The NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan X Review
by Ryan Smith on March 17, 2015 3:00 PM ESTCivilization: Beyond Earth
Shifting gears from action to strategy, we have Civilization: Beyond Earth, the latest in the Civilization series of strategy games. Civilization is not quite as GPU-demanding as some of our action games, but at Ultra quality it can still pose a challenge for even high-end video cards. Meanwhile as the first Mantle-enabled strategy title Civilization gives us an interesting look into low-level API performance on larger scale games, along with a look at developer Firaxis’s interesting use of split frame rendering with Mantle to reduce latency rather than improving framerates.
Though not as intricate as Crysis 3 or Shadow of Mordor, Civilization still requires a very powerful GPU to run it at 4K if you want to hit 60fps. In fact of our single-GPU configurations the GTX Titan X is the only card to crack 60fps, delivering 69fps at the game’s most extreme setting. This is once again well ahead of the GTX 980 – beating it by 31% at 4K – and 40%+ ahead of the GK110 cards. On the other hand this is the closest AMD’s R9 290XU will get, with the GTX Titan X only beating it by 23% at 4K.
Meanwhile at 1440p it’s entirely possible to play Civilization at 120fps, making it one of a few games where the GTX Titan X can keep up with high refresh rate 1440p monitors.
When it comes to minimum framerates the GTX Titan X doesn’t dominate quite like it does at average framerates, but it still handily takes the top spot. Even at its worst, the GTX Titan X can still deliver 44fps at 4K under Civilization.
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Jdubo - Thursday, March 19, 2015 - link
290x was the original Titan killer. Not only did it kill the original release but killed its over-inflated price as well. I suspect the next reiteration of AMD flagship card will be Titan X killer as well. History usually repeats itself over and over again.jay401 - Thursday, March 19, 2015 - link
You say this is not the same type of pro-sumer card as the previous Titan yet the price is the same. No thanks.Ballist1x - Thursday, March 19, 2015 - link
No gtx970/970 sli in the review;) Anand you let the consumers down...H3ld3r - Thursday, March 19, 2015 - link
R9 290x only haves 4Gb at 5ghz and does a awsome job at 4k. the 295 only operates with 4Gb the other 4 are mirrored and shines in 4k. So i can't understand everybody concerns with 4k gaming with upcoming fiji. This Titan X has 12GB at 7Ghz and only shows how gddr5 is obsolete.oranos - Friday, March 20, 2015 - link
The ratio of potential buyers to comments on this article is atronomical.leignheart - Friday, March 20, 2015 - link
Hello everyone, I would like you to read the final words on the Titan X. It says the performance increase over a single gtx 980 is 33%, except the price is 100% over the gtx 980. If you are lucky enough to pay just 1000$ for the Titan X. Please people do not waste your money on this card. If you do then Nvidia will keep releasing Extremely overpriced cards. DO NOT BUY THIS CARD.Please instead wait for the gtx 980 TI if you want dx12. I will certainly pay 1 grand and more for a card, but this card is a particular rip off at that price point. Don't just throw your money away. Read the performance chart yourself, it is in no way shape or form worth 1000$.
Dug - Monday, March 30, 2015 - link
I suppose we can't buy a Rolex, Tesla, a vacation condo, or even a pony?Paying for the best available is always more money. Get a job where another $500 doesn't affect you when you purchase something. Plus price is only perception on worth. People could say $20 is too much for a video card and they would be right.
themac79 - Friday, March 20, 2015 - link
I wish they would have thrown in 780sli, which is what I run. I would like to have more VRAM, but I'm running all the new games pretty much maxed out. I made the mistake of buying them when they first came out and payed over $600 a piece. I will definitely wait for price drops this time.H3ld3r - Friday, March 20, 2015 - link
You need is more transistors, memory speed, stream processors, bus, rops, tmu's not memory amountArchetype - Friday, March 20, 2015 - link
4K gaming not quite there yet. Not going to pay $500+ for it. And in the mean time still jamming Full HD games like a baws using my old 280X "on my Full HD monitor".