A few Tek episodes ago Logan said you guys will be reviewing an Asus 7970 card. I just bought the Gigabyte version of it. The specific model is: GV-R797TO. I had to review and benchmark it! But, I wanted to benchmark as many of today's games as possible, not just Battlefield and Crysis like every other review.
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I just finished writing my initial review, you can check it out here: http://www.gtmsanctuary.com/2013/02/review-gigabyte-gv-r797to-amd-radeon.html I will be adding more games to the review, but here's what I have so far. The hardware, noise, cooling & temps, Kombustor benchmarks, all that is in the initial review. I used Fraps for benchmarking.
Card specs:
Interface: PCI-E 3.0 X16
Core clock: 1100 MHz
Memory clock: 1500 MHz
Memory: 3 GB, 384-bit, DDR5
Stream processors: 2048
Output ports: 1 DVI, 1 HDMI, 2 Mini-Display
Card dimensions: Length = 11.22 in / 28.5 cm | Height = 4.96 in / 12.6 cm | Thickness = 1.5 in / 3.8 cm
My PC specs:
Motherboard: ASRock Z75 Pro3
Processor: Core i3 2100 (Sandy Bridge) @ 3.1 GHz
RAM: 8 GB DDR3 1333
Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower 675 Watts
Storage: one Samsung 840 Series 120 GB SSD (system drive), one Samsung HD103SI 1 TB HDD (1st media drive), one Seagate Barracuda 250 GB HDD (2nd media drive). NOTE: all games are stored on the 1st media drive
Case: Cooler Master HAF 912
Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster 27" @ 1080p
Gaming Benchmarks
Anno 2070
Played for 15 minutes, doing whatever. I have 2 big islands, one of which is completely covered with cities and factories.
Settings: everything maxed out, V-Sync off
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 23 fps
Maximum frames per second = 88 fps
Average frames per second = 50 fps
Notes:
Game is very playable at max settings. I did not notice any screen tearing with V-Sync off.
Batman: Arkham City
I played outside the whole time, flying around and beating down some prisoners and did one side mission (last Deadshot mission).
Settings: Anti-Aliasing at 2X MSAA, V-Sync off, DX11 features - MVSS and HBAO, everything else maxed/turned on
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 18 fps
Maximum frames per second = 64 fps
Average frames per second = 53 fps
Notes:
I did experience slight stutter a few times during my 15-minute test, but overall, the game is very playable at those settings.
Battlefield 3
I benchmarked about 20 minutes of Conquest Large on Operation Firestorm.
Settings: V-Sync off, graphics set to Ultra
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 33 fps
Maximum frames per second = 175 fps
Average frames per second = 79 fps
Notes:
Gameplay is very smooth. No lag anywhere, no stutter, no screen tearing.
Borderlands 2
I played for around 15 minutes at Caustic Caverns level, mostly just shooting and looting (what else is there to do?).
Settings: everything maxed out, V-Sync off
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 21 fps
Maximum frames per second = 67 fps
Average frames per second = 36 fps
Notes:
Even though the average fps is at a playable level, the game had quite a few major slow-downs where it would drop to about 22 fps for about 30 seconds or so. Most of the slowdown came from the extra particle effects of PhysX, but sometimes it happened at random, like right at the start of the level.
Civilization 5
Benchmarked for a while, maybe half an hour.
Settings: V-Sync off, everything at max
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 17 fps
Maximum frames per second = 225 fps
Average frames per second = 132 fps
Notes:
I haven't noticed when the framerate dropped to that crawl of 17 fps, the gameplay was pretty smooth. The only thing that definitely stood out was screen tearing. It was horrible in this game! Probably the worst I've seen in any game. It only happened when scrolling through the map while completely zoomed out. Bottom line is, play Civ 5 with V-Sync on!
Dishonored
Benchmarked around 10-15 minutes during the mission "Lady Boyle's Last Party.
Settings: V-Sync off, everything at max.
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 53 fps
Maximum frames per second = 132 fps
Average frames per second = 122 fps
Notes:
The game was very smooth during actual missions, but in the Hound Pits, the game stuttered quite a few times.
DMC: Devil May Cry
Not sure how long I actually played for benchmarking, but I fought the Succubus boss and that's it. 10 minutes maybe?
