|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
Test Setup and Methodology: As a reviewer, I take my test methodology very seriously. Just ask my friends, they will likely roll their eyes and go on about how, shall we say, meticulous I try to be. (Ed.- "Meticulous" is not the word we use.) Even when under the gun of an NDA deadline, I try to put the test hardware through a gauntlet of pain. In my mind, for a decent video card review, it is important to use a variety of tests at a variety of different settings. For today's review, I used the following tests:
In order to get decent test results, it is vital that a worthy test-bed is used. What I have is not so much a test-bed as it is a veritable Guantanamo Bay for computer hardware; what comes in poised and ready for the challenged often comes out broken. (Ed. - please don't break the video cards.)
Since the driver on the disk came with the Catalyst 9.3 drivers, all testing was done with these. First, let's meet the contenders: The Sapphire 4870 Toxic:
The 4870 Toxic is Sapphire's own over clocked version of the 4870 1GB, with a clock of 780MHz on the core and 1GHz on the memory. I don't expect the 4890 to have any problem tackling this card, however. The Sapphire 4870X2:
The 4870X2 is the vanilla Sapphire branded card, and we will be pitting this against two 4890's in Crossfire. The Sapphire 4890:
And here is the challenger...the Sapphire 4890, one of which will be pitted against the 4870, two of which will be pitted against the 4870X2.
Warning! Picture depicting extreme violence against computer hardware! Those who may be squeamish around underdressed and tortured computer hardware may want to avert their eyes and protect the innocence of their children.... OK, now who is ready for some test results? First up is 3DMark....
|
