AMD HD 6850 Review/Benchmark [You were wrong if you thought I couldn't add more]

RavenSEAL

Diamond Member
Jan 4, 2010
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SAPPHIRE 100315L Radeon HD 6850 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 Benchmark by Raven.7/RavenSEAL for Anandtech Forums.


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102908

***Please be aware that the following review presents figures of an HD 6850 OVERCLOCKED TO 920/1130***
*** THESE FIGURES ARE NOT GUARANTEED-OVERCLOCK AT YOUR OWN RISK***

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System Specs and Basic Info:


Windows 7 Ultimate 64-Bit
Gigabyte GA-E7AUM-DS2H
Core 2 Duo E8500 @ 3.6Ghz
4GB DDR2 800MHZ
Sapphire AMD Radeon HD6850 1GB 256-Bit




MSi Kombustor(Stress+Temp Testing)- The HD 6850 reached 920/1130 with zero issues, ran Kumbostor for about 1 hour @ 1080p 4aa stable
As you can see, that is stock voltage, so this card has serious potential for more shall we say..."enthusiastic" overclockers.
Temperatures during stress testing kick into the low 70s, but during gameplay, it does not surpass 65C*.

*ambient temp of 72C
Benchmarks Results:

Unigine 'Heaven' DX11 Benchmark 2.1-





3D Mark Vantage Graphic's Score-



MSI Kumbustor(Furmark) Bench-




S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat(Ultra- DX11)-



Crysis Benchmark-

The game plays at around 30-50 FPS. At 1600x900, the game does lock up @ 60.1 FPS, some of the time.

Settings-

1920*1080
ALL OPTIONS SET TO HIGH( MAX BEING ULTRA HIGH)
No AA.



Code:
12/31/2010 12:47:08 AM - Vista 64
Beginning Run #1 on Map-island, Demo-benchmark_gpu
DX10 1920x1080, AA=No AA, Vsync=Disabled, 64 bit test, FullScreen
Demo Loops=3, Time Of Day= 9
Global Game Quality: High
 ==============================================================
TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
    Play Time: 54.39s, Average FPS: 36.77
    Min FPS: 22.34 at frame 1948, Max FPS: 49.81 at frame 1607
    Average Tri/Sec: -31973620, Tri/Frame: -869494
    Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -1.05
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
    Play Time: 52.20s, Average FPS: 38.31
    Min FPS: 22.34 at frame 1948, Max FPS: 54.37 at frame 67
    Average Tri/Sec: -32847690, Tri/Frame: -857403
    Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -1.07
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
    Play Time: 52.65s, Average FPS: 37.98
    Min FPS: 22.34 at frame 1948, Max FPS: 54.37 at frame 67
    Average Tri/Sec: -32540046, Tri/Frame: -856667
    Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -1.07
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)
==============================================================

Completed All Tests

<><><><><><><><><><><><><>>--SUMMARY--<<><><><><><><><><><><><><>

12/31/2010 12:47:08 AM - Vista 64

Run #1- DX10 1920x1080 AA=No AA, 64 bit test, Quality: High ~~ Overall Average FPS: 38.145

Just Cause 2- Running "Concrete Jungle", JC2's most demanding benchmark. During gameplay itself, the card handles beyond smooth.




Battlefield Bad Company 2
-


Settings-
Ress-1920*1080p
Detail-High
Texture-High
Shadows-High
MSAA- 4x
Vsync-On
HBAO-Off

Locks into 60.1 FPS every now and then. BC2 is very CPU intensive, so those with quad core machines, expect even better performance on those rough situations. For me, the lowest in dropped( for more than 30 sec+) was 25FPS~ when playing "High Value Target", which is an intense urban mission with lots of stuff flying around and plenty of bullets.





Mass Effect-


Settings-
Ress-1920*1080
Detail-High
Texture-High
Shadows-High
Filtering- AA


60.1 FPS lock 40% of the time, dropps every now and then, fight scenes, etc. very few drops below 30 FPS.
Overall the game plays very smooth at high details, although some textures seemed to be crapped due to the the fact that the game looks like a console port, even with the settings turned loose.





