NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 Review: Retaking The Performance Crown
by Ryan Smith on March 22, 2012 9:00 AM ESTThe Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Prior to the launch of our new benchmark suite, we wanted to include The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, which is easily the most popular RPG of 2011. However as any Skyrim player can tell you, Skyrim’s performance is CPU-bound to a ridiculous degree. With the release of the 1.4 patch and the high resolution texture pack this has finally been relieved to the point where GPUs once again matter, particularly when we’re working with high resolutions and less than high-end GPUs. As such, we're now including it in our test suite.
Skyrim presents us with an interesting scenario. At anything less than 2560 we’re CPU limited well before we’re GPU limited, and yet even though we’re CPU limited NVIDIA manages to take a clear lead while the 680 still finds room to push to the top. For whatever the reason NVIDIA would appear to have significantly less driver overhead here, or at the very least a CPU limited Skyrim interacts with NVIDIA’s drivers better than it does AMD’s.
In any case 2560 does move away from being CPU limited, but it’s not entirely clear whether the difference we’re seeing here is solely due to GPU performance, or if we’re still CPU limited in some fashion. Regardless of the reason the GTX 680 has a 10% lead on the 7970 here.
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CeriseCogburn - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
That's a good combo, it's high on the charts.SpeedyGonzales - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
AMD 7970 and Nvidia 680GTX are both good cards.Nevertheless AMD and Nvidia try to push price increases for the upper midrange class, either because of the limited supply due to the new process or because they just try.
Both cards are from a die size perspective as well as from the performance vs. last generation perspective clearly $350-399 cards.
I recommend to wait, if you are not desperate. Demonstrate, that the market does not accept price increases, specifically given, that pogress of PC graphics is massively blocked by the stupid consoles.
kmmatney - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
To those wondering how people have enough money to buy $500 tablets ....we don't buy $500 video cards. I guess we spend moneuy on what we want - I had no trouble plucking down $500 for an iPad2, but to me onlya fool would pay $500 for a video card...evilspoons - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
At last, the replacement for my GTX 285 has arrived.It's over twice as fast. It uses less power so I can safely continue to use the same power supply. It's quieter at idle and barely louder at full tilt. It's even smaller!
AnotherGuy - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
"the GTX 680 is faster, cooler, and quieter than the Radeon HD 7970."From the benches I saw in ur review I only see it being a little faster on more games and slower on a couple others... Also at load nVidia gets hotter than 7970... Check the Metro bench temps!
nVidia is finally using as much power as AMD compared to what it used to use before and u gotta call it quieter and cooler?
Are u just a Fanboy or u got payed to write that down?
silverblue - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
Shh. It does use a little less power, and AMD have historically had quicker fans, which may explain why 7970 is cooler (that, and the cooler design).AnotherGuy - Friday, March 23, 2012 - link
Do you see the the temps in Metro benchmark?http://www.anandtech.com/show/5699/nvidia-geforce-...
AMD 7970 74 Celcius, nVidia 680 GTX 78 Celsius
How is nVidia cooler ?
BoFox - Monday, March 26, 2012 - link
At idle - that's how - and also when both cards are overclocked- the 7970 obviously reaches thermal limits much quicker than GTX 680 which reaches the limit of voltage feed due to lack of power phases and 8-pin PCI-E connector for clean power.Also, when overclocking HD 7970 to say, 1150MHz, it usually requires voltage tweaking. By then, it's already consuming more power than even GTX 580!
OTOH, GTX 680 still remains rather quiet and cool-running when overclocked to the max (with dynamic voltage scaling).
BoFox - Monday, March 26, 2012 - link
Why? Isn't that a good thing? Even if just a little bit, it's still true.travbrad - Tuesday, March 27, 2012 - link
"From the benches I saw in ur review I only see it being a little faster on more games and slower on a couple others... "Look at them again. The only game where the 7970 has a performance advantage greater than 2% is Crysis Warhead, which is an old game that almost no one plays anymore.
1920x1200 percentages:
Crysis:Warhead--7970 is 12% faster
Metro2033--7970 is 2% faster
Dirt3--680 is 17% faster
Shogun2---680 is 15% faster
Batman--680 is 17% faster
Portal2--680 is 22% faster
BF3--680 is 31% faster
SC2--680 is 27% faster
Skyrim--680 is 16% faster
Civ5--7970 is 1% faster
The 680 is clearly the faster card overall, and at $50 cheaper definitely the better deal.