SLI vs. CrossFire, Part 2 – High-end multi-GPU scaling

Metro 2033
Metro 2033 is the “Crysis” of 2010. It is a very demanding game on any PC with the very latest DX11 visuals. Metro 2033 is an action-oriented video game with a combination of survival horror, and first-person shooter elements. The game utilizes multi-platform 4A Engine and there is some doubt if the games engine is related to the original XRay engine used in S.T.A.L.K.E.R..

The Metro 2033 story takes place mostly in post-apocalyptic Moscow’s metro system but occasionally the player has to go above ground on some missions and to search for valuables. Metro 2033‘s locations reflect the dark atmosphere of real metro tunnels but in a much more dangerous and lethal manner. Strange phenomena and noises are frequent, and mostly the player has to rely only on their flashlight to find their way around in otherwise total darkness.

THQ has released an official benchmark for Metro 2033 which provides minimum/maximum/average framerates, and you can adjust many graphics settings including PhysX, AA, DOF and tessellation, and the number of runs. Our presets are set to maximum (very high) with 4xAA and DOF enabled – but no PhysX.

Here is our first chart at 1920×1200 and 2560×1600.  For single-GPU video cards, it proves too demanding without turning off most of the visuals that make this game really impressive. However, actually playing the game, one can tolerate minimums down into the 20s without noticing severe lag.

All of our configurations struggle with Metro 2033 with the aggressive settings that we used except at 1920×1200.  Our fastest graphics, HD 69x0Tri-Fire-X3 barely keeps its average framerates in the 30s at 2560×1600 and it is a slideshow at 5760×1080.