BFBC2: considering upgrading

3DMark 11 says the 6870 should be neck and neck w/ the 470 stock and 460 OC. But the last couple hours w/ BC2 says otherwise.

That's the best of five 5 minute fraps runs on Cold War. I tried playing, I tried staying away, I mixed it up. They were all the same. 70ish avg, 35ish min. To make matters worse, there's a flickering on some walls that did not appear w/ either Nvidia cards.

It seems to be putting out slightly less heat than the 460 and noticeably less than 470. I'll keep going and see if something weird's happening, but it seems to be slower in BC2.

What's AfterBurner saying as far as gpu usage is concerned (and task manager for cpu)? Why does this smell like Fermi all over again?
 
keep us updated Jodiuh, very interested in your results.
Yeah, I'm not sure what's going on. Played a couple Vietnam maps and it's looking more like 71 min, 93 avg. I haven't seen any weird texture problems either. Maybe I'll just avoid that map, lol.

It seems to be running fairly cool and the fan's barely spinning. I remember reading that this card was louder than a 460, but that's not the case for me. Both are silent and below the noise floor of some Scythe SFLEX E 1200RPM's.

6870gpuusage.jpg

BFBC2Game2011-01-1200-13-39-10.jpg
 
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How did you get those numbers at the left hand corner of your screen? I would like to see cpu and gpu usage with my c2q at eyefinity resolutions.
 
Jodiuh:

Very interesting data you provided. Its strange becouse in reviews of 6870 on BC2 6870 beats GTX 460. Maybe its driver issue? Could you try the same meassure with older drivers?
 
How did you get those numbers at the left hand corner of your screen? I would like to see cpu and gpu usage with my c2q at eyefinity resolutions.
That's the On Screen Display from MSI Afterburner.

Jodiuh:

Very interesting data you provided. Its strange becouse in reviews of 6870 on BC2 6870 beats GTX 460. Maybe its driver issue? Could you try the same meassure with older drivers?
Last night, I played Cold War awhile only to get those comparison numbers. However, every map in Vietnam plays faster than GTX 460 OC or GTX 470 Stock. It is slower than GTX 470 OC, but it's dumping FAR FAR FAR less heat into my room. Typically the GTX 470 can bump it up 1~2C per hour, but after 2 hours, 6870 did nothing. I did get a little chilly last night though.Thankfully, the Promedia's sub which never shuts off even when turned off kept my feet warm. :D

I'm not too sure what's causing the issue in Cold War or if it's in all BC2 maps or all BC2 snow maps. But my poor windows install has now been through 4 CPU's, 3 chipsets, 4 motherboards, and 4 video cards from ATI and Nvidia. So I guess it's time to start fresh anyway. :D

Probably start in on that later today...
 
I was currently running a 4gb kit and had win7 32bit installed and noticed that when in game my total memory usage was at 1.75gb...

http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/1894/usagei.jpg

Last night I installed win7 64 bit and with the exact same in game settings and the game is now using 2.25gb out of my 4gb kit.

I was thinking that I'd get a possible fps boost, but I didn't.

Although a couple months back I upgraded from a 2gb kit to my current 4gb kit and saw a 15fps boost.

When I was running the 2gb kit my memory usage was at 1.15gb.

Crazy huh?
 
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Video of flickering.

Good news! It's only that one section of the wall and a few sandbags. Be great if someone using an Nvidia card could confirm.

I'm still getting much lower frames in that map compared to 460 OC and 470 stock though, routinely dipping in the 40's.

Although, I don't see any of this thankfully.

6870 loses about 10% when IQ optimizations are turned off. :(
 
Video of flickering.

Good news! It's only that one section of the wall and a few sandbags. Be great if someone using an Nvidia card could confirm.

I'm still getting much lower frames in that map compared to 460 OC and 470 stock though, routinely dipping in the 40's.

Although, I don't see any of this thankfully.

6870 loses about 10% when IQ optimizations are turned off. :(

i dont see any wall flickering in that video....maybe you're paying way too much attention to the wall during a MP match....i dont look at walls at all....not even enough to notice the pretty textures...let alone some minor graphical anomaly
 
i dont see any wall flickering in that video....maybe you're paying way too much attention to the wall during a MP match....i dont look at walls at all....not even enough to notice the pretty textures...let alone some minor graphical anomaly

I see it. Try disabling Catalyst A.I .
 
Not just Nvidia w/ failing usage, lol.

swarm2011-01-1223-36-38-24.jpg


Alien swarm plays awful on this card. I can barely get by w/ 4x AA on 6870. 460 OC could do 32x SSAA. This card will choke down to 15 FPS if I enable supersampling. Textures look fuzzy in certain places too.

I moved from ATI/AMD awhile ago due to inconsistent performance and here they are again. What good is lower heat output if the game's I play vary wildy w/ image quality and performance? Catalyst AI's completely turned off as is that one optimization. But that gives a performance drop.
 