Continued in post #3
 
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shangshang

Senior member
May 17, 2008
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congrats. I got the Asus version. good card for me so far, played Black Ops at 1920x1200 maxed out 4xAA.

Sidenote: Sapphire brand sucks. A few years ago I've had a batch of 40 Sapphire 3870's, and 3 of them DOA on me. That's 3 out of 40, which is just too high a rate. Then a couple weeks ago, I got a Sapphire 5450 for my HDPC, and it would not boot my PC! I will never ever buy Sapphire again. Too bitter a pill to swallow again.

..and welcome back from the ban lol.
 

RavenSEAL

Diamond Member
Jan 4, 2010
8,670
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Batman: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition-

The game's benchmark and actual gameplay seem to be giving 2 complete different set of numbers, which makes me question the integrity of the benchmark itself. During gameplay, the game hangs around 40-60 FPS the majority of the time, plays smooth, free of problems. While in the benchmark, it's marked by FRAPS to be going as high as 120 in some cases, judge for yourselves.

Settings-

45672046.jpg


Benchmark-


shippingpcbmgame2010123.jpg


Devil May Cry 4(DX10)-
One word: Perfect.

Settings-

Resolution- 1920*1080
MSAA- 4x
Texture- Super High
Framerate- 60 MAX
Shadows- Super High
Quality- Super High




Mirror's Edge- It turns out the world of Unreal Engine 3 isn't a cruel one once you kick things into high gear, framerates hang around the 40s-70s, the game looks and plays awesome.

Settings-

1920*1080p
Texture Detail-High
Quality- High
AA- 4x




Red Faction: Guerrilla- As seen from the first time you fire up the gameplay, the game's engine is very powerful, with that comes a lot of demands. The best aspect of RFG's engine is it's destructible environment. Similar, yet not similar to BC2's engine, the modded Havok engine named "Geo Mod 2.0" takes a toll on the performance of the card in exchange for well....blowing up a lot of stuff, and it looks pretty. With the settings listed below, the game hangs around 25-40 FPS.

Settings-

1920*1080
AA- 2x
Shadow Detail- High
Depth oF- high
Motion Blur- True
Particle Detail- True
Ambient Occlusion- True
Sun Shafts- True




Borderlands- Through the first few hours of the game the card has blown out my expectation, it maintains solid frame rates between 40-60 . With the settings turned up, including every single effect at 1920*1080p, the card certainly shows it's power.

Settings-

1920*1080p
ALL SETTINGS SET TO MAXIMUM POSSIBLE
AA-8x[Forced on Catalyst Control Center] (Thanks to Qbah for spotting a bad screenshot)





Final Verdict- I was finally able to kick things into high gear with some AA @ 1080p. The 256-Bit helps that 1GB of memory flow smoothly, and with a decent overclock, the card comes to the level of a HD5850 and very closely to the HD6870. While I wasn't able to display the overclocking differentials, the FPS gains are worth the very little heat and power that comes with them. In games such as Just Cause 2, the game gained about 5 FPS @ 900/1100 when compared to the stock clock of 775/1000. Games such as crysis and mirror's edge, which can be heavily demanding, show why they are held in such high regard, hammering pretty much any GPU at such high settings. If you plan to overclock the card, you can be safe(if you have the necessary PSU) that 900/1100 is pretty much a lock, i was able to push it up to 930/1120 stable and holding to 70C temperatures(That might be wholenother story once the summer kicks in though).

If you're looking to upgrade cards such as the HD4830, HD4870, 8800GT, 9800GT or even GTS250/GTX260, you'll see increases in frame rates from 50&#37; to 20% accordingly. The HD6850 features DX11, which gives not only a whole new perspective to games, but a small added performance boost to more recent games. Eyefinity is a very nice feature for those that manage several monitors, although, don't expect a single HD 6850 to give you impressive performance that goes beyond medium settings @ 1080p. ATi finally brought in their own 3D system, so those with a 3D TV/Monitor, might finally get a peak @ 3D gaming if you haven't done so yet with a console.

