System setup and notes
| Graphics cards | Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 1,024MB | HIS Radeon HD 5970 2,048MB |
|---|---|---|
| Current pricing, including VAT | £315 | £570 |
| Shader model | 5.0 | 5.0 |
| Stream processors | 1,600 | 3,200 |
| GPU clock speed (MHz) | 850 | 725 |
| Shader clock speed (MHz) | 850 | 825 |
| Memory clock speed (MHz) | 4,800 | 4,000 |
| Memory bus width (bits) | 256 | 256 |
| CPU | Intel Core i7 965 Extreme Edition (3.20GHz, 8MB L3 cache, quad-core, LGA1366) | |
| Motherboard | Foxconn Bloodrage X58 | |
| Motherboard BIOS | P08 | |
| Mainboard software | Intel Inf 9.1.0.1015 | |
| Memory | 6GB Crucial PC10600 (3x2GB) | |
| Memory timings and speed | 9-9-9-24 1T @ DDR3-1,333 | |
| PSU | Corsair HX850W | |
| Monitor | 3 x NEC EA231WMi Widescreen 23in TFT (3 x 1,920x1,080) | |
| Disk drive(s) | Seagate 1TB Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 (3Gb/s mode) | |
| Graphics driver | 5970 press driver | 5970 press driver |
| Operating system | Windows 7 RTM Ultimate, 64-bit | |
Software
| 3D Benchmarks | Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 - DX9 - very high quality - FRAPS Far Cry 2 v1.03 - very high quality Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X v1.2, internal benchmark: DX10/10.1 - very high quality |
|---|
Notes
All three benchmarks are conducted at 5,760x1,080 with maximum in-game detail.
The most-anticipated game of the year Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released last week to critical acclaim and booming sales but doesn't officially support ATI Eyefinity. Although allowing the 5,760x,1,080 resolution as an option, we found the game's aspect ratio to be all wrong. Nonetheless, to show you what happens with a non-supported title, we're FRAPSing a 60-second firefight near the start of the title to give an idea of performance whilst we await some form of Eyefinity fix via driver/software updates.
Far Cry 2 and Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X both support Eyefinity and render perfectly at 5,760x1,080.
We did, of course, attempt to go all out with a pair of Sapphire Radeon HD 5970s configured in CrossFireX. Unfortunately, ATI Eyefinity doesn't yet appear to support multi-card CrossFireX configurations and we found our games constantly crashing out.