I remember Alien Swarm. Terrible performance almost completely at random. However, that was a while ago, I haven't tried it on newer cards yet. Come to think of it, I'll do that now :p
 
The biggest thing you need for BC2 is a quad-core processor. It doesn't even have to be a very fast one. You can get by with a fast dual core on this game, but the quad will help tremendously with minimum frame rates.

If your thinking about a gtx 460, go with a 1GB model.

I own a Asus N43JF that has a Core I5 and a NVIDIA Geforce 425M and it seems to run fine on high settings with MSAA and AA at 4x each.
 
Ok played Alien Swarm, big improvement in performance, am now at the 100fps cap almost continuously, instead of seeing drops to about 20, and an average around 30.
However, the game has the flickering shadows bug that plagues so many games with crossfire :/
 
What cards? The IQ difference between NV and AMD's huge in this game. If 6870, would you mind disabling xfire and running @ 8x MSAA w/ Supersampling set in CCC? That's unplayable for me on 6870, but 80~100 FPS constant with 460 OC or 470 stock.

Although, I seem to have fixed the resume from S3 problem w/ 6870 by using Ghostbuster and Driver Sweeper. I'll try BC2 and Swarm again today. Would be nice if I could get things running decently cause 6870's much much easier on my PSU than 470 OCed. Poor thing was screaming bloody mercy, lol.

I own a Asus N43JF that has a Core I5 and a NVIDIA Geforce 425M and it seems to run fine on high settings with MSAA and AA at 4x each.
So 1366 x 768, all high, hbao on, optimizations in NVCPL off, 4x MSAA, w/ 4x Supersampling set under the transparency settings? And that runs fine on 96 shaders w/ 35 watts available to it? I'd love to see a graph w/ min and avg on that setup. It would make a very very nice LAN setup. Probably doesn't roast you like a desktop either, huh?
 
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I didn't use supersampling, but I fixed 8xAA in game for Alien Swarm and the lowest I ever saw the frame rate go for the first mission was 96fps (the game's capped at 100 anyway). Now granted, this is two HD6970s, but even so this is 2560x1600 res, so I imagine a single 6870 at 1920x1200 should still be getting at least 70fps in the same test environment, which would be ample.
 
Video of flickering.

Good news! It's only that one section of the wall and a few sandbags. Be great if someone using an Nvidia card could confirm.

I'm still getting much lower frames in that map compared to 460 OC and 470 stock though, routinely dipping in the 40's.

Although, I don't see any of this thankfully.

6870 loses about 10% when IQ optimizations are turned off. :(

i just exited a game on this map, i get the same flicker on the same wall. GTX 460 with 260.99 drivers.
 
I have a 6870 and I just so happen to play all the games that it bugs out on :( so yes ive seen large surfaces like that flicker when i look around in a circle and stuff
 
Just some quick and dirty impressions of the 5870 and X4 945 @ 3.6Ghz.

Played BC2: Vietnam for probably an hour tonight at 19x12 high detail, 4xAA, temps never went above 59C with fan set at 67%. Most of the time the frames were between 80-100fps, with it dropping into the 50's once or twice. I ended up quitting due to lag (thank you Cox!)

I didn't record anything, so no hard facts, but definitely an improvement :D
 
I didn't use supersampling...
Try it. For me it's just a massive performance hit. Which makes me wonder if the 470 just wasn't doing it? Looked really sharp, but there's not a whole lot of foilage in Swarm, lol.

i just exited a game on this map, i get the same flicker on the same wall. GTX 460 with 260.99 drivers.
Cool, thanks.

I have a 6870 and I just so happen to play all the games that it bugs out on :( so yes ive seen large surfaces like that flicker when i look around in a circle and stuff
Which is why the GTX 560 can't come soon enough. Just that little bit more performance wo/ the heat.

..dirty...5870...X...x...x...dropping...I didn't record anything... so...hard :D
Hmmm...
 
Jodiuh said:
Which is why the GTX 560 can't come soon enough. Just that little bit more performance wo/ the heat.
Where do we draw the line? The GTX560 isn't likely to use much less power than the HD6970. Geforces always use slightly more than their TDP, and the HD6970 is only typically using 210-220W in games.

LOL tried 8x SSAA in ALien Swarm. FPS dropped from 96-100cap to 32-50, with severe microstuttering, of the order it was completely unplayable. I don't think I'll be using SSAA often!
 
The stutter is a feature of the card. Also known as the "Alert!"setting in CCC. It keeps you on your toes. Nvidias implementation is broken as it smooths out some of the choppy lines thereby causing one to feel calm and aesthetically pleased. This of course leads to napping while keyboarding, a dangerous situation indeed.
 
Supersampling is just a big, big performance hit. It's not worth it unless on a really old game. Try MLAA, it gives about the same IQ as Supersampling with less of a performance hit. Unfortunately since it is a post-process filter, text will get blurred.
 
That's next on the list, though I have to say, I'm normally pretty happy with the appearance of 4x MSAA, as long as I can use it without lag. 8x is just exuberance really, as far as I'm concerned.
 
I find the breakup in telephone lines, ladders, trees, and shadows extremely distracting.

Does BC2 even support TSAA? I haven't tried MLAA yet...
 
