Bringing Competition to Midrange: The GeForce 9600 GT Raises NVIDIA's Sub $200 Bar
by Derek Wilson on February 21, 2008 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Crysis Performance
Version: 1.1
Settings: All medium quality settings.
Crysis is the go to game for performance hungry graphics testing today. With beautiful graphics around every corner, even on lower quality settings, this is definitely a game we need to consider when looking at hardware. Unfortunately, the class of card exemplified by the GeForce 9600 GT (in spite of the fact that it offers a nice performance for the money) is unable to handle more than medium quality settings at 1600x1200 without performance hiccups.
For this test, we recorded our own demo using the record and demo console commands. Each test was run three times, and we took the highest score of the three (usually the second and third runs were the same or very nearly so). Our recorded demo consisted of a 20 second run through the woods in the level "rescue" and we verified the performance of our timedemo using FRAPS. The run was near the beginning of the level and we stayed clear of enemies in order to reduce the impact of AI on our graphics benchmark.
For the GeForce 9600 GT and the Radeon HD 3850, performed within 0.5 fps of each other. This is less than our standard 3% margin of error under nominal conditions. The fact that we saw performance this similar between our timedemo and FRAPS is a good indication that the Crysis demo playback feature is fairly indicative of graphics hardware performance in this particular situation. Keep in mind that our numbers will be higher than what readers see in gameplay situations, as physics, AI, and other overhead will come into play.
The GeForce 9600 GT comes out swinging with performance between AMD's Radeon HD 3850 and 3870. In addition, it leads the performance of the $200 version of the 8800 GT (the 256MB version). SLI and CrossFire scaling looks to taper off at lower resolutions, so it is likely that we could enable some higher detail settings in those cases without incurring a huge performance hit.
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ritalinkid18 - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
I think this review underestimated the price difference. The key here is cost. It said that cost wasn't a factor when comparing the two in question, but then used as a factor when comparing the SSC to the 8800 gt. The 8800gt's pricetag makes cost a big factor.Not to mention the SLI vs Crossfire, which is undoubtably the 9600gt's win. ( Case and point: http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3234...">http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3234... ) This may be about cost and a cost saving upgrade down the road should be included.
The fact that the 9600gt is the clear winner here in completely understated.
7Enigma - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
Derek and Anand I had a quick question. I, like several others, would have preferred you to have a high(er) end card like the 3870 or 8800GTS (or even just the 512meg version of the GT). I understand the purpose of the review is to show mid-range cards, but its the SLI configuration that annoys me.In a recent Daily Tech article the author eludes to 2 of these 9600's in SLI being a "better" value than a single more expensive GTS (since the 9600's would technically be less expensive). The problem with this statement as we all know is that it is software dependent on whether the extra card will actually be implemented well. Otherwise you have a single 9600 that would get blown away by a GTS. Unfortunately less informed readers of DT that then come over to Anandtech for the review would be shown the 9600 in SLI as the leader.
I understand you don't want to muddy the graphs/charts with the last 100 video cards you have reviewed, so here is my question:
7Enigma - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
While its great to use the latest and greatest CPU/RAM/Mobo (to make sure the system is GPU constrained), is it possible to stick with a static testbed for at least a couple months (say 3-6)?
Reason being, right now if you had not switched from a QX9650 to a QX9775 between your last review (3870X2), and not switched from Vista 32-bit to 64-bit, we could possibly check back and compare to previous reviews to do our own comparisons. I understand driver revisions are going to still be a factor but as long as we don't see large differences in performance between the drivers it could be a good comparison.
7Enigma - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
To keep things even more consistent between reviews just keep a HD image of the drive and reformat back to the same static testbed whenever doing a video card review (more expensive but easier would be just a HD swap). We understand you cannot have a dedicated system that doesn't do anything but review video cards, but if you could quickly just swap out a HD or reformat to the same state as a previous review that would end these constant questions about, "Why didn't you test so and so?".
You could then say, "Look it up yourself!"
Here's the quote from the DT article in question:
"As far as performance goes, NVIDIA claims a couple 9600 GT's in SLI mode will perform slightly better than a single 8800 GTX. With the cost of an 8800 GTX still above the $400 price point, the 9600 GT SLI setup is a better investment. Just to mention it, NVIDIA states the 9600 GT puts out twice the frame rates as the 8600GTS when comparing SLI performance."
7Enigma - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
test7Enigma - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
Testjamynn - Monday, February 25, 2008 - link
Why are the results for Crysis, Oblivion and Quake Wars 880GT 256 so much lower in this article than they are in their original review in this article? http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3175...">http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3175...Definetly makes the 880GT256 look alot worse than it originally tested. Looks Suspicous.
MadBoris - Saturday, February 23, 2008 - link
Ok, I was waiting for this review to popup on the home page but it never did on my visits why is that?It seems now I have to scour the site, in this case the video section, to look for it on some whim. The home page has really become disappointing, sometimes it shows an interesting blog but doesn't include this review, the home page is doing a disservice to visitors. I hope you guys can fix that or start sending all new content to the home page.
Secondly, I would have really liked a comparison to the 8800GT 512 in this review, the question to me is the 8800GT 512, for only $20 - $30 more, worth it over this card.
niva - Friday, February 22, 2008 - link
I still have my Tyan Tachion 9700 Pro in my 6 year old system and runs just fine and I use every day for office/email/internet and gaming! Of course I don't run any of the stupid games which require new gen cards. I'll keep it until it dies I think. Ultimate card evar though at the time it came it was high end as heck!Seriously though, we should all be happy that we actually HAVE a mid-price range market now. I am, thanks Nvidia!
Groovester - Thursday, February 21, 2008 - link
It seems strange that no mention was made of the 8800GS card. Perhaps it wasn't available when AT decided to test the 9600, but it would be nice had they tested the two. After all, they are NVidia's two newest mid-range video cards. According to the 8800GS specs, if they are going to retail for about the same price, it looks like the 8800GS would perform better. And I doubt that I would be using the new color "saturater" of the 9600.