AMD Radeon HD 3800 Series. Tests of the "low-end" HD3850
Date: 04.12.2007
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Preparing for the test
Prior to running the tests, we are bringing in some useful information related to the specimen being tested.
Here you can see the screenshot from ?atalyst Control Center with information on the driver version.
This a screenshot of the "hardware" tab (all the parameters did not fit on a single screen, so we had to use a graphic editor to present the information in a compact way). If we look closer, we can see an amusing incident - CCC reports that the video card is running on the PCI-Express 2.0 bus although we have never had it at our test lab. Also here we can see the nominal speeds of the GPU and the video memory.
The ATI Overdrive section displays the limit frequencies for the 3D mode which can be set for HD3850 using the CCC. The GPU limit is set at 770 MHz, which meets the nominal frequency of the higher-end model - HD3870. The limit frequency for the video memory is set at 1117 real MHz (or, 2234 MHz DDR), which is also very close to the nominal frequency for the video memory of the higher-end "sister". Isn't that an amusing coincidence? Also here, we can see the temperature of the video card in the 2D mode which amounts to 60°. In the 2D mode, the GPU frequency shows an almost twofold drop and sets at merely 300 MHz. This is the power-saving technology in action.
Basically, the temperature of the GPU under load can be viewed again using ???, but that is more convenient to do using the RivaTuner utility, especially that it is already "aware" of HD3850.
As you can see, under load the GPU temperature goes almost up to 90 degrees. That happens because the cooler does not increase the RPMs and the video card remains absolutely noiseless. Perhaps, this figure is acceptable for engineers at AMD, since that does not affect the stability of the video card at all.
Overclocking
Clearly, it is advisable to improve cooling for better overclocking. Unfortunately, we had no enough time to search for the maximum frequencies with the comfortable noise level preserved. That is why we did in a different way. Using the RivaTuner utility, we set the cooler speed to 100% with the frequencies raised to 770/2000 MHz. And the video card did work fine at these frequencies, thus confirming its superb overclocking capability. Quite possibly, even that is not yet a limit, but now let's dwell at these frequencies in overclocking.
Well.. Now let's see how things are with the performance. We now explore the performance of Radeon HD3850 at both old and new games. The "standard" kit of games which we use has been complemented with these – World in conflict, Crysis Single Player Demo, and NFS Pro Street. And that is not the only change in the procedure of tests. Where it was possible to indicate the minimum FPS, we showed it with respective remarks.
As regards the rivals of Radeon HD3850, we decided to stop our choice on the two video cards - HD2900XT and 8800GT. We did not conduct more extensive tests again because of the shortage of time, but we promise to fill in the gap in our forthcoming reviews. Comparison versus HD2900XT is interesting in terms of the effect of the memory bus width which is more than two times different in these video cards. As we investigated formerly, HD2900XT is not always capable of making the most of the video memory bandwidth, but will cutting down the memory bus width affect HD3850? And, how balanced it may turn out? Comparison versus 8800GT is interesting for another reason. First, these cards are the two major novelties of this autumn. Whatever AMD and NVIDIA will do to position them in the eyes of the buyers, they will certainly remain as direct competitors. We already saw the results for overclocked 8800GT by Gigabyte which is capable of competing even versus 8800GTX. Today, we are comparing HD3850 versus 8800GT running at the nominal frequencies.
Test configuration
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Bus
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PCI-Express
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CPU
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MB
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Memory
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OS
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WinXP + SP2 + DirectX 9.0c
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PSU
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Thermaltake ToughPower 750 W
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We ran the tests using the ForceWare 169.04 and Catalyst 7.10 drivers.
The results for Radeon HD3850 are displayed on the diagrams with bright red. The results for Radeon HD3850 overclocked to 770/2000 MHz are displayed in orange. And the results for HD2900XT and 8800GT – in dark red and green colors.
3DMark
In 3DMark, at the nominal speeds the video card HD3850 is on par with 8800GT but is inferior to HD2900XT. At the same time, overclocking does not allow HD3850 to bypass HD2900XT. Does the advantage of the latter at the memory bus make itself felt?
The lag of HD3850 behind HD2900XT at the rated frequencies is easy to forecast. With the similar architecture, the novelty has a bit lower GPU frequency and of course twice as little memory bus width. So we are no commenting on this fact further.
Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivion
At Oblivion, 8800GT takes a sure lead over both the video cards by AMD at even the rated frequencies. At the same time, the 256-bit memory bus is not a hindrance. To all appearance, the cause is in the sensitivity of the game to the performance of the shader unit. The guesswork is indirectly confirmed by the fact that HD3850 is superior to HD2900XT at overclocking.
Need for Speed Carbon
The game Need for Speed Carbon is also very critical to the speed of shader execution, so 8800GT again leaves all the others well behind. At the same time, the results for HD3850 catch up with those for HD2900XT only on overclocking. But the value of the minimum FPS in HD3850 remains a bit worse than in HD2900XT. On the other hand, this lag is not fatal and even at 1600?1200 we felt no discomfort during the game.
Serious Sam 2
At Serious Sam II, 8800GT is of course a leader at the average FPS, but at low resolutions its minimum FPS is somehow worse than in video cards by AMD. In fact, at 1600?1200 all clicks into place, except the drop of minimum FPS in the overclocked HD3850.
Quake 4
At Quake 4, the novelty by AMD demonstrates superb results and at overclocking it even leaves 8800GT behind, which didn't use to be successful before.
Prey
However, at Prey built on the same engine as Quake 4, the gap in results is already in favor of 8800GT. On overclocking, HD3850 reaches the performance of HD2900XT but it is already unable to reach 8800GT.
F.E.A.R.
At F.E.A.R., the AMD's novelty shows a really decent result, especially in view of the fact that it has merely 256 MB video memory onboard, but in these test modes the game demands much more. We believe, this is just the reason the minimum FPS in HD3850 is much lower than that of the other participants of the tests.
Call of Juarez
In this test at Call of Juarez, the full-screen antialiasing did not work for some reason, despite all the contrivances. So, we present the results produced in the No AA/AF mode. HD3850 shows itself quite decently, however the performance somehow lags with the rise of resolution.
Now we move on to tests in new modern games.
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