If you are gaming under 1080p, the HD6850 is an excellent choice, as shown in the benchmarks, several games rough up near 60FPS at high settings. So those with monitors that use resolutions in the 900, 1024, 1050 range, this card will truly deliver great performance on demanding games.

Expect the card to compete with the GTX460, if not pass it on several benchmarks. The GTX460s out in the market now are beyond nVidia's 675MHz memory clock in their reference design, going as high as 850MHz. What many people don't see to pay attention to is the HD6850's overclocking capabilities, only with a small voltage boost, the card is capable of a stable 1000/1200 clocks, matching a stock 6870 hand by hand and still maintaining temperatures close to 75C.

Overall, coming from a GTS450/HD4870, the HD6850 was a quite the upgrade I would recommend to anyone that is looking to upgrade or build a computer that'll do a decent job of gaming for the next 2 years. The prices are still decently high, and with the GTX560 having a release point price of $240-260 USD, the HD6850 is going to be on a class of its own when comparing performance/price ratio. AMD is looking to bring performance increases through drivers, and while they aren't exactly the best software programmers, the hardware's capabilities of their products are not only powerful but have a lot of unused potential.
 
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Zargon

Lifer
Nov 3, 2009
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I've had 3 sapphire cards and no issues, however ive had 3 xfx cards blow capacity
 

happy medium

Lifer
Jun 8, 2003
14,387
480
126
At your resolution you need about 1010 core to equal a gtx460 1g @ 850 core.
Pump some voltage into that puppy.:)

HD6800-OC-90.jpg


http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/foru...850-vs-gtx-460-1gb-overclocking-study-10.html

Looks like 960 core will equal a stock 6870.

HD6800-OC-91.jpg




Why do you insist on trolling AMD threads. I am serious here. No one in this thread gives a hairy rat's ass about your 460 benches.

BTW, you are gone for a week maybe longer. I will discuss this with the other mods


esquared
Anandtech Forum Director
 
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Nemesis 1

Lifer
Dec 30, 2006
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happy medium

Lifer
Jun 8, 2003
14,387
480
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This post is here why? This is an AMD thread . If OP doesn't know about the 460 great performance . He would have to be living on an island. Its AMD thread keep the NV stuff were it belongs. Stop baiting /Trolling

It looks to me like a 6850 overclocking/benchmark thread.
I think I also used a 6870 as an example also. right?
I was letting the op know his relative performance at his current clocks and cheering him on to push his card with some voltage. I'm no troll.
 

Termie

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
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www.techbuyersguru.com
It looks to me like a 6850 overclocking/benchmark thread.
I think I also used a 6870 as an example also. right?
I was letting the op know his relative performance at his current clocks and cheering him on to push his card with some voltage. I'm no troll.

Well, he sounds pretty happy with his card at 900 on the core, given that he's hitting his vsync limit. Not everyone wants to overvolt their brand new graphics cards.

What are you going to buy now that you're selling that (heavily overvolted?) HD5750? I hope you're getting a GTX460.
 
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shangshang

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May 17, 2008
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I'm not planning on OC'ing my 6850 until I've hit its limit. What I'm really waiting for is for the 6850 to drop down to under $100 (admittedly after some crazy rebate deal) and then hello XFire!!!! I envisioning this happening sometime next year or so. Then I'm set for 2 more years of gaming before I'll need to think about upgrades again.
 

happy medium

Lifer
Jun 8, 2003
14,387
480
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What are you going to buy now that you're selling that (heavily overvolted?) HD5750?

No extra volts, no option for it with 5750's. It's at stock volts and will do 912 core,1365 memory stable. :)
Waiting for the gtx 560 that should give us some some 6870/6950 price drops next month.
 

Deanodarlo

Senior member
Dec 14, 2000
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6850's are nice cards.

