Game Benchmarks
Games are mostly limited by the graphics cards. At the borderlines, however, is when a good processor begins to shine. A decent processor can mean those extra two or three frames per second that you need to make the game playable at your desired settings. The games that are we are going to be considering are some of the most popular games today. These games are Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Crysis, Crysis Warhead, Left 4 Dead, and FarCry 2. These games are considerably demanding and will present a great challenge for the Core i7 processor.
Crysis
Crysis uses the CryEngine 2 which is a revision of the first CryEngine first developed for and used in Far Cry. The engine features destructible vegetation, buildings, shading effects, water effects, and environmental interaction. The newest improvement of the Cry Engine 2 over its predecessor is support for the new shader models and DX10 in addition to the old DX9.
| 1680 x 1050 16 Qx AA | 1680 x 1050 No AA | ||||||
| v. high | high | med | low | v. high | high | med | low |
| 21.28 | 36.39 | 64.42 | 96.39 | 24.7 | 41.22 | 63.74 | 95.8 |
| 1280 x 1024 16 Qx AA | 1280 x 1024 No AA | ||||||
| v. high | high | med | low | v. high | high | med | low |
| 28.73 | 48.93 | 70.94 | 102.71 | 32.02 | 52.89 | 71.52 | 103.97 |
Crysis still has the ability to bring even the most powerful systems to its knees. This game is where the processor truly has the ability to bring itself up to the task and pick up the slack left from the graphics card. Here the processor scored an average of 21 fps on V. High with max AA and AF and an almost playable 24 fps with AA turned off in a 1680 x 1050 resolution. At high the processor score very playable frame rates of 36 fps with AA maxed out and 41 with AA turned off. All other resolutions below this threshold were playable at all settings.
Crysis Warhead
With Crysis Warhead came another wave of PC breaking graphics. This game has an even better ability of bringing a system to its knees, and it proved to do so as soon as we set it anything above “Gamer” in the 1680 x1050 resolution with AA turned off. It seems that AA in this game just drives the performance along with everything else into the ground. At maximum settings with max AA the system was barely making 5 frames per second. This does not even come close to playable. After I turned the AA off, we were able to recover a bit from the horrible loss with the 19 fps, but the game was still not playable at that point. It seems to me that the best settings you can select while still having the game playable is setting to “Gamer” mode and turning off AA or leaving the settings at “Mainstream” and maxing out the AA.
| 1680 x 1050 16 x AA | 1680 x 1050 No AA | ||||||
| Enthusiast | Gamer | Mainstram | Performance | Enthusiast | Gamer | Mainstram | Performance |
| 4.61 | 15.52 | 48.82 | 92.41 | 19.3 | 29.48 | 51.67 | 91.15 |
| 1280 x 1024 16x AA | 1280 x 1024 No AA | ||||||
| Enthusiast | Gamer | Mainstram | Performance | Enthusiast | Gamer | Mainstram | Performance |
| 15.81 | 27.35 | 56.78 | 97.46 | 25.13 | 36.18 | 57.93 | 100.05 |
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare runs on a proprietary engine, and includes features such as true world-dynamic lighting, HDR lighting effects, dynamic shadows, and depth of field. “Bullet Penetration” is calculated by the engine, taking into account factors such as surface type and entity thickness. Certain objects, such as cars and some buildings, are destructible. This makes distinguishing cover from concealment important, as the protection provided by objects such as wooden fences and thin walls do not completely protect players from harm. Bullet speed and stopping power are decreased after penetrating an object, and the decrease is dependent on the thickness and surface type of the object. The game makes use of a dynamic physics engine, not implemented in previous Call of Duty titles. Death animations are a combination of pre-set animations and ragdoll physics. (Courtesy of Wikipedia) 
| 1680 x 1050 All settings Max | 1280 x 1024 All Settings Max | ||||
| Min | Max | Avg | Min | Max | Avg |
| 48 | 108 | 79.971 | 70 | 127 | 102.429 |
Left4Dead
Left 4 Dead is not as demanding as the other games; however, it still presents a great challenge to the modern day lower end cards. Left 4 Dead’s performance requirements lay somewhere around those of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare At maximum settings system was able to run at an average of 80 fps with lows coming in at 46 and highs of 124.
| 1680 x 1050 | ||
| Min | Max | Avg |
| 46 | 124 | 80.692 |
FarCry 2
“Ubisoft has marketed Far Cry 2 as the true sequel to Far Cry, though the sequel has very few noticeable similarities to the original game. Instead, it features completely new characters and setting, as well as a new style of gameplay that allows the player greater freedom to explore different African landscapes such as deserts, jungles, and savannas. The game takes place in a fictional modern-day East African nation in a state of anarchy and civil war. The player takes control of a mercenary on a lengthy journey to locate and assassinate “The Jackal,” a notorious arms dealer.”(Wikipedia) Engine-wise, FarCry2 uses a very unique engine, “Dunia,” that was developed by Ubisoft Specifically for FarCry 2. The game features semi-destructible environments, dynamic fire propagation, storm effects, real-time night and day cycle, dynamic music system, and non-scripted AI action.The engine takes advantage of multi-core processors and supports DirectX 9 as well as DirectX 10.
| 1680 x 1050 8 x AA DirectX10 | 1680 x 1050 No AA DirectX10 | ||||
| ultra high | v. high | high | ultra high | v. high | high |
| 10.75 | 29.07 | 22.57 | 40.39 | 63.01 | 64.86 |
| 1280 x 1024 8x AA DirectX10 | 1280 x 1024 No AA DirectX10 | ||||
| ultra high | v. high | high | ultra high | v. high | high |
| 21.88 | 29.76 | 41.21 | 57.11 | 58.63 | 71.23 |
When we test hardware, we try to do everything that we can to make the bottleneck of the rig that piece of hardware. In this review, the reviewer was using 2 – 4870’s in Crossfire. This gives a fairly good benchmark point for what you will expect to see.
I find all the game benches to be lacking in comparative data. All we find out is where your rig gives out of being playable, not how much a difference the 920 is doing. It could very well be that you are reaching the capacity of what the graphics card is able to display and that the CPU isn’t involved much at all.
Nice! I need this information. But could you tell me what the “PCG 08” means?
PCG is a processor power specification to help identify thermal solutions, power supplies, and chassis that will meet specific power requirements. The PCG mark can be found on the box label and engraved on the IHS of the processor.
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