GTX 680 vs. Radeon HD 7970 - Multi-Display Showdown @ [H]

wabbitseason said:
"Out-of-the-box" or no, this is an extreme overclocking hardware enthusiast site, isn't that right? How is it remotely [H]ard to exclude a freely-available tool which addresses the exact problem you are lamenting? By that line of reasoning we shouldn't overclock these cards at all, in the interest of a fair comparison..
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And they weren't overclocked in the review XD, but yeah your point is to not oc cards/cpu's in general during a review if the interest of the site was strictly about out of box experience.

But there is a quite the difference in the need of downloading a 3rd party tool in order to do the work, to that end if such tools were to be used in a review they would probably be relegated to it's own review. A review of something like RadeonPro/NVIDIAInspector etc. by itself not to be adopted as general review practice.

To the same end as reviewing an aftermark product such as cpu cooling. As things like cpu overclocking doesn't need anything that wasn't already provided and mostly now of days branded gpu's tend to come with some sort of official overclocking software.
 
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BigMack70 said:
It's still a step in the right direction. Throwing your hands up in the air and saying "oh well we can't measure this perfectly so we won't try" ALWAYS sounds like a cop-out to me.
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The decision is above my pay grade around here, but personally, I'd rather not do something unless it is right.

Parish_Rane said:
My question relates a little more to the subjective experience of Nvida VS AMD. For desktop and single monitor gaming (IE Starcraft2, Dota2, etc) was it easier to do this on Nvidia or AMD? I currently have a 5850 and the process of switching back and forth is incredibly time consuming. Is the Nvidia solution any better?

EDIT: Ideally I wouldn't have to switch profiles in order to play single monitor games. I was under the impression that was possible with NVSurround.
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I typically run single screen games in windowed mode so I don't have to constantly flip flop my profiles around. If the flanking screens are distracting, I'll just hit the power button on them to turn them off.
 
Thank you for a most useful article. I'm looking forward to the next installment testing with 3 and 4 cards.
 
H.A.M.mer said:
IMO RadeonPro (and NV Inspector) should be included in your reviews.

I understand that you want to focus on the "out-of-the-box" experience because that is what both AMD and NV have to offer themselves. While this seems correct in terms of "corporate fairness" it somehow leads to a bit unhandy conclusions.

I am pretty sure that most of the high-end pc-gamers with multi-gpu setups which tend to overclock, undervolt or mod their hardware are using such third-party tools for their every-day use.

That leaves this "out-of-the-box" experience as the only focus at least a little incomplete and could very well be extended by including tools like RadeonPro.

In the past you have focused well on that useful, practical side of pc-gaming in your reviews but excluding tools like RadeonPro from the evaluations seems not reflecting the every-day gaming-use of multi-gpu-systems nowadays.

To my mind both AMD and NV should officially support great tools like RadeonPro an NV Inspector. Modern multi-gpu gaming has obviously reached a point of complexity in which those companies are dependent on the community for extending the gaming-experience.
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My sentiments as well, showing CFX smoothness can be done could be an important consideration for an euthusiast purchase. At what performance hit as well. those high FPS even for short periods of time skews the CFX to higher numbers. From the article looking at the graphs I agree with HCP, the erractic looking CFX graphs does take away from the win.

We build super rigs, modify and OC them to the max, exotic cooling but then never OC or use third party software to game with :p. Fraps is a third party software as a note and is used.

Still if RadeonPro is used that probably would be more appropriate for a separate article related to CFX. Like all reviews, it is applicable for the current generation and software which could well change dramatically the next day. That also applies to third party software.
 
I agree with Noke , i'll have my cake and eat it too, i'll have the highest possible frame rates and use a third party tool (radeon pro) which is no more difficult or different than using msi afterburner for that matter, which is pretty much standard fare for anyone who visits this site i would think.

I can see the out of the box arguement, but i'll never be an out of the box user ...
 
