Radeon 7970 released - ARMA 2 Performance Gains

[bangtail 0]

Congrats Bangtail! Hey any problems scaling? Does the screen still flicker while loading?

Not yet (fingers crossed) :D

[grillob3 11]

I did not get to order my 680s yet but just RMA my 7970..but before that i went to frys, where i can get full money back ( to be sure i was not going to mess up giving back the 7970s) and bought a couple of gtx 580 3gb stock from zotac.

Here:

Settings:

View d 810

Texture detail Very high

Video memory Default

Af Very high

AA low

Terrain detail Very high

Object detail Very high

Shadow detail Very high

Hdr quality Very High

PP very low

3d resolution 1920x1080 (100%) same as my resolution.

One 7970, b1 82fps, b2 26fps, e8 88fps, two 7970 cf ,b1 102fps, b2 27, e8 132

Now the GTX 580 sli b1 109fps, b2 27, e8 127!!!BUT this is with AA VERY HIGH!!! What hell!!! The 580s are way smoother than the 7970s and pretty much the same fps!

So now i am going to get the 680s and see what is up! No more ATI cards for me for a long long time!

[froggyluv 2130]

Interesting read about the 7000 series sacrificing graphical crispness for performance: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/image-quality-driver-optimization-graphics,3173.html

[NeuroFunker 11]

I did not get to order my 680s yet but just RMA my 7970..but before that i went to frys, where i can get full money back ( to be sure i was not going to mess up giving back the 7970s) and bought a couple of gtx 580 3gb stock from zotac.

Here:

Settings:

View d 810

Texture detail Very high

Video memory Default

Af Very high

AA low

Terrain detail Very high

Object detail Very high

Shadow detail Very high

Hdr quality Very High

PP very low

3d resolution 1920x1080 (100%) same as my resolution.

One 7970, b1 82fps, b2 26fps, e8 88fps, two 7970 cf ,b1 102fps, b2 27, e8 132

Now the GTX 580 sli b1 109fps, b2 27, e8 127!!!BUT this is with AA VERY HIGH!!! What hell!!! The 580s are way smoother than the 7970s and pretty much the same fps!

So now i am going to get the 680s and see what is up! No more ATI cards for me for a long long time!

when maxed AA = no or low AA, for it it looks your'e CPU limited. Try to overclock it. Increasing AA should always affect your performance, and when it's barely downgrading the performance, then it might be your CPU which coming to it's limits.

[griffz 1]

too bad, no test with 200% 3D resolution ...

[grillob3 11]

when maxed AA = no or low AA, for it it looks your'e CPU limited. Try to overclock it. Increasing AA should always affect your performance, and when it's barely downgrading the performance, then it might be your CPU which coming to it's limits.

Not really... cpu limited! 3960k oc to 4.8! the same cpu for both tests....and the worst thing now is that i got my gtx 680s and with the same setup i use the 580s 3gb where i got 109 on bench 1 i cant pass 102 with the gtx 680 :(

I tried driver 301.10, 301.24 beta no difference in performance but the new beta 301.25 is the worst one... i lost 3-4 fps.

My set up

Cpu 3930k @ 4.8 wc

16 gb ram @ 2133

Gtx 680 sli stock

win 7 64 ssd1

arma 2 ssd2

griffz i will test 200% tonite.

here is my test on a custom mission just loading and checking the fps.

100% 105fps

114% 80

120% 75

125% 67

133% 58

150% 43

200% 30

Edited April 17, 2012 by Grillob3

[jedra 11]

In this month's Custom PC benchmarking test, the 680 did not perform as well as expected in Arma 2 (although it stormed the boards in everything else). The HD7970 performed better or at least comparably in the Arma 2 test.

It seems that for Arma 2 alone the 7970 is a better choice, but for absolutely everything else (apart from Take On Helicopters I suspect!) the 680 is a very good card indeed.

[NeuroFunker 11]

oh, weill with such cpu and clock, thers nothing limited then :P yeah wierd. But it's something usual with new cards when they just been released, they dont work well as hoped.

[froggyluv 2130]

The HD7970 performed better or at least comparably in the Arma 2 test.

It seems that for Arma 2 alone the 7970 is a better choice, but for absolutely everything else (apart from Take On Helicopters I suspect!) the 680 is a very good card indeed.

Having owned both cards, I would disagree with this statement. FPS-wise they are extremely close with 7970 slightly beating the 680 but eveything else wise -the 680 has been a dream imho. The fact that the 7970 still costs more then the 680 is especially boggling.

[jedra 11]

FPS-wise they are extremely close with 7970 slightly beating the 680 but eveything else wise -the 680 has been a dream imho.

Er, isn't that what I said? If you only ever play Arma and you want the best performance then the 7970 seems to be the winner. But, of course in reality we play other games too, which changes things as the 680 was around 25% faster for just about every other game benchmarked.

Alas I am stuck with an HD5970OC - I will wait for Arma 3 to release before mulling over my next upgrade - my money is on nVidia this time given what came out of the blocks so far this year.

[froggyluv 2130]

If you count 1-2 fps improvemmnt as the sole deciding factor -then yes, you'd be correct. Arma2 overall looks crisper and feels smoother with 680, if you factor those in I'd say the 680 is the better card for Arma 2.

