The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion GPU Performance
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 26, 2006 1:07 PM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Mid Range GPU Performance w/ HDR Enabled
Next we looked at mainstream GPU performance, targeting graphics cards that were priced at or below $300; for reference we've tossed in a few pairs of cards running in SLI or CrossFire.
Not only have we reduced the resolution, but we've significantly reduced the image quality settings here. The result is a good balance between image quality and performance, however we would much rather play with our high quality settings as Oblivion can be one very impressive looking game with the details cranked up.
The white lines within the bars indicate minimum frame rate
The king of the mid range is actually the Radeon X1800 XT offering pretty much the best performance you can get for under $300, even outperforming the GeForce 7900 GT. If you already have a Radeon X1600 XT and happen to own a CrossFire capable motherboard, then simply picking up one more X1600 XT will do wonders for your performance. Remember that the X1600 series can run in CrossFire mode without any external dongle, so all you need are two X1600 XTs and you'll be looking at fairly good performance. While we wouldn't recommend purchasing two X1600 XTs (you're far better off with a single 7900 GT), if you already have one it's the cheapest way to get a good performance boost in Oblivion.
The GeForce 7600 GT proves to be a good middle of the road performer here, offering good performance while being priced at under $200.
The GeForce 6600 GT is unfortunately overwhelmed by our medium quality settings, and unfortunately has now become a low end contender as far as Oblivion is concerned. Running a pair of 6600GTs in SLI improves performance a bit but still no where near what a pair of X1600 XTs will do in CrossFire mode.
The white lines within the bars indicate minimum frame rate
Once again we see that there's no significant performance difference between the GPUs at the top of the charts, but performance really begins to drop off after the 7600 GT.
The white lines within the bars indicate minimum frame rate
The Medium Quality Dungeon benchmark is very friendly to the NVIDIA cards here, with the first ATI showing being the X1800 GTO half way down the graph. The GeForce 7900 GT and Radeon X1800 XT continue to be the best performers here, but the 7600 GT isn't too far behind.
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bobsmith1492 - Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - link
I'm playing with a 9700 mobility (basically 9600 ultra) in my laptop with a P-M and a gigger at 1024, medium settings about like you set it. Where in the world did all those extra settings come from though (shadows, water)? Is that something outside the game itself?ueadian - Thursday, April 27, 2006 - link
I played this game fine on my X800XL with high settings.. Yeah it PROBABLY dipped into the 20's but honestly I never really noticed "lag". I shortcircuited my X800XL by stupidly putting a fan with a metal casing on top of it it went ZZZZT and died. I bought a 7900 GT for 299.99 and voltmoded it to GTX speeds and I really don't notice a difference while playing the game. Yeah I'm sure if I payed attention to FPS I'd see it, but really, the only place I noticed lag with my X800XL at high settings was by oblivion gates, and my 7900 GT at 680 core 900 mem locks up near oblivion gates as well. I was sort of forced to "upgrade" my card, but the 7900 GT is the best value for the money right now considering you can do a pen mod to get it to run PAST GTX speeds fairly easy. I have a crappy CRT who's max resolution is 1024x768 and dont plan on upgrading it anytime soon, so I don't need 512mb memory to throw the resolution up to goddly high settings, besides, im pretty blind, I find it easier to play most online games like FPS's at lower resolution just to gain an advantage. Oblivion is near perfection as a GAME it's the most enjoyable game I've ever played, and I've been playing games since Doom. Yeah the engine does suck, and I was really disapointed to have my brand new top of the line video card actualy STUTTER in a game, but really, does it completely ruin the whole game for you? If you have played it you know that it doesn't.thisisatest - Thursday, April 27, 2006 - link
7900 series isn't what I consider to be the top of the line. There is high end and there is top of the line. The top of the line is clear.poohbear - Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - link
im really curious to see how dualcore cpus perform as Oblivion is supposed to take advantage of multithreading. if anandtech could do a cpu performance chart that'd be great. firingsquad did a cpu performance chart but only @ 2 resolutions, 800x600 & 1280x1024, they found significant differences between dualcore and singlecore on 800x600 but no diff on 1280x1024. now, i play @ 1024x768 on my 6800GT, so wondering if a dualcore would help in that resolution. also, if u could investigate some of the supposed tweaks for dualcores and if they truly work that'd be great too. thanks.Eris23007 - Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - link
A friend of mine is playing it on a 3.4GHz Northwood; he told me that when he enabled HyperThreading he got an immediate ~10% (or so) improvement.
That's a pretty good indication that dual cores will help a *lot*, in my view...
mpeavid - Thursday, April 27, 2006 - link
10% is VERY pooor multi threading performance. A decent multi threaded app should give 40-60 and higher for highlt efficient codes.nullpointerus - Thursday, April 27, 2006 - link
HT isn't the same as having dual cores. IIRC, ~10% improvement from HT is rather typical in certain areas where multiple cores have significantly better returns.Akaz1976 - Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - link
Anyone have any idea how 9800PRO compares to x800?hoppa - Friday, April 28, 2006 - link
What this test fails to mention is that I'm running a 9800 pro, Athlon XP 3000+, 1.5 gigs of ram, at 1280x768, and the game runs quite well even at medium settings. This game is very stressful at maximum everything but still manages to run incredibly well on older rigs and lower settings. Had I not played this game, after seeing this article I would've thought that it'd be impossible on my rig, but the truth is I've got plenty of computing power to spare.xsilver - Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - link
9800pro is considered midrange/lowend now -- i guess that article is coming latermy guess is aprox 10% less than the lowest card on each graph besides the 7300gs (also you dont have HDR)