I have a Sapphire one - totally quiet and overclocks like a champ with their new Trixx utility:

960/1150 at default voltage.
1000/1180 with a small bump on the voltage to 1.181v (might run with lower voltage, haven't tried)
 
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Will Robinson

Golden Member
Dec 19, 2009
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It looks to me like a 6850 overclocking/benchmark thread.
I think I also used a 6870 as an example also. right?
I was letting the op know his relative performance at his current clocks and cheering him on to push his card with some voltage. I'm no troll.
Think anyone in this thread cares about your GTX460 idol worship?
Some guy posts his new card's performance results and you try and turn it into another advert for NVDA.
Its a blatant thread crap and yes,you are a troll.
Thanks for the review Raven and congrats on the new card.
 

RavenSEAL

Diamond Member
Jan 4, 2010
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6850's are nice cards.

I have a Sapphire one - totally quiet and overclocks like a champ with their new Trixx utility:

960/1150 at default voltage.
1000/1180 with a small bump on the voltage to 1.181v (might run with lower voltage, haven't tried)
Hmm...i might try pushing mine a bit more if you got that high on stock voltage..thanks for the info :)
 

Will Robinson

Golden Member
Dec 19, 2009
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Re: the stock air.....I found my 4850 would OC a lot better with a Zalman HSF on it rather than the stock ATi cooler.
Still yours sounds pretty good at only 70C:thumbsup:
 

RavenSEAL

Diamond Member
Jan 4, 2010
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Re: the stock air.....I found my 4850 would OC a lot better with a Zalman HSF on it rather than the stock ATi cooler.
Still yours sounds pretty good at only 70C:thumbsup:
Yea, it has 2 120mm fans in front of it, on top of the card's heatsink and fan, which are pretty decent. So temps don't seem to be important atm, 70C is when i run Kumbustor, when playing games, it just hangs around 58-63C, which is awesome.
 

shangshang

Senior member
May 17, 2008
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No extra volts, no option for it with 5750's. It's at stock volts and will do 912 core,1365 memory stable. :)
Waiting for the gtx 560 that should give us some some 6870/6950 price drops next month.

So all this time that you have been worshiping the 460, following every web deal on the 460, you haven't bought one yet??? I thought you would of at least gotten the Palit gtx460 1GB for $129AR from Microcenter already, or more recently the Galaxy gtx460 768MB for a potential $93AR (shipping included). Boy... what are you waiting for???? Waiting for the gtx560 to come out so you can buy an HD6870 for $150AR??? Happy, you're a man of many convictions but none of them are strong. Upgrade already. Let's see some actions!

Oh I notice you have an Asus P5Q board. That's a non-SLI board isn't? Well my boy then you're better served with Xfiring 2x 6850s!!! C'mon dude that 5750 is weak sauce compared to the rest of your system.

BTW I just got the Galaxy gtx460 768MB for work. I'll be gaming at work next year :D :D
 
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raasco

Platinum Member
Feb 6, 2009
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Nice numbers Raven. I just put that card in my system yesterday, but I'm still running stock. Overclock or Crossfire? That's my dilemma.


I'm not planning on OC'ing my 6850 until I've hit its limit. What I'm really waiting for is for the 6850 to drop down to under $100 (admittedly after some crazy rebate deal) and then hello XFire!!!! I envisioning this happening sometime next year or so. Then I'm set for 2 more years of gaming before I'll need to think about upgrades again.

Yea, that crossfire performance is looking mighty tempting. I was hoping the GTX560's would push the price down on the 6850's, but we'll have to wait and see.
 

tannat

Member
Jun 5, 2010
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Nice results, it does not really look like you need to crossfire at that resolution yet. One HD6850 is quite enough. You have plenty of time to wait for pricedrops.
 

Idontcare

Elite Member
Oct 10, 1999
21,118
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Nice results! That's a really fine looking overclock. Congrats on the card, Raven.

Agreed!

I really like what you did here in your OP RavenSEAL :)

I can only hope more members take after you and follow-suit with their cards as well.
10502.gif


This is what technical forums are all about. Data talks, BS walks.

Thanks for contributing! :thumbsup: