HEXUS.bang4buck, temps, power-draw, overclocking
In a rough-and-ready assessment of the cards' bang per buck, we've aggregated the 1,920x1,200 framerates for the four games, normalised them* and taken account of the cards' prices.
But there are more provisos than we'd care to shake a stick at. We could have chosen four different games, the cards' prices could have been derived from other sources and pricing tends to fluctuate daily.
Consequently, the table and graph below highlight a metric that should only be used as a yardstick for evaluating comparative performance with price factored in. Other architectural benefits are not covered, obviously.
| Graphics cards | Sapphire Radeon HD 4830 512MB | Sapphire HD 4830 512MB XF | PowerColor HD 4850 512MB | Force3D HD 4870 512MB | BFG GTX 280 OCX 1,024MB | BFG GTX 260 (216) OCX MAXCORE 896MB | ZOTAC GTX 260 896MB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Actual aggregate marks at 1,920x1,200 | 182.52 | 326.16 | 203.94 | 258.09 | 330.06 | 290.16 | 247.85 |
| Aggregate marks, normalised*, at 1,920x1,200 | 153.78 | 283.08 | 185.92 | 235.17 | 285.03 | 265.08 | 239.78 |
| Current pricing, including VAT | £100 | £200 | £115 | £185 | £351 | £257 | £190 |
| HEXUS.bang4buck score at 1,920x1,200 | 1.54 |
1.42 |
1.62 |
1.27 | 0.81 | 1.03 | 1.26 |
| Acceptable frame rate (av. 60fps) at 1,920x1,200 | No (CoH, CoD, ET) | Yes | No (CoH, CoD, ET) | No (CoH) | Yes | Yes | No (CoH, CoD, GRID) |
* the normalisation refers to taking playable frame rate into account.
Should a card benchmark at over 60 frames per second in any one game,
the extra fps count as half. Similarly, should a card benchmark lower,
say at 40fps, we deduct half the difference from its average frame rate
and the desired 60fps, giving it a HEXUS.bang4buck score of 30 marks.
The minimum allowable frame rate is 20fps but that scores zero.
Here's the HEXUS.bang4buck graph at 1,920x1,200. The graph divides the normalised score by the price.
| HEXUS.bang4buck (graphics) 1,920x1,200 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sapphire HD 4830 512MB | ZOTAC GTX 260 896MB | BFG GeForce GTX 280 OCX | BFG GeForce GTX 260 OCX MAX | Sapphire HD 4830 XF | Force3D HD 4870 | PowerColor Radeon HD 4850 |
| 1.54 | 1.26 | 0.81 | 1.03 | 1.42 | 1.3 | 1.62 |
The good news is that there are no stinkers here at all - every card produced decent-enough framerates, in most games, at 1,920x1,200.
Temperature musings
We perform our testing on an open test-bed with a 120mm fan simulating case airflow.
| Graphics cards | Sapphire Radeon HD 4830 512MB | Sapphire HD 4830 512MB XF | PowerColor HD 4850 512MB | Force3D HD 4870 512MB | BFG GTX 280 OCX 1,024MB | BFG GTX 260 (216) OCX MAXCORE 896MB | ZOTAC GTX 260 896MB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ambient temperature | 24°C | 23.5°C | 25°C | 23.5°C | 22°C | 21°C | 23°C |
| Idle temperature | 32°C | 35.5°C/32°C | 77°C | 78°C | 54°C | 42°C | 53°C |
| Load temperature | 54.5°C | 63°C/50°C | 82°C | 90°C | 74°C | 64°C | 71°C |
| Ambient-to-load delta | 30.5°C | 40°C/27.5°C | 57°C | 67°C | 52°C | 43°C | 48°C |
Our look at the card commented on the dual-slot cooler employed by Sapphire, and we wondered if it would come into its own with respect to temperatures. The answer appears to be a resounding yes, with incredibly low idling temperatures and below-average load temps. However, we'll only confirm this as we look at a greater number of HD 4830 cards.
The second column details the temps on both GPUs in a CrossFire setup. Note that GPU0 (left-hand numbers) is significantly hotter than the other. GPU0 is the one in the primary slot and, consequently, struggles a little to draw in cooler air.Power-draw
We test this using an at-mains watt-meter and use the same power supply and platform (X48) for all cards. The reading takes the whole platform into account and is calculated whilst the system is idling and when running 3DMark06 at 1,920x1,200 4xAA 8xAF.
| Graphics cards | Sapphire Radeon HD 4830 512MB | Sapphire HD 4830 512MB XF | PowerColor HD 4850 512MB | Force3D HD 4870 512MB | BFG GTX 280 OCX 1,024MB | BFG GTX 260 (216) OCX MAXCORE 896MB | ZOTAC GTX 260 896MB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Idle power-draw | 99W | 134W | 106W | 141W | 107W | 107W | 103W |
| Load power-draw | 168W | 275W | 175W | 216W | 260W | 233W | 227W |
Unsurprisingly, the single-card idle and load power-draw is the lowest of the bunch, but putting two together makes it the most power-thirsty combination on test, just beating out a pre-overclocked GeForce GTX 280.
Overclocking
We managed to push the dual GPUs' core right up to 708MHz,
from the
default 575MHz, representing a 23 per cent overclock. The memory,
however, refused to budge an inch without causing visual corruption.
The elevated frequencies returned an average framerate of 90.6fps in
our Enemy Territory: Quake Wars test, up from the default 78.6fps - a
nice, healthy increase.
