Source Engine: Counterstrike Beta Hits The Street
by Derek Wilson on August 26, 2004 5:22 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
ATI is the performance leader when we're talking about Source Engine performance at the high end. Unfortunately, we didn't have an X800 XT to compare with our 6800 Ultra, nor did we have our 6800 nonultra that we predict would have fallen between the 9800 XT and X800 Pro (closer to the latter) in our tests. Apparently, some of our graphics cards decided to go on vacation this week to visit a penguin. When it comes to upper midrange, NVIDIA's 6800 GT seems to have a leg up on the X800 Pro in most tests (though this may have changed if we could have gotten our Pro to run 20x15). This is just further proof that (so far) the GT offers some of the best value in NVIDIA's lineup.Overall, the framerates we saw in these tests were higher than we expected. Doom III will bring just about anything to its knees at the highest settings, and 2048x1536 wasn't even an option on the list. We still expect to see very high framerates when gameplay elements (more CPU usage) are introduced into the mix. This follows the traditional view (that id Software broke from with Doom III) that higher resolutions and higher framerates are always the better option. Certainly, these aspects have their place, but id has proven they aren't the be all end all of graphics engine design. This fundamental difference in viewpoint helps explain our initial impressions of each game. Source can look incredibly crisp running at a steady framerate at 20x15, and Doom III can look incredibly frightening at 10x7 with its intense shadows, atmosphere and lighting effects, and well executed low contrast edges between overlapping objects.
We will absolutely still have to wait for Halflife 2 before we can make any further judgment calls about relative goodness of the engine. Obviously the outcome of our tests revealed that even when source is pushing its hardest against a graphics cards, modern hardware doesn't have any major trouble rendering scenes.
From our brief look at CPU scaling, we can see that none of our tests were really CPU bound. This helps us know we were pushing our graphics hardware as hard as possible. We can also expect Valve to use as much of the CPU headroom they can for other things in the actual game. This is why we haven't taken as in depth a look at CPU scaling yet.
We hope our coverage of Valve's latest beta release has been informative, and if there is anything further anyone would like to explore, please feel free to drop us a comment and let us know.
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DerekWilson - Friday, August 27, 2004 - link
we run with default configuration -- trilin opt on aniso opt off ... this probably accounts for the issues.there isn't a config that you can set to make nv and ati do the exact same thing. unfortunately. also, most people run default settings when it comes to opts (AFAIK).
Tobyus - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
Derek, I may have missed it in the article, but did you say whether or not you enabled Trilinear and Anistropic Optimizations? Also, I didn't see whether you ran with vsync off, but I am guessing you did since that causes about a 10 fps performance loss on my system.I ran the benchmarks with this system (yes, they are beta drivers, and I had Anistropic and Trilinear optimizations enabled, but I also ran the test with 61.77 drivers and at 1600x1200 with 4xAA, 8xAF and the Highest detail settings including Water: Reflect all, I was getting 52 fps)
Athlon 64 3000+
MSI K8T800
1GB OCZ PC3200
Geforce 6800 GT
Windows XP Pro SP1
DX9.0c
Forceware 65.62
My tests were all run with the highest settings in the advanced options, except reflect world/reflect all which I will specify in each individual benchmark. These tests were also run with 4xAA and 8xAF.
800x600
Reflect World: 126.88
Reflect All: 114.45
1024x768
Reflect World: 113.25
Reflect All: 102.98
1280x960
Reflect World: 88.95
Reflect All: 83.25
1600x1200
Reflect World: 55.61
Reflect All: 53.21
2048x1536
Reflect World: 31.30
Reflect All: 29.98
I don't understand why I had better performance than your system Derek. I have nothing overclocked, and the only settings I can think of that I have enabled that you may not have are the optimizations. Is it true that ATI cards default to running with optimizations and they cannot be disabled? If that is true, I would think that it would be fair to enable optimizations on the nvidia cards and that may show a nice improvement and a closer race between the two brands of cards.
SirDude - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
"As a student at North Carolina State University, Derek Wilson [B]double majored[/B] in both [B]Electrical and Computer Engineering[/B]. After graduating, Derek brought his extensive Engineering background to work with the AnandTech team. Derek's specializations include [B]compiler theory and design[/B], giving him [B]a unique understanding of microprocessor architecture and optimization[/B]. He has also done [B]extensive work[/B] in the [B]3D field[/B], having [B]designed and implemented[/B] his own [B]3D rendering engine[/B] as well as having done much [B]programming for modern console platforms[/B]. Derek's hands-on experience in the realm of 3D graphics gives him a unique eye in his coverage of the PC graphics industry."#35 you know better then this guy I suppose? Here's an idea for ya', why don't you shut up and go away you [B][U][I]Troll[/I][/U][/B]
thelanx - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
Just read the rest of the article, after reading between the typos and reading the conclusion, it appears even with the console commands, the FX series is still running the DX 8.0/8.1 path, even if you try to force the dx 9 path. Thus AT is justified in not including the fx 5950 in their review.#35, Looks like you could benefit from some homework too, perhaps reading that article you posted more carefully. ;) Next time, give constructive criticism but try not to be so harsh. You aren't the only one guilty of harshness, intellectual discussion and debate is great, but many of the discussions on the net would be better with more cool heads. :)
thelanx - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
#35 As I recall, and as the article you posted confirms, the 6800 series do not automatically run the benchmark in dx8, it is only the fx series and below.Ballistics - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
If you guys would have done your homework before posting this article you would have been informed. Having done that you could have accurstely informed us.Don't know a good way to benchmark CS Source? Don't know how to force the hardware to use DX 9.0 ? Don't mention that all nVidia cards are forced to use DX 8.1 while ATI trudges away at DX 9.0 and coincidentally falls behind?
Here's a link to the article: http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/half_life_2_fx...
Educate yourselves.
yanon - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
In the future, Anandtech should do at least two benchmarks--one for the extreme gamer and one for the average gamer.Right now, the extreme gamers probably have AMD FX-53, the Raptor Drive, 2 Gbytes worth of elite super overclocked ram, and Geforce 6800GT/Ultra.
The average gamers probably have something close to AMD XP 2500+, any 7200rpm harddrive with 8Mbytes of cache, 512 MB to 1 GB worth of value DDR ram, Geforce 5700/ATI 96000/ ATI 9800.
yanon - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
The sentiment is clear. People want to see a benchmark score for a setup that includes AMD XP 2500+, ATI 9800 Pro, and 512 Mbytes of DDR 3200 ram.flashbacck - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
Can you guys post results for more midrange hardware? Not everyone has a Geforce 6800 XT, Radeon X800 SuperMegaUltraProPlatinumSpecialLimitedEdition or Athlon 64 50000+.Cygni - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
I like the way people are bitching about typos on a site thats offering FREE articles to the public. Jeeze.And oh, I dont really care what OTHER sites are getting on these tests. If you have been around the net, you know the likelyhood of Anandtech being wrong is pretty close to nil. This aint Toms.