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Review: GeForce FX5600 Ultra rev2

by Ryszard Sommefeldt on 18 June 2003, 00:00 4.5

Tags: NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qar2

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System Setup


• AMD Athlon XP3200+ 'Barton' Processor, 2200MHz, 512KB L2 cache, 11 x 200MHz, Socket A
• Asus A7N8X Deluxe 2.0 motherboard, nForce2 Ultra 400 chipset, Socket A
• 2 x 256MB Corsair XMS3200 memory, CL2, 6-2-2, DDR400 on the Asus motherboard

GeForce FX5600 Ultra (2nd revision)
• ATI Radeon 9600
• Sapphire Atlantis ATI Radeon 9700 Pro

• Windows XP Professional Build 2600.xpclient.010817-1148 w SP1
• ATI CATALYST 3.4
• NVIDIA nForce 2.41 platform drivers
• NVIDIA Detonator FX 44.03 Display driver
• DirectX 9.0 Runtime

• 3DMark 2001SE v330
• UT2003 Retail (Build 2225)
• Comanche 4 Demo
• Serious Sam 2 Demo
• Quake3 v1.30
• Codecreatures Benchmark Pro

If you've managed to take in my previous pair of graphics card reviews, the 4 graph format will be familiar. We test 6 benchmarks over 3 settings on all the tested cards.

Blatant cut and paste next to tell you how it's all contrived. As always, each result is the result of a 3 test run, with the top and bottom results discarded and the middle one kept. If the 3 sampled results aren't within 2% of each other, they are all discarded and the 3 samples taken again. 6 benchmarks with 3 settings to be sampled per benchmark, per card. 3 tests x 3 samples x 6 benchmarks x 3 cards = 162 tests at a minimum.

The board is up against its chief rival from ATI, 9600 Pro. No 9500 Pro I'm afraid, I just wasn't able to grab hold of a board in time for this review going out.

Like other models in the GeForce FX range, the FX5600 Ultra runs at full clock speed during all 3D operations, in this case 400MHz core and 400MHz memory (800MHz DDR). However in 2D mode, the fan switches itself off and the core clock is backed off. The theory being, 2D operations require much less graphics horsepower, after all, how much processing power do you need to shift a few windows around the desktop. That in turn means the fan can be switched off during those quiet times, no bad thing since it's a little on the noisy side, although nothing too shocking. Core clock runs at 235MHz in '2D' mode, nearly half the '3D' clock. It doesn't affect any of the tested benchmarks at all and memory clock speed remains a heady 800MHz DDR, even in quiet-core 2D mode.

I've also thrown a Radeon 9700 Pro in to the mix, just to show you what the next performance leap is like above the midrange sector we're concentrating on. If we're lucky, the NVIDIA might even get close to 9700 Pro in some of the tests.

Here goes.