[jedra 11]

If you count 1-2 fps improvemmnt as the sole deciding factor -then yes, you'd be correct. Arma2 overall looks crisper and feels smoother with 680, if you factor those in I'd say the 680 is the better card for Arma 2.

Sounds like nVidia are heading in the right direction with this card though. Maybe something at last to rival the 8800GTXs I have in my spare machine - wonderful cards those. It sounds as if you like this card - I presume that you are seeing the benefit in other games. Out of interest what resolution are you running at?

[grillob3 11]

I get more fps with my gtx 680 sli and smoother gameplay than with my (already RMA) 7970 cf ( 1050/1425 factory oc)! arma=nvidia by far! i had a 5970 then added a 5870 in trifire....after that i got the 7970 cf and rma to get the 680 but before i went to frys and got 2 580s 3gb to test....results for me in arma 2 oa (all the same settings but AA for all cards that i tested and the same pc setup):

bench 1 bench 2 bench e8

580 3gb sli 109 27 127 AA very high

680 sli 107 27 133 AA very high

7970 cf 102 27 132 AA low

5970+5870 96 24 not tested. AA low

The difference is not that much but nvidia cards play way smoother than ati and less glitches!The ati has sharper image! But Nvidia all the way now for me....

What sucks is that i did not get any improvement from 580 3gb sli to the 680....seems like the same cards...:( but i would see the 580s using over 2gb o ram and the 680s sometimes caps on the 2gb....maybe thats way i get more fps on the 580 3gb.)

Edited April 18, 2012 by Grillob3

[NeuroFunker 11]

i wonder what scene causes 27 fps with such highend rig?

[grillob3 11]

Bench 2 is cpu demanding!

[rangerpl 13]

Don't forget the lower TDP of the GTX680. May not seem all that important but in the long run you save money as well.

[grillob3 11]

Don't forget the lower TDP of the GTX680. May not seem all that important but in the long run you save money as well.

That is why i am keeping them! and plus is better in other games like batman and bf3...

[froggyluv 2130]

Bench 2 is cpu demanding!

So what are we talking bout here gentlemen -we have dual top line cards running with quad core's OC'ed to the high 4's low 5's. Whats it gonna take to beat that nasty Benchmark#2 - Octocore at 6.6 ghz....:rolleyes:

[grillob3 11]

So what are we talking bout here gentlemen -we have dual top line cards running with quad core's OC'ed to the high 4's low 5's. Whats it gonna take to beat that nasty Benchmark#2 - Octocore at 6.6 ghz....:rolleyes:

The day we see that bench 2 being beat will be maybe in 2-3 years with new cpu generations! that means over 60fps! We will be able to play arma 2 with lots and lots of AI!Maybe middle of arma 3's life!

After a point ocing cpu does not effect arma anymore....my i7 920 i tested from 4 to 4.3 and only gain 5 fps after that 4.4 and up there was no difference...but with 3930k @ 4.3 i got 5-8 frames more than my 920 @ 4.3 (clock to clock + extra 2 cores) and an extra 5-8 more @ 4.8!And the same with 3930k after 4.8 no gain....this was all on a custom mission that i use to test in game.

[kotov12345 10]

The day we see that bench 2 being beat will be maybe in 2-3 years with new cpu generations! that means over 60fps! We will be able to play arma 2 with lots and lots of AI!Maybe middle of arma 3's life!

After a point ocing cpu does not effect arma anymore....my i7 920 i tested from 4 to 4.3 and only gain 5 fps after that 4.4 and up there was no difference...but with 3930k @ 4.3 i got 5-8 frames more than my 920 @ 4.3 (clock to clock + extra 2 cores) and an extra 5-8 more @ 4.8!And the same with 3930k after 4.8 no gain....this was all on a custom mission that i use to test in game.

because 920 is x58 chipset 3930 is x79 with quad channel ram and it much faster.CPU no much difference for gaming within same chipsets.

[PuFu 4591]

the speed gain with quad channel ram is pretty nil. (my workstation at the studio was a 2600k, i got a 3920 for a few days now). I have tested the diff a bit with a range of tools, and there was no obvious difference there.

[kotov12345 10]

to be honest very hard to say for me due I still play with 930 and 4870x2.But if we are talking about arma2 never know what difference give playing with combination fastest chipset + fastest graphic card.

[Gera_CCT 12]

Don´t worry too much with GPUs. ArmA likes A LOT SSD Drives.

[grillob3 11]

froggyluv, BangTail and everybody that has a gtx 680 and X79/SNB-E Systems:

I learn today that all the new nvidia drivers dont support pci-e 3.0 (so you guys are running it on pci-e 2.0 you can check it with gpu-z)!they will only do it for the ivy-bridge but there is a hack for that!

hack:

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.4gamer.net%2Fgames%2F022%2FG002210%2F20120323002%2F

Where i got it from:

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.aspx?m=1509861

Tests:

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.aspx?m=1537816&mpage=1

If you have sli you got to disable it on nvidia control panel and do it for each card on the registry.

Edited April 19, 2012 by Grillob3

[froggyluv 2130]

Thanks for heads up but my mobo is Asus Sabretooth p67 and doesn't support pci-e 3. Looks like some nice gains for multiple gpu's tho!