Date:
Monday , May 04, 2009
Author:
Matthew Krysiak
Editor:
Brent Justice
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XFX HD 4870 1GB XXX and MSI N260GTX OC3

We evaluate our first AMD GPU video card from XFX, the Radeon HD 4870 1GB XXX. We compare to MSI’s new custom N260GTX OC3. Both are tested against an ATI Radeon HD 4890 to see which comes out on top in F.E.A.R. 2, GTA IV, Fallout 3, FarCry 2, and Crysis Warhead. In-depth overclock testing too.

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System Test Setup

For our test system platform we are using an ASUS Blitz Formula motherboard with an Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9650 processor at 3.66GHz, and 4GB of OCZ Technology DDR2 PC2-8000 Platinum. For the power supply, we will be using a Corsair TX750W.

While it might be a bit "overkill," we use the 3.6GHz overclocked quad-core processor in an attempt to keep from putting our evaluation into a position of being CPU limited. Obviously, we make every effort to not use CPU limited games for video card evaluations, but the 3.6GHz processor seems to put many peoples’ minds at ease when it comes to that subject.

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Driver Setup

With both the NVIDIA and AMD video cards we will be using the latest drivers. For the NVIDIA video card we will be using the ForceWare 185.68 BETA driver. For the AMD video cards we will be using the Catalyst 9.4 WHQL driver.

Below are GPU-Z screenshots of the XFX Radeon HD 4870 XXX and the MSI N260GTX OC3 after we installed the drivers

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Evaluation Method

We evaluate what each video card configuration can supply us in terms of a playable gaming experience while supplying the best culmination of resolution and "eye candy" graphical settings. We focus on quality and immersion of the gameplay experience rather than how many frames per second the card can get in a canned benchmark or prerecorded timedemo situation that often do not represent real gameplay like you would experience at home . Then we will follow with apples-to-apples testing based on real gameplay as well.