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Double Stacker Riposte - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 Preview

By Kenny Yeo - 18 Dec 2008

Test Setup

Test Setup

Before we jump into the results of our benchmarking tests, let's have a quick look at our test setup. This time, all our tests will be done solely on our Vista system. Our system has the following specifications:-

  • Windows Vista SP1 Test System
  • Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 (3.00GHz)
  • Gigabyte X38T-DQ6 motherboard
  • 2 x 1GB DDR3-1333 Aeneon memory in dual channel mode
  • Seagate 7200.10 200GB SATA hard drive
  • Windows Vista Ultimate with SP1

For the purpose of this preview, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 will be compared against the ATI's flagship the Radeon HD 4870 X2, as well as the Radeon HD 4870. To see how much faster the new NVIDIA flagship is, we've also included the GeForce GTX 280 and the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216. The GeForce GTX 295 is running on beta ForceWare 180.87 drivers provided by NVIDIA, whereas the other NVIDIA cards are running on the recently released ForceWare 180.48 drivers. The cards from the red camp, on the other hand, are running on Catalyst 8.10 drivers as we've not yet updated them to the latest that was just released a few days back. Still, it should give you a good picture of what to expect since drivers alone don't dictate the absolute performance of the hardware. The complete list of cards tested is as follows:-

  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 1792MB GDDR3 (ForceWare 180.87)
  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280 1GB GDDR3 (ForceWare 180.48)
  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896MB GDDR3 (ForceWare 180.48)
  • ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 2GB GDDR5 (Catalyst 8.10)
  • ATI Radeon HD 4870 512MB GDDR5 (Catalyst 8.10)

For the purpose of this preview and due to restrictions from NVIDIA, we will only be testing the GeForce GTX 295 with the following benchmarks. Rest assured we'll have more testing done by the time we release the full review in a few weeks when the card is officially launched with probably a better driver set.

  • Far Cry 2
  • Left 4 Dead
  • Futuremark 3DMark Vantage (ver 101)
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