[PCPer] Frame Rating: High End GPUs Benchmarked at 4K Resolutions

[Final8ty]

Our experiment with early testing of high end graphics cards on a 4K display has definitely been interesting. After using $3000 graphics card configurations on a 50-in 3840x2160 monitor it is going to be a struggle to go back to smaller display and single lowly graphics card. But alas, that is part of the job!

Problems creep up for the Radeon HD 7970 if you consider going to the route of SLI or CrossFire. While the GTX Titan and GTX 680 scale very well in most of our titles at 3840x2160, the Radeon HD 7970s in CrossFire suffer from runt frames and high frame time variance that result in either much lower than expected animation smoothness and/or stutter. The GTX cards in SLI do not have this behavior resulting in a much better multi-card scaling proposition. Yes, the prototype driver would help the HD 7970s out quite a bit, but that option is still weeks or months away.

If we take into account the prototype driver for the Radeon HD 7990, it makes a good case to take that spot away from the GTX 690. With much more even frame distribution, the dual-Tahiti card looks like a better option in several games even though there is still much work to be had for the driver team to produce frame times as evenly as NVIDIA SLI does. Long story short, even if the prototype driver were available today to consumers in its current form, I still think the GTX 690 would have the advantage. But AMD is on the right track and with some more development they could make their card the better choice.

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/Frame-Rating-High-End-GPUs-Benchmarked-4K-Resolutions

 

[zaydq]

Wonder how much this experiment ran them?

 

[blackened23]

1300$

 

[cplusplus]

It's really weird that they're complaining about the drivers not being out yet, but almost no one has a 4K TV/monitor to actually use this type of setup for.

 

[omeds]

Titans doing well in SLI.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

This article fully shows what an incredible waste of money Titan is for $999.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Titans doing well in SLI.

Yep, needs some work with Tri though, AMD is getting slaughtered in these reviews.


This pretty much sums up my experience with FC3...

They should have just used CryEngine and stopped trying to be heroes.

FC3 made me want to vomit on my 7950. :\

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Yep, needs some work with Tri though, AMD is getting slaughtered in these reviews.


This pretty much sums up my experience with FC3...

They should have just used CryEngine and stopped trying to be heroes.

FC3 made me want to vomit on my 7950. :\

You are posting crossfire graphs for FC3 not single GPU graphs. If you posted the single GPU graphs you'd see that FC3 runs like a turd no matter what brand of GPU you are using. In FC3 $550 bucks gets you +5 fps at 4k. That's a bargain.

EDIT: The single GPU graphs actually smooth out at 4k resolutions for FC3. That's a surprise? Perhaps the low FPS nubmers contribute to less variance between frames?

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Well sir I does have two 7950s, but the point wasn't to call out AMD, it was to show that FC3 runs like bokaboka no matter the hardware really, while Crysis 3 does much better.

And even with a single 7950 it was terrible for me, slightly better with it limited to 30~ fps in ab but my cpu wasn't capable of 60 sustained, but even when I could get it over 80 with lower settings it still ran poorly for me.


It's a knock at FC3 and their modified old cryengine rather than a knock at AMD.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Well sir I does have two 7950s, but the point wasn't to call out AMD, it was to show that FC3 runs like bokaboka no matter the hardware really, while Crysis 3 does much better.

And even with a single 7950 it was terrible for me, slightly better with it limited to 30~ fps in ab but my cpu wasn't capable of 60 sustained, but even when I could get it over 80 with lower settings it still ran poorly for me.


It's a knock at FC3 and their modified old cryengine rather than a knock at AMD.

Forgot you still have a stone aged CPU don't you? Upgrade. :thumbsup:

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Sell me one of those Haswell chips you got on that tray of yours :sneaky:

 

[alcoholbob]

I don't really see a point running anything at 4K at this point if we are stuck at 30Hz with HDMI 1.4.

But damn, TVs have dropped in price. Back in 2008 my 32" LCD TV was $1500. I remember it wasn't too uncommon to see 42" TV go for over $2k either.

