F.E.A.R. GPU Performance Tests: Setting a New Standard
by Josh Venning on October 20, 2005 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
As we said in our introduction, FEAR does indeed set a new standard for games, and there is no denying the quality of its graphics. Perhaps there could have been more variety in some areas, but the beauty of the action sequences can't be matched in any first-person shooter that we've seen. For graphics, FEAR paves the way for a new generation of games, and is also the first game able to bring the highest powered cards available to their knees when played at its full graphical potential.
We feel that it is important to note that we tested with products unavailable at this time. We feel that it is important to look forward at what we might be able to expect from ATI in terms of performance. At the same time, we feel that that gap between launch and availability of product at this point in the game is a huge mistake. All we need to say about the subject is that there is no reason to wait for these cards to become available based on our performance analysis.
This game alone gives players without high end monitors a real reason to justify saving up for a 7800 GTX. Those who want to play FEAR at the highest resolution and settings with AA enabled (without soft shadows) will basically have to use the 7800 GTX, as no other card available gets playable framerates at those settings, and the 7800 GTX does just barely (if uncomfortably). If you have to play at 1600x1200 and you don't care about AA, then the 7800 GT and possibly the 6800 GT will play well, as will ATI's X1800 XL. However, don't run out and buy an X1800 XL just yet because the 7800 GT runs the game better, and right now, you can buy the NVIDIA darling for less money than the X1800 XL (about $340 as opposed to $390).
FEAR looks good enough that people will enjoy the game at even the lowest resolutions, and all of the cards that we've tested will run the game fine at resolutions as high as 1024x768 without AA and soft shadows, with the exception of the X1300 PRO. This card performed the worst overall, but it still runs FEAR fine (without AA and SS) at 800x600. If you are on a shoestring budget, but need to buy one of these cards to play FEAR, a good choice would be the X800 GT for $130, or even better, the 6600 GT for about $15 more. That's not much more money considering the 6600 GT gets 31 fps at 1280x1024 compared to only 25 fps on the X800 GT, which we wouldn't waste our time. With the MSRP on the X1300 Pro sitting at about $150, we can't see how the part will sell at all given its competition.
If you are looking for a good middle-of-the-road card that could handle 1024x768 with AA enabled, the 6800 GT might be a good choice, but at $280, it might be nice to save up and get the 7800 GT ($340). Overall though, given performance and price, you'll want to stay away from both the X1800 XL and the X1300 PRO, as they just aren't practical. Keep in mind, however, that these are still very new graphics cards and prices change.
This is very old news by now, but we have to mention it yet again. The fact that ATI still has no competitor for the 7800 GTX yet means that lots of FEAR players will be looking to NVIDIA for their graphics solution. This puts ATI behind again, and with games like Quake 4 coming out soon, things are looking even worse for ATI than they already have been. We were happy to see that ATI is at least coming out with high end parts, but where is the 7800 GTX competition? We need to see the X1800 XT on shelves with a competitive price soon, or there won't be much that can help ATI, especially with the rumors about what's coming down the pipe from NVIDIA.
All that aside, our focus here is on FEAR, and while we aren't saying that this is the best game out now by any means, we are saying that it is probably the most significant, given how graphically demanding it is. Be assured that we will be giving it a much more thorough testing on the "fun-ness" factor for a while to come.
As we said in our introduction, FEAR does indeed set a new standard for games, and there is no denying the quality of its graphics. Perhaps there could have been more variety in some areas, but the beauty of the action sequences can't be matched in any first-person shooter that we've seen. For graphics, FEAR paves the way for a new generation of games, and is also the first game able to bring the highest powered cards available to their knees when played at its full graphical potential.
We feel that it is important to note that we tested with products unavailable at this time. We feel that it is important to look forward at what we might be able to expect from ATI in terms of performance. At the same time, we feel that that gap between launch and availability of product at this point in the game is a huge mistake. All we need to say about the subject is that there is no reason to wait for these cards to become available based on our performance analysis.
This game alone gives players without high end monitors a real reason to justify saving up for a 7800 GTX. Those who want to play FEAR at the highest resolution and settings with AA enabled (without soft shadows) will basically have to use the 7800 GTX, as no other card available gets playable framerates at those settings, and the 7800 GTX does just barely (if uncomfortably). If you have to play at 1600x1200 and you don't care about AA, then the 7800 GT and possibly the 6800 GT will play well, as will ATI's X1800 XL. However, don't run out and buy an X1800 XL just yet because the 7800 GT runs the game better, and right now, you can buy the NVIDIA darling for less money than the X1800 XL (about $340 as opposed to $390).
FEAR looks good enough that people will enjoy the game at even the lowest resolutions, and all of the cards that we've tested will run the game fine at resolutions as high as 1024x768 without AA and soft shadows, with the exception of the X1300 PRO. This card performed the worst overall, but it still runs FEAR fine (without AA and SS) at 800x600. If you are on a shoestring budget, but need to buy one of these cards to play FEAR, a good choice would be the X800 GT for $130, or even better, the 6600 GT for about $15 more. That's not much more money considering the 6600 GT gets 31 fps at 1280x1024 compared to only 25 fps on the X800 GT, which we wouldn't waste our time. With the MSRP on the X1300 Pro sitting at about $150, we can't see how the part will sell at all given its competition.