That's what SSAA is meant to fix, as well as potentially MLAA. Try them both. They do hit hard on performance though. (AF should help a bit with telegraph wires and fences, make sure that's on. If the game doesn't mention it, force it in the control panel)
 
Wooo, it's glad to be back on team green! New drivers kick up performance even more...

HD6870vsGTX47026658.jpg
 
Here are some results between the 5850 on the X3 720 @ 3.4 Ghz and the 5870 on the X4 945 at 3.6 Ghz. Yes, this isn't an extremely fair comparison due to having the 5850 for so little time, but numbers are numbers.

Medium Detail, 1xAA:
line_graph_x3_x4_m1xAA.png

Improvements: 10% increase in minimum frames, 20% increase in average.

High Detail, 1xAA:
line_graph_x3_x4_h1xAA.png

Improvements: no improvement

High Detail, 2xAA:
line_graph_x3_x4_h2xAA.png

Improvements: 16% increase in minimum frames, 16% increase in average.

High Detail, 4xAA:
line_graph_x3_x4_h4xAA.png

Improvements: 8% increase in minimum frames, 12% increase in average.

High Detail, 8xAA:
line_graph_x3_x4_h8xAA.png

Improvements: 0% increase in minimum frames, 14% increase in average.

Final thoughts - 2xAA will likely be my final settings with the results due to the higher minimum and great average. This again is the worst-possible scenario in BC2 (in my opinion).

I still haven't found the "worst case scenario" in Vietnam, but I average about 30% increase in minimum frames and 20% increase with average frames with 4xAA.
 
Looks about right for a Radeon on that map. Going from 6870 to 470 is night and day. Maybe someday they'll make something worth a shit.

*flame suit engaged*

Edit: did u run that with optimiztions on or off in driver panel?
 
Edit: did u run that with optimiztions on or off in driver panel?

Are you referring to Catalyst A.I.? If so, I had it set to default which is "Standard". I am going to set it to "Advanced" to see if the claimed improvements are real. For some reason, I remember having to disable Catalyst A.I. at one point with the 4850.
 
Thanks for those benchmarks tlbig10, good information. I am very curious how a x3 vs x4 would compare at the same frequencies and with the same GPU. If a lot of other people have the same interest and it's not much of a hassle that would be a great benchmark to do :D
 
The only straight comparison I have is with the 4850 and the X3 and X4 at medium detail and no AA. The interesting thing is the results were the same, but with the X3 @ 3.4Ghz setup, the X3 was the bottleneck, and with the X4 @ 3.6Ghz, the 4850 was the bottleneck. So the X3 720 @ 3.4 Ghz and a 4850 is a really great match in terms of equality with the 4850 being slightly faster at those settings. The 4850 definitely holds back the X4.
 
i just tried again tonight using the newest 266.58 WHQL drivers, system still stock pretty much, slight overclock on the 460GTX, stock is 810/1622/1950 and it runs 850/1700/2000 default now thanks to Nibitor and NVFlash...anyways....

BFBC2, all settings maxed, HBAO on, 32xCSAA, 16xAF....everything maxed out at my native resolution 1440x900 now has the GPU completely maxed out, framerate doesnt seem to have been affected at all going from 16xCSAA to 32xCSAA, it just took my GPU from being 85% or better used to 98-99% pegged out the entire time im playing

very niiiiice!
 
The ati5870 @ 950/1250 actually gave me better fps then ati6950 in my rig. It was within about 10fps, but I bet the results would have changed if I tested at a higher resolution like your running.

Also the 5870 is only $200 right now!, I went ahead and picked one up on newegg.
 
GTX 460 is good, but i would honestly steer clear from Evga. I have been plagued with problems . received 3 gtx 460's only 1 works.

It seems the focus on nothing but phone tech support, and not so much about sending you a working functioning card.

You should see the condition of this last RMA they sent me.... complete and utter crap.
I started a seperate thread on it.

But with that said my one working gtx 460 still smokes through BC2. My sli setup is only needed when i enable stereoscopic 3d which effectively cuts your frame rate in half.
 
The ati5870 @ 950/1250 actually gave me better fps then ati6950 in my rig. It was within about 10fps, but I bet the results would have changed if I tested at a higher resolution like your running.

Also the 5870 is only $200 right now!, I went ahead and picked one up on newegg.
Same results for me with my Q9650 system.

I tested out both the 6950 and 5870, 5870 was about 7-10fps faster in BC2 at 1600x1200 resolution.
 
Hmm, perhaps I should bump mine up from 900 to 950. Are you 5870 guys overvolting your cards to reach that number? My 5870 at 900mhz has yet to go over 60C, so there seems to be some headroom.
 
I can run BC2 at 1920x1200 with 2X AA and 16X AF with my 6870 and Vysnc on and get a consistent 60 FPS....
 
I have just built a second rig with Sandy i5-2500k @ 4.5GHz and Asus 5850 DirectCU TOP Crossfire @ 950/1200 1.255volts and it literally destroys the game at 2560x1600. I am talking multiplayer since single is of no interest to me. I will post some fraps stuff later tonight.
 
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