Core i7 vs. Phenom II X2 vs. X4 scaling performance analysis
Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X.
Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. is an air combat video game developed by Ubisoft Romania and published by Ubisoft. It was released in United States on March 6, 2009. You have the opportunity to fly 54 aircraft over real world locations and cities in somewhat realistic environments that are created with satellite data. This game is a more of a take on flying than a real simulation and it has received mixed reviews.The game story takes place during the time of Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter. H.A.W.X. is set in the year 2014 where private military companies have replaced government-run military in many countries. The player is placed into the cockpit as an elite ex-military pilot who is recruited by one of these corporations to work for them as a mercenary. You later return to the US Air Force with a team as you try to prevent a full scale terrorist attack on the United States which was started by your former employer.
H.A.W.X. runs on DX10.1 faster and with more detail than on the DX10 pathway. All of our video cards can take advantage of DX10.1. Let’s check it out H.A.W.X. with our top cards at 2560×1600 with fully maxed out in-game settings and 8xAA:
Here are our results at 1920×1200 resolution:
Finally at 1680×1050:
Although all of our configurations give a similar playing experience in this game with maxed out settings and 8xAA, generally we see the quad- faster than the dual-core and faster CPU clocks lead to faster frame rates. The Core i7 920 is fastest with HD 5870 CrossFire, and to a lesser extent with the GTX 480, compared with the Phenom II 955-X4. In contrast, using the least powerful video card, the HD 5870, the Phenom quad-core trades blows with Core i7. Choice of CPU definitely depends on what graphics card you plan to use for a balanced system. If you are running a midrange videocard, you do not need an extra-ordinarily fast CPU to pair up with it; conversely, if you have fast triple-GPU graphics, it makes sense to pick a very fast quad-core CPU.
Let’s check out our DX11 games.
Flat-out amazing!!! I’ve never seen anything so epic like this. So, there was not any microstuttering in any of the above games, where the “measured” 40 fps appeared to look more like “perceived” 25 fps? I guess microstuttering is not noticeable if the measured fps is above 70-80, since half of this (45 fps) would still appear to be relatively smooth. Anything below 30 fps becomes really noticeable, so were there ever 40-50 fps instances with 2x 5870 CF that felt like 25fps or so? I’ll take your word for it, if you were actually watching 10,000 hours worth of benchmarking, ha (just kidding, don’t shoot my head off)!
Surprised there are not more comments. For a single video card it does look like a dual core is more than enough. Sure there are a few games that take advantage of four cores, but the fact remains they remain in the minority.
Bobert, I’ve been saying the same thing for months now.
Wow, very thorough and detailed article. It’s one thing to test CPU performance using a single video card, but it must take some brawn to do it for three different video configurations.
There’s so much data here to look at in so many ways. I suppose if you would have included an SLI setup we would then be able to determine how CPU speed affects SLI vs. Crossfire. If I’m looking at this data right, though, it seems Crossfire sees benefits from quad cores more than single video cards do.
Far Cry 2 seems to be a good example of this. Also Far Cry 2 shows interesting relationships between CPU and the GTX 480. The single HD 5870 doesn’t really react to CPU speed and cores the same way dual 5870s and the GTX 480 do. That’s pretty interesting.
So well done. If I only had one suggestion is that I would like to see GTA4 benched, mainly because I own it and good, thorough, and updated benchmarks of it are not easy to come by.:)
Concerning the Far Cry 2 numbers, despite being beaten with faster processors, the HD 5870 paired with the 2.6 dual core is actually outperforming the Crossfire and Nvidia setup. That’s what I find a bit interesting here.
AWESOME REVIEW.
This is EXACTLY what review websites ARE NOT putting out.
A non GPU-bottlenecked review showing how i7 really does have a significant gaming lead over Phenom II.
God you’d be surprised how many AMD fanboys still believe (and spread rumors) that Phenom II is plenty for 5870 crossfire. Psh. Plenty on today’s games maybe, but that is due to the PC gaming community being SNARED by the noob console community and their half a decade old setups.
Ok I’m ranting.
Two Thumbs!!
Raidur means it shows how Phenom II bottlenecks 5870 crossfire.
Everyone knows i7 is faster in games.
PS. I’m not Raidur.
PSS. I’m Raidur.
PSSS. Or am I?
Awesome review GJ.
Please let me know if you’re looking for a article writer for your
site. You have some really good articles and I believe I
would be a good asset. If you ever want to take some of the load off, I’d love to
write some material for your blog in exchange for a link back
to mine. Please shoot me an email if interested.
Thank you!