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VisionTek ATI HD 3870 X2 OC Review
Author: Guest Ninja
Published: Thursday, July 17, 2008
Benchmarks
To put the VisionTek 3870 X2 through the paces we will be using a gambit of the more popular synthetic test suites on the market today. Synthetic testing is an easy way to compare cards with most test available in free or trial versions for your home use. In addition to these tests we will throw in a Unreal Tournament 3 test to keep things in perspective. UT3 is a favorite among local gamers and provides a solid baseline for our real world performance.
Each benchmark was run using the default settings after a fresh boot of the test system. We ran the benchmark a minimum of three times and took the highest score. More tests are run if a large variance is discovered. As with any benchmark, your results may vary.
For comparison, I tested against a very popular NVIDIA offering the 8800 GTS 320, possibly the fastest 8800 GTS on the market today. As most of us will be using CrossFireX the scores show a dual GPU result, but for you multi-monitor types I also include some results with CrossFireX disabled to show the single GPU results.
Each benchmark was run using the default settings after a fresh boot of the test system. We ran the benchmark a minimum of three times and took the highest score. More tests are run if a large variance is discovered. As with any benchmark, your results may vary.
For comparison, I tested against a very popular NVIDIA offering the 8800 GTS 320, possibly the fastest 8800 GTS on the market today. As most of us will be using CrossFireX the scores show a dual GPU result, but for you multi-monitor types I also include some results with CrossFireX disabled to show the single GPU results.
The system as it was tested
ABIT Fatal1ty AN9 32X nForce 590 SLI Chipset
AMD X2 5600+ (2.8GHz) 1MB L2 cache 2000MHz FSB (Dual-Core)
OEM Heatsink
2x 2GB Mushkin DDR2 XP2-6400 (4-4-4-12)
160 and 250 GB Maxtor SATA II
Ultra X3 1000 Watt modular power supply
16X Lite-on DVD Burner
Windows Vista 64 Business Edition
Video cards
VisionTek HD 3870 X2 Overclocked edition
EVGA 8800 GTS 320 XXX Edition
AMD X2 5600+ (2.8GHz) 1MB L2 cache 2000MHz FSB (Dual-Core)
OEM Heatsink
2x 2GB Mushkin DDR2 XP2-6400 (4-4-4-12)
160 and 250 GB Maxtor SATA II
Ultra X3 1000 Watt modular power supply
16X Lite-on DVD Burner
Windows Vista 64 Business Edition
Video cards
VisionTek HD 3870 X2 Overclocked edition
EVGA 8800 GTS 320 XXX Edition
3D Mark 06
Love them or hate them you have to test with the latest from Futuremark. As you can see from the test results The VisionTek 3870 X2 dominates the 3DMark 06 and 3DMark Vantage scores by a solid margin.
3D Mark Vantage
PC Mark Vantage
UT3 - WAR Serenity
Our UT3 benchmarks were run using the WAR Serenity botmatch at a resolution of 12x10, as the following graph is showing even at that resolution we are rather CPU bound with no clear distinction between a CrossFire setup or single card. It is interesting to note that a single 3870 is more efficient in this particular situation. Bottom line, dual GPUs demand high resolution gaming well above 12x10.
Cinebench
The Cinebench 10 is a great technology benchmark that clearly takes advantage of multithreaded video resolution. In this particular benchmark our VisionTek 3870 X2 OC scratches out a victory with the CrossFireX setup but only by a small margin.
