Graphics Hardware Benchmarks
FS Insider has details about a graphics hardware benchmark test carried out by Toms Hardware, in which Flight Simulator X is used as one of the test applications. It makes for an interesting read.
The video card was the only thing they changed during testing. One thing I found particularly interesting was that nearly all of the “top” video cards provide virtually the same frame rates. I note that my video card (nVidia GTX 7800) is near the top of the list performance wise, although I do have the mobile version, it being in my laptop. This may explain why I’m actually getting better performance than some other people who have otherwise superior hardware to mine.
Definitely worth a read, especially if you’re considering upgrading your card at the moment, although I’d imagine anyone in that position will probably be waiting for DirectX 10.
How does your experience compare with the findings of the report?
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{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Looks like NVidia have the market sewn up when it comes to FSX the results certainly arn’t representative of any of the other benchmarks, which kind of makes me supicious, even more so when the FSInsider article doesn’t even give ATi a token mention. Anyone have any ideas?
I must admit to being an nVidia man. I’ve never had much success with ATI and Flight Simulators in the past, so I tend to stick with them. That’s not to say they’re any better, they just seem to work better for my particular setups.
Mark - FlightSimX
WOW- Nice find, Being a gamer i have used many a different Gfx card in my time and always buy the latest when i can afford it. Ati did seem to suffer with FSX, but what has really annoyed me is my twin 8800 gtx cards are pushing out the same FPS as a 7800. I have a 7800 setup and my 8800 setup and there is a massive difference, So i am a bit dubious. However and i think this is where the benchmark went wrong, I have had FSX on 3 different processors, Single, DUO Core 2 e6600 and no a Quad Core Q6600. This is where i have seen a big boost. Lets hope that they make it worth while owning dx10 cards with the next patch because at the moment the support and drivers for 8800 is horendous. I was glad to see on other benchmarks for various games the 8800’s showed that they are worth owning for Gaming in general.
Jason
It would appear from the benchmarks and Jason’s comments that FSX is more likely to be bottlenecked by your CPU and not your graphics card. Should make for interesting times when DX10 is implimented as a lot of people seem to be expecting a boost in performance and as I’ve posted before I’m sceptical about this being a realistic expectation.
I also note that the benchmarks do not contain entries for ATi’s DX10 cards.
Hi,
Carrying on from where i left off, I have a game called Company of heroes it is an RTS game,I recently applied the DX10 patch. Apart from a graphical glitch(i think this may be an Nvidia problem) it looked really nice and the explosions and fire effects were amazing. However my average frame rate dropped a little. Basically my take on it is that there is more detail and therefore DX10 cards should be able to handle this and still produce a similar frame rate(I’m guessing slightly lower). But it is still early days and i have still failed to see a decent problem free 8800 driver for Vista yet. The idea should be that with all the new tech, it handles things much better and then produces the new layer with absolute ease, fingers crossed. Message for Pie Eater you using a dx10 ATI, what’s the best one at present? I am considering building another machine and trying ATI, My last ATI was a radeon 9800 256mb good card but have been with nvidia since so I am a little out of touch and would appreciate the info if you have time, cheers
Jason
Hi Jason. Thanks for the updates - it’s an interesting thread. Please keep us posted.
Mark - FlightSimX
Hi Jason, personally I think most peoples experience of DX10 will mirror your own i.e. nicer graphics (as long as the software exploits it properly) but with a drop in framerates. The recent DX10 cards have been introduced at a time when there are no real titles available to make use of the hardware, so it makes sense for them to be killer DX9 cards with DX10 included, hence the drop in framerates. Personally I think the next generation of graphics cards will be more focused on DX10 because by the time they are ready there will be more titles available to make use of the hardware. This is why I’d not reccomend anyone with a decent DX9 card to upgrade right now.
In connection with your query ATi’s DX10 card of the moment is the 2900XT, as per previous incarnations we’ll wait a little bit and get the XTX version which will be king of the hill when it arrives.
If I were building a new rig at this moment in time I would concentrate on the processor and build a Vista PC based around an Intel Quad Core CPU with 4Gb DDR3 memory and until DX10 graphics have sorted themselves I’d probably find a 2nd user 7900GTX which will give me top notch performance and which I could probably sell on for not much less than I bought it.
I think we’ll need to wait for DX10 top be properly implimented by developers and at least another generation of DX10 cards
Urrm scrub that last sentence, I forgot to remove it before I posted.
Thanks for the Head up PieEater, I have Intel Quad Q6600 at the moment but was considering building another rig and use ATI, but my brother needed a new chip so i sold him my Intel E6600 so that system will have to wait now. But i have blown the money on a 22″ Samsung screen so it may be on hold for a long time lol. Thanks for the info on ATI.
I love my DX10 cards but the frustration is not worth it at the moment
Cheers
JAson
After a couple of false starts I finally managed to get a coment from ATi regarding the results acheived in the benchmarks;
“FSX had a lot of problems with our cards and Nvidia’s at one point. There has been patches and driver updates since to address issues with FSX. We do not know when those benchmarks were taken, but it is likely before our most recent updates and patches from Microsoft.”
It’s possible then that this has been addressed with driver updates, the non-inclusion of Ati’s DX10 cards in the lineup does lead me to beleave that the results are a few months old.
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