Benchmarked - Civilization: Beyond Earth
by Jarred Walton on October 23, 2014 8:00 AM ESTAMD CrossFire Performance
Update, 10/24: Turns out there's a "hidden" setting in the configuration file that needs to be manually enabled for Mantle SFR rendering on CrossFire setups to work. Go to your configuration file (%homepath%\Documents\my games\Sid Meier's Civilization Beyond Earth\GraphicsSettings.ini) and change the one line to say "Enable MGPU=1". This will allow Mantle SFR to work properly. I had to retest CrossFire performance, and the updated results are below, with a more detailed explanation posted in a separate article.
Last but not least we have some early results for CrossFire performance. With the appropriate tweak to the configuration file, Mantle CrossFire support adds an interesting wrinkle to the mix. Regular CrossFire still works as usual, but minimum frame rates take a hit relative to single GPUs even while average framerates improve. Here are a couple graphs showing scaling of performance as we move through the various settings. I've included both single GPU and CrossFire results for the R9 280 and R9 290X, both with and without Mantle:
CrossFire 290X ends up pushing past the 60FPS barrier, even at 4K with 4xMSAA, so that's quite a feat. Except, minimum frame rates take a hit and go from 32FPS with a single 290X to 20FPS with CrossFire 290X. Enabling Mantle changes the story quite a bit; the CrossFire Mantle configuration can't quite push past 60FPS, but at 56FPS it's at least close and the minimum frame rate of 37FPS is better than both the single GPU and single GPU with Mantle figures.
We can also see quite nicely in this graph that the CPU bottleneck at High and Ultra settings is around 110-120FPS, even with a 4.1GHz Core i7-4770K, while our minimum FPS bottleneck is even lower: 65FPS for CrossFire Mantle and 49FPS with a single 290X (without Mantle).
As for the R9 280 CF configuration, the two Tahiti GPUs (without Mantle) come just short of matching the performance of a single R9 290X Hawaii card. Mantle again improves minimum frame rates, but the gap between R9 290X Mantle and R9 280 CF Mantle grows. This is one more reason why we generally prefer single GPU configurations, at least up to the point where you have the fastest GPU you can buy.
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JarredWalton - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Okay, I added a third page where we investigate minimum FPS. Mantle actually helps here quite a bit, so I need to tweak the conclusion a bit. (CrossFire on the other hand is still not working right with Mantle, at least in my testing.)StevoLincolnite - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Unfortunately, Mantle doesn't really shine on mid/high-end hardware, it's the low-end stuff that it really helps.Would be nice to see to see how a Pentium Anniversary, Core i3, AMD FX Octo, Core i7 5930K and 5960 handle it.
Alexvrb - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Agreed! Especially FM2+ chips. You'll naturally be testing lower settings and resolutions in such a scenario, however.doronnac - Friday, October 24, 2014 - link
Thanks for the data Jarred.I'm using an average cpu with an above average gpu.
Some games choke my cpu but only at new levels / checkpoints so it doesn't bother me, but others stress my cpu enough to cause occasional slowdowns.
Either way, your interpretation of min.fps is the most accurate and least misleading that I've seen. Love it!
Iketh - Saturday, October 25, 2014 - link
even more reason for min frame rateGich - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Try Mantle "with an AMD APU or a Core i3 processor" and NOT a "hundreds of dollars GPU"?Like an i3 + R7 260.
dragosmp - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
I'm also a big fan of Civ5 and I'll get this game as soon as possible, but I wonder.Maybe the "upgrader" would be a more realistic use-case, like: I have 300$, what do I get? Do I upgrade the ye-old Phenom II to an i5 and stay with the same 7950 (Mantle can't help much) or I get a 290 with the old CPU and count on Mantle to relieve the CPU load?
Drasca - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Personally since the TBS is CPU-bound when hitting 'end turn', as the GPU won't help make turns faster, I would go with the CPU upgrade and keep the 7950. Unless you're trying to go 2k-4k resolution, you won't get much GPU benefit. CPU overhead for GPU usage is not very much.looncraz - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
Upgrade the CPU. I am running a 7870XT (a.k.a. 7930) with an i7 2600k @ 4.5GHz and nothing slows me down.Investing in a good SSD, however, may make even more sense.
looncraz - Thursday, October 23, 2014 - link
I should also note, that the 7950 is helped by Mantle, as is my 7870XT. Any GCN graphics card works.