Fall 2003 Video Card Roundup Part I - ATI's Radeon 9800 XT
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Derek Wilson on October 1, 2003 3:02 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
F1 Challenge ’99-‘02
We’ve had plenty of requests to benchmark with a racing simulation. When we were designing the new testing suit this was one of the first games that came to mind. The game is faced paced, has lots of graphics options, and could keep someone who is into F1 racing busy for weeks at a time. Combine all of that with a nice replay feature and we have a very useful benchmark. We just ran a lap at Australia and counted the framerate of the replay via FRAPS while following one of the drivers in the middle of the pack.
In this bench, everyone seems to being doing really well with the exception of the two lowest end cards. It seems very clear that this test is CPU bound, and we are looking forward to benching some CPUs with this game (as well as trying to push the highend cards with some higher resolution tests). There really is no clear winner, but NV38 does come out at the top of the pile.
When we flip the filter switch, the 9800 XT drops the least in frame rate, and takes a clear lead over NV38 and the 9800 Pro. Usually NVIDIA is the camp gaining the most ground after AA and AF are enabled, but it is very much worth noting that in this benchmark (and others we will point out later) AA and AF didn't really seem to work as well on the NVIDIA cards as it did on the ATI cards. There was some difference between the two, but we will have to do more research into this area before we can bring forth anything conclusive.
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Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
I'd like to see higher resolutions being used. This would (partially) remove the CPU from the equation, if we're testing video cards. 1024x768 may not be enough of a test nowadays.Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
Does ANYONE read the first few pages of the review?I really like the new format. I have a limited amount of time to read this stuff so I'm glad it's coming in bite size pieces.
I can't wait for the companion reviews that cover image quality etc. Until then, I'm satisfied that I have the salient points.
Anonymous User - Tuesday, October 7, 2003 - link
How about adding Battlefield 1942 to the test suite?Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
I would like to see Nascar Racing 2003 Season (Sierra/Papyrus) and Nascar Thunder 2004 (EA) added to the list for future testing; esp. NR2003.Thanks
Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
why are idiots allowed to post?Anonymous User - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
What surprises me is that NVIDIA let Anandtech use and benchmark a card that hasn't been even announced yet. I haven't seen any reviews or previews for this card anywhere, and it's not even listed on NVIDIA's site! It's a bad time to own a NVIDIA card, so I guess I'll get rid of mine real soon.assemblage - Monday, October 6, 2003 - link
Star Wars Galaxies and Everquest. It would be nice if those games were benchmarked.Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
Add Rise of Nations, it needs alot of power at late game & after every wonder is built.Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
You know, it may be a bit overkill, but wouldn't it be a good idea to test video cards on a 8x846 opteron system, so that none of the tests is anywhere near cpu-limited?Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
Nah, Bigshit under whatever handle is an idiot. Most of the rest are just naive. I think it's fair to criticise this review in several areas - e.g. the constant use of 1024x768 - but give 'em a chance to get it right before you start the accusations.