Testing:
The tests to be executed include one synthetic benchmark, four benchmarks integrated with 3D games, thermal testing, and power consumption testing. Each card was run through the following tests, and the system was rebooted between each run.
» FutureMark 3DMark Vantage
» PT Boats - Knights of the Sea
» Devil May Cry
» Company of Heroes - Opposing Fronts
» Call of Juarez
» Thermal Testing
» Power Consumption Testing
For 3DMark Vantage and the 3D game based testing, the benchmarks were executed in two different configurations. The first was with the resolution and anti-aliasing set on the low side (typically 1280x1024 and no AA), and the second was with the resolution and anti-aliasing set on the higher side (typically 1680x1050 and 8x AA).
3DMark Vantage:
We'll start with FutureMark's 3DMark Vantage, and higher is better for all results reported. The complete suite of tests was first executed in "Performance" mode, which uses a 1280x1024 resolution. In this mode, the GPU score of the HD4850 X2 is just over 27% higher than the Toxic HD4870, and almost 37% higher than the pair of Toxic HD3870 cards in CrossFire. The total score of the HD4850 X2 also dominates, beating the other two configurations by about 17-23%.
3DMark Vantage was run a second time on each configuration, this time in "High" mode, which uses a 1680x1050 resolution. The scores may be lower here, but the margin of victory is even larger. The HD4850 X2 beats the Toxic HD4870 by about 36% in terms of the GPU score, and by about 19% in terms of total score.
Right out of the gate, the Sapphire Radeon HD4850 X2 2048MB graphics card has marked its territory as the alpha male of the bunch!
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