastest moving of them all.
Ryan Smith - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
Actually we did something a bit like that early last year for the NV drivers.http://www.anandtech.com/show/3510
At the time the PhysX package was around 40% of the required space.
On modern drivers the languages have a lot to do with it. The NV International drivers are a good 30MB bigger than the English-only drivers.
heflys - Monday, September 13, 2010 - link
This card is such a disappointment. It performs worse than the year old card 5770, and only surpasses it when overclocked; it's also about the same price. Furthermore, in some reviews, the 5770 even beats it in Crossfire vs SLI comparison! To add further insult to injury, AMD is about to launch new cards shortly!This card has to be priced at $110-120 to be competitive in my book.