AMD Carrizo Part 2: A Generational Deep Dive into the Athlon X4 845 at $70

GRID: Autosport at 3 GHz

No graphics tests are complete without some input from Codemasters and the EGO engine, which means for this round of testing we point towards GRID: Autosport, the next iteration in the GRID and racing genre. As with our previous racing testing, each update to the engine aims to add in effects, reflections, detail and realism, with Codemasters making ‘authenticity’ a main focal point for this version.

GRID’s benchmark mode is very flexible, and as a result we created a test race using a shortened version of the Red Bull Ring with twelve cars doing two laps. The car is focus starts last and is quite fast, but usually finishes second or third. Both the average and minimum frame rates are recorded.

For this test we used the following settings with our graphics cards:

The EGO engine typically shows off any small changes in hardware configuration, which can be a good thing, and similar to the other tests the average frame rates favor Kaveri.

Minimum frame rates show a similar story. It's interesting to note that on our AMD cards, the R9 285 and R9 290X, both Carrizo and Kaveri push the minimum frame rates from below 30 to above 30, despite the fact that the AMD cards seem to have a poor showing for GRID (at least at 3 GHz).