| ATI HD2600XT Performance Preview | ||
| by Michael "SKYMTL" Hoenig | June 28, 2007 | ||
| Benchmarks Benchmarks All benchmarks were run twice to ensure accuracy This particular system was used because it gives a good impression what someone might be running if they are interested in upgrading to the HD2600 XT. System used: Processor: AMD X2 3800+ (at 2.6Ghz) Processor Cooling: Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 Motherboard: DFI Lanparty SLI DR Expert RAM: 2GB Corsair XMS PC4000 DDR (at 520Mhz) Hard Drive: Samsung Spinpoint 250GB, 7200Rpm SATAII Case: Gigabyte 3D Aurora 570 Case Cooling: 4x Noctua NF-S12-1200 fans PSU: Silverstone Decathlon 650W DX9 OS: Windows XP SP-2 32-bit Video Cards: ATI HD2600 XT (stock) BFG 8600GTS OC BFG 8600GT OC BFG 7600GT OC (underclocked to reference speeds) BFG 7900GS OC (underclocked to reference speeds) EVGA 8800GTS 320MB (stock) Drivers: ATI 8.39 (RC4) Beta Ndivia 158.22 (8-series) Nvidia 94.24 (7-series) A note about games:All games used in the benchmarks were patched to their latest version before beginning the benchmarks. A note about image quality settings: All image settings were controlled from directly within the game being benchmarked. The Nvidia control panel was left at default settings. 3DMark 05 While the 2005 version of 3DMark may be showing its age, it is still a great tool to use when benchmarking graphics cards. While the scores may not reflect real-world gaming experience with modern games, it is still a good litmus test of a graphic card’s performance.  Judging from this benchmark, it seems like AMD’s card can hold its own against the 8600GT which it is meant to compete with price-wise. On the other hand, the 8600GTS pretty much walks all over the HD2600 XT in this older test. Prey While this is one of the “older” games in these tests, it is still able to pull down the frame rates of some of the best graphics cards out there. In this case we are looking for a minimum of 30 frames per second in order to play the game though 60fps is preferable. For this benchmark, a custom timedemo was run.  For those of you hoping for good gaming performance in all the tests from the AMD card, these benchmark results will bring you crashing down to earth. Whether it is the beta drivers or just the RV630 core having a hard time with this game in particular, one thing is certain: there is a lot of room for the HD2600 XT to improve. Rainbow Six: Vegas Using the newest version of the Unreal engine, R6:V is a visually stunning piece of work and extremely fun to play even though the move from the Xbox360 to PC has not been without issues. In this test the opening in-game opening cutscene of the Mexico City mission was used (in conjunction with Fraps) since this game has neither record mode nor performance test mode. In addition, a hack was used in order to get the game to run at the specified resolution.  Luckily, the 2600 XT does better in this test when compared to the Prey test by performing equally to the 8600GT OC (remember this card is slightly overclocked from BFG). On the other hand, it is performing far below its potential. Company of Heroes (DX9) Company of Heroes from Canadian developer Relic has been widely held as one of the greatest RTS games of all time while also being one of the most stressful games on the graphics card. There are very few instances in this game that will not make your graphics card beg for mercy and as such it makes a great benchmarking tool. The in-game benchmarking tool was used to attain these results.  This is one test where the HD2600 XT attains a good result when compared to its competition. It performs better than a similarly-priced 8600GT and has room for driver and improvement in its final iteration. Medieval II: Total War This is a game that we see all too rarely in benchmark results even though it places a massive strain on both the graphics card with thousands of units on-screen at once and the processor which as to calculate the AI for all those units. This game is perfectly playable at 20fps but anything below that and gameplay gets thrown out the window and you are left without much control over your army. In this test, the Battle of Hastings opening scene was run while Fraps was used to take measurements. This scene runs a few minutes and uses zooms and camera pans that must be used throughout gameplay so it gives a good overall look at what performance you will experience. All numbers are average frames per second.  Once again the HD2600 XT is edged out by the 8600GTS but it runs a few frames per second faster than the 8600GT. We also noticed a slight image improvement over the Nvidia cards when it came to the textures sued for the units’ chain mail. While it may not have been much and it did not make an impact on gameplay, it is nonetheless something to take into account.         | ||
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