Introducing Nvidia’s GTX 580 – Fermi Improved!
CRYSIS
Next we move on to Crysis, a science fiction first person shooter by Crytek. It remains one of the most demanding games for any PC and it is also still one of the most beautiful games released to date. Crysis is based in a fictional near-future where an alien spacecraft is discovered buried on an island near the coast of Korea. The single-player campaign has you assume the role of USA Delta Force, ‘Nomad’ who is armed with futuristic weapons and equipment. Crysis uses DirectX10 for graphics rendering.
A standalone but related game, Crysis Warhead was released last year. CryEngine2 is the game engine used to power Crysis and Warhead and it is an extended version of the CryEngine that also powers FarCry. As well as supporting Shader Model 2.0, 3.0, and DirectX10’s 4.0, CryEngine2 is also multi-threaded to take advantage of dual core SMP-aware systems and Crytek has developed their own proprietary physics system, called CryPhysics. However, it is noted that actually playing this game is a bit slower than the demo implies.
GPU Demo, Island
All of our settings are set to the in-game maximum’s “very high” including 2xAA for 2560×1600 and 4xAA for 1920×1200 and we force 16xAF in the control panels. Here is Crysis’ Island Demo benchmark, first at 2560×1600 resolution (2xAA):
Although the HD 5870 passes the stock GTX 480, the stock GTX 580 as well as the overclocked GTX 480 move right past it. Next we test at 1920×1200 and we up the anti-aliasing from 2x to 4xAA as we lower the resolution from the previous run.
‘The reference GTX 480 is edged out by the HD 5870 although the GTX 480 when overclocked is definitely faster. However the GTX 580 is even faster than the highly overclocked GTX 480 while the Radeons play Crysis a bit slower at our admittedly extreme setting. So far, no single GPU yet offers playable framerates at 2560×1600 at very high’ plus 2xAA although our overclocked GTX 580 comes closest. Perhaps the larger framebuffer of the GTX makes a little performance difference over the Radeon’s.
All of our top cards are now playable with Crysis at 1920×1200 if you are willing to compromise with anti-aliasing and/or lower a couple of detail settings. However, the experience is similar on all 4 cards although the Galaxy GTX 580 is definitely faster if you are keeping score and our overclocked version scales nicely.
Amazing review guys, I wonder if I can evolve my GTX 480 to 580 using EVGA’s RMA process. I need maor powah!!!
I think this is the best GTX 580 review I’ve seen on the net! And I’ve read almost all of them. Thanks for testing so many game titles and especially DX9 titles. I still run XP, so it’s important for me to see how the card did in them. Most reviews only have one or two DX9 games tested, some don’t have any. After reading this review I made up my mind about getting this card. Thanks!
Oh, and I forgot to ask: please use same titles when reviewing the upcoming HD 6970. Thanks!
I had 3 580 GTX’s in my system using a Core i7 980x, and it crashed during minesweeper.
How did it go with the step up program?
Thanks for the kind words. And I generally use the same titles and same settings for the high end cards.
I will be very busy for the next few days.
A very comprehensive review.
It seems that Nvidia has upped its game. I’ve always preferred single GPU solutions over SLI or Crossfire, as have many others, although right now this is out of my budget. It exceeded expectations – cooler and faster. I wonder what AMD’s response will be like.