Settings: everything maxed, V-Sync off
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 26 fps
Maximum frames per second = 199 fps
Average frames per second = 102 fps
Notes:
Even though the game looks amazing, it's not a very graphically intensive game, as you can see from the average. I had the game maxed out even on my old video card - Saphire Radeon HD 6770, no lag, no stutter, some minor screen tearing with V-Sync off.
Driver: San Francisco
Benchmarked a bit over 15 minutes. Did a couple of police chases, and drove around Downtown area - drifting, jumping.
Settings: settings set to High (no individual settings in this game), V-Sync off
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 53 fps
Maximum frames per second = 121 fps
Average frames per second = 94 fps
Notes:
I benchmarked a little over 15 minutes and never saw any lag, stutter, or screen tearing.
Far Cry 3
I played for a couple of hours on these settings but benchmarked about 20 minutes of it. Ran around the island exploring, taking over outposts, hunting, and flew the hang glider once.
Settings: V-Sync off, Alpha to coverage Enhanced, SSAO = HDAO, video quality set to Ultra
Results (read notes!):
Minimum frames per second = 19 fps
Maximum frames per second = 63 fps
Average frames per second = 38 fps
Notes:
Even though the gameplay is pretty smooth for the most part, some areas present continuous lag. Such as the starting town of Amanaki. The framerate there drops to about 17 fps (MSI Afterburner showed 17, not sure why Fraps got 19). Another "issue" is that in the first hour or so of gameplay, the GPU was only utilized at around 40%. I think that was the reason for the lag, because once it got to around 80%, the lag was gone. Maybe somebody here can explain why that is. Is it like a "warmup period" for the GPU...?
Guild Wars 2
I benchmarked way over 15 minutes, probably an hour. Spent the whole time doing local missions and killing things.
Settings: V-Sync off, all settings at max
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 21 fps
Maximum frames per second = 81 fps
Average frames per second = 50 fps
Notes:
Despite the very acceptable average framerate, the gameplay was laggy from time to time.
Hawken
Played one whole match of Missile Assault. 15-20 minutes.
Settings: V-Sync off, everything maxed out, PhysX particles on. NOTE: there doesn't seem to be any AA settings
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 11 fps
Maximum frames per second = 60 fps
Average frames per second = 32 fps
Notes:
The game felt laggy all throughout. The significant drop in framerate was always right after respawning.
Saints Row 3
I played for just over 15 minutes, mostly blowing stuff up with a tank. After dying, I drove around the city in a fast car. Then again started blowing stuff up with a tank.
Settings: AA at 2X, everything else is maxed
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 26 fps
Maximum frames per second = 124 fps
Average frames per second = 45 fps
Notes:
Gameplay is very smooth, no lag, no stutter, no screen tearing.
Sleeping Dogs
Played for just under 15 minutes. Drove around the city in a fast car (class A). Did a bike race, which I failed 3 times in a row, which caused me to go on a rampage shooting everything that moves.
Settings: V-Sync off, Frame limiter off, HD textures on, everything else is maxed.
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 21 fps
Maximum frames per second = 48 fps
Average frames per second = 33 fps
Notes:
Game played very smoothly, no issues of any kind.
Skyrim
Wanted to benchmark the standard 15 minutes, got sucked into the game, ended up benchmarking about an hour. I think... Just did the usual Skyrim stuff, exploring, looting, killing, admiring the scenery, rearranging dead bodies in sexual positions...
Settings: V-Sync off, all other settings maxed out, official HD texture used, Dynamic & realistic lighting mod used,
Results:
Minimum frames per second = 16 fps
Maximum frames per second = 65 fps
Average frames per second = 58 fps
Notes:
Despite the high average fps, Skyrim always seems to have micro-stutter. It's faint, but still noticeable.
Would appreciate any kind of input on the card, the review, the results, whatever. I've only recently discovered your guys' YouTube channel and quickly became a huge fan of it. The Tek episodes are awesome!
I'd also love to hear what others think about just how much the framerate bottlenecked due to my Core i3 2100 and 8 gigs of 1333 RAM. I asked this question on Tom's Hardware but didn't get any solid answers. But now I have the results...