Testbed and Methods
We installed the XFX GeForce 6600 GDDR2 graphics card into our testbed computer:
- AMD Athlon 64 4000+ CPU (2.40GHz, 1MB L2 cache)
- ASUS A8N-SLI Premium mainboard (NVIDIA nForce4 SLI chipset)
- OCZ PC3200 Platinum EL DDR SDRAM (2 x 1GB, CL2-3-2-5)
- Samsung SpinPoint SP1213C hard disk drive (Serial ATA-150, 8MB buffer)
- Creative SoundBlaster Audigy 2 sound card
- Cooler Master Real Power 450 power supply (RS-450-ACLY, 450W)
- Dell P1130 and Dell P1110 monitors (21? 1800x1440@75Hz max display mode)
- Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP2 with DirectX 9.0c
- ATI Catalyst 5.9 (with RADEON X1000 support)
- NVIDIA ForceWare 81.89 (it抯 an analog of the WHQL-certified ForceWare 81.85 with support of all new cards from NVIDIA)
We set up the ATI and NVIDIA drivers in the following way:
ATI CATALYST 5.9:
- CATALYST A.I.: Standard
- Mipmap Detail Level: Quality
- Wait for vertical refresh: Always off
- Adaptive antialiasing: Off
- Temporal antialiasing: Off
- Quality AF: Off
- Other settings: default
NVIDIA ForceWare 81.89:
- Image Settings: Quality
- Vertical sync: Off
- Trilinear optimization: On
- Anisotropic mip filter optimization: Off
- Anisotropic sample optimization: On
- Gamma correct antialiasing: On (for GeForce 7 only)
- Transparency antialiasing: Off (for GeForce 7 only)
- Other settings: default
We select the highest graphics quality settings in each game, identical for graphics cards from ATI and NVIDIA. If possible, we use the games?integrated benchmarking tools (to record and reproduce a demo and measure the reproduction speed in frames per second). Otherwise we measure the frame rate with the FRAPS utility. If it is possible, we measure minimal as well as average fps rates to give you a fuller picture.
We turn on 4x full-screen antialiasing and 16x anisotropic filtering in the 揺ye candy?test mode from the game抯 own menu if possible. Otherwise we force the necessary mode from the driver. We don抰 test the 揺ye candy?mode if the game engine doesn抰 support FSAA.
Since the described product belongs to the entry-level sector, we only tested 1024x768 resolution when FSAA and anisotropic filtering were turned on ?the performance of the card was just too low for comfortable play in higher resolutions.
Besides the XFX GeForce 6600 GDDR2, the following graphics cards took part in this test session:
- GeForce 6600 GT (NV43, 500/1000MHz, 8pp, 3vp, 128-bit, 128MB)
for details see our article called Leadtek WinFast PX6600 GT TDH Graphics Card Review - GeForce 6600 (NV43, 300/500MHz, 8pp, 3vp, 128-bit, 128MB)
- RADEON X1300 PRO (RV515, 600/800MHz, 4pp, 2vp, 128-bit, 256MB)
for details see our article called ATI RADEON X1300 PRO: Entry-Level Gets a Decent Performer? - RADEON X700 (RV410, 400/700MHz, 8pp, 6vp, 128-bit, 256MB)
The GeForce 6600 and the RADEON X700 graphics cards were emulated by down-clocking the GeForce 6600 GT and the RADEON X700 PRO, respectively.
These games and applications were used as benchmarks:
First-Person 3D Shooters:
- Battlefield 2
- The Chronicles of Riddick
- Doom 3
- Far Cry
- F.E.A.R.
- Half-Life 2
- Serious Sam 2
- Pariah
- Project Snowblind
- Quake 4
- Unreal Tournament 2004
Third-Person 3D Shooters:
- Prince of Persia: Warrior Within
- Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Simulators:
- Colin McRae Rally 2005
- Pacific Fighters
Strategies:
- Age of Empires 3
- Warhammer 40.000: Dawn of War
Semi-synthetic benchmarks:
- Aquamark3
- Final Fantasy XI Official Benchmark 3
Synthetic benchmarks:
- Futuremark 3DMark03 build 360
- Futuremark 3DMark05 build 120