If you are looking for a good middle-of-the-road card that could handle 1024x768 with AA enabled, the 6800 GT might be a good choice, but at $280, it might be nice to save up and get the 7800 GT ($340). Overall though, given performance and price, you'll want to stay away from both the X1800 XL and the X1300 PRO, as they just aren't practical. Keep in mind, however, that these are still very new graphics cards and prices change.
This is very old news by now, but we have to mention it yet again. The fact that ATI still has no competitor for the 7800 GTX yet means that lots of FEAR players will be looking to NVIDIA for their graphics solution. This puts ATI behind again, and with games like Quake 4 coming out soon, things are looking even worse for ATI than they already have been. We were happy to see that ATI is at least coming out with high end parts, but where is the 7800 GTX competition? We need to see the X1800 XT on shelves with a competitive price soon, or there won't be much that can help ATI, especially with the rumors about what's coming down the pipe from NVIDIA.
All that aside, our focus here is on FEAR, and while we aren't saying that this is the best game out now by any means, we are saying that it is probably the most significant, given how graphically demanding it is. Be assured that we will be giving it a much more thorough testing on the "fun-ness" factor for a while to come.
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giles00 - Tuesday, October 25, 2005 - link
I thought the bit-tech review was more relevant - they actually sat down and played the game, proving that the inbuilt graphics test doesn't bare any representation on real game play.http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2005/10/24/fear/1.h...">http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2005/10/24/fear/1.h...
here's a good quote:
lindy01 - Sunday, October 23, 2005 - link
Having to upgrade your hardware to the latest and greatest to get good looking games is crazy. In the last two years its spun out of control.My 9700pro lasted the longest, then I bought a 6800GT for $359.....my next purchase is a xbox360 for $399....I am sure if they make a version of Fear for it it will look great on my 50inch HD Sony TV. Ahhh and it probably wont ship full of bugs.
Dam if it were not for PC games my system would be a 1ghz P3 with 512megs of ram!
Regs - Monday, October 24, 2005 - link
I'm a little reluctant too this year to upgrade. The worse thing about it is when they make a good optimized graphics engine , like HL2's & Far Cry's, they dont seem to last very long. I expected at least a few other developers to make good quality games with them but that never happened. So the end result is that you're upgrading your PC for 2 or 3 titles a year. ID's OpenGL based engine was the only real "big" seller with Riddick and Quake 4 thankfully. Plus if you include the problem that if the games turned out not to be in your liking you're stuck with 1000 dollars worth of useless hardware.CronicallyInsane - Sunday, October 23, 2005 - link
I got the game, installed the new patch, and have been running @ 1024x768 just fine with the majority of the goodies on. Given, no soft shadows, and on 4x rather than 8x or 16x, but it looks beautiful to me.2.4Gig Northwood @ 3 gig
1 gig pc3200
Raptor 36G
6600gt agp @ 550/1.1
Try it before you bash it, ya know?
d
carl0ski - Sunday, October 23, 2005 - link
I am starting to think technology sites are forgeting they are to be reviewing the game.Not VIDEO cards.
So What the hell is this (not yet available) doing in an article helping us decide to buy a game?
we want to buy the game knowing whether it will run on what people own.
Geforce TI's
ATI 9800XT
ATI Radeon X1300 Pro
ATI Radeon X800 GT
NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX
NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT
NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT
etc
AS that is what the mainstream/people own already
We want to know if it'll run on our own computers!!
simple as that.
How many of the 1,000,000's of copies a game is sold on do people run on $400 current generation Cards?
probably only a small percentage
most people i know who bought BF2 use cards ranging 6 months - 2 year old cards.
yacoub - Sunday, October 23, 2005 - link
Any chance this will actually happen?http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid...">http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...amp;thre...
Regs - Saturday, October 22, 2005 - link
You make reference to how the soft shadows are implemented to Riddick compared to FEARs yet I searched the site and there is no benchmarks or IQ comparisons of Riddick. If you asked me that's a major problem considering you have no evidence published to back up your own statement.Jeff7181 - Saturday, October 22, 2005 - link
This should be a game review... not a GPU review. Review the game, play the game how you'd actually play it... with sound enabled. THEN show us the FPS measurements.yacoub - Saturday, October 22, 2005 - link
A large number of Anandtech readers do not comprehend anything other than "GPU review" so you will likely not see a true game review anytime soon on a realistic rig. It's always only ever a GPU test with an FX-55. =/yacoub - Saturday, October 22, 2005 - link
You include the 6600GT and 6800GT but not the X800XL and X800XT, the two comparable cards. Stop with the 1800-series nonsense and post the BUYABLE ATI cards as well please! Would be nice for those of us considering upgrading to an X800XL or 6800GT to see how they stand up in FEAR. :(