Test Setup and Results

I am currently unable to do the frame rating/frame pacing testing that Ryan does.  It simply costs a lot of money to get that setup.  Instead, I have used the more traditional testing of FPS across multiple applications and benchmarks.  In this context, it certainly does not invalidate these results.  Ryan covers every new GPU with the frame rating suite, so if a reader is curious about those results, they can find them on this site.

The pack is very comprehensive when it comes to what a user needs to get up and running.  Lots of extras like stickers and posters round out the goodies for the enthusiast crowd.

I recently changed from the AMD test system to the Intel based i7 3770K.  This CPU certainly pushes even high end graphics cards and gives us a better look at their theoretical performance.  I also started testing in only 1920×1200 and 2560×1600.

I test the cards in a rather large case, instead of an open air workstation.  I believe this is more representative of most usage scenarios, and the controlled airflow does provide positive results when it comes to thermals.

The back of the box has the transparent window so a user can verify that the card in the box matches what is printed on the front.

For comparison I am using the Asus GTX 770, Asus R9 280X, Asus R9 270X, and the Asus GTX 760.  I show the 280X and 270X in CrossFire using the latest Beta drivers that enable Frame Pacing to resolutions up to 2560×1600.

Intel i7 3770K

Gigabyte G1 Sniper 3

GSkill 2 x 4GB DDR-3 1866

WD 1 TB Caviar Black HD

Lite-On BDR

Enermax Fulmo GT Case

Corsair AX1200 Power Supply

Windows 7 64 Bit

AMD Catalyst 13.12 Drivers

NVIDIA 331.82 Drivers

 

Results

I try to have a good balance of synthetic testing combined with real world results.  I believe this is a good balance of what is theoretically possible with these chips vs. what we see in actual games.  Let us start off with the synthetics first.

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