Interesting article, from what I see AMD users have a lot of something to be happy about - I can't see a [H] reading Xfire user NOT using Radeon-pro to smooth things out if it works, which from all reports it does. However, I can see [H]s reasoning - if we start running 3rd party add-ons, where do we stop? Do we then start modifying caps/profiles to get the best performance for each vendor? Pick the best driver for each specific game mb? The OOTB measure is best for reference, which it seems AMD do quite well indeed. Still won't get me to bag my 690 - the prettiest vidcard ever, which I still get a buzz out of seeing - my rig sits on the removable tray from a lian-li mobo, exposed, dust prone but easy to get @...why they didnt wak a HDMI on still bemuses me...then I would'nt have to buy a converter which is no good, we all have to keep spending, people need the jobs it creates, remember that all you spendthrifts, before you roll your eyes..:confused::confused::eek:
 
FYI, the only way I've found so far, even with Radeon pro, to smooth out framerates, is to cap the fps 10-20 fps below the average you are getting in-game. I'll have more information about this in the Far Cry 3 evaluation and will explain how to get the smoothest operation with CrossFire.
 
Parish_Rane said:
My question relates a little more to the subjective experience of Nvida VS AMD. For desktop and single monitor gaming (IE Starcraft2, Dota2, etc) was it easier to do this on Nvidia or AMD? I currently have a 5850 and the process of switching back and forth is incredibly time consuming. Is the Nvidia solution any better?
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Starcraft 2 and Dota 2 both run great in borderless windowed mode, and will run on the center monitor this way without changing out of your eyefinity profile (that's how I play them). I noticed in another thread that you mentioned LoL, which also runs great in borderless windowed mode on the center monitor while in eyefinity mode. Other games like Guild Wars 2 and Diablo 3 have issues with this, and stretch to full eyefinity resolution when toggled into borderless windowed mode - I change profiles with a hotkey for these games. One trick that I've learned is to save your profile when in simple mode in CCC, rather than advanced - they tend to work better that way. The vast majority of the time I remain in my eyefinity profile, utilize hydragrid for window management, and use borderless windowed mode for single screen games.

TLDR: Borderless windowed mode. Try it - it works for all the games that you've mentioned.
 
Brent_Justice said:
FYI, the only way I've found so far, even with Radeon pro, to smooth out framerates, is to cap the fps 10-20 fps below the average you are getting in-game. I'll have more information about this in the Far Cry 3 evaluation and will explain how to get the smoothest operation with CrossFire.
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This is the info I think many would love to know also I think you will be opening up padoras box as well on endless have you tried this or why did you not do that type questions. I hope you are brave enough to just let us know what you find and let it be. I have a feeling some games will work well with frame capping and others, well not so well. Exploring beyond the box card and into new areas pushing the boundaries to me is actually more HardOCP like anyways.
 
Brent_Justice said:
FYI, the only way I've found so far, even with Radeon pro, to smooth out framerates, is to cap the fps 10-20 fps below the average you are getting in-game. I'll have more information about this in the Far Cry 3 evaluation and will explain how to get the smoothest operation with CrossFire.
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Excellent news. Keep up the good work.
 
XTF said:
And what is the problem?


Are you saying measuring it at the GPU is wrong? What's the reasoning behind that?
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I think all he is saying that the testing isn't fleshed out yet.

The way I see it TR came up with the numbers to back [H] subjective testing.

There are very few sites (I believe) you can go to for reliable reviews. [H] and TR are some of the best.
 
I'm curious about how much I would have to lower graphic settings to do 3x 1080p on a single GTX 680 2GB to keep 60 FPS. I found my monitor back down to the price I originally bought it, so its very tempting to buy another one.

Update: Bought a 3rd montior and displayport cable (black cables are like $2 more, stupid Apple). GTX 680 seems to run 3x1080p just fine if you lower AA.
 
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Yep Great review, I just went with dual 4gb 680's and couldnt be happier. I upgraded from a single lightning 6970 and one thing I noticed was 30-40fps with the 680's seems alot smoother than 30-40fps with the 6970. I thought it was just me but obviously not.
 
Was on the fence last year with 680 vs 7970 but for triple monitor the more Vram the better.
I couldnt afford dual 4gb 680's so went with 2x7970 CF in my FT03.
getting 60+fps in BF at 5760x1200 max settings.
 
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