50" AND 4K and this is a first gen product for only 1.3K what steal.

 

[Black Octagon]

Agreed. Bring on 4k monitors that use DP or the supposedly imminent Version 2.0 of HDMI for 60Hz

 

[Haserath]

Why can't everything just be displayport already.

 

[alcoholbob]

Why can't everything just be displayport already.

Hey, hey, some of us need an HDMI port for audio

 

[frowertr]

I don't really see a point running anything at 4K at this point if we are stuck at 30Hz with HDMI 1.4.

Dual Link DVI for me. I don't need no stinking HDMI for audio...

 

[BrightCandle]

I can't imagine wanting to put a 50 inch TV on my desk. Surround at least gave me peripheral vision but I struggle to focus on all of a 24" screen let alone one that has a diagonal twice that. Seeing as how todays monitors are fairly close to the "retina" standard of PPD it doesn't look like we really need to go up to 4x as many pixels in the same space, more like +40%. This TV standard is likely going to stay in big TVs for quite a while. Thus the 30 fps isn't going to be that big of a problem.

 

[willomz]

I can't imagine wanting to put a 50 inch TV on my desk. Surround at least gave me peripheral vision but I struggle to focus on all of a 24" screen let alone one that has a diagonal twice that. Seeing as how todays monitors are fairly close to the "retina" standard of PPD it doesn't look like we really need to go up to 4x as many pixels in the same space, more like +40%. This TV standard is likely going to stay in big TVs for quite a while. Thus the 30 fps isn't going to be that big of a problem.

I want a nice curved 3840x1200 display
3 monitors seems to many, but I don't want a gap down the middle!

 

[Face2Face]

Well sir I does have two 7950s, but the point wasn't to call out AMD, it was to show that FC3 runs like bokaboka no matter the hardware really, while Crysis 3 does much better.

And even with a single 7950 it was terrible for me, slightly better with it limited to 30~ fps in ab but my cpu wasn't capable of 60 sustained, but even when I could get it over 80 with lower settings it still ran poorly for me.


It's a knock at FC3 and their modified old cryengine rather than a knock at AMD.

This is Off-Topic, but why does everyone have a hard time running FC3? As much as I can see I can completely max out this game @ 1080P and running 59-60FPS nearly all of time and running well with Vsync- I am doing something wrong or right?

 

[Black Octagon]

They're not having a hard time running it. They're saying that it stutters no matter what...regardless of what the reported frame rate is.

 

[Face2Face]

They're not having a hard time running it. They're saying that it stutters no matter what...regardless of what the reported frame rate is.

I guess the stutter would be more evident without vsync enabled? Games tears really bad without it.

 

[KingFatty]

I think it would be fine to use one of these 50" 4K displays.

I mean, I am currently OK with having two 24" displays side-by-side (or even three).
I'd also be OK with stacking another two 24" displays on top of those, for a 2x2 matrix of displays.

Wouldn't "melding" those 4 displays into one big one be even better, eliminating the bezels etc. and conserving space?

 

[Grooveriding]

This is Off-Topic, but why does everyone have a hard time running FC3? As much as I can see I can completely max out this game @ 1080P and running 59-60FPS nearly all of time and running well with Vsync- I am doing something wrong or right?

Far Cry 3 is only a pleasant experience if you can maintain 60fps at all times, if you are fluctuating below that, it's horrible.

On my SLI 680s I couldn't maintain 60fps. It was stuttering and hitching constantly and just plain sucked. On my Titans it is perfectly smooth as the framerate maintains 60 constant.

If you are not holding steady at 60fps the game just doesn't play right.

 

[Black Octagon]

I guess the stutter would be more evident without vsync enabled? Games tears really bad without it.

Maybe, but even people getting less fps than their monitor refresh rate have reported the problem. It's well known that the game's choice of engine was a fail

 

[BallaTheFeared]

I guess the stutter would be more evident without vsync enabled? Games tears really bad without it.

I didn't have much in the way of tearing problems, but the stutter was really detracting.