Far Cry 2 Dissected: Massive Amounts of Performance Data
by Derek Wilson on November 21, 2008 5:30 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
Alright. That was a lot of data, and I applaud anyone who was able to successfully wade through it all. For those who didn't want to (or just couldn't stomach it), here's a quick summary of the results.
Most cards, including all cards that come in at >$100, are able to handle Far Cry 2 at Ultra High quality. Adding AA on top of that is fairly stressful and might require a drop back down Very High quality, though we don't see much need for AA in this game as it is low contrast and the effects do a good job of hiding or distracting from aliasing.
DX10 offers a performance improvement over DX9 for Ultra High and Very High settings. DX9 is only useful for High quality mode which offers a very large boost in performance over DX10 and should be enough to get almost any relatively recent discrete graphics card running at a passable resolution. Going forward we will be using our custom timedemo for testing Far Cry 2 at Ultra High quality under DX10.
The stand out in this test is the Radeon HD 4870 1GB. This $300 AMD single GPU part performed on par with NVIDIA's much more expensive GeForce GTX 280. Some tests favored the GTX 280 while others the 4870, but only 2560x1600 with 4xAA was a runaway victory for the NVIDIA part. Obviously this puts the Radeon HD 4870 1GB ahead of the GeForce GTX 260 variants, but they are generally $50 cheaper. If you can afford the price difference, the 4870 1GB won't disappoint. But $50 is a good chunk of change and the GTX 260 parts are still very capable under Far Cry 2. That decision will come down to budget, performance at the target settings and resolution, and simple preference.
Because CrossFire doesn't work yet, we can't really compare how multi-GPU scales against NVIDIA hardware. NVIDIA hardware does scale fairly well, going anywhere from 75% to 85%+ faster with a second card.
While some of the AMD parts, including the Radeon HD 4670 and 4850, performed consistently well against the competition, we don't feel comfortable solidly recommending any AMD part other than the Radeon HD 4870 1GB for Far Cry 2 because of the massive trouble we've had with their drivers. So we'll stick with recommending against the 9600 GSO, 9600 GT, and 9800 GTX... in case that helps. We do honestly believe that AMD will fix this performance issue (that shouldn't be there in the first place), but we just aren't comfortable putting our stamp of approval on hardware when there are these kinds of issues being sorted out.
At what we see as a key gamer price point, $200 - $250, for playing Far Cry 2 we heartily recommend the GeForce GTX 260 core 216. You can save money and go with the GeForce GTX 260 (original version) for $20-$30 less (or more with rebates) as they are on their way out the door (NVIDIA is no longer making the 192 core GPU), but the 512MB Radeon HD 4870 just doesn't stack up to these cards in these tests. To top that off, if you haven't picked up Far Cry 2 yet, EVGA is offering overclocked GTX 260 parts at stock prices bundled with the game. Now if that isn't the sweet spot, I don't know what is.
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jhh979s - Thursday, November 27, 2008 - link
I'm using a 4850 1GB and I play on ultra high at 1920x1080 with 4 or 8x AA cant remember which. I've never experienced any slowdown but I'm using DX9.gochichi - Tuesday, November 25, 2008 - link
OK, so the 4870 1GB does a much nicer job than the 4870 512MB right? What about the 1GB variants of the 4850?I don't have this game, not sure I really want it for $50.00 (I would buy it at $20.00 for instance). I have a 4850 512MB and am generally amazed by how well it feeds my 1920x1200 monitor.
Let's not forget that Crysis and Far Cry 2 are interesting benchmarks but they are not actually some of the better games out there (going by the reviews).
If you haven't been playing Call of Duty 4 because your hardware isn't up to par, a better "$200 question" is how the new Call of Duty runs. COD4 is one of those few upgrade worthy games, I'm pretty sure that Far Cry 2 is not. I technically wouldn't have to upgrade my setup to run it, and I can't even bring myself to pay $50.00 for the game. I'm not sure that many of you out there would want to spend even more than $50 to run this game. Most of us can't be upgrading for any old system hog that is released.
Of course, if you're shopping for a new video card and one of them comes with a game you're interested in, it's going to sweeten the deal. When I was shopping, I was almost lured in by one that had "The Witcher" included. I knew I wouldn't buy that game separetely but it sounded interesting enough to lure me. It's all about the package and the price. Would I recommend the 4850 based on my experience? Absolutely. But NVIDIA is a great company and has been catching up nicely with driver updates. The only beef I have against NVIDIA is that they've been renaming their old parts with new names and that is absolutely unethical. Heck, Nvidia's naming scheme is so bizzarre that a 8800GT 640mb is considerably worse than a 8800GT 512MB.
Now, back to my original question... if the 4850 1GB does, in fact, perform substantially better than the 512MB one, I would think it would put it right at the top of the list for this game.
strikeback03 - Wednesday, November 26, 2008 - link
Actually, nvidia's naming scheme is so bizarre that while I don't think there was an 8800GT 640, there was an 8800GTS 640 and an 8800GTS 512, and performance order went 8800GTS 640 < 8800GT 512 < 8800GTS 512. How is a customer supposed to make sense of that?SiliconDoc - Friday, November 28, 2008 - link
Yes, and the 9800GT with the bios updated old core - the 8800GT - or in the case of the Asus Ultimate (now sold out everywhere it seems ) the 8800GTS - then the ddr2 vs ddr3 - not to mention that smae issue with ATI - now ddr2, ddr3, ddr4 - one has to be quite careful in what they finally purchase, huh. LOLThen you have the brands issues and the rebates and the OC issues - the ram type on the cards that overclocks better or not ...
I think NV is still getting some review diss because of their confused naming convention which so many considered trickery or too messy to sort out - or time consuming... so I think there's part of the fan issue opposition.
Nonetheless, I'm glad I chose what I did based upon price and package and all the research I could muster before purchase - I waited quite a while and luckily those 6 months saw a massive output of new card releases - I could have just as easily went with an ATI release with some great deal on price and a game - I'm sure it was my excellent skills but wouldn't argue much with someone calling it luck. LOL
I see so often reading all over the net at all the popualr and unpopular places - ATI people chiming in that they don't have a problem... and I can't think of really a single case of an NV fan chiming in, in that fashion - so that tells me one thing....
No matter how many ATI users have had zero problems their entire lives in any OS with ATI cards including any game ever made or thought of, the very fact they have to constantly tell everyone that means :> THERE'S A LOT OF OTHER PEOPLE HAVING PROBLEMS WITH ATI.
I suppose I could be wrong, and instead - every ATI buyer is an absolutely masterous OS and game installer and configurator - and likewise all the uncomplaining NV users are oafs who are so noob skilled they can't properly install an ATI card to save their lives... NAHHHHHH !
kr7400 - Tuesday, December 2, 2008 - link
Can you please fucking die? Preferably by getting crushed to death in a garbage compactor, by getting your face cut to ribbons with a pocketknife, your head cracked open with a baseball bat, your stomach sliced open and your entrails spilled out, and your eyeballs ripped out of their sockets. *beep* bitch
I would love to kick you hard in the face, breaking it. Then I'd cut your stomach open with a chainsaw, exposing your intestines. Then I'd cut your windpipe in two with a boxcutter. Then I'd tie you to the back of a pickup truck, and drag you, until your useless *beep* corpse was torn to a million *beep* useless, bloody, and gory pieces.
Hopefully you'll get what's coming to you. *beep* bitch
I really hope that you get curb-stomped. It'd be hilarious to see you begging for help, and then someone stomps on the back of your head, leaving you to die in horrible, agonizing pain. *beep*
Shut the *beep* up f aggot, before you get your face bashed in and cut to ribbons, and your throat slit.
You're dead if I ever meet you in real life, f ucker. I'll f ucking kill you.
I would love to f ucking send your f ucking useless ass to the hospital in intensive care, fighting for your worthless life.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po0j4ONZRGY">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po0j4ONZRGY
I wish you a truly painful, bloody, gory, and agonizing death, *beep*
7eki - Tuesday, November 25, 2008 - link
Problem with stuttering can be removed by typing for example "gfx_maxfps 30" in console. Usually stuttering appears after loading a game, or when there is someone in a hut near you who you will have to talk to. On Catalyst 8.10 turning off the AA and typing this command fixes the problem. On 8.11 game works perfectly in 1600x1200, ultra detail and 2 times AA (with previously mentioned command). Sometimes when there are lots of things going on FPS drop to min 25, but it's still a great framerate for what you pay for this card and U can C in the game. Firstly I thought that it was something wrong with the vsync or that sort of stuff. It's definately a problem connected with memory buffer. I remember that ATI had similar problems in F.E.A.R. on their x800 series with 256MB but they have fixed it. For me FC2 on 4850 works as good or even better as it does on my friend's 9800GTX.Hawkmoon - Tuesday, November 25, 2008 - link
Any word on what drivers were used for the nVidia cards?And what was the system used for these tests?? (memory/cpu/mobo etc)
Hawkmoon - Tuesday, November 25, 2008 - link
I guess I missed it... or they updated the 2nd page.Before we get started, let's take a look at our test setup:
Platform: ASUS Rampage II Extreme, Core i7-965, 6GB DDR3-1333, Intel SSD
AMD Driver: Final 8.10 hotfix
NVIDIA Driver: 180.44
rocky1234 - Monday, November 24, 2008 - link
Well as I said in those AMD forums to a few guys there & this was after reading their posts or system configs is that alot of the time a lot of the issues are not from The video card or the drivers but from a badly configered system or a system that is overclcoked to far or even worse spyware or viruses & yes a lot of those system do have a unhandy program like Norton 360 installed on them.I run the 4870x2 & have not had any BSOD's related to the video card itself yes I have had a BSOD here & there but it was form overclocking the CPU to far EG: when I tried to push my Intel Quad core to 4.1Ghz which in this case was a issue for the CPU but is happy to run all day at 4.0Ghz but I run it at 3.9GHZ to be safe & have a stable system.
After having owned a Nvidia gaming card & seeing BSODs pretty much daily & they were related to the Drivers I was more than happy to pawn that card off to another system I own.
BubbaJudge - Monday, November 24, 2008 - link
Since the 8.10 hotfix, many of us running Vista and 4850/4870 in CF cannot run the hotfix or the 8.11s without a BSOD upon reaching the desktop. One card, no problem, two cards, infinite BSOD loops. Never mind it being just a Far Cry problem. We cannot run our machines with current AMD drivers.We now are at 5 pages of angry frustrated users over at the AMD forums
http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=2...">http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview....&thr...
Was hoping you guys would find this, I think you came very close, and am very happy to see you come down on the absurdity which is now Catalyst.
I have been running ATI since the 9700 pro, but I've had enough of struggling with ATI multicard graphics solutions(oxymoron).